December 2011
36 posts
10 tags
“In order for our social amnesia to remain resolutely unacknowledged, we hide...”
– from Teachers as Cultural Workers by Paulo Freire
5 tags
0057: What if schools worked to strengthen...
#education #humanity #revolution
Perhaps teachers and school leaders should work to help communities strengthen themselves and organize against oppression. Teachers could teach problem solving and work with students and community members to develop a curriculum aka an action plan to address specific problems within the community. Sure literacy. Sure math. But mainly relevant problem solving....
6 tags
0056: Silence
#violence #life #reality #teaching #education #prayer
A student of mine watched as her brother was shot in front of her early this morning. Please lend her your thoughts or prayers. So often we hear, “you just never know what goes on in these students’ lives”. More often, we do know what’s going on. We teach lovely people. We suffer together.
8 tags
http://thebookofcletis.blogspot.com/2011/12/on-hone... →
On Honesty by Educated to Death. Special Thanks to Cletis Stump for sharing his space for a few of my words.
#Teaching is a cycle of great victories and great defeats and there’s always in between.
11 tags
0055: I'm tired, but who rests while their...
#teaching #education #opportunity
I started writing this blog to fight my own growing cynicism, and I find why I am doing what I’m doing. Why am I a teacher? I see education—literacy, problem solving, the ability to compete— as a chance for life. It’s the difference, for many, between life and death. Access to quality education is a life changer. It isn’t just a minor...
9 tags
0054: Am I an Unintentional Imperialist? What am I...
#teaching #learning #revolution
I’m coming to a point where I don’t believe. I’ve told myself “education is a tool for transcending any obstacle”. I’ve told students, parents, and teachers that. I’ve been an education evangelist. But, my faith is running thin. I’m preaching, but I’m not believing. And, this disagreement between word and...
Comment Posted by Carol Black on "Are Teachers... →
adventuresinlearning:
hese are such important questions.
If you look at the phenomenon of collaborative “cheating” in school, for example, you’ll see that it represents a child’s choice of the value of loyalty to a friend over compliance with a structure that tries to pit her against her friends in a competition for adult approval. (This value contradiction should be obvious when we hear...
6 tags
0053: Students Unite, Demand to Be Taught
#student #revolution #education
Students should organize and refuse to participate in anything related to standardized testing. They should demand to be taught and allowed to learn. Schools will fail as long as the primary stakeholders, the students, are not involved in the decisions being made. We know what is needed to begin this education revolution. We know what is needed to function in this...
5 tags
0052: Failing Schools, Soaring Profits, and No...
#edreform #occupy #education
Textbook publishers and the companies that make standardized tests and testing materials should be public just like the schools that receive their products. They should not profit from illiteracy. As long as people are getting rich off of failing schools the problem will continue. There is no money for a company who creates materials to solve “problems”...
9 tags
0051: Asleep in a field of poppies amidst an...
#education #honesty #awake
I struggle with honesty. With self-honesty. I have a hard time swallowing the truths about myself. I’m struggling with a bubbling truth about myself as a teacher. I’m tired of it. I’m tired of showing up each day to an impossible challenge. I’m tired of trying to sell information to people who don’t want it or need it. I’m tired of...
10 tags
0050: School Architecture and the Zombie...
#education #architecture #prison #zombies
I’ve never been to a school that didn’t feel like a school. They’ve all had that icky institutional feel to them, at least the ones built after 1950. I taught in a school that was built around the turn of the century. It didn’t feel so much like a school, but a relic of days past that had been inhabited by children who had been...
13 tags
0049: I'll learn from you, but I won't go gentle.
#teaching #learning #power
I have a class that is refusing to learn from me. We have days that are functional, but the majority of their energy is spent rejecting my instruction. They are fighting hard to say: “We don’t need you, and we don’t want you as our teacher.” I fight back with a steady dose of teaching and experiential learning that is challenging. I’m...
4 tags
0042: What we overpaid teachers do with our time...
#teaching #edchat
I’ve managed to sleep for nearly two days straight. I’ve needed it. I intend to spend a few more days staring blankly at a wall.
I would genuinely love to write more, but we should all be staring blankly with our families and friends.
Cheers to you exhausted educators who will be back hard at work on Monday.
11 tags
0048: Education for the Prevention of Transforming...
#sschat #teaching #oppression
I wonder to what extent the elimination of social studies and civics in many schools has done to the detriment of our students. If it hasn’t been eliminated it has been downplayed by the fact that it is not a tested subject. The civics class has in many cases become a place to practice for the Language Arts portions of standardized tests. Kids in these social...
Will: Teachers - Thank Goodness! →
willrichardson:
A couple of days ago, my friend Howard Blumenthal sent along this essay that his 86-year-old father wrote in response to a post here about online learning from a few weeks ago. I thought it might make for some uplifting Sunday reading, so I’m sharing it here. Enjoy!
By Norm Blumenthal
…
Beauty and truth
4 tags
“If “if’s” were fifths, I’d be drunk.”
– Veteran teacher on #edreform 