A Note to My Leaf-Burning Neighbors | Live Long and Prosper

A Note to My Leaf-Burning Neighbors | Live Long and Prosper

A Note to My Leaf-Burning Neighbors

AUTUMN

Ah…who doesn’t love the nostalgic scent of burning leaves in the fall?

Answer: Anyone with lungs!

It’s Autumn in Indiana and my woodsy neighborhood is filled with fallen leaves. Many of my neighbors are recycling them by mulching them into their lawns or gardens or hiring crews to pick them up. Some others, are piling them up and setting them ablaze, and by doing so filling the air with poisonous toxins and choking ash.

IT’S JUST ONE LITTLE FIRE

What damage can one little fire cause?

It’s not just one little fire…it’s several since we live in an addition with dozens of houses and hundreds of leaf-dropping trees. The point is that “multiple fires in one geographic area can cause concentrations of air pollutants that exceed federal air quality standards” – at least until the current EPA decides that the right of citizens to breathe is just not a priority.

And, about those lungs…

Besides being an irritant, leaf smoke contains many hazardous chemicals, including carbon monoxide and benzo(a)pyrene. Carbon monoxide binds with hemoglobin in the bloodstream and thus reduces the amount of oxygen in the blood and lungs. So carbon monoxide can be very dangerous for young CONTINUE READING: A Note to My Leaf-Burning Neighbors | Live Long and Prosper

COVID-19 Widens Inequality Among America’s Young People, But So Far, There Is No Plan to Address It | janresseger

COVID-19 Widens Inequality Among America’s Young People, But So Far, There Is No Plan to Address It | janresseger

COVID-19 Widens Inequality Among America’s Young People, But So Far, There Is No Plan to Address It

What are all the ways the COVID-19 pandemic has thrown obstacles in the paths of America’s poorest young people?  The numbers are staggering. Hardship is so overwhelming that it is almost impossible to grasp the deeper meaning of the data in the reports from major policy organizations.

Here is the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: “Households with children are more likely to have trouble affording food or paying the rent or mortgage than households without children. Based on five weeks of Census Bureau Pulse Survey data collected from June 18 to July 21, we estimate that: Approximately 19 million children, or 1 in 4 children, live in a household that isn’t getting enough to eat, is behind on rent or mortgage payments, or both. These levels of hardship are substantially higher among Black and Latino children, reflecting longstanding inequities that the current crisis has exacerbated.”

The Economic Policy Institute describes barriers to learning: “The pandemic has exacerbated well-documented opportunity gaps that put low-income students at a disadvantage relative to their better-off peers. Opportunity gaps are gaps in access to the conditions and resources that enhance learning and development, and include access to food and nutrition, housing, health insurance and care, and financial relief measures. One of the most critical opportunity gaps is the uneven access to the devices and internet access critical to learning online. This digital divide has made it virtually impossible for some students to learn during the pandemic.”

First Focus on Children tracks family suffering:”The Household Pulse Survey from the Census Bureau tracks food insecurity, financial hardship, and other indicators of child and family CONTINUE READING: COVID-19 Widens Inequality Among America’s Young People, But So Far, There Is No Plan to Address It | janresseger

A Pivotal Moment for U.S. and Public Schools? (Part 2) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

A Pivotal Moment for U.S. and Public Schools? (Part 2) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

A Pivotal Moment for U.S. and Public Schools? (Part 2)

Do individuals like you and me know for sure at the time something occurred that it was momentous, a historic turning point in the flow of events and individual lives. Probably not.

After all, it is only in retrospect–after the future becomes the present–that people look back at prior events and then can pinpoint something that occurred as pivotal. Surely, in 1859 when John Brown attacked the U.S. armory at Harper’s Ferry (VA) to get weapons to lead a slave rebellion, neither he nor most Americans knew that his actions (for which he was put to death) became instrumental in launching the Civil War over a year later.

Some other examples of not knowing when an event is a turning point:

When silversmith Paul Revere set out on his midnight ride on April 18, 1775 to alert militias in Lexington and Concord that British regulars were marching toward them to destroy stockpiled munitions, he surely did not know that the next morning’s events would be the beginning of the end of the 13 British colonies with a Declaration of Independence the following year and a war that lasted until 1783 leading to the formation of the United States of America.

The initial people infected with the coronavirus in Wuhan, China in late-2019 did not know that authorities would lockdown the city of 11 million as Covid-19 CONTINUE READING: A Pivotal Moment for U.S. and Public Schools? (Part 2) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

DID THE GOVERNOR COMMISSION A BIRD? – Dad Gone Wild

DID THE GOVERNOR COMMISSION A BIRD? – Dad Gone Wild

DID THE GOVERNOR COMMISSION A BIRD?

