Using Student Journal Writing to Fight Bad School Reform
Every student should have a journal including most students with disabilities and ELL students. Journal writing is one of the best teaching techniques to show students that their voice matters and that their schools are about who they are and what they do.
It also teaches students many writing skills. It is a 180 degree turn from the lockstep Uncommon School’s orderly march like a soldier, stare like a zombie, and get clicked at like an elephant in a circus performance, schools that reformers think will shape students up and make them conform.
Kate Walsh, President of the National Council on Teacher Quality and David Coleman, President of the College Board don’t think journal writing matters.
They are wrong. My guess is many teachers are like me and know the value of having students keep journals.
Walsh, who has her knickers in a knot about how the “the reformers” are sometimes divided on what teachers should teach, even though reformers don’t teach, said Kids are paying a high price for our neglect. It [the reformers inability to get their act Using Student Journal Writing to Fight Bad School Reform: