Effects of Poverty on Education

Course Description

Effects of Poverty on Education considers the impact of poverty on academic achievement.  Course content includes effective ways teachers may empower students to overcome the barriers to learning that results from enduring the impact of poverty.  The course emphasis is to develop a minimal, error-free, instructional system classroom teachers may use to teach all disadvantaged students. 

The purpose of this course is to provide classroom teachers and school administrators the knowledge, strategies, and skills to challenge the barrier of poverty.  To achieve this purpose, course process and content will draw upon the course text, “A Framework for Understanding Poverty,” by Ruby K. Payne.  In addition, equal emphasis will be upon the sociology of American schools and the cultural “trap” of poverty.  We may provide many innovative and effective strategies to advance school reform, but if we do not address the impact of school sociology on academic achievement, school reform will be compromised.  The innovative feature of this course is bringing together the framework for understanding poverty and the sociology (social context) that traps so many bright and capable students in a self-fulfilling dead-end.  By joining these two aspects of poverty, teachers and school administrators will have the knowledge base and skills to effectively challenge barriers of impoverishment.

Objectives

• Participants will differentiate the difference between internal and external poverty.
• Participants will use gained knowledge to develop ways to determine the time and extent of poverty being endured by their students.
• Participants will gain insights into the role of language in academic achievement.
• Participants will identify the hidden rules of social class position.
• Participants will analyze ways to improve academic achievement for students enduring poverty.
• Participants will initiate the development of a framework for understanding poverty.
• Participants will complete a mid-term review.
• Participants will initiate a pedagogy for children from poverty.
• Participants will consider affective education necessary to build meaningful relationships with students from poverty.

Curriculum Design

This course will emphasize the development of insights and understandings of the impact of impoverishment upon schooling in America, and then to apply the insights and understandings to case studies and “real” problems.  Participants will design, based on course process and content, a strategy for removing barriers directly resulting from poverty.

Time Requirements

This course will be offered over a period of 13 weeks and is a 60 hour 3 credit graduate course. Modules 1 through 9 will be completed one per week. Module 10 will be completed over a two-week period so students will have time to revise and complete the final integration project.

Hardware & Computer Skills Requirements

Students may use either a Macintosh computer or a PC with Windows 95 or higher. Students should possess basic word processing skills and have internet access with an active e-mail account. Students also are expected to have a basic knowledge of how to use a Web browser, such as Netscape Navigator, Microsoft Internet Explorer or America Online's (AOL) browser. To download a browser at no cost, visit one of the following Web sites – Netscape.com; Microsoft.com and AOL.com.

Course Materials

The required text for this course is “A Framework for Understanding Poverty,” by Ruby K. Payne. The textbook and course materials will be provided for all students.  A variety of readings will be referenced throughout the course. Other supplemental readings will be provided.

Session Outline
Module 1: Internal/External Poverty
Objectives: 

1. To differentiate between internal and external poverty
2. To recognize the reciprocal between internal and external poverty
3. To recognize the function of time on the issue of poverty

Module 2: Applying Gained Knowledge to "Real" Problems
Objectives: 

1. Use time and extent of poverty to direct classroom instruction

Module 3: The Role of Language and Story
Objectives:  

1. To recognize the relationships between the display (perceptual field) and language development
2. To understand the relationship between language development and academic achievement

Module 4: Responsive Pedagogy and Hidden Rules
Objectives:  

1. To discover the hidden rules among classes
2. To use student’s background experiences to overcome barriers that result from poverty

Module 5: Improving Academic Performance
Objectives: 

1. To identify cognitive deficiencies most often noted among students from poverty
2. To identify interventions that improve cognitive strategies

Module 6: Mid-Term Review and Composing a Framework for Understanding Poverty
Objectives:

1. To review course progress
2. To derive a framework for understanding the impact of poverty on student achievement

Module 7: A Pedagogy for Children from Poverty
Objectives: 

1. To initiate the design of a pedagogy for children from poverty

Module 8: Building Meaningful Relationships with Students from Poverty
Objectives:

1. To acquire the knowledge and skill to create meaningful relationships with students from poverty

Module 9: Closing the Achievement Gap Between Students from Poverty and Middle Class Students
Objectives: 

1. To identify the essential components of an instructional system for students from poverty

Module 10: Synthesis and Technology
Objectives:  

1.      To assimilate Computer Assisted Instruction

2.      To create a plan for using information in this course

Grading

Student Requirements

	1.	Participation: Participation in all Forum activities and dialogue with colleagues.
	2.	Reading Assignments: Students will complete all assigned reading in the textbook, Web sites and answer questions in the appropriate Forum thread.
	3.	Culminating Activity: Participants will conduct an assessment of personal dynamics in their classroom and design lessons that encourage the use of different intelligences.

Student Academic Integrity
Participants guarantee that all academic class work is original. Any academic dishonesty or plagiarism (to take ideas, writings, etc. from another and offer them as one's own), is a violation of student academic behavior standards as outlined by our partnering colleges and universities and is subject to academic disciplinary action.

Register
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