Duncan said that the current school calendar is "insufficient..., insufficient for some children." Some who cite this "summer slide" have proposed year round education with intermittent breaks of two-to-three weeks. Yet, studies of the effects of YRS (Year Round Schooling) have proven "inconclusive and contradictory."
For years, the threat of summer school effectively encouraged students to study. Students who failed to work hard during the traditional calendar year might be sentenced to summer school. No one wanted that! Summer vacation is a time to recharge the batteries, share good times with good friends, soak in new experiences and actively pursue one's own interests.
I will make sure this summer is a time of great growth for myself and, hopefully, for my children. We have already taken steps here to prevent the summer slide. My kids signed up for a summer reading club. We're growing milkweed plants in the hopes of harvesting enough to feed three hungry monarch caterpillars by late July. We've started a World Cup of Checkers. We may move on to chess.
Boldest of all, and to emphasize that the most important gains in life are not purely measurable in academic terms, we adopted our first dog yesterday. He is a beautiful, 14-week-old, black lab puppy whom we dubbed "Midnight" (a.k.a., Captain Midnight). He has no pedigree of which to speak; he came from the shelter; but he is perfect in nearly every way. I am happy to say that he already understands enough about his wee-wee pad to personally prevent over ten accidents and earn over ten rewards in his short stay with us.
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Midnight will teach us (and we must work to teach him) more about responsibility, faithfulness and love than anything common-core aligned. You ask me how I know. I don't. I just feel. So, as corporate interests wage war via charter expansion, let us make sure our public-schools do not become the modern-day equivalent of Odysseus' Argos .
For years, the threat of summer school effectively encouraged students to study. Students who failed to work hard during the traditional calendar year might be sentenced to summer school. No one wanted that! Summer vacation is a time to recharge the batteries, share good times with good friends, soak in new experiences and actively pursue one's own interests.
I will make sure this summer is a time of great growth for myself and, hopefully, for my children. We have already taken steps here to prevent the summer slide. My kids signed up for a summer reading club. We're growing milkweed plants in the hopes of harvesting enough to feed three hungry monarch caterpillars by late July. We've started a World Cup of Checkers. We may move on to chess.
Boldest of all, and to emphasize that the most important gains in life are not purely measurable in academic terms, we adopted our first dog yesterday. He is a beautiful, 14-week-old, black lab puppy whom we dubbed "Midnight" (a.k.a., Captain Midnight). He has no pedigree of which to speak; he came from the shelter; but he is perfect in nearly every way. I am happy to say that he already understands enough about his wee-wee pad to personally prevent over ten accidents and earn over ten rewards in his short stay with us.
Midnight will teach us (and we must work to teach him) more about responsibility, faithfulness and love than anything common-core aligned. You ask me how I know. I don't. I just feel. So, as corporate interests wage war via charter expansion, let us make sure our public-schools do not become the modern-day equivalent of Odysseus' Argos .
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