Help Making Money
February 5, 2010Guest Post by My Friend Kelly
January is over and the Eating From the Pantry Challenge has come to a close. While you may be ready to dive back into grocery shopping, couponing, and restocking, don’t let the momentum end here. The principles behind this challenge can be applied to a variety of other projects which can help cut costs, de-clutter your home, and streamline daily life. Sometimes this means using up excess stock and other times the focus is getting more regular use out of non-expendable items.
Here’s a few ways to do that:
Personal Hygiene Products
Whether or not you can find coupons and deals on the food your family eats, most everyone will be able to find a rebate or rewards deal on hygiene products at one of the drug stores or national chains around the country. Using what you learned during Eating from the Pantry Month, give yourself 30 days before buying any new personal hygiene products. In the meantime, clear out your bathroom cabinets and see what you still need and what you don’t.
Finish up half-used bottles of shampoo and conditioner and use the last bits of lotion from gift sets. Replace the razors with dull blades or broken handles and if you have liquid soap, refill pump bottles. Toss broken combs or hair accessories and use up the last inch of mousse or gel before starting a new bottle. If someone in your family opposes a particular brand and you have unopened items consider putting together a care package. Check out this post for ideas on what to send and who to send it to.
Pull out fresh floss and mouthwash to improve your oral hygiene and health. If you haven’t swapped out your toothbrush in the past three months or have recently gotten over an illness open up a new one but don’t throw out the old just yet–a toothbrush can clean more than your molars!
Household Cleaners
Maintaining a clean house doesn’t have to take hours and hundreds of dollars in premium cleaning products. Use similar tactics to inventory what you have, see what you need, stretch what you use and find substitutes. While you’re digging under the sinks use up the last little bit of general cleaner and wipe down the shelves. Try to identify what you use each product to clean and how often you use up a bottle.
Don’t just think about products but other supplies as well. Re-purpose old towels from the kitchen or bath as cleaning rags, use old worn out toothbrushes to scrub small crevices, find an old pillowcase to clean ceiling fan blades, or lone socks to dust. If you find you have a pile of dusting rags you can reduce the amount of paper towels you buy.
Office supplies
How many different places in your house do you have a stash of pens? Notepads? Tape? Round everything up and sort it out (old shoe boxes come in handy here) and toss or donate what you don’t use. Find out what you’ll need for everyday use and what school-aged children can take to class. Just like the pantry challenge, make do with what you have–blue pens can work just as well as black ones–and substitute where you can. Whether you write grocery lists on the back of a used envelope or reuse file folders these tactics can keep money in your pocket and clutter out of your home.
Centralize one place for commonly misplaced items like tape, scissors, and sharpies. Or is that just my house?
Crafts & Decorations
If you can be described as crafty, then you’re probably well aware of the dangers that entrap quilters, scrapbookers, knitters and painters alike. It’s easy to hoard supplies and fill drawers, bins and yes, even rooms with projects that we have no hope of finishing in ten lifetimes. Make the commitment to stop buying new supplies for one month and go “shopping” at home. Dig through your stock and try to remember what project you had in mind when you brought home these items.
Finish an old project or start a new one, substitute one component instead of buying new, and give away things you won’t use to someone who will. Consider a swap amongst friends or just a potluck night in when everyone can bring a dish and a project and work together.
As Spring rolls around it can be easy to get tired of our surroundings and want something new and fresh. Check your attics, basements, and closets for decorative items that were put away or forgotten. Re-hang a picture or touch up the paint on a table. Move around some furniture, pull out the throw blankets, fill glass vases and use the good china. Put a new picture in an old frame or clear everything off a wall and paint it fresh. Look for things you already have that can be used in new and interesting ways.
There are also some things we can be getting more use out of, things that are not necessarily used up.
Entertainment
Do you have family games gathering dust? Puzzles, video games, books or movies that go unused? The same principles apply even if using an entertainment item will not expend it for future use. Pull out all your puzzles and look them over together. Maybe some are missing too many pieces, another too advanced for younger children, some too juvenile for older children. Keep what you’ll use, recycle what you won’t. Donate unused items to your school or church, ask friends if their children would enjoy something new.
