11 Area Schools Add the 4th R--Resourcefulness

One school puts kindergartners and second-graders in the same class. Another uses videotaped report cards. A third makes ballet part of the curriculum.

These programs and others are paid for by special state grants won by 11 area schools. The goal is to take a new idea and make a better school with it.

Nearly all of the 11 schools serve many immigrants and disadvantaged students whose academic skills lag. The five-year grants provide an opportunity for the schools to buy computers, train teachers and devise better ways of doing things.

The schools won the funds, which are called restructuring grants, by submitting proposals to the California Department of Education. Statewide, 822 schools applied and 144 received the funding. Reform efforts at one of the schools, Compton High, are profiled on Page J1.

Here is a partial list of what other area schools are doing as part of this program:

*Garfield Elementary, Bell Gardens

Principal Janet Torncello has set up classrooms where older students learn by helping to teach younger students. The school also has started requiring older students to perform community service projects.

Part of the grant also will be used to remodel the kindergarten playground to include a garden, bike paths and tables for outdoor lessons. The school also is purchasing books that parents may check out to read to their children.

*Tracy High, Cerritos

Tracy High is for students who have had problems in a traditional high school, who have fallen behind in their work or who wish to combine school with a job. The school is developing a computerized training program for students who want their education to lead directly to a job.

Principal George Hershey wants a program that combines computer simulations of work situations with actual job experiences. He also wants his vocational program to teach students how to work with other people. “No matter how well students are prepared in a specific career area, if they don’t get along, they won’t be successful,” he said.

*Gardenhill Elementary, La Mirada

This elementary school is developing new ways to grade students. Instead of relying on report cards, the school has begun making audiotapes and videotapes of each student. In kindergarten, for example, a teacher can trace the development of a child’s speaking skills by making periodic videos of the child reciting poems or singing.

The school bought computers to establish an electronic file on each child’s progress. The school also has equipment that will allow Gardenhill students to communicate via a videophone with students and teachers from other schools.

With additional grant money, the school has established an arts program through which all students receive an introduction to dance and operatic training.

*Jordan High, Long Beach

The Jordan High plan has two parts called “houses” and “career paths.” Ninth-graders are divided into 140-student houses that share the same teachers. The instructors work together to plan lessons and solve student problems. Later, students will choose a career path such as law-related education, business and technology or performing arts. The law path, for example, would include specific courses on law enforcement or the legal profession. Some basic academic courses also would have a vocational slant, such as Spanish for court reporters.

In addition, the school has brought to the campus a college preparatory curriculum called the International Baccalaureate Program. Students can apply to receive college credit for many of the program’s classes.

*Washington Middle School, Long Beach

Many students fall behind or become uninterested because they have little say in their school and education, Principal Shawn Ashley said. To address this problem, Ashley has divided the school into families of 300 students. Each family has the same 10 teachers from sixth through eighth grades. Each family plans events for itself and for the whole school, such as awards assemblies and dances.

Other efforts include making students serve suspensions in school as part of special classes and giving teams of teachers more responsibility for student discipline.

*Cesar Chavez Elementary, Norwalk

Chavez Elementary (formerly Walnut Elementary) has an arts program designed to improve self-esteem and give children a chance to succeed outside academics. Like Gardenhill Elementary, the school brings in professional dance teachers to expose children to movement from ballet to African dance.

The school also has invested its money in teacher training and after-school reading tutors. Other after-school activities include a homework club, field hockey and, next year, a family science class, administrative assistant Geneva Painton said.

*Los Cerritos Elementary, Paramount

Like Garfield Elementary in Bell Gardens, Los Cerritos is setting up classrooms that mix students of different ages. Next year, administrators hope to have at least two grade levels in every class, coordinator Scott Bohlender said. “Upper-grade children retain more knowledge because they are teachers for the younger children,” he said.

The school also is letting teachers offer their own optional specialty subjects, such as dinosaur study, to reinforce basic reading and writing skills. In addition, the school has a classroom where parent volunteers may leave their preschoolers while they help teachers in the classroom. Parent volunteer hours have climbed from fewer than 200 a year to more than 1,900.

*Paramount High, Paramount

As with similar plans at Jordan High in Long Beach and Compton High, Paramount administrators want to create a campus that prepares students for finding work while paying more attention to academic and personal problems.

All ninth-grade students will be divided into “families” that share a group of teachers. The team of instructors plans lessons and helps students cope with peer or family problems.

In the upper grades, students choose a career path, such as medicine and health or office finance and marketing. The school hopes to provide mentors for students in various professions.

*Signal Hill Elementary, Signal Hill

The goal at Signal Hill Elementary is to ensure that by the third grade, all students have acquired the expected academic skills, program director Claudia Kreis said.

Restructuring efforts at the year-round school include: training a staff of five teachers to offer special reading training; purchasing 36 terminals for a computer lab that will offer course work in Spanish and English; extending kindergarten instruction from the required 180 to the equivalent of 240 days, and increasing parent involvement.

*Orchard Dale Elementary, Whittier

Orchard Dale has used much of its grant money to buy high-tech equipment. Every third-, fourth- and fifth-grade classroom has three computers. The school also has purchased laser disc and computer-linked compact disc players. In addition, Principal Diane House has offered after-school classes and asked teachers to create community-service projects at every grade level.

State Grants to Restructure Schools SCHOOL:Tracy High DISTRICT: ABC Unified GRANT: $222,750 SCHOOL: Compton High DISTRICT: Compton Unified GRANT: $1,452,385 SCHOOL: Orchard Dale Elementary DISTRICT: East Whittier City GRANT: $523,800 SCHOOL: Jordan High DISTRICT: Long Beach Unified GRANT: $1,800,000 SCHOOL: Signal Hill Elementary DISTRICT: Long Beach Unified GRANT: $639,288 SCHOOL: Washington Middle DISTRICT: Long Beach Unified GRANT: $738,000 SCHOOL: Garfield Elementary DISTRICT: Montebello Unified GRANT: $639,045 SCHOOL: Gardenhill Elementary DISTRICT: Norwalk-La Mirada GRANT: $429,300 SCHOOL:Walnut Elementary DISTRICT:Norwalk-La MiradaGRANT: $417,105 SCHOOL: Los Cerritos Elementary DISTRICT: Paramount Unified GRANT: $472,500 SCHOOL: Paramount High DISTRICT: Paramount Unified GRANT: $2,581,500