On shopping while brown

This is out of control. The discussion always boils down to black and white, but ignores all the shades in between. My mother had to have "the talk" with me back when I was a kid and the pharmacy we used had a habit of following any customers they deemed 'suspicious'. Apparently I always looked 'suspicious' when I went in there, since the so-called security person would follow me like a shark after an injured surfer.
Fast forward to today. I'm too dark to satisfy the ignorant redneck parents, yet lack sufficient melanin to please the African-American families.
Beg pardon, but there are a lot of us on this very broad spectrum, who have had to deal with subtle and non-subtle prejudice for years. Bigotry comes in many flavors.

Of standards, rigor, and 'high expectations'

As I read about the Taliban attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar, Pakistan, resulting in the deaths of 145 people, mostly students, headlines fly around my mind, like

Pakistani gravedigger weeps over Taliban schoolkid victims

The Taliban's caliphate of chaos in Pakistan: Siddiqui

Pakistan militants: Children's massacre was to avenge army strikes

Why the Pakistani Taliban's war on children keeps on going  (7700 articles and counting, as of 8:30 pm tonight)

And then I go into work and try to convince my American students, who are privileged by comparison, and everything I see is an echo of this teacher's epiphany. I could have written what she wrote, if I weren't so beat down and exhausted that clear writing is nearly impossible. I am a textbook example right now of 'Executive Function Overload'. I'm so stressed and worn out I can barely drag myself to work every day.  My school talks a lot about 'standards-based' classrooms, but all the information provided, all the examples given, seem to be focused on the look of the room, rather than the content or quality of the lessons. We've just been treated to a big pitcher of koolaid on the topic of the Self-fulfilling Prophecy and the Pygmalion Effect (Rosenthal, 1968 article here)

I read another piece by a teacher who took her leaders at their word and held her students to high standards, with the consequences that came of not completing assignments despite numerous opportunities, afterschool tutoring, etc. She was called in to account for her pass/fail rate, and was told that if students were failing, then she had failed them. she changed her lessons, with the same result. In the end,

When she talks about the exhortations to set high standards, I hear the echo. When she talks about being attacked for doing exactly that, I have flashbacks. To this afternoon, when a parent chewed me out for asking her daughter to rewrite her plagiarized project. To the week before last, when a parent yelled at me over the phone about whatever she thought were my failings, as if it somehow makes her son's constant disruption of the learning environment more acceptable. To the school year quite some time back when I stopped bothering to grade actual work, but just recorded 65s and 75s in the gradebook, so that the final averages would meet the minimum to pass. I had had all I could take of explaining to parents why their children couldn't earn As without doing exceptional work, but especially why they couldn't earn Cs without doing any work. Because, you see, I don't GIVE grades. Students have to EARN them. And they work very hard to either pass or fail in any class I teach. What I'm wondering is simply this: at what point does the student pick up the ball? The quarterback can't win the game all alone. Right now, I'm feeling like Tim Tebow when his time in the NFL ended. MAybe I should just drop to one knee and pray?

Drowning in KoolAid

We are all familiar with the phrase- "drinking the koolaid". It's a reference to the followers of People's Temple founder Jim Jones, who willingly drank poisoned fruit punch (Flavor-Aid brand) in response to his command that they commit suicide as a 'revolutionary act'. In the end, over 900 people died in the Guyana jungle where Jones had hoped to establish a Utopian community.


Well, in the effort to create a Utopia in our schools, an awful lot of poisoned punch is being served up: data-driven decision making, test-based accountability, 'rigor', high standards, Common Core,  high-stakes tests, 'school choice', charters, vouchers, and more. One of the worst has to be the rah-rah sessions referred to as "Professional Learning Communities". The term comes from the work of Rick and Rebecca DuFour and others. Ostensibly, a group of professional educators comes together on a regular basis to learn and share. They are supposed to set their own agenda, their own goals, and formulate their own plan to achieve those goals.


In daily practice in my district, PLCs are just another meeting with agenda dictated from above and predetermined outcomes. Exchange of ideas is not welcomed, and dissent is actively discouraged. Anyone with ideas or opinions not in line with the agenda and outcomes is to be silenced by whatever means. In other words, drink the koolaid, smile, and be happy about it. Yesterday I just about hit my limit.


Please, sir, could I have some more? NOT

What is the real agenda?

At the risk of sounding like a conspiracy theory nut, I have come to the conclusion that there is a reason my school is being starved of resources and picked apart by critical visitors. We just had another of those visits, and I'm not looking forward to the faculty debrief meeting, based on what I heard the principal endured. We've been singled out for mandates and nonsense not imposed on the other middle schools in the district, even though we've been repeatedly told otherwise. Funny how no one realizes we can call and email colleagues at the other schools and just ask?
Anyway, the conclusion I've reached is this: the long-range plan is to close the school, and probably convert it to a charter. What other logical reason can there be for withholding resources, running off staff, and browbeating those who remain? We are under capacity, and have been for 3 or 4 years now. Meanwhhile, our nearest neighbor school is just 5 minutes away with trailers, but the board doesn't make the slightest adjustment in attendance zones. It's a formula for failure. 'Tho' this be madness, yet there is method in it.'

