In this chapter, Sal Khan talks about his ideals and how it would be to have schools open and in session year round. He refers back to the 18th century when most families lived on farms and families depended on the children to help feed their families. Food came before an education. He talks about bringing our education system up to the twentieth century, let alone the twenty-first.
One of the first points in the book that I spent a lot of time thinking about was the amount of time our buildings stand empty during breaks and summer vacation. I know that they are used for a few hours here and there, but they are never used to their fullest potential. I have never heard of the option of educational classes offered 6 hours a day during the summer for children and parents who want to continue to learn over the summer. I wonder if our education system is ready to handle children who advance at that rate? What a fabulous opportunity to offer classes to children who want to expand their knowledge in various areas. The district could offer multi level classes and full day learning opportunities for children in grades K-8.
Another area I have been thinking more about is reading over the summer. I do believe many children read, but lack the higher level thinking that is involved during school hours. I feel that we can enhance their reading with an option like a Blog, Skype or book discussions at Kipling. As a school if we all read 2-3 books over the summer and either have weekly discussion groups at Kipling and/or Blog or Skype about the books the families would have a reason to encourage the children to read and discuss what they are reading. This activates and engages their brains. I feel like this could be carried over to math game night for various grades as well. Again, this would activate and engage the brains of children.
We are lucky in our district to have so many families who have access to the internet and devices at home. I do believe we should be encouraging more continued use of programs like Khan Academy over the summer. I believe as a staff we should talk about how we can enhance the usage and feedback to our students over the summer to create and encourage more student growth. If children know that we are engaged in their work over the summer, many children will continue to use the programs like Khan Academy.
I believe that in the past, summer came and I encouraged students to do school work over the summer and I even gave direct links and skills for each student. Many children would complete some assignments and read a few books. After reading this chapter on Redefining Summer I have a new perspective on my role and responsibilities for students I am passing on to the next grade. I believe I should be open to offering them as much learning as they want and summer shouldn’t stop them. As an educator, I should encourage and continue to provide feedback to my students during the summer months.
As a school and district, I believe we are in the forefront of education. I feel that this should be a discussion that we should be having on who and how we should be monitoring our students year round. We may not be physically in the building year round, but I do believe after reading this chapter, I can encourage and provide feedback to my students which would make a huge difference in the following year.
Questions I Still Have:
How can I best encourage my students to truly be engaged in learning over the summer?
How can I help them continue to learn over the summer?
As a school/district what opportunities, support, programs are offered to continue to stretch their learning?
As a school/district do we want to put anything in place to push all students? Set goals for summer growth?
Written by Carolynn and Danna