Do your kids have piles of half used or broken crayons? Turn them into a craft project. Go through your books and weed out volumes you no long read, reference or enjoy. Do the same for family pictures by tossing prints that are fuzzy or faded, or pictures that have no personal meaning or value. Be careful about tossing older photos that may have some value to another family member. Check out this post for tips on preserving family memories.
Clothes
If you find yourself wearing the same outfits over and over again try the Empty Closet Challenge. Pull everything out and box up things that don’t fit or flatter your figure. Work with what you have and fill in pieces that will create attractive looks that fit your lifestyle. At the end of the month pull out the boxes of discarded clothes and sell them by consignment or eBay, return new items to the store, donate to a charity or give to a friend. Don’t forget to look over belts, scarves, jackets, shoes, and jewelry too. Rethinking a wardrobe can be challenge–check out this site for ideas on using thrift store finds to create stunning new looks for under $20!
I know it seems overwhelming when you think of all the places to apply the principles you learned during Eating from the Pantry Month. But just like January, take one thing at a time, make adjustments as you go, and share what you’ve learned. By 2011, you might just have a cleaner, uncluttered home, more money in the bank and new routines. Then your only challenge will be finding a New Year’s Resolution you haven’t already accomplished!
Kelly is a 25 year old single homeowner living in Northern California. Despite a high cost of living and tough job market, Kelly has created a cozy home without acquiring debt. Now just $3,000 away from eliminating student loans (the last of consumer debt), Kelly looks forward her first trip abroad, thrift store decorating, and teaching financial awareness. Kelly blogs at My Friend Kelly.
Photo credit: Fauxto_credit; Kevin McShane; Patrick Q
The initiatives amount to a package of tax credits, spending expansions and new mandates on employers to encourage retirement savings by workers. Most of them will be included in Obama's budget for the fiscal year starting Oct. 1, and they will require approval from Congress. Obama will release that budget Feb. 1.
The president's latest rollout of ideas served as a preview of his prime-time State of the Union address. The economic elements of that speech will also cover Obama's plans to boost job creation and reduce swelling budget deficits — areas of concern to the public.
Obama's address will outline his second-year agenda across a spectrum of issues, including tighter rules on Wall Street behavior and a push for financial discipline in Washington. He also is expected to touch on the issue of gays in the military.
In an interview Monday, Obama defended his agenda and said he would not support only smaller issues that avoid controversy. “I will not slow down in terms going after the big problems,” he told ABC News.
Among the president's economic ideas:
– Nearly doubling the tax credit that families making under $85,000 can receive for child care costs, with some help for families earning up to $115,000, too.
– Capping the size of periodic federal college loan repayments at 10 percent of borrowers' discretionary income to make payments more affordable.
– Increasing by $1.6 billion the money pumped into a federal fund to help working parents pay for child care, covering an estimated 235,000 additional children.
– Requiring employers who don't offer 401(k) retirement plans to offer direct-deposit IRAs for their employees, with exemptions for the smallest firms.
– Spending more than $100 million to help people care for their elderly parents and get support for themselves as well.
The White House maintained that its imperative still is to create jobs. Unemployment remains in double digits, and the economy is the public's top concern. Yet Obama said that squeezed families need help in other ways, too: paying for child care, helping out aging parents, saving for retirement, paying off college debt.
What matters ultimately to people, Obama said, is “whether they see some progress in their own lives. So we're going to keep fighting to rebuild our economy so that hard work is once again rewarded, wages and incomes are once again rising, the middle class is once again growing.”
Less clear was how much the programs would cost or where the money would come from.
Officials deferred comment until the release of the budget.
Obama, whose poll numbers are off, is trying to sharpen his economic message in a way that shows people he is on their side. White House officials say they know people have been turned off by the long, messy fight for health insurance reform. Plus, there's a perception that families have gotten far less help than big banks.
The economy is growing, but not fast enough to bring down widespread joblessness. The unemployment rate is at 10 percent and most economists say it could take until at least 2015 for it to return to more normal levels.
