9-6-14 Wag The Dog Week

WagTheDog | Everyone has been made for some particular work, and the desire for that work has been put in every heart. ~ Rumi: 

Wag The Dog Week

Listen To The Music

Our lives are to be used and thus to be lived as fully as possible, and truly it seems that we are never so alive as when we concern ourselves with other people. ~ Harry Chapin Students will learn more from text that is unpretentious and emotive than complex and informational. Readings in the classroom should stimulate student feelings and stir up emotions rather than stifle student feelings and

4 by getwhatugive / 24min 

Common Core Bait and Switch

“Selling” the Common Core State Standards to students, parents, and employers with promotional slogans such as  “college and career readiness”, “critical thinking”, “constructivist  learning”, “technology integration”, and  “21st century skills” while cash-strapped schools provide fewer trade and vocational programs, eliminate the arts, increase class size, narrow the curriculum, and rely on test

200+ by getwhatugive / 5d 

AUG 25

Critical Thinking vs. Creative Thinking

The Common Core demands students think critically while staying connected and diving into text, yet employers desire workers who can think creatively, connect with people, and dive into their work. David Coleman has made it clear that students are expected to read like a detective while most employers expect students to read with perspective. There is a significant difference between critical thi

97 by getwhatugive / 11d 

AUG 22

Common Cure: Growing Pains or Growing Awareness?

Media reports have focused on a recent survey indicating a sharp decline in support for the Common Core among teachers. These reports have also included a variety of explanations and theories as to why this decline has occurred. Unfortunately many of the quotes and much of the speculation comes from Common Core cheer leaders who have limited teaching experience and do not have regular contact wit

94 by getwhatugive / 14d hide  //  save

AUG 17

Equipped for the Future

The problem with the Common Core’s mission to improve “College and Career Readiness” is not that these expectations are too high, but these standards are too narrow and specialized, so they do not prepare students for the real life and diverse challenges of life, school, and employment.   In April, 2014 the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported… “In October 2013, 65.9 percent of 2013 high school gr

18 by getwhatugive / 19d 

AUG 11

He Who Controls The Language…

‘I don’t know what you mean by “glory,”‘ Alice said. Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. ‘Of course you don’t—till I tell you. I meant “there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!”‘ ‘But “glory” doesn’t mean “a nice knock-down argument,”‘ Alice objected. ‘When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.’ ‘The questio

100+ by getwhatugive / 25d 

AUG 10

Thoughts and Feelings Do Matter

“The children coming into their second grade classroom that morning arranged their chairs in a circle for a daily ritual: Their teacher asked every child to tell the class how they felt (unless they didn’t want to share this), and why they felt that way. This simple exercise in a New Haven, CT elementary school was the first time I saw a lesson in emotional literacy. Naming emotions accurately hel

8 by getwhatugive / 26d 

9-6-14 With A Brooklyn Accent: Love Letters to the BATS

With A Brooklyn Accent:

Why Charter School Leaders Are Behind Attacks on Teachers Unions and Public Schools

If you ever wonder why famous charter school leaders like Eva Moskowitz or Steve Perry don't just run their schools quietly and let the results speak for themselves and instead devote much of their time attacking teachers, teachers unions and public schools, consider this. When the hiring freeze in NYC public schools was lifted a few months ago, a large number of charter school teachers applied fo

40 by Mark Naison / 1d 

SEP 03

Where Are You From? A Guest Post by Malaya Velasquez Saldana

“Whereare you from?” the ubiquitous question posed to me since I learned to formulate my first English sentence, has overtime accrued the weight of a multitude of implied questions, and exclamations. Now by 22 years old the weight of that question is so heavy with implications, and assumptive self-erasing experiences I hear it and laugh. The kind of laugh that your mother makes when you lie to her

8 by Mark Naison / 3d 

SEP 02

Why The Obama Administration Won't Back Off Its Disastrous Education Policies

   As I was sitting watching the US Open after a day of preparing for classes, I started thinking of why state after state, with the encouragement of the US Department of Education, keeps subjecting teachers to evaluation systems which are humiliating, time consuming and inaccurate, despite evidence that shows that their main effect is to drive good teachers out and turn teaching into a revolving

14 by Mark Naison / 3d 

In the US " Improving Teacher Quality" really means Humiliating and Firing Veteran Teachers

All over the nation, the imperative to "improve teacher quality" has morphed into a campaign to marginalize, humiliate and force out veteran teachers. Not only has this caused tremendous distress to the individuals thus targeted, it has deprived our public schools of a priceless source of knowledge and cultural capital and has contributed to huge turnover among new teachers who are depri

3 by Mark Naison / 4d 

AUG 26

Defend Gus Morales!

