Children who live in poverty are less likely to attend preschool than kids in more affluent neighborhoods. Research show that kids whose parents are educated professionals have fulfilled an entire year of education ahead of their poorer counterparts. They know twice as many words and are exposed to various experiences that helps to expand their thinking and learning. By age 10, the gap between these two groups is at least three years apart.
In third grade some of our children have not mastered the basic reading and math skills and never will. By the time they reach 6th grade they have lost hope in their own abilities to succeed. We don’t need research or statistics to tell us that poor children are less likely to be taken to museums, theatres, cultural enrichment workshops or even the library. Its not because the parents don’t want to, but financial limitations get in the way, lack of knowledge and exposure to what is available.
How can we support our children who are so far behind academically? If our children are in fact three years behind, what can we do to boost up their self-esteem and self worth? Where do we begin to close the achievement gap?
1. In order to support our children academically we must first boost up with their social-emotional being. They deserve to know that they are worth living a life of abundance and prosperity. They get to know that they are not their circumstances and anything is possible.
2. It doesn’t take much to boost up a child’s self esteem or worth. All they need is someone to hear, understand, relate and care for them.
3. To close the achievement gap we must bring back the ARTS into our school. “UCLA professor of education Dr. James Catterall analyzed data on more than 25,000 students from the National Educational Longitudinal Survey to determine the relationship of engagement in the arts to student performance and attitudes, and also investigated the impact of intensive involvement in instrumental music on student achievement. She found that students with high levels of arts participation outperform “arts-poor” students by virtually every measure and that high arts participation makes a more significant difference to students from low-income backgrounds than to high-income students (www.jensenlearning.com, 2012).”
In addition to the arts we get to provide equity and excellence to our children. No child should be excluded or isolated from a classroom due to their score on a standardize test or behavior. To be able to teach our children teachers MUST be happy to be in service to ALL children. If not, what's the point of teaching. Educators who are open to feedback and learning from colleagues who are effective. Have a thirst for knowledge, finds solutions to problems and situations, ensures that ALL children are learning in a safe, loving environment, will do whatever it takes to provide the BEST instruction for ALL children and will change with time.
Go to www.vitueinapocket.com and click on program to find out about our art program called Under 21. Under 21 is on a mission to provide children with an opportunity to use their voice through art while learning about virtues. Join us in making a difference in the lives of our youth. Tutor or mentor a child once a week or month, volunteer your time at a day care center, elementary, middle or high school, send your child to our program or volunteer at Under 21. Join us as we take a stand in empowering our youth to be the change.
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