The plans Obama set forth came from the yearlong work of a task force, led by Vice President Joe Biden, that was charged with helping the middle class.
“We're talking about dignity. We're talking about security,” Biden said. “We're talking about knowing your pension is safe, your health insurance is reliable, your elderly parents and your children are going to be cared for, your neighborhood is safe.”
Obama's initiatives also include expanding and simplifying a tax credit that matches retirement savings, and making 401(k) rules easier to understand.
On the matter of gays in the military, Obama has vowed to lift the ban on gays serving openly, and several lawmakers support a repeal of the law. But some senior military advisers and members of Congress have urged the president not to shake up the status quo at a time of two wars.
Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, said he had planned to convene a hearing on the issue in January, but that the Obama administration asked him to hold off until the president's national address.
“We were told by the Pentagon that they expected the president to say something in the State of the Union on it,” Levin said.
Levin, who favors repealing the law, said he does not know what Obama will say. He said he plans to hold hearings in February and would like to hear testimony from Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mike Mullen.
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Guest Post by My Friend Kelly
January is over and the Eating From the Pantry Challenge has come to a close. While you may be ready to dive back into grocery shopping, couponing, and restocking, don’t let the momentum end here. The principles behind this challenge can be applied to a variety of other projects which can help cut costs, de-clutter your home, and streamline daily life. Sometimes this means using up excess stock and other times the focus is getting more regular use out of non-expendable items.
Here’s a few ways to do that:
Personal Hygiene Products
Whether or not you can find coupons and deals on the food your family eats, most everyone will be able to find a rebate or rewards deal on hygiene products at one of the drug stores or national chains around the country. Using what you learned during Eating from the Pantry Month, give yourself 30 days before buying any new personal hygiene products. In the meantime, clear out your bathroom cabinets and see what you still need and what you don’t.
Finish up half-used bottles of shampoo and conditioner and use the last bits of lotion from gift sets. Replace the razors with dull blades or broken handles and if you have liquid soap, refill pump bottles. Toss broken combs or hair accessories and use up the last inch of mousse or gel before starting a new bottle. If someone in your family opposes a particular brand and you have unopened items consider putting together a care package. Check out this post for ideas on what to send and who to send it to.
Pull out fresh floss and mouthwash to improve your oral hygiene and health. If you haven’t swapped out your toothbrush in the past three months or have recently gotten over an illness open up a new one but don’t throw out the old just yet–a toothbrush can clean more than your molars!
Household Cleaners
Maintaining a clean house doesn’t have to take hours and hundreds of dollars in premium cleaning products. Use similar tactics to inventory what you have, see what you need, stretch what you use and find substitutes. While you’re digging under the sinks use up the last little bit of general cleaner and wipe down the shelves. Try to identify what you use each product to clean and how often you use up a bottle.
Don’t just think about products but other supplies as well. Re-purpose old towels from the kitchen or bath as cleaning rags, use old worn out toothbrushes to scrub small crevices, find an old pillowcase to clean ceiling fan blades, or lone socks to dust. If you find you have a pile of dusting rags you can reduce the amount of paper towels you buy.
Office supplies
How many different places in your house do you have a stash of pens? Notepads? Tape? Round everything up and sort it out (old shoe boxes come in handy here) and toss or donate what you don’t use. Find out what you’ll need for everyday use and what school-aged children can take to class. Just like the pantry challenge, make do with what you have–blue pens can work just as well as black ones–and substitute where you can. Whether you write grocery lists on the back of a used envelope or reuse file folders these tactics can keep money in your pocket and clutter out of your home.
Centralize one place for commonly misplaced items like tape, scissors, and sharpies. Or is that just my house?
Crafts & Decorations
If you can be described as crafty, then you’re probably well aware of the dangers that entrap quilters, scrapbookers, knitters and painters alike. It’s easy to hoard supplies and fill drawers, bins and yes, even rooms with projects that we have no hope of finishing in ten lifetimes. Make the commitment to stop buying new supplies for one month and go “shopping” at home. Dig through your stock and try to remember what project you had in mind when you brought home these items.
