… about your emotional weight

How much “weight” do you carry every day?

Isn’t work challenging enough without adding weight?

You may be thinking, “What kind of nerve does Eric have, talking about my weight?”

Actually, this post is NOT about the extra pounds on your frame. (After all, you likely already know that every 10 pounds of weight loss equals 40 pounds of added pressure OFF your knees. Put it differently, for each pound of body weight lost, there is a 4-pound reduction in knee joint stress among overweight and obese people with osteoarthritis of the knee.) Read more

Help Your Brain Make Better Decisions: Cognitive Skill Building for ALL of Us

We have all begun a new calendar year. For some, there is already stress and more of the same challenges from last year. But this post has answers for you. This is all about using something FREE to help your brain in the decision-making process. It works for you, your colleagues, your family and your students.

By the way, over a year’s time, what is it worth to you to make just ONE better decision a day? Read more

Can Teachers Move Students Of Poverty To Middle Or Upper Class?

tt-podcast-art-eric-jensen

Drew Perkins talks with author Eric Jensen about his book, Poor Students, Rich Teaching: Mindsets for Change (Raising Achievement for Youth at Risk) and how he believes teachers can change their mindsets to help students of poverty move to the middle or upper class.

Jumpstarting Learning for Children in Poverty

Contrary to popular belief, DNA is not a child’s destiny. IQ is not fixed. Cognitive skills can change. This is critically important in K-12 schools because of the poverty gap — the difference between a child’s chronological age and developmental age.

In a healthy environment, a child’s developmental age will match his or her chronological age. In a high-risk environment, research shows that while a child’s chronological age is 5 years old, his or her developmental age is closer to 3 years old. This has a huge impact on school readiness and performance.

Today, 51 percent of all students in U.S. public schools are poor. Our public education system is designed to help students achieve a year of academic growth in a school year. For economically disadvantaged children, that’s a problem. Read more

The impact of poverty in education

education Poverty- brain based learning

Reprinted from http://www.educationdive.com

U.S. Secretary of Education John King’s voice wavered slightly during the July 27 conference call, as he recounted his personal battles with poverty and homelessness.

“I know schools can save lives, because schools saved mine,” King said. “Public school teachers gave me a sense of hope, created an environment that was structured and supportive. I understand school can be the difference as a safe and supportive place for students facing homelessness.”

King was addressing members of the media about new proposed policies under the Every Student Succeeds Act, which will support mandated local liaisons in school districts to help identify and offer resources to students who classify as homeless. They will also help to clarify the unique needs of the rising homeless student population, which includes more than 1.3 million children throughout the country. More than half of the nation’s public school children were low-income in 2013.

He also indicated that the Obama Administration has committed increases in funding to support programming support for homeless students — about $85 million for the next academic year. But many wonder if the federal government’s support will be enough to solve the growing crisis, with far reaching impact on educational service delivery and performance metrics.

Social justice outside of education typically incorporates public views on inequalities in housing, income, and criminal justice administration. But for the children growing up in environments where these challenges impact their daily lives, the learning outcomes typically create another vicious cycle of divesting — through suspensions, expulsions and negative classroom experiences.

“A large number of students coming to school from poverty live in a chronic state of stress, with symptoms mimicking those of ADHD,” said Eric Jensen, an author and researcher who has consulted with secondary systems nationwide on strategies to educate students from impoverished communities. “So they get labeled as discipline problems, when really, they are living under chronic stress.”

Jensen said to combat the impact of poverty in the classroom, teachers should have way more empathy before judging students’ ability and work to avoid judging students altogether.”That’s easier said than done, but teachers must understand kids don’t choose parents, neighborhoods, DNA. So when they are being impulsive, challenging authority — these are symptoms that have been in literature for more than 30 years,” he said.

Biochemically, Jensen said, elevated levels of cortisol can destroy brain cells. This change creates risk factors for depression, anxiety and anger, all which can be enhanced by environmental factors like unhealthy living conditions, violence or drug abuse in the home.

These factors can limit exposure to complex language, listening and responding, and slows the brain’s capacity to handle processing, like rapid speaking.

To solve the issues, Jensen recommends schools emphasize relationship building and cultures of respect and encouragement for students. While it is a difficult proposition to ensure quality teachers at every level throughout a secondary career, Jensen said that five years of holistic learning and accounting for the effects of poverty, can all but eliminate their impact.

“It is a long-term process because what counts is how many minutes per day are they in a metabolic state. If I can keep them confident for five to six hours a day, then life is good. Five years in a row of above average teaching, and you can reduce the stressors among students and teachers that begin to make way for cognitive development and essential learning skills.”

Click to read more..

