Month: July 2023

Schools are places where people come to learn. They can be dedicated to a particular discipline, like the Juilliard school, which is known for teaching dance and acting. They can also be a part of a university or seminary.

In Europe, universities emerged during the 12th century. Academicians were called schoolmen. They began with grammar schools, which selected students based on their ability and aptitude.

They foster the development of young people

Schools are a key component of a healthy community, and they help young people develop the skills they need to succeed in their lives. In addition to providing a safe and supportive learning environment, schools help children build relationships with other people, which is essential to their development. These relationships will influence their future choices and behavior, as well as their life outcomes.

Moreover, attending school helps students become aware of their strengths and weaknesses. They will also learn more about the world around them, and they may find their passion and purpose in life. They will also learn to ask questions about the material they are studying, which will help them become better learners.

Additionally, school provides them with social activities to keep themselves from getting bored at home and causing problems to society like using drugs. Meeting people of their age in a school setting also broadens their perception of the world. They can meet new friends, or even become good acquaintances who will be with them for years to come.

They encourage learning and development

The school system is often seen as the great equalizer for society. By law, public schools cannot discriminate against students based on their academic performance or income level, and they provide the opportunity to learn for all.

Schools also help the community grow by bringing together people with similar interests and concerns. They can even address local issues that affect the neighborhood. In addition, many schools offer summer learning opportunities like film workshops, art camps, and sports activities. These events are often free of charge, and they make the school a hub for community development.

To encourage learning, teachers give regular feedback on student work. This type of frequent, specific feedback is known to improve student performance and motivate them to continue learning. It also helps students become more self-sufficient by encouraging them to evaluate their own progress. This is especially important for young children. It can help them develop a sense of pride and accomplishment over their achievements.

They prepare students for future careers

School is a place where students learn about a wide variety of subjects. It also teaches them important skills that they will use throughout their lives. These skills include time management and how to work in a team. Attending school regularly is essential to a student’s success in life.

The world of work is changing rapidly. According to McKinsey Global, many jobs that exist today will disappear or be replaced by artificial intelligence. Schools can help prepare young people for this future by focusing on soft skills, like communication, and connecting their learning to career pathways.

In addition, they can encourage student involvement in their community by giving them the opportunity to volunteer at local organizations and take part in extracurricular activities. This will teach them how to interact with people outside of the classroom and develop their leadership skills. It will also allow them to see the world in a different way and find solutions to problems.

They make a community stronger

Schools are a central part of the community, offering an important space for social connections and civic engagement. They also play a vital role in addressing local issues that affect their neighborhoods. This multifunctional approach can be a catalyst for change, building stronger communities.

School is a great place for kids to learn skills they need for their future. They can get better jobs and meet people with similar interests. This is particularly important for students from poor families. Schools can also keep kids from getting bored and turning to drugs. They can try out for sport teams or other school groups and learn how to work with others.

Many schools are taking a community-based approach to their work by collaborating with local organizations. This model focuses on partnerships, and provides support for families facing challenges, such as poverty or mental health issues. Schools can also help address the root causes of these challenges, such as gentrification or economic inequality.

Kindergarten is a major step for kids and parents alike. It’s important to know what your children will be learning so you can prepare them at home.

Learning to recognize the alphabet’s letters is a major focus in kindergarten, as is learning each letter’s sound. Kids will also begin to put letters together to form words.

Language

Oral language development is a key focus in kindergarten. This includes listening comprehension and vocabulary building, as well as phonological awareness and phonemic awareness. Phonemic awareness is the ability to identify and distinguish initial sounds in words, and it helps students decode word beginnings and ends. It also enables children to recognize and generate words that rhyme and share spelling patterns (e.g., hat, mat).

Kids in kindergarten will begin to identify sight words. These are high-frequency words that appear frequently in texts but do not follow standard phonics patterns, so they can be difficult for young readers to decode. Teachers may display these words on flashcards or create a classroom word wall to help students learn them quickly and easily.

In addition to learning their sight words, kindergarteners will be introduced to basic number concepts. They will learn to recognize, order, and count objects up to 30. They will also practice adding and subtracting small numbers.