Finish an old project or start a new one, substitute one component instead of buying new, and give away things you won’t use to someone who will. Consider a swap amongst friends or just a potluck night in when everyone can bring a dish and a project and work together.
As Spring rolls around it can be easy to get tired of our surroundings and want something new and fresh. Check your attics, basements, and closets for decorative items that were put away or forgotten. Re-hang a picture or touch up the paint on a table. Move around some furniture, pull out the throw blankets, fill glass vases and use the good china. Put a new picture in an old frame or clear everything off a wall and paint it fresh. Look for things you already have that can be used in new and interesting ways.
There are also some things we can be getting more use out of, things that are not necessarily used up.
Entertainment
Do you have family games gathering dust? Puzzles, video games, books or movies that go unused? The same principles apply even if using an entertainment item will not expend it for future use. Pull out all your puzzles and look them over together. Maybe some are missing too many pieces, another too advanced for younger children, some too juvenile for older children. Keep what you’ll use, recycle what you won’t. Donate unused items to your school or church, ask friends if their children would enjoy something new.
Do your kids have piles of half used or broken crayons? Turn them into a craft project. Go through your books and weed out volumes you no long read, reference or enjoy. Do the same for family pictures by tossing prints that are fuzzy or faded, or pictures that have no personal meaning or value. Be careful about tossing older photos that may have some value to another family member. Check out this post for tips on preserving family memories.
Clothes
If you find yourself wearing the same outfits over and over again try the Empty Closet Challenge. Pull everything out and box up things that don’t fit or flatter your figure. Work with what you have and fill in pieces that will create attractive looks that fit your lifestyle. At the end of the month pull out the boxes of discarded clothes and sell them by consignment or eBay, return new items to the store, donate to a charity or give to a friend. Don’t forget to look over belts, scarves, jackets, shoes, and jewelry too. Rethinking a wardrobe can be challenge–check out this site for ideas on using thrift store finds to create stunning new looks for under $20!
I know it seems overwhelming when you think of all the places to apply the principles you learned during Eating from the Pantry Month. But just like January, take one thing at a time, make adjustments as you go, and share what you’ve learned. By 2011, you might just have a cleaner, uncluttered home, more money in the bank and new routines. Then your only challenge will be finding a New Year’s Resolution you haven’t already accomplished!
Kelly is a 25 year old single homeowner living in Northern California. Despite a high cost of living and tough job market, Kelly has created a cozy home without acquiring debt. Now just $3,000 away from eliminating student loans (the last of consumer debt), Kelly looks forward her first trip abroad, thrift store decorating, and teaching financial awareness. Kelly blogs at My Friend Kelly.
Photo credit: Fauxto_credit; Kevin McShane; Patrick Q
The initiatives amount to a package of tax credits, spending expansions and new mandates on employers to encourage retirement savings by workers. Most of them will be included in Obama's budget for the fiscal year starting Oct. 1, and they will require approval from Congress. Obama will release that budget Feb. 1.
The president's latest rollout of ideas served as a preview of his prime-time State of the Union address. The economic elements of that speech will also cover Obama's plans to boost job creation and reduce swelling budget deficits — areas of concern to the public.
Obama's address will outline his second-year agenda across a spectrum of issues, including tighter rules on Wall Street behavior and a push for financial discipline in Washington. He also is expected to touch on the issue of gays in the military.
In an interview Monday, Obama defended his agenda and said he would not support only smaller issues that avoid controversy. “I will not slow down in terms going after the big problems,” he told ABC News.
Among the president's economic ideas:
– Nearly doubling the tax credit that families making under $85,000 can receive for child care costs, with some help for families earning up to $115,000, too.
– Capping the size of periodic federal college loan repayments at 10 percent of borrowers' discretionary income to make payments more affordable.
– Increasing by $1.6 billion the money pumped into a federal fund to help working parents pay for child care, covering an estimated 235,000 additional children.
– Requiring employers who don't offer 401(k) retirement plans to offer direct-deposit IRAs for their employees, with exemptions for the smallest firms.
– Spending more than $100 million to help people care for their elderly parents and get support for themselves as well.