The emperor has no clothes

As new Common Core exams are rolled out across the country, more and more of this will happen.
New York State already encountered similar problems with the new tests. Here is Jeannie Kaplan's description of the situation in Colorado: http://kaplanforkids.wordpress.com/2014/11/13/news-flash-students-will-not-learn-the-subject-if-teachers-are-not-allowed-to-teach-the-subject/

Russ on Reading: I Blog; Therefore, I Am

The issue of debate that Russ describes, whether one can think deeply without having acquired basic skills, seems, to me to serve mostly as an excuse by one educator to dismiss a large portion of his student base instead of taking an opportunity to be part of their intellectual development. This person is basically saying that he/she won't 'waste time' on students who are not at some predetermined performance level. Those students are often the most insightful and original thinkers; what a loss to this educator who refuses to engage with them.




Russ on Reading: I Blog; Therefore, I Am:        Descartes said, “I think; therefore, I am.” I want our students to say, “I read and write; therefore, I can think.” Rene Descar...

finally someone sees through it

apparently no x-ray glasses were required.
http://educationvotes.nea.org/2014/06/03/al-law-using-public-dollars-to-subsidize-tuition-at-private-schools-ruled-unconstitutional/

When will the madness end?

From Pennsylvania:  new legislation targeting teachers.http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2014/06/pa-newest-state-to-assault-teaching.html?m=1

More than words

Campaign to get us thinking about what we say.
http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/30/living/duke-you-dont-say-identity/index.html?c=us&page=0

Yay Carol Burris

And without due process protection, she could be fired fot telling the truth..


http://m.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2014/04/29/the-scary-way-common-core-test-cut-scores-are-selected/

Don't drink the koolaid

And don't eat the sandwich:     http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2014/03/poop-sandwich.html?m=1   

I hate it when a supposedly secure and dependable website suddenly loses all my information. We have a state-run website for teacher job openings (public schools). It used to be a one-stop application process; not quite so much now, but still, I've had my profile there for several years. Today I looked and saw something intriguing, but before I could proceed, there was an alert to update my profile. OK, start date needs to be fixed. No problem, right?  WRONG! All the rest of my info seems to be gone. Damn if I want to go through all that shit again. This is at least the second time their server has done this, and I'm tired of it. There isn't another place to see all, or almost all, of the public school openings in the state. Outside stuff like Monster and Indeed is outdated by the time they list it, and their search functions are useless.

a new Science blog

Labcoat Life, at Nature
http://www.nature.com/scitable/blog/labcoat-life

Public Television and Public Schools

Should be supporting each other, right? Maybe not, when corporate funding comes into play.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-dreier/public-television-education_b_5130372.html


Don't forget David Sirota's investigation of the money trail behind the PBS  'documentary' series bashing public pension programs.

Public Schools for Sale? | Moyers & Company | BillMoyers.com

Public Schools for Sale? | Moyers & Company | BillMoyers.com




This might partially make up for some of the nonsense he's aired recently...

Now here's a scalable plan for "accountability"

http://dianeravitch.net/2014/02/16/texas-parents-give-grades-to-legislators-its-ugly/

If we continue to perpetuate the myth that "everyone should go to college", then the counselors will keep meeting the kids (and parents) who inspire these unspoken comments:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2014/02/10/the-greatest-line-i-never-said-by-college-admissions-counselors/
As a public school teacher, I can name a few administrators who fall into the same category...

Some things just get better with time...

so why do we keep chasing after the NEXT great thing? sometimes the one right in front of you is just dandy, thank you very much. Not that I want to give up my computer, but I also think there is too much technology for its own sake, especially in the classroom. (Evaluation checklists aren't helping that, I might add...)
http://dianeravitch.net/2014/02/15/in-praise-of-the-pencil/

If I have to hear the word "DATA" one more time...

I have all the 'data' that I need. It's in the understanding or confusion on the kids' faces when we teach. It's in the work they complete and I check. It's in their quiz grades and test grades. It's in their lab data sheets. In other words, my gradebook. why should all (or any) of that be on the wall? I'm with Carolyn on this.  http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2014/02/14/how-data-walls-in-classrooms-can-humiliate-young-kids/ 

World views

On the subject of teaching science, if you want to prove old ideas wrong, you must first know what the heck they are:
http://www.artofteachingscience.org/evolution-might-be-a-law-but-student-ideas-are-important/




On my choice of college major, please stay out of my intellectual endeavors. That's like telling me what books I should spend time reading. I'll choose, thank you. That degree in art history has served me well, for instance in teaching social studies (long story, but there it is) and using political cartoons and ads in lessons. Plus, I love visiting old buildings, and I did a lot more on trips abroad than just go shopping!
http://dianeravitch.net/2014/02/15/alexandra-miletta-what-i-learned-by-studying-art-history/


http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/style-blog/wp/2014/01/30/president-obama-disses-culture-with-art-history-degree-punch-line/


http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/01/30/but-what-do-the-art-history-majors-think-of-president-obama/