Above Grade Level

Even within the highly fractious US political environment, where Dems and Republicans cannot even agree on whether UP is DOWN or DOWN is UP, shockingly, there IS "near unanimous, bipartisan agreement that TUTORING is among the most promising, evidence-based strategies to help students struggling with learning loss," one that Biden has embraced as a potential key to stemming the tide of COVID learning loss! Of course, this is not surprising to those in the know: "Decades of r...igorous evaluations have consistently found that tutoring programs yield large, positive effects on math and reading achievement, and can even lead to greater social and motivational outcomes." Decades of rigorous studies have even revealed the characteristics of ideal tutoring programs. These ideal characteristics include (i) a dosage level of at least 3 tutoring sessions per week, (ii) having a consistent tutor over time, and (iii) having instructional materials that align with the curriculum and classroom instruction of the student. Here's to TUTORING - one surefire way to transform a student's abilities. https://www.the74million.org//analysis-high-quality-high-/

When Amazon founder Bezos looks for the smartest people in the world to join his various enterprises, he looks for people who constantly revise their understanding of things and reconsider problems they thought they had already solved. Bezos sees such people as "open to new points of view, new information, new ideas, contradictions, and challenges to their own way of thinking" which he views as a sign of intellectual humility. Bezos knows what Socrates knew and what famed... Canadian music artist, K'naan, paraphrased in song lyrics some time ago, "Any [person] who knows a thing knows, he knows not a . . . thing at all!" Paradoxically, the smartest people around know they know nothing at all: that's why their insatiable quest to learn, grow, and improve never ends. Now that is something we can all learn from. https://www.inc.com//this-is-number-1-sign-of-high-intelli

"The United Nations says the pandemic has caused the largest disruption in education in history, with more than a billion students affected since July last year." Now that's a profoundly sad showstopper of a statement. But perhaps we can find some succor for the soul in the results of "recent peer-reviewed research published in the American Institute of Physics" which found that "closing schools only slightly reduced by four per cent the number of infections among the population aged 25 and under." This was based on data from hard hit New York City. https://globalnews.ca//school-closures-covid-19-spread-st/

In a world in which social media platforms' algorithms help spread FAKE stories and information SIX TIMES as fast as TRUE stories, at least according to one recent MIT study*, it's vital we raise our kids with the critical-thinking and news literacy skills they need to survive in a world filled with misinformation. Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world. - Nelson Mandela *A 2018 study by scholars at the Massachusetts Institute of Techno...logy found that it takes true stories about six times as long to reach 1,500 people as it does for false stories to reach the same number of people on Twitter. https://www.fastcompany.com//why-news-literacy-is-just-the

This Mom echoes the concerns and sentiments of many parents during this pandemic: "While her kids Maddie and Ben have 'amazing teachers who are doing the very best they can' amid Ontario's current school closure during a COVID-19 lockdown, Belyea wonders about how much curriculum is being covered in their respective Grade 6 and Grade 4 classes. During her kids' remote classes, Belyea hears the teachers' time taken up troubleshooting tech problems and repeatedly walking stude...nts through online tools. Opportunities for one-on-one assistance have also waned. Ben, who is nine, shies away from asking for help online because he's self-conscious about classmates hearing him struggle." If your child needs extra 1-on-1 academic attention during this difficult time, reach out and we'll be there for you. https://www.cbc.ca//pandemic-learning-gap-unesco-report-1.

One unexpected silver lining to COVID-19 is that in some foreign countries COVID led to lower teacher-to-student ratios BECAUSE of the necessity of implementing COVID-19 safety protocols - and that in turn led to a ratio of 1 teacher to 15 students which is known to produce better education outcomes. Most pedagogical studies indicate that this 1:15 ratio is what most governments should target for their school classrooms. Ironically, COVID concerns forced many countries to hit this target for the first time to reduce the rate of COVID-19 transmission. https://www.theglobeandmail.com//video-how-class-size-cov/

Let's promote TRUE math understanding! Students are often taught to memorize math steps, without actually understanding the underlying mathematics. This is a problem. One solution is to encourage *higher order thinking* by using comparison models e.g. "comparing multiple correct strategies, comparing confusable problem types, and comparing correct and incorrect strategies." This works! New research reveals that "incorporating these types of comparison problems resulted... in greater conceptual knowledge and procedural flexibility than the control groups." If you want to promote true *understanding* of mathematics, then the *comparison model* technique works wonders! And it's fun! https://phys.org//2021-01-comparison-multiple-strategies-m

Looking out at our society, we are plagued by vast amounts of misinformation, conspiracy theories, science denial, and other forces that are threatening our society, said Jal Mehta, a professor of education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and co-author of In Search of Deeper Learning. We need inquiring citizens to make good decisions about our democracy, and to take on big challenges like climate change, education, health care, poverty, and more. While there... are many ways to cultivate a love of learning in your children, here's one easy one: Researchers have found that a strong predictor of childhood flourishing is the ability of families to share ideas or talk about things with their child that really matter, said David Grodberg, a psychiatrist and chief medical officer at the behavioral health platform Brightline. For example, creating family rituals around shared activities like playing board games or reading or maybe at the dinner table, listening to each other and talking about ideas and interests together. https://www.huffingtonpost.ca//how-to-raise-kids-who-love-

Do smarter teachers make smarter students? How do teachers' cognitive skills impact student performance, country-wide? It turns out, the answers are, YES & SIGNIFICANTLY, respectively. (Just one of the reasons why our tutor candidates have to successfully pass through a gauntlet of skill assessments and screening processes before they can join our ranks.) "We find that teachers’ cognitive skills differ widely among nationsand that these differences matter greatly for stud...ents’ success in school. An increase of one standard deviation in teacher cognitive skills is associated with an increase of 10 to 15 percent of a standard deviation in student performance. This implies that as much as one quarter of the gaps in average student performance across the countries in our study would be closed if each of them were to raise their teachers’ cognitive skills to the level of those in the highest-ranked country, Finland." https://www.educationnext.org/do-smarter-teachers-make-sma/

Although it's tough to find a silver lining in these dark days of the pandemic, doctors are noticing one very positive trend among kids: there is a significant "decrease in common respiratory illnesses, including the flu, colds, and RSV. Experts credit that to practicing safety health measures like hand-washing, social distancing, and mask wearing." On the flipside, there has been an obvious uptick in mental health issues among kids, including elevated rates of depression and anxiety. https://www.parents.com//the-pandemic-is-leading-to-a-dec/