 Welcome to Learning English, a daily 30-minute program from the Voice of America. I'm Ashley Thompson. And I'm Dan Novak. This program is designed for English learners, so we speak a little slower, and we use words and phrases, especially written for people learning English. Coming up on the program, Anna Matteo reports on a Vatican meeting on the future of the Catholic Church. Mario Ritter Jr. has a story on export restrictions, causing food prices to rise around the world. Katie Weaver brings us the Education Report on how one rural American school system has been able to make gains in math. Later, Dan Friedel presents the English lesson of the day. But first… Pope Francis on Wednesday is opening a gathering of bishops and others to discuss the future of the Roman Catholic Church. Some of the discussions include subjects that have never been considered before. For the first time, women and non-clergy can vote alongside bishops in what is called a Synod of Bishops. The change reflects Francis' belief that the Church is more about its people than its leaders. The gathering, called a Synod, starts on October 4th and will end on the 29th. It will be followed by a second gathering next year. The second Synod is expected to put forward detailed proposals for Francis to consider in a future document. The Synod will have 365 voting members, including the Pope, and 54 women. Their numbers are chosen by national bishops, organizations, and religious orders. In addition, there are around 100 experts and facilitators who will help move the discussion along, but they will not vote on a final document. The working document for the gathering came after two years of listening to concerns from Catholics around the world. The aim has been to raise questions and start a debate. For example, the document calls for specific steps to promote women to decision-making positions in the Church. And it calls for Church members to have more influence in Church governance. It also suggests the inclusion of LGBTQ-plus Catholics and measures to prevent clergy from abusing their power. Some conservatives have raised questions about the Synod since Francis announced it three years ago. They said that those questions have already been settled by Church teachings. And raising the questions only risks division among Church members. Just this week, five conservative cardinals from Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas made their disagreement with Pope Francis public. In a letter, they put forward five questions, or dubia, asking Francis to affirm Church teaching on these issues, including homosexuality and female clergy. They said the Synod was creating confusion. Francis answered that changes in the world help the Church to better understand and explain its teachings, and that the Synod is a way to find the path forward. With much sincerity, I tell you it's not good to be afraid of these questions, Francis told them. For two years, the preparation for the Synod has been open to the public. However, the Synod itself will be closed to outsiders. There will be no live stream of the gathering. Organizers say it will be a closed-door meeting. And those taking part have been told not to speak to reporters. No daily briefings are planned, as in earlier Synods, although five briefings are expected to take place over the time of the gathering. Francis has defended the measures. The Pope said he did not want political gossip leaking out with news of attendees arguing over disputed issues. This isn't a television show, he told reporters in August. I'm Anna Mateo. Important foods like grains and cooking oil again are growing more costly in many places around the world. Observers say that is because countries have put export restrictions in place to protect food supplies at home. They also blame the price rise on weather conditions and the Ukraine war. Caroline Kellow is a 28-year-old who works at a hair salon in Kenya's capital, Nairobi. She experienced the rising cost of food while planning meals for her two children. The price of onions has risen by 200% since neighboring Tanzania restricted agricultural exports. Kellow tried a different kind of onion, but those became too costly as well. Cooking oil and corn flour prices are increasing also. So she said, I just decided to be cooking once a day. East Africa has fertile land and a large workforce. But the high cost of growing and transporting crops and a lack of rain have resulted in decreased local production. In the case of onions, the UN Food and Agricultural Organization found that in 2014 Kenya was getting half of its onions from Tanzania. Some traders have tried to get supplies from Ethiopia. Others have stopped selling onions altogether. But Timothy Kinua, who says prices have reached their highest level in seven years, promised he would sell the crop. It's something we can't cook without, he said. Joseph Glauber is with the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington. He said, Tanzania's onion limits this year are one example of the spread of food restrictions. He called it a contagion, or something that spreads like an infectious disease. His organization says that 19 countries have put 41 food export restrictions in place. The restrictions include bans or taxes. India banned the export of some rice earlier this year, cutting one-fifth of the world's export market. Myanmar answered with its own export bans. India has also restricted onion exports. The action sent prices climbing in Bangladesh. Dry weather