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Tuesday, April 15, 2014

Russ on Reading: John Kuhn's Fear and Learning in America: A Review

Russ on Reading: John Kuhn's Fear and Learning in America: A Review:



John Kuhn's Fear and Learning in America: A Review

http://www.amazon.com/Fear-Learning-America-Teachers-Education/dp/0807755729

John Kuhn is one part story teller, one part evangelist and one part passionate champion of public education. Through personal narrative, historical reference, sound research and righteous indignation he lays waste to the corporate education reform movement in his compelling new book. What I love about Kuhn's writing is that his well told stories and carefully cited sources give way at times to bursts of passionate advocacy that have the reader, at least this life-long educator, primed to storm the beaches of the Gates Foundation or the Halls of Teach for America if necessary, to do what is right by children, teachers, parents and public education.

I have had the opportunity to hear Kuhn speak and his writing voice leaps off the page at you, just as his speaking voice jumps out at you in an auditorium. Indeed Kuhn first came to prominence on the public stage for a speech he gave at a Save Our Schools rally in Texas a few years ago that went viral on You Tube. Fans of Kuhn the public speaker are sure to be fans of Kuhn the author. Fear and Learning is his second book. I reviewed his previous work,Test and Punish, on this blog last year.

Kuhn's bona fides as a critic of the education reform movement are impeccable. After two years working as a missionary in Peru, Kuhn returned to his native Texas and became a teacher of Spanish, eventually working as an assistant principal, principal and superintendent in rural Texas. His book is punctuated by telling stories of his time as a teacher and administrator and