After-School Care
Posner and Vandell’s article, "Low-Income
Children’s After-School Care:
Are There Beneficial Effects of
After-School Programs" provides valuable
research to support the need for
quality after-school programs for low-income
children. Low-income children
need after-school programs like UCLinks because
"poverty affects children
directly because it limits the material resources
available to them and
indirectly because of the psychological distress it
engenders in parents,
which in turn negatively influences parental
behavior."(1) The time a child
spends after-school is also important to
their academic and social
development. The quality and type of after-school care
a child receives
directly correlates to their performance in school and growth
in academic
abilities. The UCLinks program was created to offer low-income
children a
quality, academic after-school program. In the UCLinks program, they
have
children develop their academic skills in language arts,
reading
comprehension, off-computer activities, and mathematics. The
UCLinks
after-school program works on bringing the children up to grade level
or
furthering their development. It does not serve as a homework center
for
children. Instead, the UCLinks program concentrates on fostering their
academic
talent in an organized environment. In Posner and Vandell’s article,
they
document research that promotes organized, academic after-school
care,
"Children’s academic and conduct grades were positively related to
time
spent in one-to-one academic work, with an adult, whereas academic and
conduct
grades were negatively correlated with the amount of time spent in
outdoor
unorganized activities." (454) The children of the UCLinks program
work
with a mentor in 1-1 or 1-2 setting, where mentors specifically focus
on
academic areas they need to improve or help them develop their abilities
to the
fullest. 1B. The UCLinks program understands how important reading
skills are to
children’s success in school. If children do not learn to read
at grade level,
they have a greater risk of falling behind in class work and
eventually dropping
out. The UCLinks program uses a combined approach to
reading instruction with
whole language and specific skills development. In
each mentoring session of the
UCLinks program, the mentors practice whole
language instruction. Children have
the opportunity to read one on one with
their mentor. Bill Honig advocates this
interaction with the children,
"Teachers classroom routine should include
reading good literature to
students and discussing it with them, especially by
asking questions that
stretch children’s minds beyond the literal meaning of
the text."(3) The
active participation the children engage in while reading
to their mentors is
productive because the children are able to practice
decoding, automatic
recognition of words, and improve their reading
comprehension. Mentors ask
their students relevant questions about the book that
pertain to the plot,
main points and theme of the story. The UCLinks program
also practices the
specific skills development with their students. Specific
skills development
focuses on phonemic awareness, phonics, print awareness, word
structure, and
word-attack and self-monitoring skills. Honig recommends specific
skills
development, "Students should be taught these skills in an
active,
problem-solving manner that offers plenty of opportunities to
practice the
skills in actual reading and writing situations."(13) Children
work on
computer software like Kid Phonics to develop these specific skills
which will
ultimately help them read better. The children of the UCLinks
program can also
spend off-computer time writing stories and poems which
immerses them in print
awareness and word structure. 1C. In "Children,
Mathematics, and
Computers" by D. H Clements, he writes "It appears the
dominant focus
of school mathematics instruction in the last decade has been
on computational
skills(which students are learning fairly well), but that
the development of
problem-solving skills and conceptual understanding has
been
inadequate."(1) The focus on computational skills rather than
the
problem-solving and conceptual understanding hinder the mathematical
abilities
of students. As math becomes more abstract, they do not have the
required mind
state to solve problems with higher level concepts. The UCLinks
program supports
the teaching of relational mathematics, according to Skewer,
knowing what to do
and why, over rote learning with their students. The solid
mental foundation
relational mathematics builds will increase the
mathematical abilities of the
children and help them problem-solve as math
becomes more complex and abstract.
The teaching of relational mathematics
in the UCLinks program can be observed
with the use of pencil and paper,
manipulatives, and computers to help children
understand mathematical
concepts and problem-solving. These practices are
further supported in
Clements article, "National Council of Teachers in
Mathematics recommends
that students be actively involved in learning,
experimenting with,
exploring, and communicating about mathematics."(4) The
development of
children’s mathematical abilities increases when they actually
learn the
concepts behind the math problems and how to solve them on their own.
The
interaction children have with pencil and paper and manipulatives
stimulates
their thought process and helps them understand why. Computers
also present an
interesting new way to learn mathematics with software like
Math Blaster and
Mighty Math Heroes. Children need to learn mathematics
solutions that actively
engage them. If they are strictly prohibited to
computation, children will lose
their interest in mathematics as they grow
older.