Math

Math is one of the core subjects in kindergarten that lays the foundation for children to build upon as they progress through elementary school. Early math skills help kids develop critical thinking and problem-solving abilities.

The focus in kindergarten is on developing an initial understanding of numbers, basic addition and subtraction, identifying shapes, and creating patterns. Kids also learn about time and calendars.

Counting is taught through the use of concrete props, such as counting objects arranged in lines or arrays. Kindergartners will learn to recognize numbers that come before and after a given number to understand number sequences, which is an important skill they will carry forward into their academic careers.

Kids will also get their first introduction to measurement, learning to compare and classify objects by size, color and other attributes. They will also learn about 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional shapes by drawing, building, constructing and sorting them. And they will start to get the hang of place value, understanding that position makes some numbers bigger than others, such as that 21 is bigger than 12. They’ll even begin to use skip-counting.

Social Studies

The goal of social studies is to help young children understand the world and its systems, such as those governing their families, neighborhoods and schools. The subject also helps students identify and address real world problems to participate in a caring democratic society. Research on early childhood social studies shows that students learn best when the curriculum is engaging and relevant to their lives.

Kindergarten kids are naturally curious about the people and places that surround them. This curiosity can be used to teach them about the culture of other nations and their traditions. For example, kids can learn about different holidays celebrated around the world with pictures and stories. They can also develop spatial thinking by drawing maps of their school and neighborhood.

Many teacher resource guides, activity books and children’s books provide ideas for teaching young children about civics, economics, history and geography. You can also find activities that incorporate the arts and fine motor development skills.

Science

Although science curriculum can vary by state, most kindergarteners learn some of the same basic science concepts. Check your child’s school website or talk with her teacher to find out what the classroom is teaching.

Children’s natural curiosity is a perfect vehicle to introduce them to scientific exploration. Science K nurtures that curiosity by providing daily opportunities to explore the world around them and develop organized, analytical thinking skills.

The McRuffy Science series teaches life science, earth science and physical science, building the foundations of these scientific disciplines that kindergarten students need to understand. Students work with hands-on materials and engage in activities that teach them to observe, record observations, and think and act like scientists.

To help your child build these scientific skills, try doing experiments together at home. For example, fill small containers with different smells to test your child’s sense of smell. Or plant some bean sprouts and watch them grow to learn about the process of life.

Reading intervention is supplemental instruction for students who are behind their peers in developing critical reading skills. This type of instruction is typically part of a school’s RTI (Response to Intervention) or MTSS model.

Build phonological awareness by teaching syllables, sounds and vowels to struggling readers. Teach phonics by pairing fluent readers with less fluent ones to practice the correct sound-symbol correspondence.

Phonics

Phonics instruction helps students learn to recognize and decode letters and their sounds so they can read words and sentences. Research shows that systematic phonics instruction significantly improves reading skills in kindergarten and first grade.

It’s important to remember that phonics instruction is not a standalone program and that it needs to be combined with other types of instruction to support student success. Studies have shown that teaching phonics without incorporating strategies for phonemic awareness, vocabulary, comprehension skills, and fluency can confuse rather than help students.

Picture Card Sort is a great way to begin implementing phonics intervention, allowing students to practice their letter-sound knowledge until they can demonstrate 95% accuracy or higher. When students are ready for a more specialized strategy, try using Letter Sound Bingo 3 or 4 days per week to focus on segmenting and blending consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words with short vowels like cat, cut, cot, set, and sit.

Fluency

Many research studies have found that Repeated Reading (RR) is a highly effective fluency intervention for students with reading difficulties and disabilities. RR is most effective when it includes passage previews and goal setting, and is implemented in conjunction with other interventions that focus on vocabulary and comprehension.

Comprehension is the ultimate goal of reading, and is what enables us to make sense of the words we read. Children who struggle with comprehension are often those that are able to decode words, but who cannot understand what they have read. They may skip words or omit them when reading aloud. They might stop reading when they don’t understand the meaning.

Building comprehension skills requires work on phonics, fluency and comprehension strategies. In particular, we must teach students to pull apart and define words that follow traditional patterns, build morphological awareness of prefixes, suffixes, and bases, and practice reading chorally to understand how a word sounds.

Comprehension

Ultimately, children must be able to understand what they read. This is called comprehension and is the big payoff of reading intervention. Strong comprehension can boost learning in all subjects, make reading enjoyable and turn students into lifelong readers.

Reading comprehension is a complex cognitive process that involves the intentional interaction between reader and text to extract meaning. Comprehension requires a range of skills including the ability to link word meanings with the word symbols, the ability to identify important details and logically infer their significance, and the ability to use figurative language (e.g., metaphors and similes).

Reading comprehension can be taught directly to students through direct instruction and practice activities that include reading aloud, partner reading, literature discussions, and individual student writing about their understanding of texts. It is recommended that teachers provide comprehension instruction in addition to teaching phonics, fluency, and vocabulary. Several studies show that interventions that focus on multiple components of reading improve comprehension.

Vocabulary

Vocabulary refers to the set of words a person recognizes when reading or listening. Vocabulary includes both expressive and receptive vocabulary, and is one of the largest contributors to reading comprehension skills.

Research suggests that students who have a wide and varied vocabulary perform better on reading comprehension tests than students with a narrow and limited vocabulary. This is because a broad vocabulary helps readers make sense of unfamiliar words and concepts.

A recent study found that a vocabulary intervention significantly improved text comprehension of texts containing taught words. However, the amount of vocabulary knowledge gained from the intervention did not predict the effect on comprehension. Vocabulary instruction should include methods to teach students how to recognize words in context. This can be done through a variety of vocabulary strategies, including making word lists and utilizing a Find-Learn-Practice-Review strategy like the one in Moby Vocabulary.

Education transforms lives and breaks the cycle of poverty. Yet for hundreds of millions of children, access to quality education is just a dream.

School introduces kids to other kids from different backgrounds and helps them develop their personalities. It also teaches them to respect people from different cultures and get along well with them.

Socialization

Socialization is a major part of children’s education. It teaches them the values, norms and roles of their society. The most important agents of socialization are the family and school, though the media, religion, peer groups and workplaces also play a role.

The socialization process begins at birth, but its full impact on a child’s development may not be felt until the early childhood years. Sociologists recognize that gender, class and ethnicity play a big role in patterns of socialization. Working-class families usually emphasize obedience and conformity, while wealthy parents may encourage the development of judgment and creativity.

When children enter elementary school they are exposed to two sets of socialization agents: teachers and peers. The teacher, for example, has both the ascribed status of “classroom teacher” and the achieved status of “informal peer group leader.” Children’s interaction with their peers creates their own peer culture within school. The interaction also teaches them such skills as teamwork, classroom discipline, time awareness and dealing with bureaucracy.

Self-Esteem

Having a positive sense of self-worth is a powerful factor in kids’ happiness, well-being and success. It helps kids feel confident and capable, even in the face of challenges, so they’re comfortable asking for help when needed.

Kids learn a lot about themselves from their environment, including how they are treated and the messages they hear. Harsh criticism (“You’re so lazy!”), comparing them to others or praising only their results can harm their self-esteem. Instead, focus on the effort rather than the outcome and teach them to love themselves regardless of their wins or losses.

Encourage your children to explore their strengths and interests through play. They will gain a deeper understanding of their own values and build confidence as they complete activities independently. Allow them to give and help when they are ready, and let them know that their efforts are appreciated. This also teaches them that they are not defined by their weaknesses and builds resilience.

Academic Performance

Students’ academic performance is an important issue for all stakeholders. It impacts the student, teachers, parents and the society. Research has revealed that there are several factors that affect student’s academic performance. These factors can be classified as student, teacher and school based. Student factors include regular studying, self-motivation, punctuality and interest in a subject. Teachers’ factors include completion of syllabus and use of Teaching Learning Materials (TLMs). School based factors are availability of text books and modern laboratories.

