Average Rating: 
Rating:  - EXCELLENT BOOK ON CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENT
Anyone who has a child in the school system knows that the educational process does not allow for one-on-one assessment of a child's learning abilities. A child either keeps pace or in many cases, falls behind. The author has written an excellent book on what a child needs in order to grow, learn, and develop his or her full potential. It would be wonderful if all children learned at the same rate and possessed the same aptitude for learning; however, each child is a unique individual. The educational system today does not structure its learning process around that fundamental fact. A good many of the behavioural problems we see surfacing today stem from the fact a child becomes frustrated, bored, overwhelmingly challenged, or discouraged by the educational process, and their actions are often a result of what is lacking in the education system. Some parents, as well, do not take that fact into consideration and often expect Mary to keep up with brother John, because John seems to excel in everything, while Mary struggles to achieve. There are a variety of topics to be found in the book, including development of memory, language, and motor skills. If you are an educator or have a child who is experiencing difficulties in this area, this book provides excellent resource material. It is one parents and individuals with the authority to make changes in the system should read and take to heart. The book contains a valuable message, is well researched, and is equally as well written.
Rating: - Must Read For Educators & Students (That Means Everyone)
Levine examines in more detail the 8 different ways of learning, and how the brain learns in easy to read laymen terms. Students are individuals and they usually learn in the most optimum way in one of, or in a combination of these areas: attention, memory, language, spatial ordering, sequential ordering, motor, higher thinking, and social thinking. But the value of this book comes from Levine's incorporation of scientific research to show readers how these eight neurodevelopmental systems evolve, interact, and contribute to a child's success in school. We've had the endless "theoretical" studies of different learning styles. Levine provides the needed punch: what should the parent and educator "do." Here is the foremost how-to on reshaping the futility of "one-size fits-all" in our educational system, which doesn't tap the true potential, capabilities, and interests of our students. The key for an educator is to not only identify which students learn more conducivley from the eight learning styles, but then tailor course work for them. Student-centered proactive activities that offer more personalization and localization make this easy to do. With one-on-one tutoring and small groups, it's obviously less difficult for an instructor to identify and utilize lesson plans than in a class of 15-20-25 students, obviously. For students that have been labeled as lazy, unmotivated, or "slow," it is for some students correct. But for many more of them that are tagged with this generalization, it's a misnomer. One that often isn't even uncovered as the student moves through and graduates from the school system. Another great book in addition to this one is Howard Gardner's "Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences."
Rating: - Putting The Horse Before The Cart
Although the book "A Mind At A Time" by Mel Levine, like the other current good ones, such as, "The Child Whisperer", "Why Didn't I Think Of That", etc is kind of based on material that is somewhat passe' and now well known, I did enjoy and learn many things from reading it. As a longtime parent and educator, however, I am more and more becoming convinced that the first and most important thing for children to learn about and internalize is character. Teaching children of all levels and abilities then becomes much, much easier. All of the most brilliant, well-meaning research on learning is rather less useful if an individual does not possess good character traits, including the will to learn. I feel that's the root core problem in an American educational system that has great educated and dedicated teachers. For a resource that makes it easy and interesting to understand character and why character counts, I am currently receiving excellent results when using the book, "West Point: Character Leadership Education..." by Norman Thomas Remick. But, maybe you know of another one. In any event, I can only say that putting the horse before the cart by teaching and imbuing character makes imparting knowledge a heck of a lot easier. And knowledge is virtue.
|
