8-1-14 Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher

Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.:

Guest ten minute drawing. Arthur Goldstein.

As you may know, my drawing arm is presently in a cast. I have invited guest Ten Minute Drawers to fill in. All submissions are welcome. - Arthur Goldstein is a NY city teacher and UFT activist.  Arthur’s art. Text by Fred Klonsky.

3 by Fred Klonsky / 38min hide  //  save

Guest ten minute drawing. H.D. Worth.

As you may know, my drawing arm is presently in a cast. I have invited guest Ten Minute Drawers to fill in. All submissions are welcome. - H.D. Worth is the pseudonym of a Chicago suburban teacher and IEA union activist. “An H.D. Worth original. Done in exactly ten minutes!” he writes.

2 by Fred Klonsky / 1h 

Hinsdale’s town bully is Dr. Richard Skoda. Union has an hour to surrender or they’re locked out.

From the Darien Patch: The Hinsdale High School Teachers Association claims that bargaining team members were given an hour to decide whether or not to rescind a strike authorization vote in exchange for the school board’s assurance to forego its right to a union lockout. Both sides have been meeting with a federal mediator to negotiate a new contract for the professional educators at Hinsdale Ce

by Fred Klonsky / 2min 

Guest ten minute drawing. Leigh Klonsky.

As you may know, my drawing arm is presently in a cast. I have invited guest Ten Minute Drawers to fill in. All submissions are welcome. - Leigh Klonsky is a NYC public high school art teacher and artist.

by Fred Klonsky / 12min

New problems for “Dr.” Carter in New London. His tenure at CPS and AUSL? Anyone? Anyone?

. The troubles for “Dr.” Terrence P. Carter keeping mounting up. He was a slam-dunk choice for New London, Connecticut’s superintendent of schools until his resume turned out to be phonier than a World Wrestling Federation match. The board put the hiring on hold until they could investigate whether he really got a Ph.D. from Stanford. I’m not sure what there is to investigate since Stanford says

1 by Fred Klonsky / 35min 

David Brooks argues for grit. I hate grit. Seniors are poor because they desire immediate gratification? No grit.

There are few people writing in major media today that are dumber than David Brooks in the New York Times. In yesterday’s column he said we should be focused more on teaching poor folks character development and grit. Remember that Mary Tyler Moore episode where Ed Asner and Lou Grant tells Mary she has spunk. “I hate spunk,” he says. Well, I hate grit. At the core of the concept of grit is that

10 by Fred Klonsky / 3h hide  //  save

Words that can get teachers fired.

Until very recently, Timothy Torkildson blogged for the Nomen Global Language Center — an ESL school in Provo, Utah. Earlier this month, Mr. Torkildson wrote a blog post explaining why homophones can be a difficult concept for new English speakers to grasp. Then, he was fired. In his original post entitled “Help with Homophones,” Torkildson wrote, “In English a homophone is a word that has sever

16 by Fred Klonsky / 4h 

7-31-14 Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher

Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.: No ten minute drawings for the next few days.President Eskelsen Garcia. Meet Senate Bill 7.This blogger and NEA President-elect Lily Eskelsen Garcia at the NEA RA in Denver. If you go back and read my report from the Representative Assembly of the NEA – I was a retired delegate – you will see that I t

by mike simpson / 9h 

8-1-14 Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day… | …For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL

Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day… | …For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL:

TIME Chooses Its 50 Best Websites Of The Year & There Is One Gem On The List

TIME has just selected their 50 Best Websites of the Year. You’ll know most of them, and most of the others that you don’t know you don’t really need to know. However, usually I find one or two gems on their annual lists, and today is no exception. Quotacle is that gem, and here’s its description: It’s early days for this site, which lets you search for classic movie quotes along with the relevan

by Larry Ferlazzo / 19min hide  //  save

McKinsey & Company Projects That Common Core Implementation Will Result In 15% Increase In Dropout Rate

Thanks to Lori Jablonski and Tom Hoffman (I’ve embedded Lori’s tweets below), I learned about a report from the Carnegie Corporation that includes charts created by big-time consultants McKinsey & Company. First, the chart: So, based on my quick reading of the Carnegie report, titled Opportunity by Design: New High School Models for Student Success, unless we create small schools and do blend

by Larry Ferlazzo / 19min 

Four Very Good Additional Resources On “Flow”