The White House maintained that its imperative still is to create jobs. Unemployment remains in double digits, and the economy is the public's top concern. Yet Obama said that squeezed families need help in other ways, too: paying for child care, helping out aging parents, saving for retirement, paying off college debt.
What matters ultimately to people, Obama said, is “whether they see some progress in their own lives. So we're going to keep fighting to rebuild our economy so that hard work is once again rewarded, wages and incomes are once again rising, the middle class is once again growing.”
Less clear was how much the programs would cost or where the money would come from.
Officials deferred comment until the release of the budget.
Obama, whose poll numbers are off, is trying to sharpen his economic message in a way that shows people he is on their side. White House officials say they know people have been turned off by the long, messy fight for health insurance reform. Plus, there's a perception that families have gotten far less help than big banks.
The economy is growing, but not fast enough to bring down widespread joblessness. The unemployment rate is at 10 percent and most economists say it could take until at least 2015 for it to return to more normal levels.
The plans Obama set forth came from the yearlong work of a task force, led by Vice President Joe Biden, that was charged with helping the middle class.
“We're talking about dignity. We're talking about security,” Biden said. “We're talking about knowing your pension is safe, your health insurance is reliable, your elderly parents and your children are going to be cared for, your neighborhood is safe.”
Obama's initiatives also include expanding and simplifying a tax credit that matches retirement savings, and making 401(k) rules easier to understand.
On the matter of gays in the military, Obama has vowed to lift the ban on gays serving openly, and several lawmakers support a repeal of the law. But some senior military advisers and members of Congress have urged the president not to shake up the status quo at a time of two wars.
Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, said he had planned to convene a hearing on the issue in January, but that the Obama administration asked him to hold off until the president's national address.
“We were told by the Pentagon that they expected the president to say something in the State of the Union on it,” Levin said.
Levin, who favors repealing the law, said he does not know what Obama will say. He said he plans to hold hearings in February and would like to hear testimony from Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mike Mullen.
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Posted by eugenecarney1983
you could say they're jerking off but that's not much better. seems fitting though.
Eugene Carney
This article is interesting, but I don’t understand the last paragraph. How can we make the government be capitalist about increasing the salaries of STEM? I think what you are really asking for is direct intervention in the way Universities and research laboratories allocate their resources?
If capitalism is going to do the job, then I think the problem is that people don’t know how to recognize and hire talent in STEM. If they did, then there wouldn’t be an issue of uncertainty in getting the plum academic jobs if you were the “top talent”. What we may really need is research into hiring, grant allocation, and so forth.
But it may be that this recognition of talent and “right” idea is just too hard, computationally. That would make it hard for market forces to inject much money, since the average worker isn’t worth the cost. In that case you are really calling for old-fashioned intervention, to STEM positions unnaturally high-paying, because you think the benefit of bringing the elite back into the field will outweigh the cost of bringing more of the average folks in too.
December 8th, 2009 at 5:45 pm
While I applaud your interest in reforming education, you need to understand why “nothing seems to work.” The reason is that basic human psychology is violated nearly everywhere. After twenty years working with classroom programming, I had an insight into how students are motivated–that was 17 years ago–it’s taken near-disaster in education to get people willing to take a different viewpoint
I can send a book (ebook form, cf. end below)) that explains it and copy here a blog (published currently in Educationnews.org) that summarizes the contents. If you want to discuss this, have someone call me at 480-588-6200.
John Jensen, Ph.D
Two Weeks to Transformation:
A Roadmap
by John Jensen Ph.D.
If you’ll stay with me for a few paragraphs, I want to lay out a roadmap for transforming your classroom in a couple weeks. Along the way, you’ll note many familiar elements yet details that at first may be off-putting. Maybe you’ve been burnt by classroom interventions that over-controlled and ended up wearing out both you and your students. So I first want to discuss the kinds of details we need and why.
What’s the difference between a Model T Ford and a 2009 Mercedes Benz? A Second World War V2 rocket and one carrying a Mars lander? The Wright brothers first successful plane and a modern Stealth jet? Alexander Graham Bell’s first telephone and the modern cell phone?