Parental involvement also positively affects children’s academic performance. Studies have shown that children who have As and Bs in school report that their parents encourage them to do well. This is likely because children of upper and middle class families have better parental support for their education, while poorer children are often parented by single parents who work. The worthwhile long-term endeavours imagined by adult society that children’s education should achieve may conflict with children’s own perceptions of worthy endeavours that fulfil their short-term hedonic wellbeing.

Physical Health

Children are more likely to have a positive body image and learn healthy lifestyle habits early in life, if they regularly participate in physical activity. Taking part in team sports and other group-based activities, such as passing a ball or playing hopscotch, teaches them to work together towards a common goal and expend their energy while doing so.

Currently, physical education is the only opportunity that is guaranteed to reach nearly all school-age children and provide them with vigorous- or moderate-intensity, health-enhancing physical activity. High-quality physical education programs are characterized by instruction by certified teachers, a focus on learning and skill development, age appropriate tasks and activities, and group-based activity of sufficient duration for children to reap health benefits (see Box 5-5).

Recent physical education curriculums have evolved to connect body movement with its consequences and teach children the science of healthful living. Randomized controlled studies indicate that students in schools implementing a science-based fitness curriculum are more active than those attending traditional physical education classes.

Education support is the process of providing assistance to students. This may include personal, financial, care, or emotional issues that affect their learning and wellbeing at school. It may also be a matter of addressing practical problems.

Individualised learning support creates relevance by connecting students’ aspirations, strengths and goals with their study. It can be conducted through group or individual meetings.

Individualised learning support

Individualised learning support aims to respond to the needs of each student, including their aspirations, strengths, and interests. It includes consultation and collaboration between teachers and students, identifying and tracking adjustments, and reviewing the impact of these adjustments. It also involves ensuring that all decisions are made in the best interest of the student.

ILPs (alternatively known as student success plans, academic and career plans, or individual career and education goals) are a new and increasingly popular strategy for supporting students’ college and career readiness. ILPs are a process and a tool, helping learners explore their post-secondary options, defining their career interests, and creating a roadmap to success.

In addition to individualised learning support, implementing inclusive education requires strengthening national frameworks to ensure that policy emphasizes inclusion and equity; training teachers in inclusive teaching practices; and reforming curriculum and assessment for accessibility. It also requires setting up funding mechanisms and providing resources to vulnerable schools and children, such as support centres, resource teachers, assistive technologies, and learning software.

Academic advising

Academic advising is the process of assisting students in a number of areas, including exploring the value of higher education, evaluating and developing educational goals, interpreting institutional policies, and referring students to appropriate student support services. It also includes evaluating progress toward established goals and monitoring academic performance. It also helps students navigate university policies, such as taking a leave of absence or studying abroad.

Academic advisors are familiar with the curriculum and requirements of their school and keep detailed records about each student they counsel. They help students choose classes for the next semester and ensure they are staying on track to graduate. They also offer support in other ways, such as recommending tutoring or office hours for students who are struggling to meet expectations. Academic advising professionals also encourage students to engage in critical reflection on their own experiences and challenges. They may also teach their advisees about a variety of theories, such as developmental approaches and Deweyian concepts of constructivism.

Communication skills

Effective communication skills are essential for any career, but they can be particularly important in an educational setting. They can help you convey your ideas clearly, and they can also enhance your interpersonal relationships. In addition, they can improve the effectiveness of your work and lead to better results.

Academic support can take many forms, including tutoring sessions, summer learning opportunities and extra-curricular activities. It may also include counseling and mentoring programs, and alternative ways of grouping and instructing students. These supports can be imposed by state or federal policies, or they may be voluntarily created to meet specific student needs.

Education support personnel are a key component of the educational system and must be recognised for their role, have the same status and rights as all education staff and enjoy working conditions consistent with this. They must be able to effectively communicate in written and verbal form, with people from different backgrounds. They should also be able to work in a variety of environments and situations.

Behaviour management

Education support staff play a critical role in student learning. They help students to be more engaged in class, and are often the first to notice when a student is struggling. They also help with administrative tasks and work to ensure that classrooms are safe and positive environments. These employees include aides, custodians, secretaries and bus drivers.

