Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Race to Nowhere

A screening will be held at St Elizabeth Seton Church on May 18th in Pleasanton.

Director Vicki Abeles turns the personal political, igniting a national conversation in her new documentary about the pressures faced by American schoolchildren and their teachers in our achievement obsessed public and private education system and culture. Featuring the heartbreaking stories of young people across the country who have been pushed to the brink, educators who are burned out and worried students aren’t developing the skills they need, and parents who are trying to do what’s best for their kids, Race to Nowhere points to the silent epidemic in our schools: cheating has become commonplace, students have become disengaged, stress-related illness, depression and burnout are rampant, and young people arrive at college and the workplace unprepared and uninspired.

Race to Nowhere is a call to mobilize families, educators, and policy makers to challenge current assumptions on how to best prepare the youth of America to become healthy, bright, contributing and leading citizens.

More information about the film can be found at their website!

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Summer Book Wars Heat Up


It's April - and the endgame has started - parents are starting to ponder the summer brain drain. Keeping kids busy, and keeping minds active during the summer is made even harder this year - many schools in our area have cancelled Summer School. The Golden Apple has offered Summer Bridge books for about 10 years. These books offer a great day to day plan that helps parents keep kids on track. They've updated the books this year, making them more challenging, but also raising the price $1 to $14.95. The books are still a bargain, considering how effective they are at keeping kids skills sharp all summer. This year, they have some competition. Teacher Created Resources, one of our top publishers has published their own book, Summertime Learning. We're very excited about this new entry for a number of reasons. Summertime Learning has a similar schedule, workload and subject area range. It has much better reward stickers and retails for only $9.99! Either book is a great way to keep minds active. For more about these books visit our page devoted to Summer Workbooks. We'll be adding summer reading lists and a wonderful resource guide written by our in-house master teacher Gayla Peek very soon.