Each pair have in common travel in a particular environment. A common basic concept binds each pair yet the difference between old and new lies in this. In the new version, more details are integrated to serve the purpose of the whole. Details come “on line” to make the concept work better–different materials, the mechanics and physics of their operation, and the energy applied. As each ingredient is improved, its integration into the whole produces better results. Inventors constantly push the edge of design for better results: “If we try it this way, could we extend its range?’ In each pair, we should note, the more advanced does not replace the more primitive. The Model T can stand in the parking space next to the Mercedes, and a driver can say, “Today, I’ll take the Model T” and be satisfied with 25 m.p.h. so as not to stress it.
With education we’re somewhat in that position. We can (and often do) choose to go with the 25 m.p.h. vehicle and the Alexander Graham Bell telephone. In all of human history, from plain to jungle, some have taught others. We innately know how. Although we add printing and writing so we can go farther, we can still choose the model employed in the jungle for thousands of years. We can revert.
If we want to improve education, we do it essentially the same way as with automobiles, planes, rockets, and phones. We bring details on line to serve the purpose. Realizing many years ago that this could be extraordinarily easy was the start of my Silver Bullet approach to learning. It presumes that certain conditions (instructions, directions, arrangements, etc.) completely under a teacher’s control can dramatically spur students’ motivation and mastery. Many readers of Ednews.org have accepted my offer of a free ebook copy of my method, and I‘ve often sent along a brief orientation to it also. Here, I’d like to expand on it and narrate a kind of roadmap to the book.
In it, you’ll note strategies divided into steps 1-2-3 etc., but these are not intended to confine a teacher. Usually the principle is clear and teachers may want to apply it their own way to save time or integrate it into their existing instruction. Having steps spelled out gives them an option to engage students and present ideas in their own way and then conclude with activities that increase long term learning. There’s typically much that could be said about why to employ the methods, but my focus instead is intensively on how–how teachers can obtain particular results if they want to.
The easiest way to get a sense for the approach is probably by reading Chapter 9. It describes my pilot program that transformed fractious, hostile fourth graders into an ideal class in six weeks with the watershed occurring about midway. While each of the 54 sections in the book serves a need, some are as foundational as a rocket’s tensile strength and the fuel propelling it. The numbers in parentheses designate sections in the book.
The first nine sections applied together generate a quick start, getting learning and good feelings underway. You may need nothing else, fulfilling one reader’s comment that we need to “do a lot of a few things” instead of “a lot of things not enough.” These are the few to do a lot.
(1-2) Students must first understand and organize new material. This is familiar ground but often done incompletely. The later steps become possible only after the material is organized. (3) Hard copy is an unfamiliar increment for many, having an efficient summary of key points in one’s own handwriting or duplicated in a form students can keep. Developing the hard copy consolidates their understanding, winning half the battle. The remaining aim then is installing in mind what they already possess in writing. Too many teachers are satisfied just to get it in writing. As students expand their understanding, the same process applies to the new increment–get it formed so you at least “have it” and then assimilate it permanently. (4) Referring to this summary as a learning feat presents it to students as something they will perform. (5) Partner practice–telling the hard copy back and forth–roots their learning in peer relationships, and is a safe setting in which to practice expressing it until they are sure they maintain it (6). A major motive comes into play as they perform it daily (7), standing up in a game-like format. They also draw on the brain’s natural retentive powers with a few minutes daily of mental movie (8). The most powerful means of improving their behavior toward each other is appreciation time (9), telling others how they generated good feelings. These nine methods can be instituted on day one. Used steadily, they ensure learning and good feelings, and can change your class in two weeks.
An array of other ways to help students, however, are ready to install as needed. Improving communications is done by providing students criteria for conducting a discussion, and then having them rate themselves on their use of the specific skills (10-11). Developing their ability to listen and give total attention to each other can be done in pairs (12-13), and a variety of topics, conflict resolution skills, and group structures can stimulate whole class discussions (14-16). The use of ratings is valuable for many purposes–students scoring themselves or others on specific measures in the direction a teacher wishes to channel development (17), and the formal division of the class into captain-led organization groups can serve many purposes (18).