Effective behaviour management strategies can prevent classrooms from becoming disruptive places, and can make it easier for teachers to concentrate on their teaching. They may also help students with behavioural issues to be more productive in class. They may use different strategies, including rewards and discipline.

Behaviour management is an important skill for teachers, and requires sensitivity and insight into child development. Teachers should know what the underlying causes of behaviour are so that they can address them quickly and effectively. They should also be able to understand the different expectations of children at each stage, and be able to communicate these clearly to their students.

Schools are places where students learn to be part of a society. They are where they learn to challenge others and they are where they learn to communicate.

These days, schools are also where children with special needs get individualized attention. These students may be attending a private school that specializes in autism, deafness, developmental delay or physical disability.

The Purpose of School

Often people will agree on some goals for schools, but there may be a lot of disagreement on what those goals should be. For example, many students will want schools to focus heavily on getting them ready for jobs. Others will want to see schools promote empathy and tolerance of different views. Still others will want to see schools help them find passions.

One primary goal of school is preparing students for careers, and this will generally lead to high social status. A high-quality education will enable a person to obtain prestigious jobs and become involved in the community as a leader or volunteer.

Another primary goal of school is to prepare students for a lifetime of learning. If a person is not able to learn, he or she cannot progress in life. The fact is that everyone must learn. For this, school is the perfect place to be exposed to ideas that are different from ones own in a safe environment.

Learning for the Purpose of Learning

Learning for the sake of learning is a goal that can be a driving force for people in all walks of life. This can be seen in people who seek out continuing education to stay competitive in the job market, or those who work hard to develop their skills so that they can keep up with technological changes in their jobs.

Generally speaking, learning for the purpose of learning is achieved through experiential learning. This can be through a variety of course-based and non-course-based ways, such as internships, undergraduate research, service-learning, and student teaching.

Experiential learning also helps students to make connections between theories they learn in the classroom and real-world situations. This is why learning objectives traditionally begin with “The student will be able to” rather than just describing the material that will be covered. This shift towards more student-centered goals has been a key feature of the Common Core State Standards. This is a good way to make sure that students are being given the skills that they need for success after graduation.

Building Community

Schools are naturally a central part of any neighborhood. Historically, schools have been a safe place for all members of the community to access education, health services, recreation, and culture. This has helped them to foster communities of people who support and care for each other.

Research shows that students who feel a strong sense of community at school are more engaged academically. Unfortunately, many schools struggle to create this feeling of togetherness. Students of color and those from low-income families often report lower levels of community in their schools than their peers.

The key to building community is making it a core value in the school. This means promoting parent group membership, volunteer participation, and local partnerships. It also involves creating classroom community-building routines like reading aloud and allowing for teamwork to build trust and support. Lastly, it’s important to encourage teachers to collaborate and share ideas. This way, all classes are aware of what is happening from one another and can connect the work being done in different subjects.

In kindergarten children learn to work at a new pace and to follow the rules of a classroom. This helps them become open and collaborative learners.

Kindergarten students learn the alphabet, both upper and lowercase letters, and how to print them. They also practice counting objects and recognizing shapes.

Math

Developing a solid math foundation is essential for kindergarten students. This includes learning to count, recognize numbers, and identify 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional shapes. Kids also learn to compare and contrast objects and concepts.

It is important to develop a coherent system of high-quality standards, curriculum, instruction and assessment that provides children with a solid mathematical understanding. This can be done by using collaborative processes that include public school teachers, administrators and personnel from center-based and family child care programs and Head Start.

National professional standards identify big ideas that are both mathematically central and accessible to young children at their current level of understanding, such as patterns (a component of algebra). Providing opportunities for this kind of deep interaction helps kids build a strong foundation in math.

Reading

Reading skills are very important for kindergarten children. They need to know the alphabet in both lower- and upper-case and recognize stand-alone letters and letters within words. They also need to understand that written words represent spoken sounds.

Kindergartners learn that many words can be broken down into syllables and that words with similar endings often rhyme. They also work on learning sight words, which are short words that cannot be sounded out using phonics.

