CURMUDGUCATION: ICYMI: Curtain Up Edition (9/26)
Curtain Up Edition
CATCH UP WITH CURMUDGUCATION
Almost unlocking a mystery of SAT scoresSo close. Sooooo close!! Covering the release of SAT scores this year, WTOP news noted two results and put them right in the headline: Va., Md. SAT scores rise, but number of test-takers plunges It's the "but" that tells us that somehow, they didn't manage connect the dots, which is a shame, given there were only two. Of course, they mean average test scores rose, and understanding averages is im
Critical Race Theory Panic Continues To Widen Its AimMoms for Liberty is one of the frontline group s fighting against "critical race theory" and a whole lot of other things. Launched initially as anti-maskers and anti-school closers, they quickly moved on to anti-race stuff. They are another of the groups that has hired some pros and generally displayed available resources that are impressive--even unbelievable-- for just a group of moms. They're
If You Have Missed Michelle Rhee...She Who Must Not Be Named is back, a little. One of the early examples of how one can parlay two years in Teach for America into a career as an educational "expert," she took over DC schools, launched some advocacy groups, established herself as a major brand (the Kim Kardashian of education reform), and then--poof. Her career turned out to be brief after all . Dogged by controversy and revelatio
ICYMI: Tech Sunday Edition (9/19)Yes, I'm directing a community theater production again, and in the time of covid it's quite the adventure. This time it's the Wizard of Oz, and today we enter the final run-up to performance, so if I don't seem to be logging as many hours at the Institute, that's why. But we have reading for today. Ida's Wild Ride The indispensable Mercedes Schneider keeps us updated on her Ida-related adventure
School Choice Isn't Uber. It's LulaRoe.I didn't mean to watch; I really didn't. But my wife started in on the LulaRoe documentary and I was sucked in. Mostly because the founding couple, DeAnne Brady and Mark Stidham are such truly awful people, but they were awful in a way that immediately rang a bell. There are some superficial similarities. In particular, the multi-level marketing pyramid scheme aspects of LulaRoe, where the focus
FL: The Big Standardized Test is dead. Long live the Big Standardized Test!As widely noted, Florida's Governor Ron DeSantis has had a testing epiphan y. "More learning and less test prep," he says, and his right hand education man Richard Corcoran says, gee, testing really is a waste of as lot of time (he only just noticed this during the pandemic BS Test suspension period). Man, that Big Standardized Test is bad news, says the top guys in the state that wrote the book
How To Undermine The Teaching Of ReadingNo, this is not yet another salvo in the reading wars, because I don't care where you fall on the pure phonics -- just take your holistic guess continuum, you have to believe in the power of content knowledge. There's plenty of evidence of the importance of content knowledge, though I'm partial to the old baseball experiment , in which it turned out that students have a higher reading comprehensi
What's Too Controversial for the ClassroomJohn Wallis was a fresh new teacher, hired to teach drama, world mythology, and speech and debate at Neosho Junior High in southwestern Missouri. He hung a gay pride flag and a sign saying "In This Classroom, EVERYONE Is Welcome." He was told a parent complained, so he took the items down. Students asked why. He explained, said the flag did not represent what he would teach in his class, and went
ICYMI: 9/12 Edition (9/12)9/11 was one thing; what started to happen in this country on the twelfth is something else entirely, but we don't have national days of remembrance about that. Meanwhile, there's plenty to read about in the world of education. NH "education freedom" accounts cost soaring NH implemented vouchers; now it's turning out to be way more expensive than advocates promised. Proctorio's awful reviews disa
Arne Duncan and Pedagogical Badger HatsArne Duncan was at it again, popping up on Fareed Zakaria's CNN show to talk about post-covid education (looking kind of Herman Munster-ish on his Zoom screen). Much of his shtick was predictable. Students are months behind ( which actually means , of course, scores on the Big Standardized Test are down, we think). We have to meet their social emotional needs, as we accelerate learning (just, you
Backpacks Full Of CashJeanne Allen's magical phrase , turned into a rhetorical weapon against her and other free market choicers, never seems to quite go away, perhaps because all sides find it an apt description of free-market choice. Right now they're getting ready to load up more backpacks out in LA . Allen was sure
