Essay on Boarding Schools

I had to write an essay on an educational topic, so I picked boarding schools to start looking at if boarding school is good for kids. Here is my essay:

Notes on School Uniforms

I had to give a five-minute speech on any educational topic, and I picked school uniforms because I want to put my students in uniforms. Here are the notes from my speech:

Internationalism

As an International Baccalaureate graduate and a current student of one of the most international-student-friendly universities in the country, I think an internationally-focused education is extremely important. We need a certain amount of American nationalism, but it is so different knowing how easy it really is to know the world.

This can be done with an emphasis on foreign languages, culture, geography, and other things. I also think it's important to celebrate (or at least acknowledge) holidays and customs from all over the world and include lessons and such on the culture and country and importance of the holiday/custom.

Letters to New Students

My senior year, my IB class wrote letters to the incoming juniors about IB and about life as an upperclassman. It was a ton of fun for us to remember the year, but it was also a touching gesture for students coming in who were unsure about what to expect.

When we turned these letters into our teacher, she handed us similar letters from our parents about life that none of us students had any idea about. We all read our letters and advice from our parents, and many of us started crying from how loving and thoughtful they were. I know I am going to keep the letter from my parents for the rest of my life.

I think this is a beautiful thing for all students to do. I think it would be best for seniors to write to incoming freshmen and for 8th graders to write to incoming 5th graders. It might be nice for 5th graders to write to incoming 1st graders, too, but everyone would have to make sure to keep their vocabulary age-appropriate.

"The Excellent 11" by Ron Clark

I just finished reading "The Excellent 11" by Ron Clark. It's a book of 11 attributes he thinks all educators should have with a ton of examples. I strongly support (nearly) every point he makes (the only one I do not fully support is that it's ridiculous when a principal does not know every single student, but just because I'm horrible at names), and I am very excited to next read "The Essential 55."

The excellent 11 are enthusiasm, adventure, creativity, reflection, balance, compassion, confidence, humor, common sense, appreciation, and resilience.

Clark also gives suggestions for how to plan field trips and make lessons more interesting. His passion is clearly contagious.

Saturday School?

While I was looking at the Governor's School of North Carolina (a junior/senior school that is otherwise very similar to the kind of school I want, including that it's a boarding school), I started wondering if I should have a half day of school on Saturdays. I'm already considering having a half day on Fridays, like I had in my high school, with presentations during the second half. With a half day on Saturdays also, each class would meet three times each week (full period on MW or TTh and a half period on F or S), and something like volunteer activities could be on Saturdays.

But then comes the question, why don't I just combine the half days on Friday and Saturday into a full day Friday? I'd really like to have a half day on Fridays: it was a treat for staying so late in the day and working so hard the beginning of the week. Also, I don't want to make teachers teach on Saturdays because I want the best teachers, and I want to also reward them for being so good.

In conclusion, I do not think I want to have school on Saturdays, but it is something to keep in mind. I think the best way to deal with this is to not have Saturday school but to have kids (at the boarding school) come do volunteer activities every Saturday morning (later than school starts) or afternoon for a few hours.

I got the idea by looking at these two schedules:
http://www.ncgovschool.org/life/east/
http://www.ncgovschool.org/life/west/

Scholarships

Since I am hoping for this to be a private school, students will be charged tuition. Part of this tuition and other sources of money, however, will go toward half and full scholarships for students.

I'd ask and expect of all students and parents to not reveal whether the student is paying full, half, or no tuition.

Uniforms

After some deliberation, I'd like all of my students to be in uniforms. I want my girls in skirts, but I may have to add shorts and pants options for the girls (pants and shorts only for the boys) as did the British School I attended in 5th grade.

Outside the uniforms, I want a campus-wide dress code (including faculty and staff and asked of visitors). This would include wider sleeves than spaghetti straps and a certain length for shorts and skirts.

I'd like several events, though, where students can practice their personal presentation and dressing skill by not wearing a uniform to school events. This could be for meetings, volunteering, and special events or days.