The teacher frequently reads aloud to the class, sharing a variety of books and other print materials with the children. She helps them connect new words and ideas to their own knowledge and experiences.

Science

Science experiments completed in kindergarten help children build academic ability from a very young age while also exploring their natural curiosity levels. Kindergarten science focuses on basic concepts such as physical and Earth sciences as well as principles of experimentation and investigation.

In physical science, children learn about the properties of materials such as color, shape, size, temperature, odor, and texture. They also explore how objects change from solid to liquid to gas.

Discover & Do experiments connect directly to the weekly reading material for a more linear progression from reading to doing. This helps students develop skills like predicting, measuring, and analyzing.

Social Studies

Social studies are subjects in which the content is focused on human beings and their interrelationships. It is different from arithmetic, which has social utility but is not centered on human interactions.

Kindergarten children are learning that they are part of a community and must follow rules to be successful members. They are gaining an understanding that other people have different opinions and must learn to accept those differences.

Developing the ability to understand and respect others’ culture and traditions helps children become global citizens. They also are learning about their own family history and heritage, helping them to appreciate their own uniqueness.

Creative Arts

Creative arts are activities that allow children to use their imaginations and creativity in a wide range of mediums. These include visual arts, music and dance.

Show wordless picture books to children and encourage them to tell the story visually. Discuss the illustrator’s materials and process choices.

Participate alongside children in planned and spontaneous movement and dance activities. Invite them to comment on, imitate and suggest movements observed.

Provide a variety of instruments for children to experiment with and play to music that features different rhythms, patterns and tempos. Demonstrate how to use these instruments for free movement. Share and play music that children’s families enjoy.

Technology

Children need to become proficient in using technology as a tool for learning. This will help them with their future studies and will be an important part of their overall development.

Teachers need to teach kids how to use the right technology in the classroom. It should complement and not interrupt children’s natural play patterns and learner-centered activities.

The best way to do that is by using child-friendly applications. It is also important to encourage students to collaborate with peers when using technology (OME, 2016). This will promote peer-to-peer respect and support social competence. It will also foster creative thinking skills and encourage students to make connections between concepts.

Reading intervention is a strategy that helps pupils who are struggling with reading. It focuses on the main concepts that a student must grasp in order to read: fluency, phonics, and comprehension.

Educators can close the gap in reading scores by training teachers on research-based methods and providing curricula that embraces evidenced-based instruction. They also need relevant content and frequent assessment.

It focuses on boosting the skills of slow readers

A significant portion of students with reading difficulties lack the skills needed to succeed in school. Providing intensive instruction is one of the most promising ways to improve these students’ outcomes.

The best intervention strategies focus on boosting the skills of slow readers, but they also must keep students engaged and motivated. This is challenging, as students can get discouraged if they’re not improving quickly.

Interventions that combine decoding and word recognition with phonics instruction and comprehension have been shown to be effective for older struggling readers in the upper elementary grades. The research on these multicomponent interventions is ongoing.

Other effective approaches include reading partnerships, which help struggling students develop positive relationships with teachers and peers. These activities can be combined with a variety of reading intervention techniques to increase student engagement and boost performance. In addition, students can practice their reading skills at home and during school transitions or breaks. These practices are essential for developing students’ silent reading fluency.

It’s a highly effective strategy

Reading intervention is an important strategy for students who are struggling in school. It can help them close the gap between themselves and their peers. It can also boost their confidence and improve their overall performance in school.

Teachers should use an evidence-based approach when designing their reading intervention strategies. They should also provide students with the necessary resources to succeed. This includes a variety of books and other instructional materials, as well as an assessment tool to monitor student progress.

In addition, a teacher should be patient with struggling students and encourage them to keep trying. Remember that every child learns at a different pace, so it can take time to become a good reader. However, if a student is determined to learn, they will eventually make progress. The key to success is to find a strategy that works best for each individual student. Then, be sure to implement it consistently and offer encouragement as needed.

It’s based on the needs of individual pupils

Developing good reading skills requires practice and a strong foundation. Students who lack these skills often fall behind their peers academically and socially. Teachers can help them catch up by using evidence-based instruction and interventions based on research. The Find What Works website provides guidance for educators, researchers and others to identify strategies, policies and programs that have been shown to improve student outcomes.

