Cultural Competence and Acculturation
Posted by Trudy on April 26th, 2007 filed in Uncategorized, Youth
In our work with at-risk youth and families, cultural competence (or better yet - multicultural competence) is a key skill. Child Trends, noted for their summaries of research for youth programs, recently published Enhancing Cultural Competence in Out-Of-School Time Programs: What Is It, and Why Is It Important? A resource I have long found valuable is a multicultural competence checklist for school counselors, developed by Cheryl Holcomb-McCoy and published in 2004 by the American School Counselor Association. In the online article Assessing the Multicultural Competence of School Counselors: A Checklist, 51 competences divided into 9 categories provide a more concrete list of competences than I have found elsewhere. I also like to look at the issue from another perspective, that of acculturation. I’ve found the writings of my colleague Jennifer Skuza (such as Understanding the experiences of immigrant children in Minnesota) helpful in my thinking about programs as ‘cultural competent’ as well.
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Creating A Blogger’s Code of Conduct
Posted by Trudy on April 20th, 2007 filed in Security, Social Networking, Youth
Remember the email Netiquette standards that discouraged flaming and typing in all caps? In today’s world, apparently we need the equivalent for blogs. Tim O’Reilly recently started a conversation to establish a “Code of Conduct and return to (or require) civility on blogs. A news article gives examples of recent problems. While the drafted Code makes sense as far as it goes, I wonder what a Code designed for the free speech and safety of teen bloggers, those writing on MySpace and other social networking sites, would look like. In the Nov 2005 Pew Report Teen Content Creators and Consumers reported 19% of online teens keep a blog and 38% read them. In their just published Teens, Privacy & Online Social Networks, Pew notes that 55% of online teens have profiles, and 39% link to their blog. They also report the kind of information that gets posted, with age and gender differences. Many of these teens treat their blog as an online journal or diary, writing about their personal life. We worry for them about the repercussions these entries could have on future career and education options, as well as the impact on individual well-being and social network. In a recent online article, Brydolf summarized some of the risks and behaviors of youth. If you were creating a Code of Content for today’s online savvy teen, what would it include? What language would be convincing? (I was always partial to the “don’t write anything you wouldn’t want your mother, coach, best friend, worst enemy to read”).
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speaking up for relevant science and technology
Posted by Trudy on April 18th, 2007 filed in Families, SET, Science, Social Networking, Technology Trends, Youth
Since 2003, Project Tomorrow has sponsored the “Net Day Speak Up Project” to provide youth, teachers and parents a chance to ’speak up’ on issues of technology and science in the schools. More than 250,000 responded to the 2006 survey. Julie Evans posted presentations of the compiled results on the Net Day News site. “Online connected-ness” is redefining friendship, people across the country and the world they regularly talk with online, but have never met. Online safety and privacy are not major issues.
Do we want youth to enjoy their science learning? Make it relevant! The list of attributes in the presentation sound like what 4-H SET Mandate Team has been advocating: real world problems, using science tools and equipment, talking with real scientists, solving challenges and puzzles, visiting places where science happens. And science that will them in a career. As we continue our work reconceptualizing and redeveloping 4-H science curriculum and programs, we should keep the opinions of youth presented in this survey front and center. Make it relevant!
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Collaborative Curriculum Development Portals
Posted by Trudy on April 17th, 2007 filed in Technology Trends
Following on the heels of the collaborative encyclopedia Wikipedia are several portals to encourage the sharing and collaborative development of curricula and learning resources. The Curriki site is one. The resources here are quite varied — from what appears to be formal classroom curriculum, to lesson plans for informal learning activities, to features such as animations, quizes, videos that could enliven or supplement your activity. The “Ecological Footprint” lesson had some interesting quizzes and videos, tools that could enhance a food/nutrition or ecology activity. The “Stay Still” set of activities on Stability would make a fun half-day science learning adventure. Another site is the OWL or Open World Learning Portal. Check out their Tree of Life project, especially the “Treehouse” features developed by youth for their school classes. Within 4-H, CYFERnet, the eXtension Youth SET for Life (Science, Engineering & Technology) Community of Practice, and Wisconsin 4-H are implementing models for collaborative curriculum and lesson plan development. Have you tried any of them? What tools or strategies work?
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Kids & Online Gaming
Posted by Trudy on April 16th, 2007 filed in Educational Games, Youth
Are the youth in your program playing games online? Dave Walsh of National Institute on Media & the Family has a new online booklet for parents: Who’s In Charge?. Short, mentions some of the more popular games, provides some vocabulary and suggests ‘house rules’ for game use. Free, but you need to have an account to access.