Technology in Classes

What should be the role of technology in the classroom? How much should kids use technology?

A few decades ago, American educators were getting nervous about American students and their performance on the global scale, particularly as compared to Japanese students. So, funding was put into increasing the amount of technology in the classroom because many assumed Japanese students simply had a lot more technology at their disposal in the classroom. However, a few few years later, a study was done, and it turned out that Japanese students used technology much less than American students did. Therefore, it wasn't an increase of technology in the classroom that made Japanese students so advanced.

I agree that technology does not need to play a large role in the classroom. The lady I tutor for uses her smart board a lot to write things - like the agenda for the class or assignments - that I believe could just as easily be written on the board. True, typing is often easier than writing, but why spend so much money on something that could be accomplished with an extra dry-erase marker or two?

I do, however, think that teachers should have a fairly easy way to project their computer screens onto a bigger screen to show videos and websites. I think it is particularly good when this is done onto a white board (I'm not a fan of chalk boards...), especially for math and science teachers, because a powerpoint or problem can be projected onto an area where the teachers can write things and solve problems on top of the slides.

Computer labs are important in the school and sometimes laptops.

"Taking Sides"

I use a book called "Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Educational Issues" for my American Education course this semester, and I had assumed that my book was the only one like that. However, today while I was at a high school library tutoring a class of ESL (English as a Second Language) students, I saw a whole display of them in different topics. I absolutely love my education one, and am very excited that there are others. I flipped through a few of them, and I would highly recommend these books to anyone, especially for use in the classroom.

Typing and Spelling

I remember in elementary school going through the torturous typing classes and the horrendous and never-ending spelling and vocabulary tests, and I can guarantee I'll put my students through the exact same thing! Of course I don't want them to be torturous and horrendous, but those subjects need to be taught well.

Too many of my friends, even at the college level, still type using only two fingers, while I'm sitting here remembering my typing teachers covering my hands with blankets and turning off my monitors while I typed, teaching me to type extremely well.

As for spelling tests, I have heard that some schools aren't even giving them to students anymore because it's so easy to look things up, and we have autocorrect everywhere. I'm a horrible speller, but I'd be AWFUL if it hadn't been for all of those spelling tests I've had that forced me to learn.

Today, while I was tutoring ESL (English as a Second Language) students at the local high school, I realized that spellcheck really can help spelling - this one student would spell something wrong, I would help her find the right way to spell it, then she would remember the correct spelling when she had to type the word again a few minutes later - but I'd like students to have a solid spelling (and typing) foundation before getting to middle and high school.

Seminars

I've played around in my head with the idea and frequency of seminars (at the high school level) that teach things like how to maintain positive relationships and how to buy a house (http://educatorjasmine.blogspot.com/2012/02/usefulness-classesseminars.html). I'm pretty sure I want them to be in the afternoon on Fridays - the second half of a half day of classes (http://educatorjasmine.blogspot.com/2012/03/schedule-high-school.html) - but I'm not positive.

Each student would keep a binder all four years of high school for these seminars, and every speaker would have one sheet of paper that they would fill to give to the students for their binders. The binders could be split into sections like emergency, relationships (incl. friends, family, coworkers, etc), schools (incl. college), future (like buying a house, balancing checkbook), and any others I find relevant. Students could take notes on parts of the seminar, too, to make sure they're paying attention. These binders should be kept at the school over the summer and breaks so they are not misplaced. Transfer students should be given a partial binder of old papers. They don't have to be exactly the same as their classmates' (maybe from a few years before) but similar. 

The students would have something like a homeroom to check into before and after each seminar to make sure they were going. These teachers would also check each day to make sure the student had their seminar folder and attended the seminar (and got a paper). Also, once each month, the homeroom teacher would give marks for the binder being organized and the papers filed into the sections. I think this could be worth something like 5% of the culture class grade. 


Even if each student gets one paper every Friday all four years, there will only be about 120 pages in their binder by the end of their senior year, which is not excessive. This number is calculated by estimating 30 weeks of seminars each year and 4 years. Every now and then, the students could get the afternoon off (but not so much that an afternoon off is expected). 

Baby College

I've heard of something in Harlem called a "Baby College," where parents are taught different topics about how to raise a child. I'd love to have a program like this. It could even start out online then possibly become an actual live class. The live classes should also have some component that attempts to bond the parents. Some topics that could be included:

Feeding at different ages
Discipline
Choosing equipment like strollers and bottles
Changing a diaper and other basics (like bathing)
Helping baby's brain grow

Teachers' Culture Class

I strongly believe in practicing what we preach, so I'd like the teachers (and maybe the staff also) to go through some sort of culture training (http://educatorjasmine.blogspot.com/2012/02/cultureetiquette-classes.html). This could be done online and/or through seminars. Some topics from the students' culture class that I think the teachers could take are:


Personal image: sitting, standing, walking, dressing, speakingTable mannersBeing a good conversationalistSocial networkingCommon Courtesies: being a good neighbor, living with othersNotes, letters, invitations, announcementsGreetingsSocial names and titlesHosts and guestsFormal dinners and partiesGiving and receiving gifts
International etiquette

Schedule - High School

Updated 6/1/12:

I am now realizing that I was planning on expecting a LOT more than I should of these kids. I want them to be well-rounded, but I cannot make every kid excellent at so much. New plan: 

Mondays, Wednesdays, and every other Friday: classes 1-4

Tuesdays, Thursdays, and every other Friday: classes 5-8

Friday afternoons: possibly a half day. This could still be a good time for SOMETHING. Some weeks it could be seminars, some weeks guest speakers, some weeks team building, etc. 

Job: These kids "jobs" are to be excellent students, and that is it when they are with me. 

Volunteering: Maybe there can be optional volunteer trips on the weekends and holidays (definitely awesome service trips in the summers). Perhaps I can require a few hours like NHS does, but not much more. 

Sports: Still haven't quite figured that one out, but this is a school for advanced academics, not advanced sports (coming to that later...). 

To see my previously planned schedule: 

Personalize

I think a good way to personalize a student's education is through essays, particularly ones with very open prompts, like:

Identify a set of materials that illuminate an aspect of the novel for you, as a reader.
What do you make of the changes? Feel free to speculate on the reasons for these changes and analyze the effects of these narrative “I” voices.
How do these changes alter the entire frame of the novel?

This personalization would work for any subject, except possibly math.  

Grading Scale

I do not really like the standard GPA system and the weighted/non-weighted classes system because I expect all of my students to be at the same, high level, and I think a 4.0 and 5.0 grading scale is silly if all classes are weighted the same.

Also, if all of my students will be taking generally the same classes all four years of high school, then the grades out of 100 will reflect each other. Just like people take GPA boosters all the time, classes like culture and the arts could be grade boosters (though I want particularly culture class to be challenging).

This also could make students aware of how each grade they get in each class for each assignment could effect their GPA's but also that it is more of a holistic experience, and that each assignment and each class is a give and take of the others.

After School Activities

I'm thinking that activities like debate, choir, and sports should be after school, but I also wonder if those should just be part of the arts classes. Or, doing it after school would be good because those who are serious about it have a good time to practice, and they can spend their arts period doing something else. And, the daytime classes could be for students who are at a more basic level so everyone gets a shot at, for instance, choir, but the competitive singers aren't held back by beginners in the classes. 

English

English should have a global focus (but with maybe one full year of American Literature) and a focus on good literature that the students would enjoy with classics like The Great Gatsby.

Some of my goals: 

• Expose students to works (including fiction, nonfiction, short stories, and poetry) that they wouldn't see in their high school, particularly international works 
• Expect students to have an advanced level of writing and a particularly advanced level of grammar and spelling 
• Offer many opportunities to write in response to prompts, subjects, and no prompts
• Connect literature to film adaptations

Further Studies

Further studies are there to expose students to as many subjects as possible so they can, hopefully, know more about their own passions and what they want to do with the rest of their lives. Some of them would be units in the Further Studies class, but some would also be offered as semester courses. I think that this should be structured like the arts classes, where high school students get to pick which semester classes they want, middle school students have units in the fall and semester classes in the spring, and elementary school students have just units.

