kids Speak for America

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Ideas for Improving American Public Education

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American students have received a quality education but there is room for improvement.

The 2019 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) test of math and reading, which U.S. fourth and eighth graders take every two years. Those results, released in October 2019, also found that U.S. achievement hasn’t progressed over the past decade and, for low-performing students, was the same as 30 years ago.

The international test administered by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and called the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA).

In 2009 the tests showed that American students ranked 31st in Math, 23rd in Science, and 17th in Reading when compared to student test takers from 65 countries. The test requires critical thinking and reading comprehension because the questions in all three areas involve word problems about real situations. The mediocre results suggest that American students have opportunities to improve test scores.

What the next testing will show may not look good with many of our nations schools closed as a result of the Coronavirus Epidemic.

students

Many remedies for upgrading America’s schools have been suggested, including revising curricula, remodeling schools, adding electronics features to classrooms, and numerous other improvements. However, most of the suggested remedies suffer from being expensive, logistically difficult, or politically resistant.

On the other hand, there are several changes that would help to improve the American education system and the scores of American students relative to international students that are much simpler and more straightforward.

First, American parents can do a more effective job of helping the public schools and improving their children’s educational performance. Too often American parents feel that supporting their children’s education means attending concerts or games, driving students on field trips, bringing snacks to class, helping with fund raising events, and checking homework. American parents may be the best in the world at doing those things and more in support of schools, but, unfortunately, those things are not the most effective way to support the education of their children.

One of the best activities that a parent can do with their young children is to read to them and to be seen reading. Communicating the joy of reading and helping children become lifelong readers is extremely valuable. Reading with their children also gives parents the opportunity to talk about the ideas and values in the stories and how they apply to real life. When the children are older parents no longer need to read to them, but they should continue to talk about real ideas and values. Parents can talk about the issues in the family, the school, the community, the state, and the nation. This is the type of activity that will help to encourage students to become thinking young adults and prepare them to be wise adults. The benefit to their school work and their testing will be an increase in the student’s ability to think critically and to solve real world problems.

A second remedy to the public education system is to upgrade the selection of teachers. Currently, there are a large number of colleges and universities offering degrees in public school teaching, and the result is that there are far more new teachers each year than are needed. The solution is to decrease the number of colleges and universities that offer a teaching degree and to increase the requirements to be accepted into a teaching degree program. Currently at many colleges it is possible for a student who graduated in the bottom half of their high school class and who are maintaining a C average in their college courses to be accepted into a teaching degree program. A teaching degree should be much more difficult to obtain.

Colleges could upgrade their standards to accept only those students who graduated in the top third of their high school class and who maintain a B average in their college course work into a teaching degree program. At the same time, colleges could increase the rigor of the education department teaching program so that the end result would be fewer but far higher quality teachers being granted a teaching certificate. The prestige of being a teacher would likewise be elevated to the level of being a doctor or an engineer. The benefit to the public education system would be that there would be more highly educated and highly trained teachers in the classrooms able to teach and inspire students to become good critical thinkers.

With these simple but significant changes, American students would not only score higher on international tests but they would be better prepared to address the problems of the world.

Filed Under: Family Tagged With: America, College, Education, Kids, School, Teacher, United States, USA

Be Part of the Kids Speak for America E-Board

Seth 1 Comment

I would like you to be a part of the Kids Speak for America E-Board. I could use at least 50 volunteer board members both kids and adults. You guys and  girls will be able to send me specific information about subjects you want covered. We will have a special section on the website where you can share things you want to see done or maybe you want some ideas from the other e-board members. We could have online meetings to talk about some of the things that have been happening all over the U.S.A. and we will write articles and discuss how they should be wrote and what needs to be included or if the site needs to be expanded further. We can make it so adults listen to kids, high school students and college students for it is our future that is getting messed up.

If you would like to be part of this e-board or just want to share your ideas as to how this board could be best set up contact me.

Seth W. CONTACT

Filed Under: Family Tagged With: America, College, High School, Kids, Speak, Students

College Republicans Finally Got it Right

Seth Leave a Comment

Hi people.  You might think I am an 11 year old pain in the butt but if you think I am a pain now just wait for I will keep on fighting to get Republicans and Conservatives elected.

Some of you stupid politicians and people I know that seem to follow them like sheep believing that Obama and the Democrats are going to give them whatever they want are so dumb that they should never vote.

I used to complain about Obama spending all of that money going on vacation and now I wish he would stay on vacation so that he doesn’t keep messing things up and spending even more money that us kids are going to have to pay back. If people are smart they will also give the Democrats in Congress a vacation when they vote in November.

I watched this video of College Republicans and they admitted how stupid they were getting taken in by all of Obama’s promises. I sure don’t understand how this guy keeps getting away with telling so many lies but he does and the Democrats keep giving him high fives.

I think you should watch this video of the College Republicans and listen to what they have to say. This is a really good video and while I may not be old enough to vote yet they are and so are some high school kids.

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: College, Congress, Democrats, Elections, Obama, Republicans, Video

Why You Shouldn’t Follow Kids Speak on Twitter

Seth 2 Comments

I was taking to a friend and telling him how hard it was to get adults to follow me on twitter and Facebook. My friend asked me why they should follow a kid and said what do you know about politics?

The truth is that I don’t know a lot about politics but the way I look at it either do some of the stupid idiots that are in congress. The idiots that keep getting our country deeper in debt and making it so kids like me might never have what people call the American Dream..

As a kid maybe I shouldn’t understand why they want to take away our guns. I know that it is one of my dreams to go into competition shooting and this is something pretty hard to do without guns.

Maybe I shouldn’t know about taxes but I know that it is wrong to take something away from someone just because they have more than you. My family isn’t rich they will not have to pay those high taxes but they remind me that those rich people are the ones that make jobs. My dad and grandpa work very hard so we can have a house and I can do things like play baseball and have a computer and I even have 2 Amazon websites so that I can earn money for college and fun things too.

Maybe I shouldn’t care about illegal aliens but I do because my mother is poor and does things like picking berries just to get some spending money and they say that Americans wont do these jobs.

I know that it is wrong to keep paying people to stay unemployed. Some of my friends parents don’t want to go back to work because they make more money than my dad does by working 2 part time jobs.

What does a kid not even in high school or old enough to serve know about the military. Maybe I have never fought in a war but someday I will be a Marine. I see our government sending our National Guard to foreign countries and in school I learned that their jobs to protect and serve within the United States helping on things like disasters. I also know that the United States must protect us and the Military should be our first concern.

What does a kid like me know about the president. I know that I see President Obama telling lie after lie. I know that lots of people around me that are lazy think that Obama is going to do everything for them. I know that he has promised change and he is doing changes that people do not want and his change is hurting this country.

So maybe I am a kid. Maybe Kids Speak for America may never be taken seriously by adults that cant understand why kids should care about our country. But I will keep on speaking out for it is the right thing to do.

With the help of some adults like my grandpa that helps me with my websites and those adults that have submitted guest articles or made comments kids like me, high school and college students will help to make the United States a country that me and my friends can grow up in and have the American Dream.

So maybe you shouldn’t follow the Kids Speak for America  blog or follow me on Twitter or Facebook or maybe you should if you really want to know how kids feel about America.

Filed Under: Family Tagged With: America, College, High School, Kids Speak, Politics

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presidents day

Presidents Day: Not Just a No School Day Presidents Day is not just a day off from school or work. On Presidents Day became a national holiday in 1879. First celebrated on Washington’s birthday it was later changed to the third Wednesday of February. Today, we celebrate all Presidents that have led our nation. This […]

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