When I first saw the book, I was perplexed. What did Twilight have to do with vocabulary? Then I peeked inside and saw that Author Brian Leaf uses passages from Twilight to quiz students and show them what the words in Twilight mean. There are more than the words vampire and blood in that book for sure; words students need to know.

The Twilight series has encouraged many young people to read more and it seems Leaf has found a way to help them learn even more while doing it.

- Staff Writer Dawn Marks

More than 55,000 students in the United States have signed up and have recorded more than 49 million minutes of reading. As part of the program, 500 books were donated to fourth and fifth grade students at Rockwood Elementary School. 

To join the effort this summer, students can log on and record their minutes of reading. Happy reading!

-Staff Writer Dawn Marks

And second, two stories related to reading. TIME magazine reports that reading — by all accounts a sedentary activity — may actually help young girls lose weight. And this New York Times story talks about the new idea of linking books and video games together.

Share your comments on these stories below, or share links to other national education news that caught your attention.

Wendy Kleinman
Education Reporter

The reading time with students is part of a national effort to break the world record for the number of children reading the same book with adults on the same day.

A nonprofit organization called Jumpstart is spearheading the “Read for the Record” event. Jumpstart also raises money to provide books to children in low-income families.

Some of my favorite books to read at the age of Garrett’s audience today — prekindergarten through second-grade children — were the “Amelia Bedelia” stories.

What are your favorite childhood books?

Wendy Kleinman
Education Reporter

Here’s a little more detail on how students fare on the different tests (click to enlarge):

Also Thursday, I ran across a story about how New York City officials want to give math assessments to kindergarteners. As you might imagine, there’s some debate over whether that’s too young an age for standardized testing. The full story is here.

Feel free to share your thoughts on these assessments or the Needs Improvement list below.

Wendy Kleinman
The Oklahoman

Parenting expert Michele Borba recommends having your child help you make a list of supplies, then look for store flyers to find the best deals. Younger children that can’t write can cut out photos of the supplies they want.

Together you can make a budget with your child, and then hit the store to gather the goodies. Borba said allowing your child to pay for the items (using a gift card or your credit card) also can help teach them financial responsibility.

Borba also recommends that families stock up on supplies that are real bargains. Sure you may only need five notebooks, but if they are 5-cents each, why not buy 50?

What advice do you have for buying school supplies? E-mail me at ssimpson@oklahoman.com or comment here.

Susan Simpson, Education Writer

State Regents last week approved a new degree program at Oklahoma State University: a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing.

The graduate program aims to train the practicing writer/teacher and will begin enrollment in fall 2012. The Association of Writers and Writing Programs cited an increase in the number of jobs for writers, both in academic jobs and as self-employed or freelance.

The MFA in creative writing requires 42 to 45 credit hours.

Other new programs approved by State Regents are:

OSU-OKC: Associate in Applied Science in Dietetic Technology; East Central University, Ada: Master of Science in Accounting; Tulsa Community College: Associate in Applied Science in Computer Programming, Transaction Processing Facility and Certificate in Computer Programming, Transaction Processing Facility; and Western Oklahoma State College, Altus: Associate in Applied Science in Production Agriculture.

The book is called “Time to Learn,” and its premise is that the last school bell ringing out at 2:30 p.m. “makes no sense at all.”

Authors Christopher Gabrieli and Warren Goldstein write:

We wrote Time to Learn because we think it’s just the right time for a practical, large-scale transformation in American public education. We think it’s ‘time to learn’ from the available evidence — and we give you a ton of it in what follows — that our children need more ‘time to learn’ all of what they need to succeed and thrive in the twenty-first century. No one knows exactly how long the standard school schedule has clocked in at about six-and-a-half hours a day, or how it got to be that way, but just about everyone knows it’s not giving kids or teachers enough time to produce high school graduates well prepared for higher education, for the workplace of our newly global economy, or for citizenship in our democracy.

A little less than a year ago, State Superintendent Sandy Garrett called for a Time Reform Task Force to study the length of the school day and school year in Oklahoma. (Here’s a recap of their recommendations, and you can view the task force’s full report here.)

“If you want to raise expectations, this is the kind of discussion we need to be having,” Garrett said later.

So let’s have the discussion. Is the school day — or the school year — too short? And if you were in charge, what would you change?

Wendy K. Kleinman
Education Reporter

Researchers found that they couldn’t tell whether the No Child Left Behind Act has indeed left fewer children behind. But what the law did give the researchers was more data because of the required testing and reporting.

Here’s what that data showed about Oklahoma.

-The percent of all students proficient in reading and math saw a moderate-to-large gain all levels — except middle school reading — from 2002 to 2007. The percent of middle school students proficient in reading saw a slight gain.

-In reading, the achievement gap narrowed between blacks and whites, Hispanics and whites, and American Indians and whites on all grade levels except for high school Hispanics. There was no change in the gap between high school Hispanic and white students in reading.

-In math, the gap narrowed between whites and the other racial groups on elementary and middle school levels, but widened across all racial groups at the high school level.

Wendy K. Kleinman
Education Reporter

The “Catch the Reading Bug” program began yesterday at public libraries.

Children up to age 12 can sign up for the series of events, and very young children can even participate if someone reads to them.

Some libraries also offer summer reading programs for teenagers.

Youths who sign up get a free reading log, book bag and bookmark and can earn prizes for what they read. Libraries also offer story times and other activities for children.

Visit your local public library for more information and to check out your first book of the summer – maybe, for those who take literally the idea of a bookworm, the old favorite “The Very Hungry Caterpillar.”

Wendy K. Kleinman
Education Reporter