Are Screens “Digital Heroin?”

By Dan Willingham

A piece appeared in the New York Post on August 27 with the headline “It’s digital heroin: How screens turn kids into psychotic junkies.”

Even allowing for the fact that authors don’t write headlines, this article is hyperbolic and poorly argued. I said as much on Twitter and my Facebook page, and several people […]

• Articles
• Attention
• Behavior
• Comprehension
• Organizing and Processing
• Retention

Retention Is Not The Answer!

by Alice Thomas

It’s that time of year…again.  And…if we keep doing the same thing over and over, we will keep getting the same results.

For over 40 years, study after study on grade retention has reached the same conclusion: Failing a student, particularly in the critical ninth grade year, is the single largest predictor of whether […]

• Articles
• Retention

Spanked With Words: More Damaging Than We May Realize

By Robert Brooks, Ph.D.

While conducting therapy with children, I often ask them about their understanding of why their parents discipline them and the kinds of disciplinary practices in which their parents engage. I also attempt to gain their perspective of how justified they consider the disciplinary measures to be and what, if anything, they learn […]

• Articles
• Emotions
• Retention

Position Statement On Student Grade Retention And Social Promotion

Revision adopted by the National Association of School Psychologists Delegate Assembly on April 12, 2003.

The increasing emphasis on educational standards and accountability has rekindled public and professional debate regarding the use of grade retention as an intervention to remedy academic deficits. While some politicians, professionals, and organizations have called for an end to “social promotion,” […]

• Articles
• Retention

Grade Retention: Achievement And Mental Health Outcomes

National Association for School Psychologists by Gabrielle E. Anderson, Angela D. Whipple, & Shane R. Jimerson

Introduction

In response to increasing pressures to improve school performance, legislation and policies regarding grade level promotion standards have been developed at the national, state and district levels. The result has been a call for the “end of social promotion” and […]

• Articles
• Retention