Educated to Death

#education #behavior #SOSchat

I’m reluctant to discuss classroom management as I don’t like the terminology or many of the reasons behind it. Nonetheless, it can be a problem for all of us from time to time. It can be especially daunting for new teachers. Additionally, classroom management, if we must refer to it in such a way, is presented as a formula with little discussion as to how or why some things work and others do not. Running a classroom takes experience, skill, patience, and reflection. Allowing learners to learn to run the class takes even more. But, for now we’ll touch on the concept of classroom management with little criticism for the purpose of keeping me focus (I’m sure we’ll discover this statement to be a falsehood).

The broad and brighter idea behind classroom management is if behavior is “under control” or a non-issue, then instruction/learning can more easily take place. In other words, if you’re not having to deal with behavior problems, more saliently, general confusion, then teaching becomes the focus of the class.

Of course, the active definition of classroom management is usually determined by administration and can range from the pragmatic orderly classroom where learning can take place, to a judgment based simply on number of office discipline referrals, to demanding a silent class. But, for the purpose of our discussion let’s try to stick with classroom management for the purpose of learning. However, I don’t think it will be possible to avoid drifting into some of the darker reasons and necessities for classroom management.

Back to the thesis, if a classroom is orderly then learning is more probable. By orderly, I do not mean silent, automatic, dead, etc.; rather, I mean safe and fairly predictable in terms of the behavior of the teacher and the learners. Order can provide an environment conducive to learning. The ways by which order is achieved and maintain also weigh heavily on this discussion. Order can be maintained through fear or love. Fear is punitive and generally authoritative, overt or covert. Love involves a more democratic and humanistic process. The more humanistic approach functions to allow students to work within a given framework with great freedom. Their ideas, goals, and curiosity direct the class. This is difficult to pull off in our current environment where the test dictates all, but it’s still possible to allow students a level of freedom and still work within the prescribed curriculum. Parameters still will be drawn, and the test will still be the final punitive dictator of action.

Theory aside, let’s look at some specific components of classroom management and why they work or fail. We’ll take rules, procedures, and directives. We’ll count the rules and procedures in the category of more permanent classroom governance, and directives will be the day to day, moment to moment communication between teacher and student. I used the word “directive” to reflect the punitive nature of the testing environment. We are positioned in a system that requires a level of punitive action. We will also look at ways to lessen the punitive effects, if they can be lessened. Maybe they can only be disguised. I’ll attempt to unravel that, too.

Tune in tomorrow for more mayhem.

#education #SOSchat #self

I will attempt to amaze you, dear reader, with my death defying attempt at reinventing the will. I will answer the question: what is education? I think it is important for any educator who claims to be critical in any way to attempt to define education. It is especially important for me to write in the first person in order to prevent myself from wandering into the unnecessary territory of absolute theory and generalization, though theory and generalizations may well be a part of the impending diatribe and exploration. It is important for me to do this for the sake of understanding my own practice and how my practice differs from prescriptive practice of education. I assume this venture will most likely attempt to justify my practice, and give credence to my constant straying from the prescribed curriculum, or perhaps I will find myself to be a fraud. Perhaps my meandering will be of some use to you, dear reader. If not, disregard it as the ravings of a shithouse rat. I will cut the crap and begin.

What is education?

Education is the means by which one comes to know, learn, and understand.

(Very general and somewhat useless)

A) Education is the means by which one comes to know, learn, and understand his or her own experience.

B) Education is the means by which one comes to know, learn, and understand the experience of someone else.

C) Education is the means by which one comes to know, learn, and understand that they are useless and nothing more than a number.

D) Education is a tool that can be used however it’s distributors choose.

I’m sure anyone of these answers could suffice, but what is it to me? I view education as a tool to be acquired and used by individuals, communities, and so forth to transform there worlds. Education is a tool for transformation. It shouldn’t free anyone; rather, it should give people the tools to free themselves. Education is awakening to the reality that power is not fixed. It belongs in the hands of those who realize they have it. Education allows people to maneuver social classes, oppression, suppression, it equally gives people the power to oppress and suppress others. Education provides choice. Choice is freedom. The more choices, the more free. So, how does my practice as an educator reflect my current definition of education (current because it’s subject to change at any moment, but hopefully with some warning)?

First, I am inconsistent. As a classroom teacher I naturally war between my understanding of education and the prescribed method. I think this is a natural symptom of institutional function. While it may not completely dictate my actions, it forces me to at least maintain a level of compliance. I still must function within the institutional framework or else, I cannot say if this is good or bad. My reflection must become more complex, I suppose.

How do I temper my understanding of education with what is prescribed? What does this do to my view of myself as a teacher?

Foremost, I come to view myself as a rebellious individual. I position myself against the system of which I am a part. This is, at times beneficial to the students in my care, especially when I choose to allow them to take the lead in class. When we let curiosity take the reigns in the class we (students and me) learn, discover, understand far more than if we stuck to any narrow curriculum or even my narrow wishes as the “leader” of the class. I find this as true as a music teacher as I did as an algebra teacher. This is true also when I “teach” teachers. All learning settings are improved by the freedom to explore problems as they arise. While this allowance for freedom may be deemed rebellious by me or an onlooker it seems to be the only way for meaningful learning occur. There are problems that occur as a result of my dualistic view of myself in the classroom. It can be a Jekyll and Hyde sort of reaction. It certainly was more of this at the start of my career. I’ve become more efficient at doing what I deem best as I’ve advanced as a teacher; nonetheless the required doublethink can result in the emergence of a very ugly creature from time to time. Temperance is the key.

There is more to write on this topic, but I will stop here. Education, as I understand it is the means by which an individual acquires choice. It involves personal power. Education is not given; rather, education enables one to acquire. Thanks to Freire et al. for all the thoughts I’ve borrowed and am attempting to process. I hope to continue this process with the aide of colleagues and tempering dialogue.

#education #SOSchat #revolution #edreform #p2

As educators we must constantly assess why we continue as educators. We must examine our practice daily through reflection and evaluate whether or not we are teaching for what we deem to be the right reasons. It is up to the teacher, alone, what those “right reasons” are. There are many reasons for teaching, just as there are many reasons for education. Education as a system is dictated by various political and corporate forces; ignoring this is simply naïve. As educators, we are the final barrier between policy and the humans the policy affects (this flows up the bureaucratic continuum, as well— principals have some control over the way policy affects teachers and so forth). It must be noted that our refusal to carry out certain policies will undoubtedly result in disciplinary action of some sort, but if we deem a policy or anything stemming therefrom harmful to the learners in our care, it is our duty to disrupt said policy. I do not mean to say, at least at this point, that we should all openly rebel and refuse to do our jobs. Rather, we must be critical and vigilant in our pursuit of providing a “quality education” for the learners in our care. We must first identify within ourselves our own definition of quality education.

If the current system offers a complete and meaningful education with opportunity to learn, explore, and become more actualized then stay the course. If the system is beneficial to society as a whole, furthering the participatory processes necessary for the maintenance of an open society, then stay the course. However, if the system shows little or no intention of providing a context for enlightenment, empowerment, and even liberation, then the system cannot be considered benevolent and must be dismantled, and most certainly disrupted.

Teachers are not policy makers. We are at the bottom of the top-down bureaucratic pyramid. We have little say in what is prescribed for our classes and students, but we do have the choice to swallow the pill. We have the choice to follow doctors orders or not. I lean toward the belief that true education is necessary for people to be free, and fully human, especially in an institutionalized society. Humans should have a right and the power to determine how and if they are institutionalized. Society should be open. If we do not help the learners in our care build their critical minds and spirits, then they will never have a choice in anything. We did not have that choice. We were pushed through one institution and into others with little choice, many of us never questioned the validity of the practices that affected us, many of us still have not or will not. What I am proposing, I suppose, could lead to anarchy of a sort. Our institutions certainly provide structure, and there is a need, at least currently, for a structure. But, we, the People, should have a strong say in the structure. We have a right, a natural right, to determine what is best for us.

As teachers, we have the choice to provide learners with skills, tools, and experiences that will make possible their own personal enlightenment. We can also orchestrate their uninterruptible submission to corruption, consumption, and greed. We can mold critical free people, or we can create subservient sheep. I submit that my views may be absolutely wrong and should be questioned and scrutinized without relent, unless, of course, you find the critical spirit abhorrent, in which case you should quickly swallow any bit of snake oil sent your way. As educators, we must be critical. We must understand our power. We must act.

We are not radicals; we simply want what’s best for our students, our neighbors, communities, and countries. We will do what’s best. We will teach.

#occupyedu #SOSchat #edreform

Yes, education should have standards, and yes, those standards should be tested with corporations in mind. The STANDARD should be that all learners are equipped with the critical skills to participate in an open society; that is, learners should be literate, connected, and aware. The test will be if power shifts, or not. If not, then we should rethink our standard. For this standard to be met, there will be steps to take. We will have to extend education beyond the first 18 years of life, and encourage learning and growth for all. Standards based learning, of course. But we just need one loose standard—that the People be allowed to acquire education that will benefit them.