© 2006 Wesley Fryer, Flickr | CC-BY-SA | via Wylio Boy, there sure are a lot of materials about “Flow” online, and there sure is a dearth of good resources among them. However, there are a few good ones that I’m adding to The Best Resources For Learning About “Flow”: Thoughts About Education: Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is from the John Hopkins School of Education. Here’s an excellent video interview

by Larry Ferlazzo / 15min

Around The Web In ESL/EFL/ELL

© 2010 RTLibrary, Flickr | CC-BY | via Wylio   I’ve started a somewhat regular feature where I share a few posts and resources from around the Web related to ESL/EFL or to language in general that have caught my attention: Try, try again? Study says no: Trying harder makes it more difficult to learn some aspects of language, neuroscientists find is the headline of a Science Daily article about a s

by Larry Ferlazzo / 9min 

Video: Stephen Colbert Does A GREAT Job Interviewing Campbell Brown

Campbell Brown, leading the latest Son of Vergara lawsuit attacking teachers, was a guest on The Colbert Show last night. And, boy, did Colbert do a great job. Check out the video below:

by Larry Ferlazzo / 28min hide  //  save

More Resources On The Ebola Virus Crisis

© 2014 NIAID, Flickr | CC-BY | via Wylio Here are new additions to The Best Resources For Learning About The Ebola Virus: Doctor Infected with Ebola Asks That Experimental Serum Go to Sick Colleague Instead is from The Atlantic. What would happen if Ebola came to the United States? is from Vox. Ebola: Liberia shuts schools to tackle outbreak is from The BBC. Daily chart: Ebola’s spread is from The

by Larry Ferlazzo / 6h 

With Friends Like David Brooks, Social Emotional Learning Doesn’t Need Any Enemies

New York Times columnist David Brooks is at it again, demonstrating the rapidly growing public face of Social Emotional Learning as a “Let Them Eat Character” strategy (which I wrote about in The Washington Post — The manipulation of Social Emotional Learning). His column today, The Character Factory, quickly dismisses the effectiveness of programs that provide economic assistance to low-income p

by Larry Ferlazzo / 7h 

7-31-14 Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day… | …For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL

Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day… | …For Teaching ELL, ESL, & EFL: July’s (2014) Best Tweets — Part FiveEvery month I make a few short lists highlighting my choices of the best resources I through (and learned from) Twitter, but didn’t necessarily include them in posts here on my blog. I’ve already shared in earlier posts several new resources I found on Twitter — and where I gave credit t

by mike simpson / 9h 

Answer Sheet 8-1-14

Answer Sheet:

Stephen Colbert to Campbell Brown: ‘Why are we blaming the teachers? Maybe it’s the dumb kids.’

Stephen Colbert welcomed Campbell Brown to “The Colbert Report” (see video below) on Thursday night to talk about her support for a lawsuit just filed in New York that seeks to eliminate tenure and other job protections for teachers. The Comedy Central host didn’t give the former CNN anchor turned anti-union activist a free pass, asking […]

by Valerie Strauss / 7min

What do standardized tests actually test?

What exactly do standardized tests test? In this post veteran educator Marion Brady  answers that question and its consequences for teaching and learning. Brady has written history and world culture textbooks (Prentice-Hall),  professional books, numerous  nationally distributed columns (many are available here), and courses of study. His 2011 book, “What’s Worth Learning,” asks and answers this q

by Valerie Strauss / 6h 

Answer Sheet 7-31-14

Answer Sheet: A teacher asks Arne Duncan a gutsy question. Here’s the answer.What question would you ask to Education Secretary Arne Duncan if you had the chance? Patrick Hayes, a fifth-grade teacher in Charleston, S.C., and director of EdFirstSC, a nonprofit, nonpartisan advocacy group working to empower people who care about public schools, got that opportunity recently when Duncan had a video c

by mike simpson / 9h 

8-1-14 Schools Matter

Schools Matter:

Hey, Obama Has Faith in Patriotic U. S. Torturers

http://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/politicsnow/la-pn-obama-torture-20140801-story.html

by Jim Horn / 41min 

Ritz's Attacker and the School Privatizers

CECI front-woman Claire Fiddian-Green’s latest assault against Indiana supt. of public ed. Glenda Ritz was her response to the Associated Press recently concerning the “memo” CECI staff sent to Arne Duncan’s office.  In the “memo,” CECI staff criticize the IDOE’s “grammatical errors” and accuse IDOE of making policy changes without the state board of education’s approval while seeking the NCLB wa

by Doug Martin / 2min 

Robert D. Skeels and Doug Martin on War Report on Public Ed Sunday

by Doug Martin I will be joining fellow Schools Matter blogger Robert D. Skeels and BATS member Dr. James Avington Miller Jr. this Sunday, August 3, on the War Report on Public Education.  Robert will be speaking about the upcoming LAUSD school board election (he ran against a billionaire-funded candidate for a board seat in 2013) on the first segment of the radio show, starting at 2 pm Pacific Ca

by Doug Martin / 2min 

"above the snake line"

