Author: abendelow
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This is what Arne Duncan is doing with federal ed dollars
He’s trying to motivate better test results by incentivizing (bribing) states and public districts with federal dollars.More money for more programs that result in higher test scores. What do those tests measure? Anything worth knowing? Next question. Duncan has come out in favor of merit pay for teachers, incentivizing (bribing) teachers with extra dollars. More…
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An evening with Alfie Kohn, "the anti-Arne Duncan"
made me wish President Obama had played basketball with him instead of Arne. But Kohn is way too short and slow. I blogged earlier this month about Alfie Kohn (website here), famous critic of American education. His comments tonight at Concordia University of Chicago were passionate, but still reasonable–a pleasant break from the obfuscatory Educanese…
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Most teachers are white and middle-class, pt. 2
My implicit behavior sends signals to my students, too. For instance, I do not move immediately to the dean when a “ghetto kid” fails to heed my instructions. I stay calm, and repeat the student’s name along with the directive: “George, sit down…..” 15 seconds later, “George, now please.” “George…?” and I move toward him…
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My emergent educational philosophy is undergoing
some powerful theoretical influences in this course, and this week’s readings are good examples. Each of the writers challenges (“problematizes”) the comfortable conception I’ve had of my job, as a dutiful public servant, selflessly helping children realize their full potentials. And while I can’t accept all of their conclusions, they are helping me become a…
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Jane Addams and I agree about the "brutish" humans:
…that there’s hope for us all. More ambulations about my readings in CUC: First in Jane’s 1907 work, Democracy and Social Ethics. Since I have worked with disadvantaged school children in Chicago–the modern-day versions of Jane A ddams‘ Little Italy neighborhood kids–I liked her notion that even “the most ‘brutish man’ has a value in…
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More evidence of the "progressive" potential of education 2.0
Mary provides a list of resources that de-privilege education, democratizing the public good of formal learning.
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Most teachers are white and middle class
Even the new teachers, fresh out of education school, are white and middle class. So what? Well, check out the students, and notice the drama: the kids are increasingly poor and non-white, come from widely disparate cultures with their languages and dialects of English. How prepared are you, Mr. White Middle Class American Teacher, to…
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A little dialog between the grad students
So the question was: “Hinchey (p. 4) forwards that it’s essential for teachers to consciously and critically examine our assumptions (about school, society at large, students, teachers, teaching, learning, etc, etc) because our assumptions impact our actions and have consequences that extend far beyond our individual contexts. How do you respond to these ideas? In…
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Google founder Brin sees students seeing more of the world
with google-y eyes–seeing farther and better than their dad’s or grandad’s eyes could. More vision means more perspective, right? I’m so glad that, in this LA Times article, he suggests what I’ve been asking for the last few years: enlisting our high school kids in knowledge-worker bootcamp–getting them working in teams in the wiki mines.…
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Values come first–in Education Land and elsewhere
What is the place of “values” in education? First of all, it’s a funky question. since “values” can mean anything to anyone, “Does [‘value’] mean the quality of valuity or the thing having value?” asked John Dewey in 1923 (“Values, Liking, and Thought” in The Journal of Philosophy). Knowing the kind of value we’re evaluating…
The Wikiness 