I've often heard character defined as how we act when no one is watching. Good character is crucial to becoming a good citizen and a productive member of society.

Children learn good character behavior first and foremost by observing how trusted adults behave, such as when a store clerk accidentally gives them too much change and they give back the excess, or when the adult fulfills an obligation when they'd rather be doing something else.

There's an education effort afoot (see Time magazine article) to help students develop character and prepare to be good citizens. Spearheaded by former Clinton White House official and author Eric Liu, the budding movement seeks to enhance academics by teaching students the value of "working hard, sticking with it, respecting others, and finding solutions during conflict."

The goal is to get parents and schools working together to develop character and maximize student success.

This article references other studies that show the importance of character, such as articles in Psychological Science and the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology that report that self-discipline and perseverance have major impact--as much as double the impact of IQ--on grade point average.

As James Baldwin has said, "Children have never been very good at listening to their elders but have never failed to imitate them." I have long been an advocate of character education. Unfortunately, attention to this movement seems to wax and wane, so I am happy to see that it is again receiving the attention it deserves. Let's give students role models worth imitating.

Education policymakers have promoted STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) Education as vital to our nation's future. Innovation depends on a solid knowledge base in math, science, and engineering. Without innovation, our industrial base will erode.

What key unlocks innovation? For many people, the arts provide an uncanny ability to illustrate abstract concepts and open the mental doors to new ways of looking at problems. Education Week recently reported on experts who are making a case for adding the Arts to STEM--creating STEAM.

The NSF-funded project Art of Science Learning explores how to fortify STEM learning by using the arts. Director Harvey Seifter says, "We believe there is a powerful opportunity here to use the arts and arts-based learning to spark transformational change in science education." He mentions a 2008 study which revealed that Nobel laureates in the sciences were 22 times more likely than scientists in general to be involved in the performing arts--think of Einstein and his violin. Others point to Leonardo da Vinci who, in addition to creating some of the world's most enduring art, also created plans for a wide assortment of innovative machines.

Some schools integrating the sciences with art include projects from elementary grades through high schools such as:

• Elementary math students exploring abstract concepts of fractions and geometric shapes through art-making projects, including a "fraction mural"
• Middle school biology students creating watercolor paintings of cell structures
• High school science students competing for the annual ArtScience Prize. This year's theme is Virtual Worlds, and next year's is Synthetic Biology.

Not all educators are "sold" on STEAM, and early results are mixed. However, I wonder if the integration of the arts in the sciences may help our visually attuned generation of students retain more information and stay interested in attending classes.

"Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn't really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That's because they were able to connect experiences they've had and synthesize new things." - Steve Jobs

One of my colleagues shared with me that she struggled with math when she was young. Interestingly, her mother was sympathetic at the time and shared that she had trouble with math herself. Fast-forward a dozen years, and my colleague was responsible for managing six-figure budgets for a small company. She discovered that, once she got over the nervousness about this part of her job, she was both good at it and enjoyed it.

I have met countless students over the years with similar anxieties about math and science.

Sian Beilock, associate psychiatry professor at the University of Chicago and author of the book Choke, has done several studies on performance pressures. Her most recent research measures the brain's reaction when a person is faced with math problems to solve.

"We know that anxiety or fear of math can lead people to perform worse than what they know," said Beilock.

College students' brains were scanned using functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Beilock determined that students with high math anxiety who were able to access the frontal and parietal portions of the brain--those linked to cognitive control, focus, and regulating negative emotions, were able to perform nearly as well as student with low math anxiety.

Basically, students' performance had less to do with fear than how they dealt with the fear. Interestingly, the portions of the brain in charge of cognitive and emotional control don't fully develop until a person reaches the mid-20s, so the results are even more important for younger students--and perhaps this is why my colleague was able to enjoy and use math more effectively as an adult.

Many teachers know that techniques for addressing anxiety, such as test anxiety, can be taught. I know many who teach their students deep breathing, or to finger-trace a spiral to help them focus.

Sian Beilock interview about her book Choke. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcr4ZD-Vrsg

Traveling through a small town in Massachusetts, I saw a sign proclaiming Rehoboth as the birthplace of public education. Like many declarations, this is subject to hot debate.

Boston, Dedham, and Dorchester challenge Rehoboth for this honor.

The facts:

Rehoboth - In 1643, a church in Rehoboth voted to support a teacher through taxes. At that time, church and state were one; however, some do not believe that can be considered public support.

Boston - Boston Latin School vehemently asserts that it is the nation's oldest public school, founded in 1635. However, students' education was paid for by donations and rental revenue until 1649.

Dedham - Residents voted to have a tax to support public education in 1644.

Dorchester - In 1639, Dorchester residents voted for rent from a specific property to support a school. Some say the rent is a "proportional property tax."