From NetRoots Nation July 19, Rev. William Barber, the voice of human rights in education:

2 by Jim Horn / 2h 

7-31-14 Schools Matter

Schools Matter: Member of FBI-Raided School Funds Todd Rokita AFTER the Raid: Member of FBI-Raided School Funds Todd Rokita AFTER the Raidby Doug Martin I mention Todd Rokita, the Indiana US congressman from the 4th district, in my book Hoosier School Heistbecause of his role with the Muslim Gulen charter schools recently raided by the FBI (see more on this at the end of this article). Since Rokit

by mike simpson / 26min 

8-1-14 With A Brooklyn Accent:

With A Brooklyn Accent:

The Link Between School Closings and Gentrification- A Chicago Story

The single story that will remain with me longest from Washington was told by Badass Mom founder and Chicago parent leader Rousemary Vega at the workshop on Community Organizing the day before the March. After sharing heartbreaking stories of the harassment she and her family experience fighting the closing of neighborhood schools her children attended, Rousemary said the following. " I live

by Mark Naison / 4h 

7-31-14 With A Brooklyn Accent:

With A Brooklyn Accent: Two Bronx Students Talk About Their Schools and the School To Prison Pipeline   Yesterday, I met with more than an hour with two Bronx high school students in a great Fordham program called "The History Makers" to answer their questions about the School to Prison Pipeline.  After I answered several questions they posed about drug policies, school discipline, race

by mike simpson / 9h 

8-1-14 The Whole Child Blog — Leading and Learning as a Principal

The Whole Child Blog — Whole Child Education:

Leading and Learning as a Principal

Post written by Ashley Allen, a master's student in communication management with an emphasis on marketing at the University of Southern California. She received her bachelor's degree from San Jose State University last spring and hopes to use her writing skills to make a difference. Teacher and principal job satisfaction is down, but Bill Sterrett, an education leadership professor, started off h

by ASCD Whole Child ... / 3h 

7-31-14 The Whole Child Blog — A Letter to My New Principal

The Whole Child Blog — Whole Child Education: A Letter to My New PrincipalWelcome to our school. I have been here for a few years so I wanted to be the first to officially greet you. I am excited to learn more about you and your leadership style. I can imagine that you'd like for me to be to work on time, have prepared lessons and execute them in a personalized manner for my students. I know you e

by mike simpson / 7h 

8-1-14 the becoming radical | A Place for a Pedagogy of Kindness

the becoming radical | A Place for a Pedagogy of Kindness (the public and scholarly writing by P. L. Thomas, Furman University):

James Baldwin, “Unable to Believe” Edu-Refomers

O, but if James Baldwin were here to respond to Campbell Brown, Arne Duncan, Bill Gates, or Michelle Rhee … Let’s imagine …

by plthomasedd / 3min hide  //  save

James Baldwin at 90: “‘I can’t believe what you say,’ the song goes, ‘because I see what you do’”

January 1, 2000, exposed a truly baffling phenomenon about most humans: A silly fascination with numbers that end in zero that completely renders those humans irrational. In the land of the arbitrary where people fear that arbitrary dates can spawn the Apocalypse, the irrational can’t even manage those arbitrary dates as January 1, 2001 (not 2000), was the turning point of the millennium. And so

6 by plthomasedd / 29min 

Critical Studies of Southern Place: A Reader, William Reynolds, Ed.

Critical Studies of Southern Place: A Reader William Reynolds, Ed. [See "Look Inside" here.] Critical Studies of Southern Place: A Reader Peter Lang USA synopsis: Critical Studies of Southern Place: A Reader critically investigates and informs the construction of Southernness, Southern identity, and the South past and present. It promotes and expands the notion of a Southern epistemology

4 by plthomasedd / 3h 

7-30-14 the becoming radical | A Place for a Pedagogy of Kindness

the becoming radical | A Place for a Pedagogy of Kindness (the public and scholarly writing by P. L. Thomas, Furman University): SC’s Zais MistakePublic education has been under assault and misrepresented by political leaders, the media, and the public since (at least) the mid-1800’s. Over the past couple of years, I have documented numerous times the key role mainstream media have played in the f

by mike simpson / 8h