Reading intervention is a classroom-based program that provides students with reading, writing and study skills at their instructional level. It includes a variety of activities that include one-on-one instruction and guided reading. Students also participate in self-selected homework books that are matched to their instruction level.

Several inquiry school boards have said that they need more direction from the Ministry on which intervention programs to use, as well as funding for purchasing these programs. This would increase the effectiveness of their interventions and allow them to reach a greater number of students.

It’s a long-term strategy

Reading intervention strategies can be used by teachers to help students improve their literacy skills. These strategies include tutoring, reading programs, and other activities. These techniques are often based on the most recent research on how students learn to read. However, they can also be tailored to the learning style of the student. The key is to focus on the needs of the student and not be discouraged by their lack of progress.

One effective technique is to have students pair up and practice reading aloud to each other. This can help them develop their comprehension skills and boost their confidence in class. It is important to find books that are at the students’ level of difficulty. It is also helpful to find books that are interesting to the student.

Educators can implement reading instruction and intervention by using the Voyager Sopris Learning(r) curriculum. This collection of high-quality reading programs is designed to meet the unique needs of Florida Local Education Agencies (LEAs) and is available through a special grant.

Education transforms lives and breaks the cycles of poverty. Investing in children before they start school yields significant medium and long-term benefits.

Children need safe and healthy environments that nurture their positive development. They also need key relationships and opportunities to learn communication, thinking and problem-solving skills. Learning to cooperate with others is important too – and this often happens at school.

Social and emotional development

A child’s social and emotional development will affect how well they can learn. They need to feel safe and secure, have positive relationships with other children, and learn how to interact with adults. This is the foundation for lifelong learning.

Children develop social and emotional skills through consistent interactions with caregivers, such as parents and teachers. These experiences are crucial to healthy development and learning. They help children understand their emotions and develop self-control. It also helps them learn to cooperate with others and resolve conflicts.

This is called social and emotional learning (SEL). It includes the ability to experience and regulate emotions, form healthy relationships, establish goals and make responsible decisions. SEL is important for a variety of reasons, including improving school readiness, academic achievement, and long-term success in adulthood. It is often assumed that a child will develop these skills naturally, but programs that focus on SEL are being implemented from preschool to college.

Physical development

Infants and toddlers develop physically in the areas of gross-motor (large muscle movements) and fine-motor skills (small movement). They use their senses to explore their environment through sight, touch, sound, and taste.

When an infant or toddler reaches milestones such as sitting up on their own, throwing a ball, and walking with assistance they learn about balance and coordination. They also build strength and stamina that can lead to physical activities such as jumping, running, kicking, skipping, or even climbing.

Teachers need to understand children’s physical development in order to provide the best learning opportunities. For example, it is important that children can hold a pencil correctly. Research shows that children who do not have the proper motor skills will struggle academically in later grades. This is why it is so important that parents and teachers stimulate physical development in young children. They can do this by providing them with a variety of experiences such as drawing, painting, and cutting.

Language and literacy

Language and literacy are key parts of children’s education. They involve the development of skills used to communicate with others through languages (language development) and the ability to read and write (literacy development).

Children learn early language and literacy skills by listening, talking, reading and playing with adults. They also develop skills by exploring and playing with books and other written materials like magazines, newspapers, take-out menus, markers and crayons.

Educators’ language and literacy knowledge can help promote children’s learning. This includes disciplinary content knowledge about how words and letters are structured, organized and related to one another and knowledge for practice about effective classroom strategies for supporting emergent literacy learning.

Every child has the right to a quality education that will enable them to realize their full potential. Education transforms lives and breaks the cycle of poverty, yet too many children around the world are deprived of this fundamental right. Education must be free and accessible to all children.

Thinking (cognitive) skills

Thinking, or cognitive, skills help children learn. They include the abilities to understand and use information, focus and manage emotions. Children with strong cognitive skills can handle challenging learning situations.