Several sections (19-28) help facilitate students’ self-awareness, management of feelings, changing unproductive thought processes, gaining greater use of their own latent traits, incorporating life wisdom, and gaining class order and cooperation. For classes that have been allowed to disintegrate into disorder, a judicious use of consequences (28) may need to be employed from the start to enable the other methods to work.
Student learning can be deepened, more readily absorbed, and more permanently retained (29-36). Peg list (29) explains how to “peg” ideas as they arrive in sequence so they can be quickly reinforced, and the practice element (30) explains how to tell the degree to which a learning method deepens learning by how directly it calls on a prior impression in the mind. A way to involve parents regularly and valuably yet briefly is by a designated listener agreement (31) with them. Some ways to help even kindergarteners master knowledge are noted (32), but my belief is that nearly all the methods work K-12 if scaled back to students’ frame of reference and taken in sequence. Memory hooks (33) contain suggestions of a familiar type. A way for students to plot their degree of concentration (34) stimulates them to get better at it. Walk Away (35) and Time Capsule (36) methods are ways to achieve perfect mastery of difficult material, such as in math and foreign languages, by using qualities of the brain efficiently.
Using maps (37), understanding degrees of precision (38), and saving the basics (39) address specific learning needs, while learning everything (40) is proposed and explained as a major purpose of education. Students can stimulate each other and save learning time by dividing subjects (41) and focusing on progress (42).
Scoring is distinguished from grading (43-50). I explain why the former encourages students more (it’s how they personally view their own effort), and how scoring by points-of-knowledge and time-explaining are objective measures of actual learning that make sense to students. Various configurations of scoreboards are offered, and suggestions for how to score language, math, reading, and writing.
Demonstrating learning occupies the last four sections (51-54). I apply the title of Academic Mastery Report (51) to a way to synthesize on one page all the scores a student masters in all subjects to present a more refined picture of his/her actual learning than do customary means. Curriculum performance (52) is the big brother of impromptu performance (8), a design for students to show off their learning in public in front of an audience. In checkpoint morning (53) they spend a half-day in a series of learning tasks and partner collaboration to master specific knowledge they choose for themselves. Team competitions (54) may be comprehensive involving several schools at once or confined to a few days in a single classroom.
A description of my pilot program and suggestions for implementation end the text, followed by ten appendices containing discussion topics, scoreboard designs, communication skills check sheet, progress ladder, and team competition worksheet.
Since math is a concern in so many localities, I’ll summarize a few points about it in terms of the sections above. Math lends itself well to my methods because of the specificity of its details and its cumulative nature, new sections building on prior understanding. What‘s correct or incorrect is typically clear concerning formulas, steps, sequences, and relationships. With math you can form very specific learning feats (4). A solid math task at any grade level is to master every term in the glossary of the textbook, usually 200-300 items, plotting each student’s progress visibly on a scoreboard reserved for this (47 and appendix 6).
An all-senses recording of summary, word-by-word explanations of math processes with hand-written hard copy (3) is, I believe, an overlooked, valuable increment. Asking “What are you doing?“ of students working long division can return a word salad of vague procedures. Any material that becomes easier as it becomes clearer should be put into a form that makes it extremely clear. Writing down their understanding adds precision and ownership. Explaining their understanding to a partner (5) can be especially helpful in math because in facing a peer we are congenitally driven to want to make sense, so we tax the limit of our understanding to do that. Presenting their understanding to another extricates them from stressful isolation and engages the linear, orderly part of their mind to resolve vagueness. Their needs for attention rise and are satisfied as they stand up to present answers successfully to questions they’ve practiced (7) and are applauded for them. Keeping visible track of their progress on a public scoreboard (47-48) increases their ownership of the results of their effort.
Two weeks to transformation. Try it.
John Jensen is a licensed clinical psychologist and author of The Silver Bullet Easy Learning System: How to Change Classrooms Fast and Energize Students for Success (Xlibris, 2008). He will email a free ebook copy of it to anyone requesting it, and welcomes comments sent to him directly at jjensen@gci.net.
December 8th, 2009 at 11:53 pm