Can You Change Mindsets?

change-minds-brain-based

You Are About to Learn How With
3 Practical Classroom Strategies

Can mindsets be changed? This post explores what initiates and changes our mindsets. But first, do you know anyone whose mindset you would like to change? I will bet you do! I have three solutions for you… Read more

12 Steps to a Better Life…

Why 8.5% is a Great, Gutsy, and Gaudy Goal.

Most people think a BIG goal is to improve XYZ in their life by 20% or even 50%. Today, you will read how your 8.5% goal can change everything else in your life for the better this year.

Getting Started

In short, the 8.5% times 12 months will multiply into something better than you ever imagined (+100%).

We are going to focus this year on just one thing.

Here it is: health.

I have enjoyed pretty good health for the last 10-20 years. In fact, I have been “sick” only twice (two colds for less than 3 days each) and had two relatively minor injuries. Only one of these “mishaps” caused me to miss a day of work (I hate it when that happens).

When I look back on my life, both of the two injuries could have been avoided. Think about that for a second; potentially, I could have had 100% work attendance with just a bit better daily health practices. I’d surely like to keep the good health moving forward, and maybe you would, too.

Now you might say that I do not have a classroom of first graders to catch colds from every day. You would be right about that; I don’t.

And, I might say, you likely don’t get on and off 80-90 flights a year, that are packed with total strangers who cough, sneeze, and put hands all over the seats inside a plane. I’d say you likely don’t rent cars 35-50 times a year that are full of germs, or that you don’t sleep in germ-ridden hotel rooms 75-95 times a year that are never cleaned well. So, how can I keep from getting sick? Read more

Engaging Students with Poverty in Mind

Engaging-Students-Poverty- Brain Based In this galvanizing follow-up to the best-selling Teaching with Poverty in Mind, Eric Jensen digs deeper into engagement as the key factor in the academic success of economically disadvantaged students. Drawing from research, experience, and real school success stories, Engaging Students with Poverty in Mind reveals:

  • Smart, purposeful engagement strategies that all teachers can use to expand students’ cognitive capacity, increase motivation and effort, and build deep, enduring understanding of content.
  • The (until-now) unwritten rules for engagement that are essential for increasing student achievement.
  • How automating engagement in the classroom can help teachers use instructional time more effectively and empower students to take ownership of their learning.
  • Steps you can take to create an exciting yet realistic implementation plan.

Too many of our most vulnerable students are tuning out and dropping out because of our failure to engage them. It’s time to set the bar higher. Until we make school the best part of every student’s day, we will struggle with attendance, achievement, and graduation rates.

This timely resource will help you take immediate action to revitalize and enrich your practice so that all your students may thrive in school and beyond. In Eric’s latest book, he shares student engagement strategies that are strongly tied to socioeconomic status. Learn the seven factors that are crucial to engaging disadvantaged students: health and nutrition, vocabulary, effort and energy, mind-set, cognitive capacity, relationships, and stress level. To address those factors, Jensen provides actions and solutions you can use in every day practice to:

  • Cultivate a high-energy and positive classroom climate that fosters success every day.
  • Build your students’ capacity to focus their attention, think critically, process content, and recall it from memory.
  • Create greater excitement that spurs student motivation and effort.
  • Develop students’ deep, sustained understanding of content.

The strategies in this book will empower you to automate student engagement efforts in your classroom and school so more struggling students succeed. You can get it at Amazon by clicking here.

Sure-Fire Ways to Ramp Up Student Achievement ASAP

teach-me

My goal is to help you become extraordinary this year. Every single strategy listed below is a teaching “factor” that ranks in the Top 20 of ALL contributors towards student achievement (sources listed at the end of this newsletter).

Below, you’ll want to turn these “teaching factors” into reality. Take just one of these and practice it until it becomes automatic. That could take you as little as 30 days or as long as a school year. In either case, once it becomes automatic, you congratulate yourself, and then add the next goal.

Here is the list to choose from (limit one per educator)… Read more

Annual Updated Health Issue:

Health and the brain

Seven Changes You Can Make to Save Your Life

Our issue this month has seven changes you can make to save your life or extend it! You, or a family member, may be concerned about the “big two” killers (cancer and Alzheimer’s). This month we focus on cancer and the July issue will again be on Alzheimer’s.

By the way, every year these suggestions get so many rave reviews that they are re-sent, forwarded and “gifted.” Feel free to do so.

The first change will reduce your risk of cancer. A recent study shows that…

DISCLAIMER: Before I begin any comments about health, I am required by law to make a disclaimer. The disclaimer is, “The following comments are not meant to diagnose or treat any disease, nor have they been approved by the FDA.” Read more