Author: abendelow
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It's happening already–in Colorado: reneging on teacher pensions
It seems that when the chips are down, civil servants can no longer depend on promises made to them by American society. Ah, perfidious populous! This New York Times article details the ways a plan comparable to the one I labor under in Illinois has been changed–taken back and altered by the folks in Colorado.…
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Is this the first "hybrid" kindergarten?
Amazing news from the Pittsburgh–the Post Gazette reports 4-5 year olds are being eased into schooling through primarily cyber-means. After I catch my breath, trying to comprehend this total paradigm shift for kindergarten (now “out of the bricks and into the clicks” one of those quoted might say), I can see its logic. The bulk…
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Look, Jane. See Vook read: on the changes to literacy of the new media
Interesting take from the Washington Post on a “hybrid reader.” How might it alter our experience of literature? “Reading Vooks made me feel a little like a creative slacker. Maybe there was no point in imagining what someone or something looked like, if I was going to be helped along anyway. “Reading has traditionally been one…
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Jazz Review: Josh Berman Trio at the Old Town Alehouse
This was not a traditional performance venue. But“Chicago’s best dive bar, established 1958,” hosts the Josh Berman Trio every Monday night at 10. Josh is a good example of the up and coming players–he’s in his early 30s–who will populate the Chicago “jazz scene” as the generations of former players of a still-evolving music die…
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The technology of Camping, part 2
To pick up on the certain existential truths, things one already knows, but can easily forget in suburbia. Aldo Leopold’s greatest hit Viz: that a human in wilderness is at the mercy of some powerful forces–weather, rivers, bugs, one’s mental and physical health, etc. [One remembers that one’s machine is fundamentally networked, subject to…
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The Technology of Camping, part 1
I just voluntarily subjected my body to a week of exposure to the natural environment, specifically, the lovely but inhospitable north woods of Wisconsin. There were mosquitoes, mud, spiders, torturous outhouses and other indignities. Why would anyone happily habituated to civilized life do such a thing? The act of camping means a human being has…
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The ultimate Ur-technology: one's lifespan
There is a dear man in my extended family, a devoted Chicago Catholic school teacher in his 50s who has just discovered that it’s all up for him. He’s got a large, malignant brain tumor going with no chance for survival beyond months. So what now? His predicament is pathetic, and brings up issues of…
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EDT 6040: No hope for the "A," but an excellent learning experience, anyway
The close of another CUChicago course (EDT 6040 Visual Literacy in the Classroom by Richard Richter) in the “hybrid” Educational Technology Masters program affords me another opportunity to reflect on what my course of study–now 15 hours of course credit—has shown me about myself as an online, distance learner. Like much else in my life…
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Market Forces in Chicago Public School's, part 2
It seems that CEO Ron Huberman recognizes economical bargains in electronic form as well, not just in flesh and blood humans. Even as he eliminates over 100 veteran mentor-teacher jobs and promotes charters, he finds online one-to-one learning modules for “credit recovery” a real savings, this article in THE journal . CPS manager of distance learning…
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CPS executes teacher-leader jobs, NKVD-style
Mike Vail’s coverage in Substance online outraged me today. What happened to more than 100 quality, veteran teachers yesterday in Chicago was a glaring instance of brute “market forces” where they don’t belong: in schools where we teach our most precious children. The bully kids are mostly dealt with. But somehow it’s OK when the…
The Wikiness 