If you were going to "build a teacher" in a largely working class town where the majority of those enrolled in the public schools are students of color, one of the models you would work from would be Augustin Morales. Born in Holyoke Mass., part of that town's large Puerto Rican community, Gus spent several years in the military before returning to school to become a teacher. He was some

5 by Mark Naison / 11d 

9-6-14 Jersey Jazzman NJ Ed News Round-up Jammin' All Week

Jersey Jazzman:

Jersey Jazzman Jammin' All Week

A Reply To A Reply from @tomamoran

Tom,Contrary to your beliefs, no one called you a racist. You know this: you put our other criticisms of you in quotes, but not the one where you allege we call you racist.What we said was that you support One Newark, a racist school reorganization policy. Which it is.You say:Maybe you folks should take a pill, and engage people who disagree with you in a civil manner. You might find that I'm not

66 by Duke / 2d 

SEP 02

Is "One Newark" Racist?

Is One Newark, the school reorganization plan for New Jersey largest city, racist? Well...- Under One Newark, "Schools assigned the consequential classifications have substantively and statistically significantly greater shares of low income and black students." That's racist.- Under One Newark, "NPS’s black teachers are far more likely to teach black students; consequently, these b

59 by Duke / 3d 

An Open Letter to Star-Ledger Editorial Board Director @tomamoran

Note: Shortly after I read Tom Moran's piece in the Star-Ledger this past Sunday, I got an email from fellow teacher-blogger Marie Corfield, who suggested we write a response together with our friend and colleague Ani McHugh. We're posting this at all three of our blogs simultaneously, and over at Blue Jersey.Moran has ignored us individually; he's going to have a much harder time ignoring us coll

300+ by Duke / 4d 

SEP 01

Sinatra, Carlin, Inequality, Education, and America: Happy Labor Day

Frank Sinatra held his fair share of self-contradictions. For a guy who espoused such working-class sentiments, his endorsement of Ronald Reagan was more than a little incongruous. And JFK, the one politician Sinatra really went to bat for, was such a neo-lib that he would have felt right at home in the Obama White House.That said, Sinatra had his truly progressive moments: Boing Boing reminds us

100+ by Duke / 4d 

AUG 31

Correcting the Education Punditry of @jonathanalter

Jonathan Alter and Bob Braun went man-to-man a few weeks ago in the pages of NJ Monthly over the subject of education reform. From my perspective, Braun cleaned Alter's clock, and I said so on Twitter. The sad fact is Alter got many things wrong in his piece, but that's understandable: the conventional wisdom he traffics in is largely a fact-free zone when it comes to education (and what else, I w

400+ by Duke / 5d 

Charter Schools: Student Mobility Is Not Student Attrition

Going to get a little wonky here, but since we're already deep in the weeds on the issue of student attrition in charter schools, I don't think I've got much choice...I had a little Twitter exchange with Ryan Hill of TEAM Academy Charter School, the Newark branch of the national charter chain KIPP, last week. He and I seem to see the issue of student attrition differently.I define "attrition&

54 by Duke / 5d 

AUG 29

Once Again: There Are No Miracle Charter Schools

Relinquishers gotta relinquish:It’s not a stretch to say that charter schools are some of the biggest winners in this year’s high school rankings list. Even though charters educate just five percent of American students, they represent 30 percent of the top ten schools in this year’s rankings. What’s more—and this is really the kicker—they’re the only ones in the top ten that do not use selective

200+ by Duke / 7d 

My Response to Tom Moran

In case you missed it, earlier this week fellow educators and bloggers, Ani McHugh (Teacherbiz), Mark Weber (Jersey Jazzman) and I wrote a joint open letter to Star Ledger editorial director, Tom Moran, regarding his continuous support of the racist policies of Newark Superintendent Cami Anderson's One Newark plan. In addition to posting on all three of our blogs, it also ran at Blue Jersey and on

63 by noreply@blogger.c... / 1d hide  //  save

SEP 02

An Open Letter to Star-Ledger Editorial Board Director Tom Moran

(Note: This piece was co-authored by Ani McHugh, aka. TeacherBiz, and Mark Weber, aka. Jersey Jazzman, and is cross-posted on both their blogs.)Dear Tom,This week, you crossed a line. Until now, your pieces in the Star-Ledger about Newark’s school system and the reorganization of the district have been ill-informed and reckless. You’ve ignored the warnings of teachers, parents, community leaders,

100+ by noreply@blogger.c... / 4d 

The Illusionist

Cami Anderson, Chris Christie’s overseer of the Newark schools, spent a good part of the first day of school traveling to schools she knew would be orderly, stopping along the way to give impromptu news conferences in which she praised her “One Newark” plan. She apparently missed the scores of empty buses roaming the streets in search of […]

300+ by Bob Braun / 1d hide  //  save

SEP 01

Betrayal

On Labor Day, the day we celebrate working men and women and their unions, the Newark Teachers Union said this to the anxious parents of New Jersey’s largest city: “We cannot be seen as aiding or abetting anything that would disrupt the operation of the Newark Public Schools. ” In short, the NTU told Newark’s parents […]

300+ by Bob Braun / 4d 

AUG 30

It’s Sunday–pray for the children of Newark

A state administrative law judge has postponed a hearing on the litigation brought by Newark residents  to block the state-imposed “One Newark” plan that has disrupted the lives of thousands of Newark families. Barring some last-minute effort in another court, the decision by Ellen Bass ends any chance of stopping the effort by state superintendent […]

500+ by Bob Braun / 6d