in Spain has hurt its olive crop, causing European buyers to look to Turkey. But rising prices there led to export limits. Morocco, which suffered a deadly earthquake recently, has also stopped exports of crops, including onions, potatoes, and tomatoes. Over a period of years, food prices change sharply. In 2007 and 2008, rice and wheat prices doubled. Glauber, who also is a former economist for the Department of Agriculture, said changes are likely to continue. I think increased volatility is certainly the new normal, he said. For example, both Russia and Ukraine are major suppliers of wheat, barley, sunflower oil, and several other foods important to developing nations. The conflict between them interferes with production by both. Changes in weather are also affecting agriculture, observers say. El Nino is a periodic warm current in the Southern Pacific Ocean. It is linked to changes in weather in several places around the world. Some scientists say climate change could make the El Nino current more severe, affecting weather everywhere. For example, a lack of rain in India means export restrictions there might not end with the new rice harvest in October. Most at risk from weather changes are nations that depend heavily on imported food. The World Bank, for example, notes that the Philippines imports 14% of its food. However, recent storms could mean further crop deficits. Rice prices there increased 8.7% in August. That is double the increase from the month before. I'm Mario Ritter Jr. Many students across the United States fell behind in math during the COVID-19 pandemic. Many educators are seeking ways to bring students back up to usual math levels. Such efforts paid off for a rural school system in the southern state of Alabama. It has shown major improvement. A study called the Nation's Report Card shows that Alabama students led the nation in maintaining math learning during the pandemic. And the state's Piedmont City school system landed at the top in a comparison of scores from before and during the pandemic. Nationwide, students, on average, fell half a year behind in math, researchers say. The Piedmont school system has about 1,100 students. Seven out of 10 children receive reduced cost or free meals in the schools. The school system has stuck with a policy it established before the pandemic. Teachers use test scores to learn where students are struggling and then target teaching to each child. We made a total transformation about five years ago, said Mike Hayes. The school system's chief, we decided that we were going to let data make every decision. Targeted instruction for small groups of students has years of research and evidence to back it up, said Rebecca Dreyfus of the educational non-profit TNTP. The short answer is that using data effectively and efficiently to plan and monitor instruction is always going to make instruction better for kids, Dreyfus said. Piedmont students were 35th in math skills for the state in 2017 when Hayes became the school system's leader. By spring 2022, Piedmont students had moved to 12th position. Once we made that decision and stuck to it and made changes and allowed our teachers time to look at the data and dive into the data, it paid off, Hayes said. As part of the effort, the Piedmont school system made the school day longer. This permitted time every four weeks for data days when educators get together to study the numbers. Cassie Holbrooks teaches fourth grade math. She said the data days help teachers see where the weaknesses are. And target instruction. Sixth grade teacher Lisa Hayes joined the school system five years ago. She said she was surprised to see how hard teachers worked during the data days. When I came here and we had a work day, she said, you don't sit in your room. You're in here, the media center, most of the day digging through test scores. Teachers then use the information to decide how to divide the students into small groups for targeted instruction. Grouping two to six students together to work on a specific skill has long been used for reading instruction and in younger grades. There is less research on the use of targeted small group instruction in math. But researchers like Dreyfus say it involves the same idea of identifying students who need extra help rather than simply pulling out children who are behind. While math teachers in Piedmont schools work with small groups, other students write in their math books, play learning games, or work on individual learning plans. At first when Piedmont expanded small group instruction in math, teachers said they did not have enough time to do the work well, Hayes said. So the schools expanded math and English language study time to between 80 and 120 minutes each day. The longer math classes made a big difference, Teacher Landon Pruitt said. In a 52 or 53 minute class, he said, there's no way you can consistently do small groups and work on getting through the standards that you have to cover. The schools also had to help teachers adjust classroom management techniques as small groups and independent work would be done at the same time. Hayes said one solution was to give teachers a program to monitor each student's screen. The district wants to make sure teachers have the support and resources to do the job well, he added. I'm not sure we have a secret sauce or anything Hayes said, but he noted that the teachers believe in learning data and letting that data direct instruction. I'm Katie Weaver. That was Katie Weaver with today's