Tuesday, December 31, 2013
DailyCensored Happy New Year from 'For-Profit University' (FPU) !
DailyCensored.com – Breaking Censored News, World, Independent, Liberal NewsHappy New Year from 'For-Profit University' (FPU) !:
AFT’s 10 Myths: Unyielding Devotion to the Common Core | deutsch29
AFT’s 10 Myths: Unyielding Devotion to the Common Core | deutsch29:
AFT’s 10 Myths: Unyielding Devotion to the Common Core
In my hands I am holding the latest issue of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) quarterly publication, American Educator. It is open to page 43, Tools for Teachers: 10 Myths About the Common Core State Standards (CCSS).
The piece was written by AFT’s Educational Issues Department.
Their position is one of unreserved support for CCSS.
Of course.
I find it remarkable the degree to which AFT and Randi Weingarten will go in order to protect and promote CCSS. One of the more telling pieces is a post Weingarten wrote for Huffington Post entitled, Will States Fail the Common Core?– As though CCSS is a personality, complete with feelings that will be hurt by states’ betrayal.
In that post, Weingarten maintains that CCSS is “not a silver bullet” but that the problem is not with CCSS but with “bad execution.”
Here’s a question– How can Weingarten state with such certainty that CCSS is not
empathyeducates – Rahm Creates A Process To Endorse His Plan For More Charter Schools
empathyeducates – Rahm Creates A Process To Endorse His Plan For More Charter Schools:
Rahm Creates A Process To Endorse His Plan For More Charter Schools
Students and community leaders have protested plans to open a new charter school across the street from Prosser High School, but Mayor Rahm Emanuel appears to be pushing ahead. |Lauren Fitzpatrick/Sun-Times Media
By Ben Joravsky. | The Chicago Reader. December 31, 2013
Combatants in the great charter school debate went toe-to-toe a couple of weeks ago in a bout that should have been broadcast live on TV.
It wasn’t Karen Lewis duking it out in the ring with Mayor Rahm Emanuel—a fight we all want to see. But it was almost as good.
Some of the officials who operate the Noble and Intrinsic charter networks—well-connected power players in the charter school movement—came to a northwest-side church to answer sharp questions from their critics, many of whom were members of the teachers’ union.
It was the December meeting of the area’s neighborhood advisory council, a group set up by the Board of Education to offer advice on whether the board should dole out precious money for two new charter high schools on the northwest side.
Not that there’s any doubt about what the board is going to decide, regardless of the feedback it gets.
Let’s be honest: Mayor Emanuel has made it clear he intends to expand charters, even as he cuts the budgets
12-31-13 With A Brooklyn Accent Go BATs: Restore Recess Party New York State- Education Program REVISED!
With A Brooklyn Accent: Restore Recess Party New York State- Education Program REVISED!:
1. Restore Recess. No use of Recess or Physical Education time for Test prep
2. Cut the state testing budget in half and use the money to lower class size and fund arts programs, sports programs and school counselors.
3. No Data Sharing. No information about children can be shared with anyone outside of the school district without parental permission
4 Create a new Education Policy Committee to replace the Education Reform Commission, and require it to have a majority of currently active teachers and parents
5. End the use of student test scores in teacher evaluations.
6. Cancel all State Education Contracts with for profit companies
7. Stop all School Closings- Help Schools in Trouble, Don’t Close Them
8. End state support for the Common Core Standards- Leave that decision up to each individual school district.
9. Multiply the number of portfolio schools which require no tests at all. Let teachers and parents form them within the public school system, not as charters
10. Bring back vocational and technical education into every school district if parents and teachers support it
11. Withdraw from Race to the Top and take no Federal Funds that require more testing, more school closings, or adoption of Common Core Standards
12. Make sure all schools, especially those in high poverty areas, have strong after school programs.
13, Make Community History welcome in the schools.
14. Encourage the creation of school farms and gardens.15. Exempt special needs students from all state tests and require that they get instruction appropriate to their developmental level and aptitudes
15. Exempt special needs students from all state tests and require that they get instruction appropriate to their developmental level and aptitudes.