I'm thinking economics and government should be required, just like they were in my high school. I'm also thinking something about international affairs/relations should be required.

Some subjects: 

Computer science

Astronomy

Earth Science

Ethics

Philosophy

IT classes

Archaeology

Criminology

Economics

Government

IT class

Education

Linguistics

Political science

Sociology

Law

Psychology

Communication

Development studies

Military science (ROTC)

Mythology

Environmental studies 

Neuroscience and behavior biology
Anthropology & archaeology 

The Arts

Some of the arts I could include are: architecture, sculpting, painting, choir, band, orchestra, poetry, dance, theater/cinema, dance, drawing, gastronomy (culinary arts), and comedy



In high school, students should be able to pick which arts they want each semester. I this this would be better to do than for each year because then each student would have more opportunities with each art and would feel better about the choices they make since much of the curriculum I'm offering is fixed.

In middle school, schools should have units of arts in the fall and get to pick in the spring.

In elementary school, schools should have units of arts all year.

The arts should have an emphasis on practicing, history, knowing something (not just memorizing everything), being well-rounded, knowing the greats, and proving what they know (instead of what they don't know). 

Social Studies

12 - 20th and 21st Century/World Topics
11 - European History
10 - American History
9 - World History 

I'm not sure what most middle schoolers learn in social studies, but I think another way to promote multiculturalism would be to do world history and American history in different years and a year (or semester) of the history of each continent. That could mean that world history could have more of a focus on the relationship between the histories of all of the continents. This could translate into: 

12 - 20th and 21st Century/World Topics

11 - World History 

10 - American History (North American History?)

9 - European History

8 - South America and Asia

7 - Africa and Australia

Foreign Languages

For the languages, I'm thinking Spanish, French, Chinese, German, Latin, Italian, Japanese, and Russian. Narrowing those down, I have Spanish, French, Chinese, German, and Latin. And narrowing it down to Spanish, French, and Chinese. I know of a language magnet elementary school that teaches those three languages starting in first grade. 

In high school, students must take three years of two different languages. This is standard of most schools, but this will be special because my students will have started learning these languages from elementary school.

In middle school, there will be multiple levels of the languages, so students can experiment around with which languages they want to study. 

In elementary school, I'm thinking that classes should be designed to mix things up so students are exposed to all of the languages that they can take when they're older at a time when they soak up languages like a sponge. However, younger students sometimes mix up languages (interesting story about a young friend of mine whose father could not understand her half the time because she mixed up her English and the Dutch she learned in school) and may not be able to comprehend learning so many languages. This would promote offering just two or three languages from this time until graduation.

Experimental Sciences

I consider the experimental sciences to be chemistry, physics, and biology. 


9 - Intro to chemistry, physics, and biology 
10-12 - Take one of those three for one year and another one for two years


The idea is that each student is exposed to all three of them, not all students are well-suited for all three, and students should have advanced study in at least one of these fields. An alternative schedule would be: 


9-12 - Two years of two of the three sciences (Chemistry 1+2 and Physics 1+2, Chemistry 1+2 and Biology 1+2, or Physics 1+2 and Biology 1+2)
8 - Intro to chemistry, physics, and biology 


However, this could be a problem because students may not know which sciences they want to study for two years until after the first year. Depending on how early I could start students with Chemistry, Biology, and Physics, I could just require that the second year of two of the sciences in high school, so the schedule could be: 


6 - Intro to chemistry, physics, and biology 
7-12 - first year of all three and second year of at least two of them 


However, this one could be a problem because I worry that middle school students could not handle the second year of one of the sciences or that they would take the first year of both of them and have to skip a year or two before getting to the second year of the subject. 


I also want to make sure that ethics (like bioethics) is present and emphasized.