Events for the week of April 2-6:
3rd Faith North Girls VB vs. Herrera at Herrera 4:45 Go North Stars!
4th and 5th Teacher Initiated Conferences of Concern (Early Release both days)
4th Site Council-5:00 and PTA meeting-6:00 on the FNM@Shaw campus
6th No School

Hello Faith North Community,

I was recently reading an article called "The Trouble with Sponge Bob" by Montessorian and University Professor Angelina Lillard who wrote about a study she did with children and television viewing. In this study Lillard points out that as a society, we used to be very concerned with IQ but that today, we are more interested in our decision making abilities. How well we can pay attention, plan, remember things, appropriately express/inhibit emotion and think outside of the box. These are considered our Executive Functions (EF) and they are characteristics that matter most to our success as adults in contemporary society.
Lillard studied 60 children to evaluate their EF. The first group drew for 9 minutes, the second group viewed 9 minutes of fast paced cartoons. What do you think she found----Yep! The children who watched the fast paced television scored significantly lower on the EF tests than their peers that drew. So after just 9 minutes of rapid fire television, EF was impaired. How much television does your child watch a day? More than 9 minutes?
The full text of the article may be viewed at:http://psychcentral.com/news/2011/09/13/spongebob-squarepants-may-hinder-kids-ability-to-learn/29375.html

See you tomorrow at the Spring Carnival!
All the best,
Susan Engdall
Principal