Is Year-Round Schooling the Answer?
Do year-round schools enhance student learning, or are they a costly, hectic, and largely ineffective cure for the nation's educational ills? Those involved in year-round schools -- school superintendents, specialists, researchers, teachers, and principals -- share their views with Education World readers.
Around the Block: The Benefits and Challenges of Block Scheduling
Education World examines the research about block scheduling in junior and senior high schools. Included: What you can do to ensure that block scheduling will succeed and tips from the principal of a successful "block-scheduled" school!
Alternative School Calendars: Smart Idea or Senseless Experiment?
Year-round schools, later start times, the four-day week, trimesters, and more!
In the Loop: Students and Teachers Progressing Together
Looping ---when a teacher moves with his or her students to the next grade level rather than sending them to another teacher at the end of the school year--- was initially advocated by early 20th-century Austrian educator Rudolf Steiner and since has been used successfully for years in Europe.
Advice About Middle School Advisories
This week, Education World answers the question What makes a successful advisory? We also include activity ideas for improving advisories!
Should Schools Take a Break from Recess?
Does it make sense, educationally and developmentally, to eliminate recess for students in elementary school? That question is the subject of debate among educators. What do teachers and parents have to say?
Is the Four-Day School Week Coming Your Way?
Test scores were on the downswing; unfunded state mandates were on the rise. There was not enough money, not enough time. What is a superintendent to do? Lewis Diggs, Superintendent of Schools in Saratoga, Arkansas, might have found the answer for his system in the four-day school week.
The School Calendar: It's Time to Make Time for Learning!
How is the school-year calendar determined in your school system? How is the length of the school day determined? Is student learning at the center of those decisions?
Block Scheduling: A Solution or a Problem?
The merits of block scheduling are a subject of great debate. Is it a flexible scheduling alternative that benefits students -- or is it a fad that's sure to pass?