16. Guarantee certified librarians in all schools to help students research, think critically, read widely and become informed citizens.
Restore Recess Party New York State- Education Program REVISED!
1. Restore Recess. No use of Recess or Physical Education time for Test prep
2. Cut the state testing budget in half and use the money to lower class size and fund arts programs, sports programs and school counselors.
3. No Data Sharing. No information about children can be shared with anyone outside of the school district without parental permission
4 Create a new Education Policy Committee to replace the Education Reform Commission, and require it to have a majority of currently active teachers and parents
5. End the use of student test scores in teacher evaluations.
6. Cancel all State Education Contracts with for profit companies
7. Stop all School Closings- Help Schools in Trouble, Don’t Close Them
8. End state support for the Common Core Standards- Leave that decision up to each individual school district.
9. Multiply the number of portfolio schools which require no tests at all. Let teachers and parents form them within the public school system, not as charters
10. Bring back vocational and technical education into every school district if parents and teachers support it
11. Withdraw from Race to the Top and take no Federal Funds that require more testing, more school closings, or adoption of Common Core Standards
12. Make sure all schools, especially those in high poverty areas, have strong after school programs.
13, Make Community History welcome in the schools.
14. Encourage the creation of school farms and gardens.15. Exempt special needs students from all state tests and require that they get instruction appropriate to their developmental level and aptitudes
15. Exempt special needs students from all state tests and require that they get instruction appropriate to their developmental level and aptitudes.
16. Guarantee certified librarians in all schools to help students research, think critically, read widely and become informed citizens.
Our Top 10 from 2013, but Bill Gates is Still Not Making Nice with Teachers | Teachers' Letters to Bill Gates
Our Top 10 from 2013, but Bill Gates is Still Not Making Nice with Teachers | Teachers' Letters to Bill Gates:
Our Top 10 from 2013, but Bill Gates is Still Not Making Nice with Teachers
Dear Bill and Melinda,
As 2013 comes to a close, we thought we would highlight the top 10 posts on Teachers’ Letters to Bill Gates that most resonated with teachers and parents this year. Due to your continued silence, we also ask that you provide us with your beloved data – evidence – of the effectiveness, or lack thereof, of your reforms as they relate to the above-mentioned posts.
We started our blog to you on June 9, 2013 with an open invitation to dialogue with teachers around the world. To date we have had 115,144 hits on our blog. We then thanked our supporters for publicizing our work on the Internet.
“Susan and I so appreciate Valerie Strauss’ Washington Post Teachers’ Letters to Bill Gates profile of our website, as well as Diane Ravitch’s strong endorsement on her blog An Amazing Website: Teachers’ Letters to Bill Gates.We appreciate Anthony Cody’s recognition on his blog here: Bill Gates Discovers Money Can’t Buy Teachers.”
On July 9th, we launched a campaign, in conjunction with the Badass Teachers Association, asking teachers to write to you both to voice their concerns regarding high stakes testing. That day we had 6,959 hits, and we posted approximately 30 letters from public school teachers all over the United States. These teachers were outraged and appealed to you to
SKrashen: The Compelling (not just interesting) Input Hypothesis.
SKrashen: The Compelling (not just interesting) Input Hypothesis.:
The Compelling (not just interesting) Input Hypothesis.
Stephen Krashen
The English Connection (KOTESOL). 15, 3: 1 (2011)
It is by now well-established that input must be comprehensible to have an effect on language acquisition and literacy development. To make sure that language acquirers pay attention to the input, it should be interesting. But interest may be not enough for optimal language acquisition. It may be the case that input needs to be not just interesting but compelling.
Compelling means that the input is so interesting you forget that it is in another language. It means you are in a state of "flow" (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). In flow, the concerns of everyday life and even the sense of self disappear - our sense of time is altered and nothing but the activity itself seems to matter. Flow occurs during reading when readers are "lost in the book" (Nell, 1988) or in the
I Was A Different Person Last year…
I Was A Different Person Last year…:
I Was A Different Person Last year…
Ed, all you ever blog or Tweet about is education. Ending this year, can’t you write about something else?
Okay, from 2013 here is something educational, but not about our schools:
When I was in college, I inherited old books from an Englishman’s library. One set of leather-bound books contained the complete works of Bulwer Litton. As I sorted the books, I made a major error. Reading the circular emblem stamped into the leather covers of the old books, I read: THE PENIS MIGHTIER THAN THE SWORD. I thought, “That makes sense.”
Bulwer’s quote stayed in my head for years – in fact, it is still there, next to the actual quote: THE PEN IS MIGHTIER THAN THE SWORD. I have a tinge of guilt that I thought the quote said something other than Bulwer intended. Sorry Bulwer, but the misreading has changed my insight into things.
Why the first reading made sense proves informative. For example, to understand that the rise of some cults started by male prophets were ways to get into the – let’s call it the genetic pool – of the population. In the case
12-31-13 Schools Matter
Schools Matter:
Public School Renewal 2014 and Beyond
Public School Renewal 2014 and Beyond
Jim HornThe public education renewal agenda embraces the values of democracy, fair play, inclusion, equal opportunity, and public school governance structure and operations of the people, by the people, and for the people. The new public school agenda welcomes the participation of philanthropists, business, and industry to do what they are most capable of doing, which is to provide resources and
12-30-13 Schools Matter
Schools Matter: TFA/KIPP Teacher Talks of Shame, Isolation, BurnoutFrom Cloaking Inequity:Graduating from college, I was energized and ready to take my place on the front line of education reform by becoming part of the Teach For America Corps. Many entering corps members are captured by the convincing sales pitch of TFA recruiters on campus. While I did meet with one of these recruiters who rein
12-31-13 Seattle Schools Community Forum
Seattle Schools Community Forum:
Washington State Charter School Updates
Public Education News Wrap-Up
A great piece from @The Chalk Face by John Kuhn who covers both the year in review AND what to do in 2014. His queries for 2014:Will the education reformers rebound from their numerous defeats this year? They still have the money, they still own the media and the US Department of Education, and they have fresh NAEP and PISA scores that “prove” whatever they want them to prove. (Tennessee and DC s
Washington State Charter School Updates
More news rolls in for updating charter schools in Washington State.First, three Charter Commissioners have expiring terms and are up for re-appointment (apparently all three want to stay). Commissioners Chris Martin, Margit McGuire and Kevin Jacka have expiring terms. It's early to say who should stay and who should go but so far these three seem capable. Margit McGuire is the most thoughtful o
Goodbye to 2013 - Hello to 2014!
Pop quizzes!Pew Research Center - News IQ QuizSlate's News Quiz.Nice idea for the new year - a Good Times Jar project. A good way to keep track of what matters to your family and showing gratitude for the good things (big and small) in your lives. Even little victories count.Start this January with an empty jar. Throughout the year write the good things that happened to you on little pieces of pa
12-30-13 Seattle Schools Community Forum
Seattle Schools Community Forum: Patt Sutton - A Champion for Public Education in SeattleThe West Seattle Herald has a very good obituary of Patt Sutton who served two-terms as president of the Seattle School Board. That's a very little bit of what this woman did for Seattle Public education (as well as being the mother of 12 children and working for Boeing.) She also:Upon learning there was no
Choosing to sue: Here's a look at some 2013 lawsuits involving school choice « Watchdog.org
Choosing to sue: Here's a look at some 2013 lawsuits involving school choice « Watchdog.org:
Choosing to sue: Here’s a look at some 2013 lawsuits involving school choice
By Mary C. Tillotson | Watchdog.org
PICK AND CHOOSE: School choice programs have been sued all over the country. Here’s what happened in 2013.
When a school choice law is passed, a school choice lawsuit follows – it’s all but inevitable. I’ve counted at least a dozen school choice lawsuits over 11 programs in 2013. Here’s the roundup:
Arizona: Niehaus v. Huppenthal
Program at issue: Empowerment Scholarship Accounts
Available to: Students with special needs, assigned to failing schools, in military families, in foster care or in adoptive families
Status: A state appeals court ruled in favor of education savings accounts, finding themdistinct from a voucher program the state Supreme Court struck down in 2009. Interested parties are waiting to hear whether the state’s high court will hear the case.
Program at issue: Lindsey Nicole Henry Scholarships for Students with Disabilities
Type: Voucher
Available to: Students with special needs
Status: In November 2012 the state Supreme Court ruled in favor of the program — sort of. The school districts did not have standing to bring the case, it said. In October 2013, other plaintiffs — citizen taxpayers, almost all affiliated with the public school system
‘Naked’ Common Core Exposed by Catholic Education Leader
‘Naked’ Common Core Exposed by Catholic Education Leader:
The Cardinal Newman Society today launched a series of reports on the controversial Common Core State Standards (CCSS) with an eye-opening report by Dan Guernsey, Ed.D., of the National Association of Private Catholic and Independent Schools (NAPCIS).- See more at: http://www.cardinalnewmansociety.org/CatholicEducationDaily/DetailsPage/tabid/102/ArticleID/2819/%E2%80%98Naked%E2%80%99-Common-Core-Exposed-by-Catholic-Education-Leader.aspx#sthash.pem2m9p9.dpuf
‘Naked’ Common Core Exposed by Catholic Education Leader
December 30, 2013, at 11:28 AM | By Bob Laird |
The Cardinal Newman Society today launched a series of reports on the controversial Common Core State Standards (CCSS) with an eye-opening report by Dan Guernsey, Ed.D., of the National Association of Private Catholic and Independent Schools (NAPCIS).In “The Naked and Procrustean Common Core,” Guernsey tackles the Common Core’s English language arts standards, which induce schools to place greater emphasis on informational reading instead of classical literary texts. Guernsey criticizes the Common Core’s “sweeping efforts to change the balance” of reading texts, finding no rationale that is “based in research or in real world experience.”
The Newman Society launched its Catholic Is Our Core project to educate key stakeholders in Catholic education—Catholic families, pastors, teachers, principals, superintendents and bishops—about concerns with the Common Core and its potential impact on Catholic education.
By publishing analysis like Guernsey’s report and links to other information and news items at CatholicIsOurCore.org, the Newman Society hopes especially to help parents become more knowledgeable about the Common Core and better fulfill
12-31-13 Ed Notes Online
Ed Notes Online:
Message to Farina and de Blasio: Undo the Damage
"The schools of Baghdad and Kabul will recover sooner than the NYC school system under your management." ... Norm Scott to Joel Klein --- quoting my self from a c.2004-6 PEP meeting.Eterno and Epstein: Revoke Jamaica High School's Death Sentence... NEW YEAR APPEAL TO INCOMING MAYOR AND CHANCELLOR: SAVE THE COMPREHENSIVE HIGH SCHOOLS, ICE Blog.I love to quote myself. Carmen Farina was sit
Newark: Cami Anderson Uses Network Model to Kill Neighborhood Schools
UPDATED: If Carmen Farina wants to make a quick mark she should begin dismantling the Networks - ASAP. They are a mechanism purposely designed to destabilize the links between a school and the neighborhood. As our pal from Newark points out here, they are a national tool of ed deform to make it easier to soften up neighborhoods for charter school invasions.Reports from a Newark teacher:Cami Anders
Summer School for Teachers Report from an Undisclosed Urban Location
Dropped from a drone, found on a Rockaway beach. I won't say which city but it is not NYC.I had the privilege of attending ten days of training in a Summer Institute. The primary advantage of attending the institute is I lost the last two weeks of my treasured summer vacation.My district has adopted Responsive Classroom, which I have nicknamed snapping and clapping. When the teacher is pleased wit
12-30-13 Ed Notes Online
Ed Notes Online: Farina the ChoiceBloomfield also predicted that Farina and her staff would implement a longer-term cultural change at Tweed. “There will be a new system-wide respect for educational experience,” he said, “there are a lot of people fresh out of college who either as a matter of data expertise or particular program expertise tell principals what’s needed. There will probably be an e
Inspiring moments in the classroom. They happen and they matter | Get Schooled | www.ajc.com
Inspiring moments in the classroom. They happen and they matter | Get Schooled | www.ajc.com:
Inspiring moments in the classroom. They happen and they matter
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