People who fret about the supposed failures of American education should see how frightening are some of the proposed alternatives. If Kimberly Kassner, the host of the dreadful Empower Mind for Teens, has teaching credentials, they are not mentioned here or in the publicity materials. Instead of a professional approach based on classic study skills, she fizzes over with attempts to be entertaining, shrieking at her audience of teens, in the first video of the two-part Power Tools for School, to get them to join in several choruses of "When I ACT enthusiastic, I FEEL enthusiastic!" After spouting an homily about "association [being] the basis of all learning," which she has the students repeat (even though they don't appear to understand what she means), she barks: "Got it? Say yes!" This is a rather ironic order, since she disses teachers who believe students when they say they understand. After a cursory look at self-esteem and how students have been traumatized by teachers, Kassner then begins a belabored lesson on how to remember people's names. If the Power Tools for School tapes look and feels like a sales training seminar, the third video in the set, How to Do Twice the Homework in Half the Time, seems like a subversion of education itself. "Reading takes the most time and is the most grueling" part of school," Kimberly Kassner states, and then presents her own four-step plan for skimming through a textbook. If you want to blow off studying, she recommends just reading captions, graphs and summaries and not wasting one's valuable teenage time on all the text stuff (the fourth and optional step in her plan). She promises good grades will follow because the information "will be in your subconscious." She tells the inspiring story of a girl who with a book report due, read "the book cover? On each side? And little bit of the story? And then she put together a paper and still got a B+ on it!" If you want to hear, like, a middle-aged Valley Girl give all her tips on how to cheat your way through school without really learning, this is the ticket. Parents who are desperate to get their kids to improve their grades may shell out for this tape (advertised via television informercial), but schools and public libraries absolutely should not waste the money. Aud: J, H, P. (R. Reagan)
Empower Mind for Teens
(1998) 3 videocassettes, 27-50 min. each. $89.95 (includes 5 audiocassettes and a book). EmpowerMind. PPR. Color cover. Vol. 14, Issue 3
Empower Mind for Teens
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