Education Report. Katie joins me now to talk more about the story. Today's report was about a school system in Alabama that led the nation in maintaining math learning during the pandemic. You talked about the finding of a study called the nation's report card. Can you tell us more about that? The nation's report card is officially called the National Assessment of Educational Progress or NAPE. The National Center for Education Statistics, an agency of the Department of Education, carries out the study. When did the nation's report card begin? The first assessment was in 1969. It's grown and changed over the years. The results of the testing help inform national education policies. The test is voluntary for every student, school, and state by federal law. However, if some states or school systems do not take part, they risk losing federal financial support. What about private schools? Did they take part of the nation's report card? Sure. For each assessment, a sample of schools is chosen from the Private School Universe Survey, PSS for short. It collects and stores data on more than 33,000 non-public schools in the 50 states and the nation's capital, Washington, D.C. Very interesting. Thanks for coming on the show today, Katie. My pleasure, Dan. In this next report, John Russell tells us about a British artist who creates art on an unusual surface. Pieces of dried chewing gum that have been crushed into the ground. Pay careful attention to the word spontaneous. We will talk more about it after the report. Lying on London's famous Millennium Bridge, British artist Ben Wilson paints on a piece of dried gum. It has been crushed flat into the ground. The important thing is the gum is below the metal tread, said the 60-year-old Wilson. The beauty of it is their all different shapes and sizes, he continued, describing pieces of gum. Wilson sees possibility in things most people avoid looking at. The flattened gum is a chance to turn a piece of waste into something beautiful. The artwork also is a way to surprise walkers and get them to take a closer look at the path they are on. By painting a picture which is so small, those that see it then discover a hidden world beneath their feet, Wilson said. Back in his North London art room, Wilson paints on the surface of a small mosaic tile. It will be part of a collection that he is creating on the walls of London's underground train platforms. The images are more personal than the chewing gum works, Wilson says, and represent a kind of visual diary. The pictures are a celebration of my life and those that I care dearly about, he said. They are a process of visual inquiry, trying to make sense of the world, he added. Wilson was born in London to artist parents. He remembers working with Clay from the age of three. He had his first art show when he was around 10 or 11 years old. He began making sculptures and large pieces for display in nature settings. Then his interest turned to waste, also called trash. He has been painting gum and other pieces of trash for 19 years. The top surface of the dried gum is not subject to local or national laws. As a result, the dried gum surface creates a space where Wilson says he can paint without damaging public property. I found this little space where I could create a form of art, where I could be spontaneous and do something which evolves out of the place in which it's created, Wilson said. Government officials have removed much of the artist's public street art, but the hundreds of gum paintings on Millennium Bridge remain for all to see. I'm John Russell. Before the report, we asked you to pay careful attention to the word spontaneous. Can you remember when you heard it? You heard the word in a quote from Ben Wilson. Let's listen again. I found this little space where I could create a form of art, where I could be spontaneous and do something which evolves out of the place in which it's created, Wilson said. The word spontaneous is an adjective. It can be a tricky word. We spell it like this. S-P-O-N-T-A-N-E-O-U-S. Spontaneous dates to the 1650s, according to the online etymology dictionary. Spontaneous originally meant occurring without external stimulus, proceeding from an internal impulse. It comes from a Latin word meaning willing of one's free will. In the quote from Ben Wilson, he said he wanted to create a form of art, where he could be spontaneous, meaning he could create art in a natural and sudden way without a lot of planning. Google's nGram viewer suggests that one of the most common ways English speakers use spontaneous is as part of a noun phrase that begins with the short word ah. So you might hear or read about a spontaneous decision or a spontaneous action. We also have a noun that is closely related to spontaneous. It is spontaneity, meaning a spontaneous character or quality. But Google's nGram viewer tells us that spontaneity is much less frequently used than spontaneous. As a result, you can think of spontaneity and spontaneous as family members, but one, spontaneous, the adjective and star of this lesson, is more popular. Let's end with a short quiz. Fill in the blank in the following sentence. He described the artwork as blank, blank, expression of joy. Here is one possible answer. He described the artwork as a spontaneous expression of joy. And that's the lesson of the day. I'm Dan Friedel. And that's our program for today. Join us again tomorrow to keep learning English through stories from around the world. I'm Ashley Thompson. And I'm Dan Novak.