At an early age, children begin to understand how things work. This helps them develop a sense of order and sequence in the world around them, such as knowing that lunch comes before TV time or that holidays, like Thanksgiving, happen only once a year.

A child’s ability to make these connections is a measure of his or her reasoning skill. A person’s processing speed is also a key component of cognitive thinking. Children with slower processing speeds may have trouble making decisions and remembering information. They also may find it more difficult to grasp subjects that require a lot of rule application, such as mathematics and foreign languages. This is normal and can be improved over time. Fortunately, kids practice cognitive thinking skills naturally every day as they explore, question and solve problems.

Education Support is a UK charity “dedicated to improving the mental health and wellbeing of the education workforce.” It was founded in 1877 as a benevolent fund for teachers and today supports teaching assistants, teachers, lecturers and staff in further and higher education.

Support your child’s learning by providing a healthy home environment that includes brain-boosting meals, restorative sleep and a distraction-free study space. Communicate openly and regularly with your children about their school experience.

Academic Advising

Academic advising provides students with the opportunity to explore options for their education. These advisors often have an extensive knowledge of the school’s resources, so they can provide students with appropriate referral services as needed. They are also trained to help students connect their academic experiences with life/educational/career goals/aspirations and to support them in developing, meeting, and achieving those goals/aspirations.

Until recently, many institutions and academic cultures conceived of academic advising as a prescriptive process. The idea was that advisers would tell students what to do, and the students, in turn, would follow the advice.

The prescriptive model is at odds with developmental approaches to advising, which recognize that both students and advisers learn best through goal-setting and mutual exchange of information. It can also disempower students by privileging adviser knowledge over student growth needs. Academic advising should promote a student-centered, relationship-based approach, and should respect students’ views, values and cultures. (NACADA 2017a). Students often turn to peers or family members for advising, however, and they may not be aware of the advising options available to them at the college.

Guidance Counselors

School counselors provide guidance for a student’s educational and personal life. They may be available for help with a variety of issues including bullying, drug abuse, depression or youth homelessness. They are also able to offer advice on how to overcome academic problems or achieve career goals.

A perceptive and understanding nature is key to the counseling profession. Students often open up to their counselors with personal and emotional problems that they are unable to share with their parents or teachers. This can be emotionally exhausting for new school counselors.

Individuals who are interested in becoming school counselors can complete a master’s degree in counseling. Online programs allow for flexibility in scheduling. Many schools have specializations in areas such as bullying specialist, career awareness or mental health. These specializations can give a school counselor a competitive edge in the job market. They can also earn additional certifications in specific subjects. This will demonstrate a higher level of expertise to employers.

ESL Specialists

ESL specialists provide educational support for students who have primary language competence in English but need to build their fluency in the language. They work with a range of student groups, including high school and college students who want to gain employment in the United States or for other reasons.

Often, these professionals are familiar not only with the ESOL standards of their state but also with those of the language arts and other content areas. They collaborate with classroom teachers on a regular basis to improve student learning, as well as assisting in the preparation of professional development opportunities for educators.

Several of the themes that emerged in administrators’ responses to this content analysis included improving the collaboration between ESL teachers and mainstream classroom teachers. In some cases, the need to address this issue may be the most important aspect of an ESOL administrator’s job. In addition, ESOL specialists are often responsible for providing testing accommodations during district-wide and state standardized tests.

Library and Media Services

School library media specialists are teachers, leaders, information specialists, collaborative partners and program administrators. They are the heart of the school and play a critical role in developing students as tech-savvy, independent lifelong learners.

They promote and support inquiry and research in all content areas to develop students who are college, career, and “life” ready. They are also the “digital content brokers” weaving technology and online resources throughout curriculum and instruction, modeling and supporting 21st century learning skills.

Library and media services offer a wide variety of educational resources to help students become information literate people who know how knowledge is organized, can find what they are looking for when they need it and understand that information should be sourced appropriately and ethically. The IU13 IMS program offers a variety of professional development programs to meet the needs of district staff including librarians, media specialists, and technology coordinators/integrators. These meetings are offered on a monthly basis and are facilitated by IMS staff.