News from EGUSD

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Florin High School students delve into their own "Brainology"

BrainologyFLHS

Students at Florin High School are discovering new ways to improve their learning through an innovative new program called Brainology.

"Brainology teaches students to calm themselves in any stressful situation," said Emily Diehl, Brainology program coordinator at Florin. "The program motivates them by empowering them to know that they have the same brain power as any student - that they just need to work hard, eat and rest well and never give up. It also empowers them to take ownership of their own learning, choices and behavior."

The brainchild of Carol S. Dweck, Ph.D. and Lisa Sorich Blackwell, Ph.D., the Brainology program is designed to help both middle and high school students gain confidence and motivation to learn by teaching them about the brain, how to strengthen it and how to apply brain-friendly study skills. The program helps cultivate a growth mindset, which leads to growth- and learning-oriented behavior.

"Research has shown that students who hold a growth mindset use more sophisticated strategies in their coursework," said Emily Diehl, Brainology program coordinator at Florin.

At Florin, the results of the Brainology program have been immediate and outstanding. The Brainology curriculum was tested by a group of about 250 intervention, English learner, special education and ninth and tenth grade college prep students at Florin during the 2008-2009 school year. After completing the program, the group improved their average API score by 32 points.

Recently, students at Florin in the Brainology program had the chance to participate in a Skype conference with Brainology founder Dweck and her colleague Blackwell. The students and staff shared information with Dweck and Blackwell about their data and progress with Brainology at Florin.

"Our students absolutely love the program," said Diehl. "Our ninth grade intervention students sit rapt during lessons and ask the most probing questions. Their recall of information from week to week is astonishing. They feel empowered and proud of their brains."

Due to the successes of the program, Brainology is spreading both at Florin and James Rutter Middle School.

"It's our main goal to have all ninth grade students receive Brainology as a part of their transition to high school," said Diehl. "All Algebra I classes will have abbreviated lessons in Brainology throughout November. We currently have a group of 22 teachers and an after-school book study of 25 additional teachers studying the principles of Brainology and they are examining how to implement these ideas in the classroom. We are also working with a vice-principal on developing protocols for growth-minded discipline coaching for our administrative team. At Rutter, they are incorporating Brainology into their interventions."

For more information about Brainology, visit www.brainology.us.

EPICS Program grows at
Pleasant Grove High School

Need a teaching aid for your social science department? What about a guitar storage unit for a music class? Engineering students at Pleasant Grove High School in the EPICS Program can build it for you.

The EPICS Program began at Purdue University in 1995 as an effort to increase the development of students entering Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) fields by combining engineering with service learning projects. In 2006, the program expanded to include high school students in the EPICS High program. EPICS High students work in teams and partner with not-for-profit organizations by designing projects that meet the needs of the organization enabling them to better serve residents of the local community.

"The EPICS High program is an excellent way to give students the experience of working to design solutions that meet real needs in their communities," said Michael Young, EPICS coordinator at Pleasant Grove.

Second-year engineering students in Young's Design and Implementation class at Pleasant Grove recently completed their first year as an EPICS high school. Under the EPICS model, Pleasant Grove students have completed several projects to benefit the surrounding community. One project was the research, design and manufacture of a portable interactive kiosk for the Stone Lakes Wildlife Refuge. Hundreds of students that visit the refuge each year for its educational outreach programs will benefit from the kiosk's creation.

Another successful project by Pleasant Grove engineering students was the creation of a competitive robotics club at Cosumnes River Elementary School (CRES). Engineering students mentor participants in the CRES Robotics Club, with help from the teachers and principal of CRES. The next goal for the elementary robotics team is to compete in the first Lego League Robotics Competition, which will inspire future scientists and engineers.

These projects were featured at the STEM Service Learning Institute held at California State University, Sacramento in August.

Pleasant Grove High School is currently one of five high schools in California participating in the program. At Monterey Trail High School, the Design and Technology Academy (DATA) is working on launching their own EPICS Program.

Young has high hopes for the future of the program.

"My goal this year is to give each student a meaningful engineering problem that they will tackle by going through the engineering design cycle," said Young. "I also hope to begin generating community partners that we can work with on a continuing basis. The goal is not just community services, but a community service project that will teach students the skills of engineering, designing and building."

For more information about the EPICS High Program, visit https://engineering.purdue.edu/EPICSHS.

Elk Grove High School art students teach future artists at Markofer

It's a bright and sunny fall morning as the students in Tom and Cindi Gardner's first grade class at Florence Markofer Elementary School happily make their way along the street to Elk Grove High School.

The students chattered excitedly amongst themselves as they walked to their monthly art project collaboration with art students at Elk Grove High School.

"They really look forward to our trips to the high school," Tom Gardner said.

Gardner has been making this trip to Elk Grove High School for the past ten years. Gardner partnered with Gordan Goodban, an art teacher at Elk Grove, to provide an opportunity for his students that they could not receive at their elementary school.

"I wanted to have better art experiences for my students than I could provide," explained Gardner. "I realized that with the tremendous facility in Elk Grove High School only one block away from our school, I could tap into their resources to provide the experiences that I envisioned."

Both the first grade and high school students enjoy the art visits. Over the years, high school students have assisted the first grade students with a variety of projects, including construction paper holiday stockings, large collages and ceramic projects for both Mother's Day and Father's Day. During their recent trip, students made Halloween trick-or-treating bags together.

"One of the highlights of the visits is to see the high school students' enjoyment of working with the first grade students," said Gardner. "The first year we started the partnership, a senior girl took it upon herself - without being asked by Gordon or myself - to plan and prep all of the art projects that year. Other high school students have initiated gifts to the first graders or other special projects for them."

Gardner has high hopes for the continuation of the partnership between Markofer and Elk Grove.

"I hope we are able to continue the collaboration in the future," said Gardner. "It would be great to be able to provide a wonderful art experience for our first grade students and to refine the projects that we traditionally do each year."

"Hannah Montana" rewards Morse readers with performance

Although the real Hannah Montana wasn't scheduled to perform, the appearance of "Hannao Montana" was just as much of a treat for the A, B and C track students at Barbara Comstock Morse Elementary School as they celebrated the completion of their annual Read-A-Thon.

"The Read-A-Thon has been a yearly tradition at Morse since 1997," said Beverly Jarvis, a second grade teacher at Morse and chairperson of the Read-A-Thon. "The purpose is to encourage our students to read more and to see reading as an enjoyable leisure-time activity as well as a learning tool. The performance of 'Hannao Montana' and the Hannettes was an added incentive for reaching their goal."

On October 30, the administrators and front office staff at Morse - principal Kilolo Umi, vice-principal Rafael Martinez, school secretary Stacey Campbell-Skipper and office clerks Kathleen Barney and Heidi Harris - took to the stage as "Hannao Montana and the Hannettes" to reward Morse students for surpassing their goal in their schoolwide Read-A-Thon, held October 8-29.

"Hannao Montana and the Hannettes" performed Ice Cream Freeze (Let's Chill), much to the delight of the students.

"Our administrators promised the students a special performance if they reached the goal of reading 5,000 books," said Jarvis. "Our students toppled that goal and read a total of 5,189 books. Mr. Martinez was hilarious as 'Hannao Montana' and the Hannettes did a wonderful job of backing him up."

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