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As more children of all ages are excelling in standard public school programs, many districts have implemented new curriculum pathways for accelerated learning opportunities. For students who demonstrate above-average cognitive potentials, International Baccalaureate Programs are providing gifted children with the chance to learn in an enhanced classroom with increased pace and rigor, amidst peers working at similar cognitive levels and abilities.

International Baccalaureate Programs (IB)

While each public school offers different honors and accelerated courses, International Baccalaureate programs are fully inclusive curriculum pathways. This means that, instead of only taking a few honors courses, students instead engage in a constant IB class schedule.

IB Programs are only available at specific schools; however, they are still publicly funded. Essentially, "The IB is a nonprofit educational foundation, motivated by its mission, focused on the student." Programs are available for students ranging from ages 3 to 19, to help develop the "intellectual, personal, emotional and social skills to live, learn and work in a rapidly globalizing world."

Since 1968, the IB Program has grown to work with 2,384 schools in 129 countries. Currently, 645,000 students are enrolled in the various IB Programs around the world, while being provided with three different programs: The Primary Years, The Middle Years, and The Diploma Program.

This video offers an overview of the International Baccalaureate Programme.

The Primary Years

The Primary

Should female and male students be taught together in the same classroom? For decades, this debate has enjoyed its equal share of both proponents and opponents. Interestingly, recent research reveals that girls and boys do indeed learn very differently, which adds another level of consideration in the co-ed education debate. In fact, how teachers address the learning discrepancy between the two genders impacts academic performance – a factor critical in the co-ed debate.

The Debate of Cognitive Development

The Recent Academic Data

Indeed, boys and girls face different emotional and physical issues as young students. However, research shows that this difference also delves into the realm of cognitive development. In fact, research has found that boys’ and girls’ cognitive development results in markedly different performance abilities – which partially may be due to the co-ed classroom environment. In recent years, girls have outperformed boys in reading levels assessed on main tests. According to research compiled by educator Sara Mead, while the gap between boys and girls is smaller at the early elementary level, it increases as students reach eighth grade through high school.

When looking at the testing data in science and math, reports once proved that boys’ cognitive performance soared over that of girls’ abilities. While boys are still scoring higher on average than girls in math and science, it has been noted that males “outperform girls only slightly in math and science, in a less drastic proportion than girls’ achievements,” according to Mead.

Learning a language can be a difficult process. Most languages are constantly in flux, with new words regularly added to the lexicon, and old ones are dropping away. Just getting a handle on the vocabulary itself can be overwhelming. Throw into the mix the grammar rules, the punctuation nuances, and even all the slang words, and learning a language can seem as daunting a task as climbing Mount Everest barefoot and blindfolded.

Thankfully, there are increasingly more programs and schools designed to help students who wish to learn a language. Immersion schools are one such program, and they are primarily designed for elementary to high school-aged students. For example, Clark High School in Las Vegas, Nevada, offers a full immersion Chinese school for its students, as well as the Pioneer Valley Chinese Immersion Charter School in Massachusetts. For some students, full immersion in a new language is the best way to learn. For others, it is simply too difficult to learn a new language without any “references” to the language they already know. Here are the advantages and disadvantages of full immersion schools, and what to expect if your child attends one.

The advantage of immersion programs

Many people believe the best way for a student to excel in a foreign language is an immersion program. Advocates also suggest the younger the child, the better it is to send them to an immersion program, and that’s why full-immersion daycare or preschool is so popular. These can

In recent years, home-schooled children seem to be “winning.” They have conquered national spelling bees, obtained generous scholarships to elite universities, and have even been crowned beauty queens. If home-schooled kids are enjoying such success, it is understandable why any parent would ask, “Is regular or home school best for my child?”

Like many questions about your child’s education, this particular one does not have an easy answer. It is important to consider many factors before deciding whether your child should stay at home to learn or should be sent to a regular public school.

Home environment vs. school environment

For many advocates of either homeschooling or public school education, the environment offered by either situation is the determining factor as to whether a child should be home-schooled or sent to a regular public school.

The calm, safe environment of home school

Proponents of homeschooling believe that children thrive better in a safe, comfortable environment with which they are familiar. Ironically, so do advocates of public schooling.

However, home-schoolers believe the home is the safest, most secure environment in which a child can learn. At home, a child does not have to deal with peer pressure or with fitting in with the popular cliques. A child can just “be.” This gives the child the opportunity to focus on the lessons being taught and on the educational expectations required of him or her.

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The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 stated that single-sex education could be provided by recipients of federal education funds, but the lawmakers left the details to be worked out in regulations. Regulations issued in 2006 clarified the conditions for providing single-sex classrooms and extracurricular activities and expanded the former rules on single-sex schools.

Traditionally, public schools, unlike private schools, did not offer single-sex education. Today, at least 366 public schools throughout the nation are either entirely single-sex or have single-sex classrooms. More and more school districts are evaluating the pros and cons of single-sex education. While most public schools will remain coeducational, there may be a good reason to make single-sex schools and classrooms available to some public school students, particularly in schools with underprivileged students and in schools showing repeated poor performance.

It Could Happen Anywhere

Parents, teachers, and students in the school district of Greene County, Georgia, were surprised to hear that their schools were embracing single-sex education in a big way. The school board unanimously decided that beginning in the fall of 2008, all classes in all county schools will be single-sex classes. The move was designed to combat the significant problems of this rural school district, such as poor test scores, increasing dropout rates, and teen pregnancies. Under the plan, elementary school girls and boys will attend separate classrooms and those in grades 7 through 12 will attend separate schools. Greene County is the first entire school system in the U.S. to