“Literature, like magic, has always been about the handling of secrets, about the pain, the destruction, and the marvelous liberation that can result when they are revealed. Telling the truth when the truth matters most is almost always a frightening prospect. If a writer doesn’t give away secrets, his own or those of the people he loves; if she doesn’t court disapproval, reproach, and general wrath, whether of friends, family, or party apparatchiks; if the writer submits his work to an internal censor long before anyone else can get their hands on it, the result is pallid, inanimate, a lump of earth.”
― Michael Chabon, Maps and Legends: Reading and Writing Along the Borderlands

Well, that certainly didn’t take long. Yesterday, I wrote about the prior day’s proceedings at the House Education Committee’s Summer study. I wrote about how Chairman Mark White treated the Commissioner of Education like a prom date. I wrote about how Ms. Schwinn continually plays around in the neighborhood of the truth without ever establishing residency. I wrote about a warning delivered by Representative Cerpicky to Mark and Governor Lee’s belle of the ball, ““I don’t ever want to be blindsided by something like this again, OK?” Cepicky said. “I’m just telling you, as representative of District 64. As we move forward, I’m constantly evaluating you.”

In continuing with the prom theme, with Cerpicky in the role of chaperone warning Mark White about his troublesome date, what Penny Schwinn did yesterday – with the Governor serving in the role of enabling parent – was pour liquor in the punch bowl and then burn out of the parking lot, kicking up rocks, in her Firebird convertible with her finger in the air. A finger clearly aimed at Cerpicky and any other state legislator that dared question her,  as the Governor gazed on in affectionate appreciation for his disruptive child, In essence, telling everyone, “She’s a wild one. Can’t control her. She’s going to cause chaos and I’m proud of her for her reckless spirit.”

What I’m referring to, of course, is the Governor’s press conference where Lee and Schwinn CONTINUE READING: DID THE GOVERNOR COMMISSION A BIRD? – Dad Gone Wild

Big Education Ape: REPRESENTATIVE MARK WHITE’S INCREDIBLY FANTASTIC PROM DATE – Dad Gone Wild - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2020/09/representative-mark-whites-incredibly.html

A VERY BUSY DAY Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... The latest news and resources in education since 2007

 Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007

A VERY BUSY DAY

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...

The latest news and resources in education since 2007

 

 

Ed Tech Digest

by Larry Ferlazzo / 4h

Nine years ago, in another somewhat futile attempt to reduce the backlog of resources I want to share, I began this occasional “” post where I share three or four links I think are particularly useful and related to…ed tech, including some Web 2.0 apps. You might also be interested in THE BEST ED TECH RESOURCES OF 2020 – PART ONE , as well as checking out all my edtech resources . Here are this w

New Study Finds That Additional Social Studies Instruction Leads To Better Reading Comprehension

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12h

A new study from the Fordham Institute finds that schools get a bigger bang for their buck when it comes to reading instruction in the elementary grades by increasing Social Studies instructional time rather than increasing time in the Language Arts. At least, that’s the conclusion it pushes. It also points out that the key element is the background knowledge that students gain in social studies

September’s Most Popular Posts

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12h

As regular readers know, at the end of each week I share the five most popular posts from the previous seven days. I thought people might find it interesting to see a list of the ten most popular posts from the previous thirty days. You might also be interested in It’s The Thirteenth Anniversary Of This Blog – Here Are The Forty All-Time Most Popular Posts. Not to mention A LOOK BACK: 2020’S BEST

September’s “Best” Lists – There Are Now 2,193 Of Them!

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12h

Prawny / Pixabay Here’s my regular round-up of new “The Best…” lists I posted this month (you can see all 2,193 of them categorized here ). With the beginning of distance learning, I was only able to post one new one. Fortunately or unfortunately, though, it’s almost time for me to start compiling the “Best of 2020,” so there will be about thirty more coming down the pike over the next three mont

Everything You Wanted To Know About Going To College But Were Afraid To Ask

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12h

geralt / Pixabay I have over 2,100 frequently revised and updated “Best” lists on just about every subject imaginable, and you can find them listed three different ways in three different places (see Three Accessible Ways To Search For & Find My “Best” Lists ). I’m starting to publish a series where each day I will highlight the “Best” lists in a separate category. Today, it’s on Going to College

My Latest BAM! Radio Show Is On Supporting Muslim & Arab Students

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

My latest ten-minute BAM! Radio Show is on how we can best support Arab and Muslim students. I’m joined in the discussion by Dr. Sawsan Jaber, Dr. Nina Shoman-Dajani, and Abeer Shinnawi, who have also all contributed written commentaries to my Ed Week column. In fact, Dr. Jaber has guest-edited the series, which begins next week. I’m adding it to All My BAM Radio Shows – Linked With Descriptions

Video: “The Largest Star in the Universe – Size Comparison”

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

FelixMittermeier / Pixabay I’m adding this new video to The Best Web Tools That Show You Objects To Scale :

Video: “What Your Life Looks Like in Numbers”

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

geralt / Pixabay I’m adding this new video from Bright Side to The Best Visualizations Of How People Spend Their Days :

 Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007