Word: edisonizing
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...also recommend a recent biography of Thomas Edison by Neil Baldwin, which contains a description of the winter night when Edison put his invention on public display. At his home in Menlo Park, N.J., he created the world's first showplace for electric light. Crowds of reporters and others would trudge up a hill to see lampposts, set 50 ft. apart and crowned with helmet-shaped glass bulbs, cast light over bare trees and snow-dusted fields...
Equally enticing was the Edison curriculum, which brings together several top programs in reading, writing and math as well as in music, art and ethics. Although some components are uncommon--teaching a foreign language to kindergartners, for instance--few are unique. Many schools already use the highly acclaimed approach to math developed by the University of Chicago and the Success for All reading program put together at Johns Hopkins University. What is unusual is that Edison has brought some of the very best approaches to bear in one place. Because an Edison school day is nearly two hours longer...
...school places enormous emphasis on technology. There is an Edison-owned computer in every student's house, which has helped create an extraordinary partnership among teachers, school and parents. Children are able to E-mail homework to themselves or their teachers, while parents can review their children's progress at home, communicate with teachers, and E-mail other parents on everything from head-lice alerts to debates over sex education...
...results are tangible. In two years, Reynolds' teachers have cut in half the gap in test scores between poor and affluent children. The school made similar headway in demolishing the difference between minority and white students' performance. Overall, Dodge-Edison's scores jumped more than 15% during its first year; in nearly every area, scores for its students not only caught up to but also surpassed the average in the district. While such results would be welcome anywhere, they are especially important here because if the school doesn't produce, Wichita can pull the plug. "We were on pins...
Nevertheless, the school is young and the picture incomplete. Critics argue that the funds lavished on early "showcases" like Dodge-Edison will dry up as Edison investors begin demanding a return on their money. But in Wichita parents and teachers still marvel at what they see happening to their kids. When Beth Loos' son David started third grade at Dodge-Edison, he was unable to read, period. A year later, in fourth grade, he is reading at third-grade level. "Before I arrived here, I heard many negative things about the school," says Loos, who teaches Spanish. "Now I feel...