School Zone
Points of Pride
Five Duval County Public Schools Selected to Host Guest Teachers from China
Mandarin Oaks and Rufus Payne elementary schools, Stanton College Preparatory School, Mandarin High School and Mandarin Middle School have been selected to host a native Mandarin-speaking teacher as part of the 2008 Chinese Guest Teacher Program.
One hundred and thirty-six teachers will be placed across 32 states in both school and district assignments to teach at the high school, middle school and elementary school levels. This is the third group of teachers to arrive in the United States as part of an ongoing collaboration between Hanban, China’s Office of Chinese Language Council International and the College Board.
The program represents a unique opportunity for students and educators to learn Chinese and learn about China from a native speaker. In addition, guest teachers will assist with curriculum development, student recruitment and materials development and will serve as a cultural resource for other subject areas and for cultural enrichment activities.
“We want to develop students with the competence and multilingual communication skills needed in an increasingly global community,” said Duval County Public Schools’ Supervisor of World Languages, Dr. Joanne Davis. “Exposure to the Chinese language and culture will provide our students with advantages in education, business and the arts.”
Teachers receive a monthly living stipend directly from Hanban while local schools are responsible for mentoring, housing, transportation and the costs of the required visa processing and required insurance. The College Board and NCSSFL representatives interview guest teachers individually to assess teaching skills, adaptability and English proficiency.
The guest teachers work at host schools for one year and then have the option to stay for up to three years if both the school and teacher are satisfied. The Chinese Guest Teacher Program seeks to address the shortage of qualified Chinese teachers in the United States and meet the growing interest in Chinese among U.S. students.
“We’re more excited than ever about how the Chinese Guest Teacher Program continues to grow,” said College Board President Gaston Caperton. “Having started out with 37 guest teachers in 2006, the total number of teachers hosted in the U.S. through the program for 2008-09 will be 193, including the 136 new participants.”
In an Advanced Placement Program® (AP®) survey conducted in 2004, nearly 2,400 high schools expressed an interest in offering the AP Chinese course in 2006-07, but for many of these schools, this goal may go unrealized. They either are understaffed or have no teacher of Chinese, and many see no prospect of finding the teachers necessary to build their programs. This increasingly common predicament underscores the shortage of qualified teachers of Chinese in the United States. According to the Chinese Language Association of Secondary-Elementary Schools, there are currently only about 250 Chinese language teachers in U.S. secondary schools.
Chinese is the most widely spoken first language in the world. It is the national language of the more than 1.3 billion inhabitants of China and millions more ethnic Chinese around the globe.
Established by the Chinese government in 1987, Hanban is the nation's official agency authorized to promote Chinese language and culture internationally, fulfilling a function similar to that of the United Kingdom’s British Council and France's Alliance Française.
Raines Teacher Selected as Community First Teacher of the Week
Raines High School Teacher Brenda Jones was announced as the first winner of the Community First Credit Union "Teacher of the Week" on Tuesday, August 12, and received two club seats to the August 16 Jaguars pre-season game against Miami at Jacksonville Municipal Stadium.
The Community First Credit Union "Teacher of the Week," program launched as part of a new partnership between Community First and the Jacksonville Jaguars. In addition to honoring First Coast teachers with club seats to home games, Community First is also sponsoring the Jaguars Foundation educational programs, making a $1,000 donation after the first touchdown the Jaguars make on a first down at each game throughout the 2008 football season.
Ms. Jones was nominated for her dedication to each of her students.
"I would like to nominate Brenda Jones for teacher of the week, month, & year," her nomination said. "She is the epitome of an incredible educator! She takes that extra time to assist students when we need help. She treats everyone with the respect she would like in return and honestly that is rare. It is apparent that she loves what she does and strives to change the lives of the young people she comes in contact with."
Throughout the season, local residents can nominate their favorite teachers online at the Community First website for a chance to win Jaguar tickets. Each time there is a home Jaguars game, Community First will draw a name from those nominated and give the winning teacher two free Club Seats to the next game. Visit
www.communityfirstfl.org for details or to nominate a teacher.
Community First Credit Union of Florida is a state-chartered credit union based in Jacksonville serving anyone who lives or works in Baker, Clay, Duval, Flagler, Nassau, Putnam and St. Johns counties. For more information about Community First, visit www.communityfirstfl.org, or call 904-354-8537 or 800-342-8416.
Reading Program at James Weldon Johnson Addresses Different Reading Styles
Last year, staff members at James Weldon Johnson College Preparatory School created and implemented a new reading program, ER (Emergency Reading or Explore Reading) to promote and increase rigor in the middle school curriculum.
ER is a daily, 30-minute differentiated program that emphasizes higher level reading skills and concepts that middle school students will need as they transition into rigorous high school classes. The program employs different reading strategies based on learning style preferences.
Teachers plan to continue the ER program this upcoming school year, but they will be making a few changes based on the findings of one of their students.
Eighth grader Nadya Alzate used the reading program as the basis for her science fair project, asking the question, "What is the effect of learning style preferences on the FCAT?" She entered the project at the school, district and state fairs.
For her research, Nadya determined the learning styles of more than 300 of her fellow students and then compared the students’ learning style preference with their previous year's FCAT reading levels.
She found that every student who scored at level 4 or 5 had a multi-modality learning style, while every student who scored at level 1 or 2 had a single learning style.
As a result of these findings, James Weldon Johnson's ER program will now address multi-modality learning styles.
"In order to be successful in the global economy, students need to be armed with reading strategies that go beyond interpreting the meanings of words," said Principal Sharwonda Peek. "They need to be able to use strategies to organize, restructure and synthesize content of the text, and go beyond the text as they connect to real world situations."
Peek said her teachers must be aware of students' reading conditions and help them overcome any impediments that are interfering with their healthy reading habits. The ER program is an effective way to accomplish these objectives.
To provide other educators with information about the school's ER program, staff members Allyson Popp and Mary Browning presented a session at the Just Read, Florida! K-12 Leadership Conference in Orlando, Florida.
| 