News articles:

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I recently returned from a two-week trip to India. During the time when I traveled the country, I had the opportunity to visit several classrooms, observing classes in English and talking with teachers. The classes I visited lacked computers, whiteboards, digital projectors, and televisions. Class size usually exceeded forty students, often with three or four students sitting at a small table and sharing a single bench. The textbooks were soft covered and several years old--often tattered and worn from years of use.

What impressed me most was that, even though the teacher lacked the tools enjoyed by teachers in the U.S., the students were engaged, attentive, and responsive. They were extremely respectful of visitors like me as well as their teachers and classmates. There were no disruptions or disciplinary issues distracting the teacher from the task of delivering the lesson. Students dressed alike in school uniforms and came to school neat and well groomed. Students always greeted me with "Hello, sir" and sent me off with "Goodbye, sir."

I fear that we often blame teachers and even lack of money for the lack of progress in some of our classrooms. While good teaching and classroom management are key ingredients to successful learning, one should never underestimate the importance of having respectful students who enter the classroom with enthusiasm and an eagerness to learn. These learner attributes greatly assist in overcoming the lack of proper instructional tools and challenging class size. We need to consider the factor of student attitude when we look to explain the poor performance of U.S. students against other countries. Teachers can place high demands on students in terms of school behavior and learning goals, but parents must do their part by sending their children to school eager to learn and understanding the value of knowledge and respect as much as they understand the value of prowess in the arena of athletics.

Click here for photos.

The school year has begun. How many of your children dread heading to school each morning?

It could be that they are victims of bullying. Bullying has become such a serious issue that the U.S. government now has a website called Stop Bullying.

Children who are being bullied may have trouble sleeping; come home with damaged or missing books, clothing, or other items; or lose interest in schoolwork and other activities. Children who bully others may get sent to the principal's office frequently; have extra money or new belongings they can't explain; or refuse to accept responsibility for their actions.

This excellent site has sections for kids, teens, young adults, parents, and educators. It has a special section on cyberbullying and a dozen cartoon Webisodes (roughly two minutes each) depicting various bullying scenarios, including one in which a mother recognizes that her child is a victim of bullying.

Finally, you can Test Your Knowledge with facts and myths about bullying.

With the budget cuts faced by educational systems around the country, I'm all for the private sector finding ways to reward our excellent teachers. Unsung Heroes, is a program offered by financial giant ING. Over the past 15 years, the company has awarded millions of dollars in grants to educators for "breakthrough projects that bring classroom teaching to new heights."

We are coming up on the 10^th anniversary of 9/11 and, if you're like me, you vividly remember where you were and what you were doing when you heard the terrible news. However, many of the children you teach were either not born yet or were toddlers on 9/11, so they have no recollection of that day or the associated events. Yet many things in their lives today are impacted by the events of that day, from the security measures they experience to parents or close relatives serving in the military.

At Learning A-Z, we believe that children in elementary school need to learn about 9/11 and understand what happened on that dark September day in U.S. history. For this reason, we have developed three separate books on the topic of 9/11: Heroes of 9/11 (Level J), September 11: Always Remember (Level R), and 9/11: A Dark Day (Level Y). Each book has support resources including a lesson plan, a graphic organizer, activity sheets, discussions cards, and a quiz. The mid-level book is free to anyone who visits our Reading A-Z website.

We hope that you will find these books and accompanying resources helpful as you teach your students about this very troubling event. Let others know these resources are available so they, too, have the support materials needed to teach about 9/11.

You may think that the U.S. Census merely counts people. Interestingly, it also collects behavioral information. For example, questions on the 2009 Survey of Income and Participation asked questions about television habits and rules, family dinners, and reading with children, among many others. The recently released data suggests that parents are spending more time with their children than they were ten years ago, and the interactions are of the high quality that researchers like to see in child development.

This data shows that parents, including lower-income parents, are reading with their children, playing with them, and eating dinner with them more frequently than was reported in the previous census. Educators are encouraged by this news, as parent involvement is crucial to success in school.

Reading to and with children is one of the most influential factors in their future reading success. At Learning A-Z, one of our most important goals is to provide affordable and developmentally appropriate reading materials for children to take home and read with their parents.

The census report's finding is heartening news. I hope that in some small way, we at Learning A-Z are contributing to the high-quality interactions between parents and children.

It's a digital age, and most kids are light years ahead of their parents and teachers regarding technology. More and more, schools are being equipped with smart boards and classroom computers. Some schools issue laptops to their students to make the learning relevant to the world we now live in.

It's also an economic reality that many students have no access to computers in the home, and there are still many schools that have few computers available in the classroom. So how do teachers fulfill the mandate to integrate technology into their lesson plans?

Just in time for the new school year, blogger Jennifer Barnett, who is part of the Teacher Leaders Network, shares some useful ideas in her blog High-Tech Teaching in a Low-Tech Classroom.