We will bang out the how’s and why’s together.

#SOSchat #education #occupyedu

It is beneficial to teach non-violence in the classroom, and to discuss its implications elsewhere. Non-violence is not always natural, but its a valuable tool and adds to the learner’s toolbox. Dialogue regarding violence, conflict resolution, and dealing with and around authority is invaluable. Time is not built-in for such conversations, but to neglect these topics is to set learners up for failure, danger, or death. The underground curriculum cannot be ignored.

I’ll expound later.

#occupyedu #SOSchat #p2 #revolution

Originally posted December 2011

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. Economic development. Crime prevention. Adult education. Early childhood. All in between. What if schools were designed for enabling community transformation. What if we spent time on rebuilding communities instead of worrying with national standards. What if standardization was concerned with a high quality of life for everyone instead of a number?

#SOSchat #revolution #p2 #OWS

If education is necessary for society to remain open or democratic or participatory, then what are we providing our students? Would it be too radical to say that engaging in stringently paced test prep, or test prep at all, drastically impairs the ability of a learner to grasp the concept of rule by the people much less participate in it? Education can function as a system of subversion or of liberation and enlightenment. A system that is built around a test can in no way be a system of liberation. I’m not sure that enlightenment can be standardized either. If we are aware of this, then why or how do we continue? Do we continue doing the same thing, the same bland test prep, the same churched up test prep? Do we continue to systematically disable the generation in our care (mind you we will soon be in their care)? If we remain passive, then we are the architects of their demise, and ours. We are building the machine that will destroy us.

If we, as educators, are believers in open, democratic, and participatory societies, then we must resist. We must survive, yes, but resist more. We must do everything in our classrooms to ensure learners learn to participate, learn to become critical, learn to smell and identify shit when shit abounds. We must enable thinkers and doers, not sitters and getters. We are not blameless if students leave our classrooms as passive automatons. Find a way to disrupt and resist corruption. We must find a way to affect things outside our classrooms. We must engage other teachers in resistance. We must encourage teachers to really teach. We must engage each other in dialogue that leads to informed and effective action. We must find a way to effect policy. We must disrupt and alter, for the better, the punitive top down measures that stand to prevent the possibility of liberating and enlightening education.

Most important, we must connect with and support one another. We must engage others. The change necessary cannot be implemented by a few, if it is we stand to see another version of the same system emerge, only with a slight twist. We, educators, parents, lovers of democracy and open society, must stand together and build support for whatever change we see as best. Power in education has been in the wrong hands for too long. The pendulum need not swing the other day. The pendulum needs to stop swinging all together. The paradigm has shifted, but the pendulum still stands swinging as a political seismograph. As long as education is dictated by those whose interests lie outside the realm of education, then the education that enables critical thought and participation will not be possible. If we’re fine with the current system, then we should let it stand. If we’re not, then we should change it. But, it will not change if we remain passive. It will not change if we or our neighbors are asleep. For now, it’s time to wake up.

#testing #SOSchat #satire #occupyedu #edchat

When referring to the Test it is important to make it a proper noun. The first ‘T’ in Test shall always be capitalized as we reside, teach, and learn in a Standardized Testocracy. Failing to use the name of the Test properly shall result in “swift and just discipline”. The Test is all knowing. The Test is all giving. The Test is just and true. Test is beauty; beauty is Test. Test with a capital ‘T’. Great is thy Testiness, Test Unto Me. These are the hymns of our fathers, the custodians of this great Testocracy. Test Save the Test. We teach the Test for the sake of the Test. We must be thankful for the Test, for it provides us with our station in life. It is giver of remediation, and dictator of pace. The Test embodies time and space. It tames our evil minds. Thank you Test for all you’ve provided. Thank you Test for pacing guides. Thank you Test, for I had no clue what to teach before You.

Wake up and drink the Koolaid, or be Remediated.

#education #SOSchat #revolution #occupyedu

Through writing, meditation, soul searching, dialogue, dialectic, and debate, I have arrived at a point of tension that requires some form of release. The crisis is that of my questioning and understanding of my role in public education. This moment is no new moment to me, nor is it original to me. It is a crisis that befalls, though it seems I have pulled it down upon myself very intentionally, anyone who participates within any institution; further, anyone who has any naïve belief in an institution and is gradually awakened to the reality of their chosen institution or institutions. I say this with the understanding that I have never doubted or been blind to the fact that public education has functioned in a sinister manner to divide and suppress people, at least this is my claim. I do, however, believe in the intention of many educators to work toward the liberation and enlightenment of the people with and/for whom they work (I would hope to be considered among this class of educators). Therein lies the crisis, educators want to aid in enlightenment and liberation; the system functions to divide and suppress. The system as it is functions to eliminate any possibility of a critical and literate populace through bland and numbing test prep from kindergarten forward. Mass standardization and narrowing curriculums do not lay the ground work for an open democratic society; rather, the road is paved for any form of rule by few without dissent or question. These ideas do not belong to me alone, but would be realized by anyone with a critical eye toward the practice of education— perhaps more saliently, the results of education as it is. Education, standardized education, has not closed any achievement gap, has not changed communities for the better, has not put more or better food on a table for the recipients of education. People have made money, but not the People. So, I arrive at my personal crisis. Where do I go? Do I continue working in an institution that seems to do more harm than good, especially in this climate? Do I fight from within? Do I seek more education? Do I seek more influence? Do I keep chopping away with many others in the blogosphere? What
can I do to amplify my voice, my struggle, and that of others? I’m not sure. I know the answers to my questions aren’t simple. I know I keep asking these questions. I do know that I need to continue seeking answers and asking questions. I need to keep connecting to other educators, rabble-rousers, and revolutionaries. There is a great beast enveloping and facing us. We must stand in solidarity to deliver ourselves, the beast, and help those being crushed deliver themselves. Scrutiny is important. Language is important. It is important that we remain humanistic and not humanitarian. It’s important that we listen. It’s important that we act. What next?

#education #SOSchat

Writing educatedtodeath.com has been a mind altering venture and adventure. I set out to be reflective, and attempt to maintain sanity in what seemed, and still seems, to be be a corrupt system with other things at play besides the well being of children. As a result, I have become a part of a larger conversation and community of educators, critics, grassroots reformers, and so forth. I have learned far more from you than I have from any formal education I have received to date. It has been invaluable to me as a teacher to be a part of such a vast conversation that leads to action and future action. I am far less isolated as a teacher, as a critic, as a human. I am far more aware of who I am as a teacher, as a critic, as a human. Writing, chatting, thinking, and quarreling here has urged me think, rethink, and think again about my practice and my contribution to education and the education debacle. I have asked myself myriad questions: Am I a part of the problem or the solution? Is it so simple? What to I need to do as a teacher to help end alter or end the standards movement? What can I do in my classroom/school/district to disrupt some of the harm being done by standardized and massifying education? I’ve asked if I should be asking these questions? Are these questions answerable? I am currently seeking some answers and questions dealing with eugenics and education? I, along with others, am asking simple questions and learning to ask and generate more difficult questions. I am arriving at a point where I think I need to take a few days to ask questions and seek answers before I write much more. I need to spend more time listening than talking. I need a break. This need for respite luckily coincides with Spring Break. Surely, as a I say I need a break I will be overwhelmed with the urge to write. Perhaps I need to write this blurb to keep myself moving forward.

At any rate, I thank you for reading and helping me learn. I am reticent to post this, but I think it’s necessary for me. And, I must always return to my original purpose for writing this— to maintain a level of sanity and reflect. I will return to my original thesis and see where it leads. Cheers.

#edreform #SOSchat

Something drastic needs to be done to alter the course of public education. It has become a testocracy. Curriculums have been molded to dictate that instruction revolves around test prep, rather than best practices in education. The culture of education, teaching, and learning have changed drastically as a result of the testing industry. Regardless of the industries intentions, money is being wasted on testing. Millions upon millions of taxpayer dollars have been and are being poured into this industry and related products and services. Many are being crushed under the weight. Ultimately, a generation has received an inappropriate and lacking education. How can we fix this?

I’d like to propose a grassroots movement and organization designed to educate and empower teachers, administrators, and the public about the disastrous effects of the propagation of this education debacle. Perhaps the organization could be called the Center for Teacher Empowerment, or maybe the National Organization for Teacher Empowerment (NOTE). The group/movement will work to empower education professionals to create and implement change in classrooms, schools, districts and in state and national politics. The goal will be to empower educator-activists and support them as they enable education communities to create sustainable change from within. Simultaneously, the group/movement will need to acquire and develop a powerful political voice that can influence and dictate policy change. Additionally, attention needs to be granted to changing public opinion about educators and education. The public needs to be educated. Propaganda needs to be countered.

A summary:

National Organization for Teacher Empowerment (NOTE)

Mission:

1. Empower and educate education-activists to implement and organize sustainable change within their immediate area (classroom, building, district).

2. Build a diverse and powerful grassroots network of educators, parents, communities dedicated to proper educational change.

3. Develop an influential political voice on local, state, and national level.

4. Correct public opinion of educators. Counter negative, show positive, and progressive.

5. Build support

It is important that we talk about making reflective and powerful change. Inaction and silence are not an option. We must carefully build support and take great care not to alienate supporters. I’d like this to be an open conversation. Is something of this magnitude doable? Help me define some goals, tactics, and options. Let’s look at what exists. Let’s join forces. Let’s continue working.

#education #edreform #SOSchat #control

(Please, if what you find below is a waste of time, skip to the *; don’t waste your time on a fool’s attempt to make sense of the senseless. Cheers.)

I want to begin by stating that I am a proponent of a critical internal locus of control for human beings— that would, of course, include students. It’s important to use ‘critical’ as a qualifier, as well, because so much of what we think is internalized has been conditioned and now seems internal. Additionally, ample argument can be made that every action is made externally. By that I mean we are constantly responding to stimuli no matter how we intellectualize it. I will not try to tease out these complications, frankly that would be a trite go at rhetorical masturbation for which I do not have the time.

That said, external motivators are a must for our current educational model of skill, drill, and test to be effective. Students, and teachers, for that matter are not working on anything truly stimulating provided by the state. The curriculum is cold and pointless, schools function more as prisons than places of curious exploration, any attempts to find glimmers of hope are subdued quickly by the pacing guide, the examples are endless. External control is required when forcing someone to be a something. Education, as it is (arguably education in general), seeks to alter the natural flow of curiosity. It seeks to apply discipline to the mind, and discipline is important. Change, growth, transformation all require a level of discipline, a great deal of it, in fact. Intellectual growth, the building of skills, thinking, and so forth all require discipline. But, discipline in itself is not the problem. The problem is, at least, two-fold. First, in our system of institutional function, the discipline, the locus of control, is not returned to the individual without rendering it less that operative. Second, the current system requires a form of external control that will prevent resistance— the content is so numbing, and the structure so dehumanizing that any soul will and rightfully resist. As a result, external motivators are a must in schools, then people can wander aimlessly through the remainder of their existence from institution to institution seeking refuge from any lack of structure. This is not a phenomenon caused entirely by education, but is simply a part of the function of western society. But, back to school. Testing especially has required motivation to be more and more external and punitive. If it isn’t then quotas won’t be made, curriculum won’t be covered (understanding is not a consideration), and testing will not boom. The industry would crumble of we had kindergartens crawling around playing with blocks, and 8th grade biology classes spending several weeks dissecting frogs. The test must happen. That is the aim. All of life is a test— a standardized test. With all this testing, the control can never be returned to the individual. What would they do? Would they rebel? Not if you’ve destroyed the will too. So while the gradual release of responsibility is present in word, if the responsibility was never developed and nurtured, then it may never appear without intensive democratic intervention that seeks to liberate the colonialized mind and being.

*I quite possibly got lost in the circles of rhetoric above, the problems of our education systems and society are multifactorial and interrelated. So, in summation, without extreme external control our education system, with its current goals, would not function. Tests would never be bubbled, remediation and remediation specialists would have no place, reformers would have to do something else, the industry would change. The means is an end in itself. Control people from as early as possible, and they will belong to their controllers forever. Hopefully, they will never even noticed they’re being controlled. I mean what would the world be like if people went around asking questions and making choices? Reasonable, perhaps?

#SOSchat @DianeRavitch #occupyedu #revolution

What will it take for learners to take matters of testing into their own hands? Can it be done? Students subconsciously resist abusive testing practices through ‘means’ that have created the classroom management focus we have today. Resistance, conscious or subconscious, is not an option. The human spirit requires rebellion to counter oppression— always. But, what will it take to move this rebellion to the front of the mind? What will be the catalyst for a truly organized kids liberation? Voices from teachers and parents ring loudly against the constant onslaught of corporate reforms and ridiculous education practices. We talk and talk. We continue to teach, when and how we can. Students continue to struggle. The learners are beneath the heel of this entire debacle.

What would happen if, come test day, students didn’t show up at all? What if they all showed up with, say, a stomach bug and soiled all the testing materials with vomit? What if they broke their no. 2 pencils and walked out? What if learners all stood up and demanded to be taught? What if they halted all education until it became their education?

Children are being treated as pawns in this education nightmare. No one should be a victim of his/her education. No one.

Until some mass resistance by students PK-12 begins to end this crisis, there will be minimal change, a lot of rhetoric, and wasted education. We will stand beside you as you continue resisting in your souls and actions. But, we are adults, we grow more and more powerless, we divide into camps and fear for our jobs. We do not have the answer here. The time has come for the children’s liberation once again. Perhaps there is a Mother Jones among you, us, or they? Learners unite, and demand your education. It’s time to flip this pyramid on its point.

Please pass this along. Give it to students, teachers, parents. Education can no longer be denied and deformed.

#education #SOSchat #revolution

Underground Education is revolutionary, but does not aim to teach or incite external revolution; rather, it aims to nudge minds awake. Underground education begins the moment you see something that needs to be taught, and you teach it regardless of time allotted. Teachers engage in this daily. It is not a specific plan or curriculum. It is simply teaching, an art that has been and is being rendered obsolete through excessive and oppressive testing procedures. Underground Education begins with you, the teacher, examining the current curriculum as is, and critically supplementing it with what you know to be educational best practice.

Early elementary teachers often don’t have time to help their learners master the skills necessary for reading. Take the time. Make sure they really learn to read. You know how to assess their literacy. Help them develop every single tool they need to engage in ‘reading’— their worlds
and the word. Talk to them, let them talk. Spend time questioning and exploring. Build motor skills and number sense. If a concept is tough to grasp and you must move forward, don’t neglect to go back even if is just for that one child. Teach. You know how to do it. No evaluation, third party, or administrative office can tell you to neglect a child in the name of an assessment. Underground teaching is about providing learners with what they need. It’s about exploring curiosity. It involves teaching and stimulating every child and mind as though they belong in gifted classes. Early elementary teachers build a firm foundation. The slogans say this is so, teachers make it so.

Upper elementary teachers face the fourth grade slump. The transition from learning to read to reading to learn, and beyond that, an even greater emphasis on testing. Learners arrive lacking basic skills for numerous reasons, teachers don’t have time to go back and teach K-4. You don’t, but you must. This is a tough critical slump. The focus, as you know, must center around enabling the learners to glean information from texts— math, reading, social studies, science, the physical world, cultural contexts, etc. This period is quite critical. Learners decide at this point if they can “learn” or not. So often kids never learn to glean any valuable or interesting information independently from the texts lain before them. This is the point where a decisions made about whether “learning” is cold and pointless or meaningful and enriching. Behavior problems blossom out of thin air for those who are behind and lost. Every child should be able to pick up a book or look at a problem, on paper or in world, and glean information and generate critical questions. They should have vocabulary and the ability to acquire vocabulary to talk about what they experience. The vocabulary and language must belong to them, it must be internalized. Of course, there is no time for this in a class full of 30+ struggling fourth graders. You’re frustrated, exhausted, beat down. It will take you chasing rabbits in class, letting them explore seemingly random trains of thought, hallway, lunchroom, and playground conversations. It will require think-alouds and scaffolding of cognitive processes galore. It requires teaching and nurturing critical thinking and problem solving skills constantly and weaving instructional strands together. It requires teaching social skills and building language to express complex emotions. It involves dialogue. Much of this sounds like teaching according to “best practice”; it is teaching the child, the human, not the test. To recap and summarize, upper elementary must aim to enable a child to learn and know s/he can learn. The tools must have a chance to be used. Learners must develop a stake in their own learning. Their curiosity must be explored. They must find what motivates them. They must be successful more than enough to have the desire and payback to continue learning.

From here forth, education involves mass testing. Everything is for the test. Students are known as proficient, basic, and minimal. Names are lost. Discipline, emotional, academic, you name it, problems multiply at this point.
Anything missed in elementary, say fractions, is multiplied from here forward. A kid without a solid understanding of multiplication can derail a pre-Algebra class in a second. The trend is triage. Help who you can. This does not suffice, of course, but what can you do? Parallel curriculum to supplement, reinforce, develop, skills to scaffold this learner to be as close to where they need to as possible. There is not time for this, I know, but it must be taken. The second half of education— middle school, junior high, and high school function academically as a place to deepen skills and augment learning. Pacing guides and high stakes testing obfuscates this though. Secondary teachers beat their heads against their cages trying to figure out how to help their learning learn independently. Kids arrive with so many pieces missing. By this time the cumulative affects of missing pieces here and there make the puzzle seem impossible. Teachers are forced to make tough decisions. The outliers are often thrown out with the bath water. Educational triage- teach to the middle. Learners and teachers are beyond frustrated at this point. It’s survival.

What can be done? Help them, the learners start connecting information, give them problems to solve. Perhaps its a problem in their own world. Something they can arrive at in dialogue. Help them, or watch them work it out through dialogue. Note their cognitive processes, go back and help them notice those processes. Help them learn to understand how they are thinking, how they are solving the problem. Let them see that they are critically working through cognitively complex stuff. Help them write it. Help them teach it. Slowly draw these skills into academic sundries. Help them note their own problem solving/learning ability. Turn them loose on a skill within their ZPD (remember that?), encourage them to teach that skill, to a neighbor, to you, to the world. Help them become powerful learners and collaborators. Everyone has mad skills that can contribute to the group. Perhaps Johnny isn’t the best reader, but his reasoning skills are out this world, his contribution to the collective intelligence of the class, this world is invaluable.

The world functions as a huge cooperative learning project. Schools do not, but they don’t then victims are left behind without a clue they ever had anything to offer— learners and educators. Education leaves people disillusioned and lost, Underground Education seeks to empower and awaken. Underground Education will not allow a learner to pass through a system without finding their value. Underground Education is not dictated by the test or the State agenda of intellectual suppression; rather, it is dictated by the needs of the learners in your care. Here, the educator is the professional. Reform is in your hands, not the hands of the distant, gravy-train riding, ed policy pricks. A top down model cannot work in the underground. Education is for the People. It is by the People. It does not celebrate labels, failures, or separation by assessment measures. It seeks to teach and help learn.

Most important teachers who bother to teach in the Underground must be connected. We must band together in this struggle. We must collaborate and innovate. We must share our methods and our aims. We, together, can revolutionize education. We are not reformers or policy makers; we are teachers, we make decisions, we implement them. We stand together.

Share your experience. educatedtodeath@gmail.com
Twitter: @educatedtodeath
#SOSchat

Let’s talk.

#occupyedu #revolution #SOSchat

Education functions either as a means of liberation or suppression. It’s difficult to tease the two apart. All that public or formal education claims to be is chock full of contradictions. Less is being done to hide these contradictions, but the rhetoric remains the same. Reformers such as Michelle Rhee claim to be “working tirelessly to build educational environments that foster learning”, while working with entities that function to suppress thought and learning through extreme testing measures. The testing is in the name of good, but has horrific affects. The fallout of all this “good” that has been done is comparable to a Chernobyl disaster of the mind. Minds have been left deformed and incapable of critical thought or participation through rigorous testing practice that leaves no time to develop basic skills. Achievement gaps continue to widen as does The chasm between rich and poor. The language of reform is confusing and misleading. We’re told and tell ourselves, as we’re told, that we are working for good.
But, we see no signs of improvement. Reformers provide us with new slogans to keep morale high.

Is all hopeless? No, but we are certainly seeing the moment nearing it’s crisis. People grow restless as conditions worsen in every area. Slogans only work for so long. What role do educators have in all of this? We function ‘in loco parentis’. We serve in place of the parent in the schools. 8+ hours of the day, 186+ days of the year. We have that much time to aide in the liberation of minds, or suppress them. There are measures taken against us if we work on the behalf of liberation. We will be labeled ineffective enemies of by those who work “tirelessly” to “foster learning”. If we do not work to civically engage our students; that is, to engage them and help them engage in critical dialogue and deepen their understanding of their own world, then we help our nations and fellow people slip deeper into apathy and passivity. ‘In loco parentis’ puts us in a place to disrupt suppression of minds. We must take that opportunity.

Teachers can no longer afford to just be teachers. We cannot be passive. The People pass through our classrooms; they stay there for 13 + years. We have to unite as teachers and ensure the best possible education for those in our care, even of its an underground curriculum, and it will be. We cannot afford to let “Education” destroy generations and minds and souls. We must enable critical learning. We must disrupt this travesty.

#government #democracy #occupy #p2 #ctl

How can anyone call this a democracy? Sure. People can participate. But, participation is limited. Very limited. People are detached from the government. It is not the people’s government. It is ‘certain’ people’s government. It is a government that belongs to ‘certain’ organizations. The candidates and current politicians rarely have any true connection to
the people, and vice-versa. A politician is nothing more than a distant celebrity who has power reaching far beyond entertainment. We, the people, vote, or not, for someone who has the funds to advertise and sustain a campaign— and they have staffs who are quite savvy in the fundraising department. These people, if they remain to be that, are distant entities from what what the common folk would know as people. Their station in life has endowed them with myriad opportunities and freedoms that only money and connections can buy. We are run by a ‘them’ that wants to be known as ‘us’.

Has this separation from the ruling spawned great apathy? Of course. But, apathy may not suffice. Apathy indicates the absence of what once was. Have we, all the people, ever really been involved? Or, has participation been limited to the wealthy, and upper middle class? All participation from the lower and working classes have seemed to require some form of public struggle. Demonstrations, strikes, civil disobedience, and so forth, seem to have been the only means of persuasion for the lower socio-economic majority of our people. Much of the change that has come about through demonstration has been a result of public response to the excessive force used by authorities. Change does not seem to come through any sort of benevolence, but only for the sake of public opinion. Change comes for the sake of keeping a name squeaky clean to those who can see. This does not seem like democracy. It closely resembles the behavior of colonialized societies, where the oppressed classes have to fight tooth and nail for every smidgen of dignity they receive, or have to turn to alternative economies and protection structures. Societies like this have huge underclass systems that operate completely separate from “mainstream” society.

Surely, I’m confused. Please explain. Am I allowed to ask these questions? Do I have any rights? Why do I feel uneasy putting this into print? Paranoia is perhaps creeping in.

#teaching #education #humanity

I blew up at one of my classes today. I made quite the ass of myself. I yelled until I could feel my face flush, and feel my pulse in my temple. It was ridiculous, sophomoric, and non-cathartic. Sure, I have been sick. Sure, I had a headache. Sure, they refused to comply. They, my class of 7th and 8th grade girls were being ridiculous. They’re capable and have not been living up to it. To top it off I got in a yelling match with one student. After what seemed like an eternity of ass-ery, I had them sit down and proceeded to deliver punitive notes for some impending punitive test. The notes largely consisted of definitions pertaining to music, all terms were in French or Italian.

I made an ass of myself. I went to the office immediately after class to confess. I simply told the principal I over-reacted and stated what I stated above. Maybe I hoped for a reprimand. Rather, I got a simple, “I understand”. So, what’s my course of action? This isn’t the first time I’ve overreacted, and it certainly won’t be the last. In the past I’ve apologized for flying off the handle, and I will do the same tomorrow. We’ll probably take our punitive test, and discuss today’s tomfoolery. I
am a teacher. I am a professional. And, I certainly am a human. It’s important that I own up to my mistakes. Humility toward a class of adolescents is deeply important. They must know that teachers are human. It would never suffice to let this pass, or to hide it, or deny it. It would break trust. It would be outside of the bond required for authentic teaching. I will do better. I will be honest. We, as a class, will move forward together. No One, me included, left behind.

#education #humanity #occupyedu

My students can give me Hell from
time to time. They’re middle school/Jr. High kids. We carry a lot of baggage into the classroom. We had a guest come in to audition them for an advanced choir, a possibly an opera camp. Keep in mind this is no arts school, we’re Title I, free lunch, and are situated in a Hell of a neighborhood. These kids struggle. We struggle.

They each delivered an impressive performance. Not impressive for them, or for their situation, just impressive. They’re badass kids. Beyond that they exercised the finest savoir faire, rivaling any junior league prick— mine can fight better too. I don’t take much time gloating, but I will today. I’m proud of my students. They are mastering their worlds, they’re learning to maneuver social classes. They are becoming masters of themselves.

#teaching #SOSchat #revolution

Quality teaching means two things. Her test scores reflect her quality teaching; or, her commitment to her students reflect her quality teaching. One statements reflect a commitment to test scores, the other to students. Does the public have a means of determining the difference? Only if they’re aware that there should be a distinction to be made. Many teachers are not even aware that there should be a difference. It’s difficult for a teacher to separate themselves from their test scores. It’s a cognitive miracle. The importance of the test is constantly reinforced through slogans, media, and, of course, evaluations. The slogans are branded onto the psyches of children from kindergarten fore. Teachers are asked (required) to participate in the branding— after all, it’s their job on the line. It behooves a teacher to create a test taking machine, further, a self-motivated test taking machine. It makes the work easier. Full buy-in to the testing system means success for all, or at least uniform massification for all. Dissidents beware. Anyone who speaks against the system, teachers, students, or parents, should expect to be branded a radical yahoo. Dissent will make the system crumble. Students who resist are suspended, expelled, remediated, and so forth. Student dissent is often subconscious and springs forth from the knowledge that forced compliance is unnatural. Defiant teachers are ostracized until they comply. They receive poor evaluations, are put on improvement plans, or fired. Some are just considered radical, and have to function more like spies than “teachers”. It’s an act of sneakily teaching the student with the appearance of teaching the test. A conscious teacher must be a master of doublespeak and fully aware of the doublethink required to function in the education system. Principals who dissent are brutalized and blackballed and the punitive measures continue to the top I’m sure. The carnage is widespread, but covert. The ones harmed the deepest are the students and teachers, oh, and society as people function less and less as human beings and more as automatons. People are being corralled into increasingly separated classes and camps. The poor, and barely making it in one camp, and the demigod rulers somewhere else— somewhere like the heavens where healthcare, literacy, and vacations are copious. Where is the solution? Who knows? Perhaps in community involvement, or better teacher evals. Maybe in representative democracy. Hell, maybe it’s somewhere in 18th century France. Viva la value-added measures my ass.

#education #revolution #SOSchat

Testing, high-stakes testing, is a fact of life in public education. I struggle with what stance to make in my writing, speaking, and day-to-day interactions with teachers. As educatedtodeath I have chosen to take an idealistic stance. This is not to say that the writing is not based in action. It is a combination of reflection and action future, present, and past. I write with the intention of growing my own practice and hope to have some greater impact, either by spawning a desire for transformation, revolution, or wakefulness in a reader, or by affirming the thoughts of another. Beyond that, and more important, I write to know what I think, and to participate in a larger conversation about where education needs to go and how to get there. I know how things are. They need to be changed from within.

As a speaker, though I have reduced my speaking tremendously this year, I try to lend practical solutions to pressing problems and lend some insight into bending the rules; that is, really teaching and preparing for the test at the same time. I try to focus on sharing my knowledge and experience with best practices in teaching. I want teachers to see that they are already implementing best practices. Sometimes they need some tweaking, but mainly teachers need to see what they’re doing right. We examine parallel curriculums and ways to quickly scaffold lacking skills to build efficacy among struggling students. We all need to know how to navigate this screwy system. We can’t do that thinking we have nothing to offer. We certainly can’t do it if we’re being crushed under the weight of the almighty test and the minions that seek to make it the Way.

As a teacher, I work to navigate the system as best as I can. I’ve always enjoyed slipping in and out of things, accomplishing someone else’s goals and the important things simultaneously. When they can’t be accomplished together it’s time to call bullshit. I’ve called bullshit, and I try to call it daily. But, I digress. My teaching practice revolves around learning for transformation, for teachers and students. It requires that we look at the test as a very present threat. It is here, we have to deal with it. We have to, “whip it”, but the test cannot be our master. No student should have their soul crushed in the name of the test. I’m sure I’m guilty of letting that happen. I can only strive to prevent that.

My writing here is for the sake of what is right. It has become a telling of the struggles I see
and endure. I thank you for struggling beside me and making this world smaller. Cheers.

P.S., If there is anything I can offer you in the area of pedagogy, classroom stuff, motivation, intervention, advocacy, etc. please let me know. I’d be glad to share, discuss, struggle with you. Email me at educatedtodeath@gmail.com

#education #SOSchat

Teaching is an action that requires love, science, foolishness, and persuasion all to work in concert. It’s a near impossible task to teach anyone anything, but somehow, through the above formula, people learn. Have you ever tried to teach a small child to blow their own nose or to tie a shoe? It’s miraculous that anyone ever learns either of those skills. Reading is no different. There are all these little bits that must be assembled by someone for reading to become meaningful. There is nothing simple about it. The credit cannot go to one person alone. Every experience a child has becomes a tool, a cog, a weight and balance in the odd amalgamation of skills and experience that are eventually referred to as print literacy. It comes with steps forward followed by numerous steps back. Theory has a big role in explaining this process/es, but the role of dogged perseverance is stronger.

Just to teach a simple skill requires the love, science, foolishness, persuasion algorithm. Teachers have to have great love for their students, and perhaps for humanity, to engage in such a daunting task. Without love we would quickly turn away from the deluge of frustration and seek higher more quickly rewarding ground.

The science behind teaching and learning, whether or not it is understood in scientific terms, is vast. First, research based methods are implemented in classrooms daily. There are, of course, basic learning theories, crowd psychology, neuroscience, and so forth. All teachers are not versed in the science of their practice, but undoubtedly implement solid research based strategies, that are recreated and invented over and over again because that is what is required. Teachers are constantly experimenting with different ways of teaching. Each year, each day, each class period the dynamics of the classroom change. What worked for one group may fail miserably. Teachers adjust, many so fluidly that it isn’t even noticeable to the teacher or observer. It’s a think on your feet kind of job.

Teaching requires a level of foolishness. What is the limit of perseverance? When do people give up? I teach alongside forty year veterans who have day in day out taught the same subject, never ceasing to try and teach basic multiplication to kids who are years behind. Teachers who patiently help high schoolers sound out words they should be reason fluently. These teachers see students grow, struggle grow some more, experience set backs, and keep going. This can all happen over the course of a day, hour, year, whatever. Teachers don’t quit. Each year regulations get tighter. Teaching becomes more impossible. We see budgets cut. We dig deep. We become less revered, more hated. Teachers are abused. Abused. Abused. And they/we keep at it. Foolish? Perhaps, but people need to learn. There is no time to hang on a cross. Each generation has needs. Our society needs literate people. We’re trying. It’s difficult, but God knows we’ll find away.

Teachers must be incredibly persuasive. Could anyone learn algebra if they weren’t? Teachers must motivate a group of students to learn to learn. We are perpetually leading people to water, and trying to help them learn to drink. We try to stir hope in hopeless people. We try to help students see their own potential. We stoke the fires of curiosity, when not impeded by test prep. We stoke the fires anyway. We try to keep learners learning even though learning seems futile.

It seems cold and pointless when it all seems to lead to a cold and pointless test. But, we don’t teach for a test. We teach for humanity. Education has a chance to be a great equalizer. It is turning quickly into something different. The great equalizer is not education as a system, but the ability to learn and navigate systems. We are fighting to give tools to people who can take them and transform their own worlds. We are fighting for our own worlds. We are fighting, hopefully, for humanity. We will continue without regard to blockades on our journey. We will
stick to love, science, foolishness, and persuasion. Say what you want, but we are teachers. We are committed. We enable our neighbors to transform their own worlds as we change ours. Keep at it.

#education #revolution #occupy

(Please note, dear reader, that this is my attempt to process a complex notion for my own benefit. If the following string of words is beneficial to you, then I have accomplished something. If it is not, please skip to the end section— it is marked with an asterisk (*). I value your time and would never seek to waste it. Here’s your warning.)

We are disconnected from the decisions that affect us. We are permitted limited control in our governments. We are allowed to vote for our representatives. Our decisions are based on limited information that we receive through televised debates and advertisements and any other information we can dig up on our own. The same goes for national, state, and many municipal elections. We are given a bit of factual information, a lot of misinformation, and then are allowed to scavenge for any other info we can find. Once said representatives are elected we are in their hands. We have entrusted our future to them. Some say they are accountable to us. That’s a hard sale. We have the power to threaten not to reelect them. We can write letters, but our participation is minimal. Our access to them is restricted. This form of democracy is labeled representative democracy. We,the people, elect people to represent us. We, the people, have very limited power.

So why bother teaching/writing/talking about participating in democracy? Why not embrace apathy? The answer is neither simple, nor solitary. Democracy is a confusing term. There are many forms of democracy proper, and the word has been is used and misused in many other ways. I think it would be beneficial for the purpose of my writing to operationally define democracy within the context of my writing, educational, and social practice. I acknowledge that this task will undoubtedly need revision and may, in fact, not completely align with the ways I’ve used the term in the past. I think the term is used too loosely and often in an idealistic manner. It might be of use to determine what democracy is not.

The term democracy is often used politically to establish an air of rightness. The word alone evokes varying emotional responses depending on ones experience with “democracy”. In American schools and churches democracy is equated directly with “freedom” and the “best form of government”. “What is democracy?” “It means it’s a free country.” The argument is designed to be cyclical. To speak against democracy or even question it is to go against all that is “right”. If properly conditioned it is to go against one’s self. This understanding of democracy is naïve and incomplete. The mere repetition of phrases, and cyclical rhetoric do not equate with democracy.

Someone who has seen their country occupied by the troops of another country in the name of “democracy” will most certainly have a different understanding. In many places “democracy” has become synonymous with imperialistic interventionism. “Democracy” in this sense is a mere slogan to hide obfuscate imperialistic behaviors. Even if some sort of democratic process is put in place it will not be sustainable because it did not emerge from the people.

*So what (who) the Hell is democracy?

I shall not even attempt to define institutional democracy. Democratic governments are beyond my knowledge, but the concept seems a little far fetched, as the concept seems to require people relinquish their power for the sake of being ruled by some distant wealthy ruler. I’m sure I have missed the boat somewhere or I simply cannot comprehend it. I’ll continue.

The word democracy is made up of the word parts that combine mean “rule of the people”, the power is with the people. That’s simple enough. That immediately raises the question: “which people?” That question has been debated heartily for centuries. But, let’s stick with an operational definition for my own writing.

I attempting to use the term “democracy” in regard to individual participation in the shaping of their own worlds. Again, for my own sake, people can transform their own worlds/communities/cultures/etc. through democratic participation. Borrowing from Freire, as people become more interconnected it becomes more impossible for them not to participate in their own realities (Teaching for Critical Consciousness). The idea is to eliminate passivity. For power to be in the hands of the people, they must first participate with one another. They must care. They must be active. We are seeing people becoming more active through the use of social media and technology. Suddenly, communication and dissemination of information is possible on a grand scale. Surveillance is now a two way street. People have information. That is necessary for an open society. It’s necessary for people to rule. So, the goal of teaching, writing/talking about it is not necessarily to persuade a doubter or even to teach in an echo changer. The goal is to participate. By writing/talking/teaching I am engaging in the creation and distribution of thought/information. It may not be correct, but I am releasing. I am opening myself to debate, disagreement, maybe dialectic. I am taking a step. I am learning. By learning, I can start to teach. I suppose my idealistic goal is to learn to participate and help others learn to do the same. As “we” grows eventually we’ll happen upon a tipping point. It takes the people to be a democracy.

If you managed to read this far, I thank you. I ask that you help me understand what I am trying to understand better. I ask that you join me in thinking about this. I ask that you do your best to awaken your neighbors. We occupy this world together. We must participate.

Thanks for reading and responding. Cheers.

#education #revolution #SOS #occupyedu

It seems that the goal of institutions is dominion over mankind. Organizations function to tame wild spirits and make them act civilly. This is not a terrible thing— people acting civilly. But, do the rulers act civilly? Not just the grand rulers, the government, corporations, etc., but the smaller rulers. Those who have dominion over few. Teachers might fall into this category. Are we just miniature tyrants? Are we forced to be? Expected to be? If we are, or aren’t do we have a choice in the matter?

The choice is often a matter of rebellion. Our institutions, which stand to standardize the masses, require a certain level of tyrannical behavior for those who work within their walls. My power as a teacher, in this system, is based on how well I manage behavior and control the flow of information. The flow of information and behavior are tied together. In a system such as our where we deposit arbitrary and minimally useful information into learners then there must be a system of behavioral management. When you colonizing a mind, there must be sanctions to prevent and/or quell rebellion. To teach there must be learning. To deposit information there must only be classroom management and training.

To return to an earlier question: do we have the choice, as teachers, to not behave as mini-tyrants? No, not “succeed” in this system. Learning for a test or standardization or massification requires some sort of coercion, whether positive or punitive, it requires an external force to motivate the learner. Tyranny is required to extend or impose tyranny. There is a choice however, and it isn’t between “success” and “failure”. The choice is between teaching and training. One requires an act of open rebellion. The rebellious and radical teacher will choose to not function as an extension of the hand of tyranny that works to dictate the goings on within a classroom, and more poignantly the minds of the recipients of said education. Our form of education, that focuses on mass standardization at the cost of neglecting the curious human spirit, forces us to choose between doing our job and teaching children. We can train and manipulate automatons or we can teach and learn with humans. Your choice.

#education #SOSchat #teaching

It’s possible to pass through one’s own education and into the teaching field without contemplating the reason for our learning, or a motivation beyond our teaching. As students we learn segmented bits of information, skills, and algorithms. If we’re lucky we happen upon poetry or quantum physics— anything to boost our minds into the metaphysical realm. Entering the metaphysical realm in thought might serve as a catalyst for one asking the age old question “why?”. Schools as they are don’t instill or stir the curiosity that spawns the “why’s” and “how’s” that lead to deeper understanding; rather, those questions are suppressed.

Those same questioned often go unasked in the teaching profession, and many others, as well. Sure, we’re asked to write our philosophy of teaching in our undergraduate teaching programs and on some job applications, but do those questions continue? Do our answers evolve? Are we aware that they have evolved? I submit that it is better to ask these questions of ourselves regularly than to be forced to ask ourselves these questions under duress. If we are seeking answers to the “why’s” and “how’s”, we are active. We are alert. The answers often lead us to participate in ways beyond our perception. These questions and answers are good to share and struggle through with colleagues, friends, etc.

The questions should be asked on a macro and micro level. We have to connect our experiences. We have to be in the process of knowing why we do what we do. We must be active.

Why do you teach? How has your philosophy evolved over your career? What questions do you need to ask?

Please share in the comments section, submit your answers/questions, or email me educatedtodeath@gmail.com

#SOSchat #testingisnotteaching @arneduncan

I heard a veteran teacher, principal, and school board member (all the same person) speak yesterday. She entered public schools before segregation. She spoke passionately about her love of public schools. She, like many, expressed how she learned to read, write, think, speak, problem solve, cooperate, and collaborate in public schools. Her children did too. I did. I know many others who did too. What has happened? Why were we different? None of us were from the wealthy elite. I finished school just before testing became the end all be all. The school was large, mostly free lunch, and had problems, but people learned, left, became employed, went to college. This was in Mississippi by the way. The veteran educator who spoke was from an inner city district in Tennessee. Learning has happened for years. It seems to have suddenly ceased.

Did the learning stop because testing, that is the great high stakes standardized test? I couldn’t say, but then again maybe I could. Perhaps the test itself didn’t destroy the minds of a generation, but it required that it happen. Testing, as many know, has taken and continues to take every resource— mental, physical, and monetary— and put it toward some type of test preparation. Basic skills are neglected for the sake of a pacing guide. Kids aren’t able to fully learn to read or fully figure out multiplication because there is no time. Testing keeps the ball moving. Rarely can we go back and reteach. In fact, reteaching has been replaced with reviewing (the quick and shallow sibling of reteaching). The damage done from shallow, incomplete teaching is cumulative. Please be aware teachers don’t set out to teach shallowly. They/we are essentially tied to the pacing guide, or else. If a kid doesn’t fully develop as a reader in K-4, which isn’t the only focus of K-4, then other skills won’t develop. The foundation will not be there. K-4 has all sorts of testing rigors as well. Kids and teachers are stressed, learning is not allowed to be complete, and kids have to move forward without ever having built a proper foundation for learning. This lack of foundation snowballs into myriad other problems from academic deficiency, to behavior problems leading to in school arrests, and the school-to-prison pipeline continues.

The effects of testing are broad and can be summed up through the stories of those teachers, students, communities, and a nation affected by the attention deflected from actual education in the name of a test.

#education #NDAA #occupy #panopticon

I have always read dystopian fiction with great fervor. The stories always seemed just beyond reality. It could happen, but it wasn’t happening. It was a nice escape that came with a warning. I’ve returned to these books and stories throughout my life with increasing alarm. 1984, Brave New World, A Clockwork Orange, numerous comics, games, and other dystopian landscapes have all been, or seemed to have been, a disturbing release from the day to day. A release with a warning. I was bouncing back and forth between Warren Ellis’ ‘Transmetropolitan’ and Cory Doctorow’s ‘Little Brother’ the other night and became a little more uneasy than usual. My beloved dystopian fiction genre no longer seems to fit in the realm of fiction at all. Huxley was considered a futurist. The future seems to have arrived, ____________ (insert your own observations). Every institution from public schools to the military to our beloved government is waxing strangely Orwellian. I am not shocked. This has been a long time coming, I know, but it certainly hurts as the light grows brighter, as the fiction grows dimmer.

Good morning world. Who turned off the fiction?

#education #revolution @educatoral

I’ve heard a lot of talk from the “higher ups” and some media outlets that “we need to make teaching a respected profession again”. There are several problems here. First, teachers have always had to fight for their dignity. We’re constantly fighting the image of “coddler”, “babysitter”, replacement parent (in loco parentis), “bad teacher, whatever. The teaching profession has struggled for any bit of dignity it has been given. Second, any dignity it has been “given” has been earned by teachers who have stood up and demanded changes be made.

For there to be any solution, we have to create it. Waiting for Mr. Duncan or anyone else to make the teaching profession respected again will result in nothing more than twiddling thumbs and more of the let down that has accompanied our profession for so long. The solution must begin with teachers becoming educated for creating change. Teachers must become activists, agitators, and advocates. This will not and cannot happen all at once, of course, it will require patience and commitment to becoming empowered, and then empowering those around you.

Foreseeable problems: Many teachers (in certain situations most teachers) have either never been in a position to advocate for themselves

Many teachers have existed in passivity throughout their careers. Their passivity has been either forced or allowed. Teachers who’ve advocated for themselves have often been forced back into passivity through threats, reprimands, or worse. These teachers are reluctant to bother with anything that might expose them to trouble.

Other teachers, similar to the first type, have been rendered subservient through years of subtle conditioning. If you do this, then this will come. Retirement being the carrot.

Some teachers follow the “don’t make no waves” policy. In many cases education is a field of self preservation. The survivalist mentality that is promoted through high stakes tests, evals, and other fear-mongering strategies keeps teachers separated, isolated, and passive. So what can be done?

Possible solutions: Foremost, the silence must be broken. Teachers have to come out of isolation. They have to be able to articulate their issues— publicly. Many teachers are quite skilled at venting their problems, but will not stand behind what they say behind closed doors. There is a lot of talk with little action. So, maybe stating the “problem” is not the answer. Maybe it lies in discussing pedagogy. I submit that if you get
teacher talking about teaching they (we) can’t shut up. Teachers want to teach, and they want to arrive at solutions. If you’re the catalyst for change that is on its way, it might behoove you and your cohorts to engage any teacher, especially the reluctant ones, in conversation about solutions to the problems they’re having— behavior, academic, etc. This builds an atmosphere of collegiality that is non-conspiratorial. It’s less threatening. Talking about teaching is not a coup; it’s a productive activity. The revolution, if you will, must develop slowly as the teacher/person/student becomes actively involved in reflection of their own practice and
begins to feel mildly in control.

How do these conversations begin? Carefully. No teacher wants some pompous activist, consultant, or hoodlum coming into their classroom and telling them what to do. Teachers need people who listen first. So, if you’re involved in change, remember to listen. Help neighbors arrive at their own solution. Help them realize their own power. Revelation happens quite easily once one begins to reflect. Revelations bring about internal revolutions.

So, take your planning period, lunch period, chat in the parking lot, whenever, and ask a fellow teacher for help. Get them to help
you solve a problem. You need their help. By engaging them in solution building you are gaining a colleague and acting as a catalyst for your neighbor’s transformation. Be a listener and a learner. Engage everyone. As many as you can.

Change takes time, humility, and a
willingness to engage everyone. If you can engage even the most treacherous administrator you’re taking a right step toward sustainable change.

(Rules for Radical Teachers http://educatedtodeath.com/post/16870273089 ).

#SOSchat #education #edreform

The course of education is charted in a strange way. Teachers teach and implement decisions made my some distant policy maker or maybe a demigod. The policy makers make decisions based on research someone did somewhere other than a classroom. The researchers are likely to be professors of maybe education, or maybe a part of some miraculously funded think-tank, or, and I had a chance to do this, by some meagerly paid ghost writer who probably needs a little money and will accept a couple of grand to do some hurried research, turn it in for review, and then have to alter the research to “better fit the needs of the organization” (won’t be doing that again— I have debt what can I say). And the cycle continues. Either way, the process is diluted, dishonest, and disconnected.

So, my proposal:

First, we alter the roles of all parties involved— researcher, policy maker, and teacher. We create a hybrid profession. Teachers will act as researchers, using their own research based practice to further develop solutions to the problem that is education. Then, they work on policy. Teachers who are researcher could go an write the policies that affect them and their students. But, what about the researchers and policy makers. They get to do the same thing. Each party works on all of it.

But, how could we do this? Teachers are underpaid, and many researchers and policy makers aren’t teachers. Exactly. We’ll deal with the pay later. Teachers become empowered when they control their own destiny. People are no different. Teachers need to be a part of making the decisions that affect them and their students. By participating in research they will undoubtedly become more reflective and analytical. The goal is to end the passivity and victimhood that often accompanies the profession. Policy makers and researchers would benefit from working in the field they are affecting. “Having worked in a field” and “working in a field” are different things. It’s easy to throw daggers if you know you’ll never be hit. And yes, I understand that there are experts. “Experts” and third parties can be helpful. It helps to have a critical eye, but the idea here is that we turn every eye critical, equally active, reflective, and productive. No longer would we have teachers, researchers, and policy makers (or reformers); rather, we would have Teacher-Researcher-Policy Makers, a brilliant hybrid of empowered and powerful educator-reformers. It would be true democracy. Now there would be many details to iron out, and much more chaff, but it’s a start. It’s a step toward democratic function.

#education #SOSchat #revolution #edreform

Contact me at educatedtodeath@gmail.com

What would it take to provide a “world class” education? Is it possible in the U.S. public schools system as it is? I venture to say no. If the answer is ‘no’, then what needs to be done? Is the answer in democratizing our schools? Eliminating bureaucracy? Liberating the education system from corporate control? Putting decision making power in the hands of educators?

How could some of these things be accomplished? Are they feasible goals? Would it be possible to create an alternative? Could educators create a sustainable alternative to the education system we have today? Could we have grassroots schools that taught children what they needed to know? We don’t want or need more charter schools. We don’t want corporate fingers dictating the every move of educators. We want, I believe, to provide an equitable education that creates the possibility for an open society or democracy in the future. We want an educated citizenry. We need that if we are not to fall into the clutches of some not so distant corporate totalitarian regime. Our public schools have been hijacked. It is becoming increasingly impossible to provide the education we know should be provided. What can we do? How can we take back our system or create an feasible alternative? Do we need to teach outside of school? We, the teachers, need to change this, but how. I’d like to start collecting ideas and collaborating. Let’s have a conversation. Please contact me at educatedtodeath@gmail.com . Let’s figure something out.

#education #SOSchat #revolution #edreform

Contact me at educatedtodeath@gmail.com

What would it take to provide a “world class” education? Is it possible in the U.S. public schools system as it is? I venture to say no. If the answer is ‘no’, then what needs to be done? Is the answer in democratizing our schools? Eliminating bureaucracy? Liberating the education system from corporate control? Putting decision making power in the hands of educators?

How could some of these things be accomplished? Are they feasible goals? Would it be possible to create an alternative? Could educators create a sustainable alternative to the education system we have today? Could we have grassroots schools that taught children what they needed to know? We don’t want or need more charter schools. We don’t want corporate fingers dictating the every move of educators. We want, I believe, to provide an equitable education that creates the possibility for an open society or democracy in the future. We want an educated citizenry. We need that if we are not to fall into the clutches of some not so distant corporate totalitarian regime. Our public schools have been hijacked. It is becoming increasingly impossible to provide the education we know should be provided. What can we do? How can we take back our system or create an feasible alternative? Do we need to teach outside of school? We, the teachers, need to change this, but how. I’d like to start collecting ideas and collaborating. Let’s have a conversation. Please contact me at educatedtodeath@gmail.com . Let’s figure something out.

#education #SOSchat #artsed

I currently teach music, choral and music appreciation, to grades 7-9. It can be a joy and/or a great struggle. Music is an interesting subject matter alone, but can easily cross over into other subject matter not pertaining directly to music. Of course, there is poetry that accompanies the melodies. Songs and styles of music are situated in a certain area, culture, situation, social movement, what have you. Music embodies or at least reflects the historical situation that caused the piece to spring forth out of someone’s consciousness. Music involves acousti-physics and all forms of mathematics. Best of all there is no test. It can be a hiding place for revolutionaries in schools who want to teach beyond the curriculum and allow their students freedom to learn. It’s a place that builds or can build tremendous self-discipline and allow for intellectual and spiritual exploration. Critical thought can be allowed to thrive in a classroom that is free from the oppression that is testing. I taught algebra prior to teaching music. I’m able to be much more human without the test, and still remain sympathetic to my friends and colleagues who remain steadfast in their dual challenge to prepare their students for the test and still strive to teach and build critical learners. It’s difficult, I know. My heart is with you as you struggle.

I have begun the process of teaching music composition to one of my music appreciation classes. This is not a part of the state curriculum; the State seemingly does not concern itself, even in a music classroom, with nurturing creativity. Regardless of prescribed curriculum, it is beyond important that humans discover their ability to create. This is, after all, one of the greatest parts of being human. We possess a tremendous intellect that permits us to create and transform culture. We often need reminding of our ability to create culture. I cannot express the light I saw in Anthony’s face when he brought his staff paper to the piano with some scribbled chords he had written and heard me play what he had written. Anthony is not an average student academically, he struggles in every subject, and spends most of his time in ISS or the principal’s office. He’s beat down and discouraged, he acts out. I got to witness and great moment of humanity and awakening when I saw him arrive at the understanding that he created culture. This goes far beyond behavioral success and efficacy. This enters the realm of metaphysical transformation in a seventh grader with a bad attitude.

All teachers don’t get the privilege or have the desire to teach in the arts. It’s a difficult field. It, like algebra, takes persistence and great persuasion. It’s frustrating. It does allow for creation though on a regular basis. We all know that moment of genesis though, in any course, when a student become more than a passive recipient and enters the realm of creator. It can be as simple as the moment a learn formulates a question based on their own synthesis and analysis of a topic. It can be the designing of a complex or simple equation. Writing a story. A poem. Whatever. Regardless of our subject matter, we must help our students realize that they are creators and transformers of culture. This is how we make them participate more. This is how we help them realize their potential. We have to let them see their own power. They are cultural creators. We have to make that understanding a priority, tests be damned. Teachers are on the front lines of a strange war for the consciousness of a people. We have to give those in our care the tools to be masters of themselves and their worlds. Teachers teach for awakening.

#education #revolution #SOSchat #occupy

I am an educator, and a staunch supporter of public education and teachers. However, I find it increasingly difficult to support a system(s) that, from the moment it accepts a child, seeks to disable any critical spirit of humanity and replace it with an eternal need that can only be sated by some an institution. Our systems do not create participatory individuals. They create passive recipients of services needed. This does not seem to be a new phenomenon. Schools along with other social services have supplied the needs and thoughts of America’s underclass for quite sometime now. The middle class has equally been rendered just as passive, only having been allowed the illusion that they work for their own benefit, when in actuality, the middle class is no more free to participate than the poor. The poor are assistance and/or wage-slaves. The middle class are slaves to their debts and ideologies of security. Neither class works to benefit or affect themselves.

The poor have been rendered silent by being made dependent. They schools work to tame their spirits and limit their thoughts. They are allowed only basic literacy skills and never allowed to create. Testing has helped to narrow the curriculum and keep teachers and students focused on curriculum rather than problems. This strata is kept entertained and barely comfortable. If they step out of line they are beaten into submission, ushered into prisons, or other institutions. Individuals who escape the grasp of poverty are encouraged to continue the upward climb, abandoning the problems from which they were delivered. The version of success given them was that of the oppressor, and by eliminating critical consciousness there is no need to stop an reflect on one’s actions.

The rapidly diminishing middle class has been ushered through existence with a focus on maintenance of that which has been acquired. Their social structure has allowed for an illusion of social mobility through petty promotions and similar reinforcements. Some have been able to attain varying degrees of power through higher education and business, but the middle class, with a few exceptions has remained just as powerless as the poor, they’ve just had more choices of distraction. The institutions of the middle class very much allow the illusion of participation in democracy, but their choices are often small, and predetermined, for many, by sectarian or party affiliation. Churches and other similar social institutions among the middle class help dictate beliefs of the middle class.

Many people escape into the realms of academia which equally has its own fixed ideologies and requirements for advancement.

The ruling elite are incomprehensible beyond the fact that they have no choice but to fight to maintain their own power at any cost. For the ruling body to remain the ruling body it must either forcefully or insidiously keep the masses occupied with internal conflict and struggle, along with copious distraction. The people are divided by class, race, political affiliation, misinformation, prejudice, and so forth. I do not intend to say that these are completely manufactured, but the structures in which we survive allow for the development of such fears and divisions. People who fear one another can be easily controlled.

All that said, the problem is a lack of critical consciousness among the people. People do not participate, because their participation has been meaningless in the past. We learn as school children that we are incapable of really making any decision. We are nurtured to be consumers. Information is deposited in us by teachers. Teachers simply deliver the curriculum. We are passive within our communities. We wait for things to be changed. Some of us call our congressmen and speak with their aides, but we are only one vote. Everything is provided for us. If it isn’t, we don’t know what to do.

How is this solved?

We begin by eliminating the distance between ourselves and our neighbors. Nothing will change as long as we are a nation of others. As long as I am on the side of right and everyone else is wrong, I am nothing more than a puppet of my chosen or ‘chosen for me’ ideology. We cannot continue as a divided people. As we grow closer we must become more involved. We will become more open. As we become more open, our society must, as a direct result, become more open.

The answer to this debacle is not simple or solitary. Just as the problem itself can not be isolated, neither can the solution. However, entering into dialogue, or the dialectic sort, can only serve to bring us closer together as human beings. By becoming more interconnected we must become more involved. As be become more involved we are no longer just a mass of sheep, but a force. We will become an open or a more open society.

*I must acknowledge that my ideas could never be called entirely my own. They are a culmination of my experiences with my own world, and my readings of the experience of others. I write this to acknowledge my understanding of my development as a part of a collective consciousness that is not entirely my own. My experiences have served to force me to open certain books at certain times that have either shaped me, or more likely, shaped my understanding of my own experience.

#education #revolution #EtherSec #humanity

Friends who give your lives to the education of others please don’t neglect your own humanity. You are a human first, and then a teacher. We live in a society that so often ties who we are to our careers. Teaching is a commitment, a very deep one. It requires all of your love and humanity if you are to be successful, that is, if you are going to reach your students (testing aside). Teachers have many expectations to meet, and many more stresses that go along with those expectation. It’s easy to watch your humanity—friends, family, hobbies, identity, etc.—slip away as your focus on teaching increases. For new teachers this is a trap. You want to do a good job. You want to measure up. You want to change the world. You’re not achieving your goals or meeting expectations. You want to keep your job. The truth is, these are thoughts that fill the minds of all teachers, veterans an new, but as a new teacher you haven’t always learned to cope with the stresses. New teachers burnout quickly in many cases. Veteran teachers are focused on keeping their jobs, and have weathered many storms. Some have maintained their humanity some have had it stripped from them little by little. For any and all teachers, if you feel like you had no life, you must do anything and everything to begin one or maintain the one you have. It’s not just a matter of social and psychological health, or even a matter of effectiveness (you are in fact more effective if you’re psychologically, socially, and physically healthy). Rather, it’s a matter of dignity and pride. Humanity is the most valuable thing we possess. It’s how we value ourselves. If you have pride and dignity, you will by nature resist oppression. You will have no choice but to advocate for yourself. You will refuse to be a victim. If you value your own humanity, you will be better able to value the humanity of others. You will be better able to connect with the people around you and in your care. You will understand the need to advocate for yourself and others. When you lose your humanity and job becomes just a job. You revert to mantra “one day at a time”. Life becomes drudgery. Regardless of your level of humanity and self-awareness, do something, anything, to move in that direction. Read a book. Write one. Seek beauty and truth. Seek to know thyself. “Treat yo’self.”
Find a friend. Go dancing. Do whatever it is (or was) that makes you feel alive. Don’t fall prey to a dehumanizing system in a dehumanizing world. Arise and celebrate your humanity. Rage for your humanity.

#education #revolution #totalitarianism #occupy #anonymous

As I watch and listen to the news, scroll through twitter feeds, read blogs, look at laws being passed, and noticing bits of education reform I can’t help noticing that it’s beginning to look a little like 1984, with a sprinkle of Huxley’s Brave New World. I don’t like to be an alarmist, but it seems as though alarms are being sounded, and then muted. I’m struggling to remain rational and calm. Reality is rather quickly morphing into dystopian fiction. Schools are massive training institutions that manage to insidiously undereducate the growing lower class. Teachers are kept busy and overwhelmed by testing and the fear of losing their jobs. Teachers have no choice but to numb their students with useless, disconnected knowledge. The middle class, what’s left of it anyway, has been kept entertained, comfortable, and apathetic for years. Just enough pay to get by and stay distracted. If that doesn’t work, the Doc can prescribe some pills. Kids are drugged too. If they won’t get in line, give ‘em a pill. Books are being banned in schools in AZ. This is at least overt. Texts and concepts are overlooked by textbook companies, curriculum makers, and overwhelmed teachers. Omission is useful to avoid alarm. Arizona is just getting ballsy. There’s a move there to censor teacher’s language in and out of school I hear. Beyond the classroom, censorship, surveillance, and indefinite detention are popping up in the laws and the public. The world is abuzz with revolution and the powers at be trying to squash them before a tipping point is reached. I wrote with an awareness that there may be Hell to pay for my words an criticisms at some point. Of course, there’s no turning back now. Surely I’ve gone mad. I’ve read too much dystopian fiction. I’ve read too much about totalitarian regimes. Perhaps I’m becoming a real life Dale Gribble. But, I’m not confident in my perceived madness. I’m more doubtful everyday.

I’ve been told many a time: “If it looks like shit. Smells like shit. Then…”

With that in mind looks and smells are quite telling, and it seems that we’re all knee deep in shit.

#assessment #edreform #lexicon

EdTrends ( http://edtrends.tumblr.com/ ) for your response to my last post regarding the impossibility of standardized student centered learning (http://educatedtodeath.com/post/17612560042). Your response speaks to the confusion that often accompanies education lexicon (and any other institutional lexicon for that matter). EdTrends responded, “What is a “standardized” test? Isn’t any of the same test given to multiple students, even teacher-written, standardized?” Yes, if a teacher creates a test an administers this test to multiple students it is a “standardized” test. However, this test is designed to show if a student has mastered a certain criterion, thus the term “criterion-referenced test”. This test shows mastery of a skill or skill set, and is typically used to guide instruction. If a certain percentage of students didn’t meet the cutscore, say 80%, then the teacher may choose to reteach or remediate the skill.

The other standardized test, the monster of which many educators speak, is a corporate designed norm-referenced test that seeks to compare schools and children across a state or national population. This means one of my students may score in the 65th percentile and be considered basic because she only scored better than 65% of the population. But, the tests we prepare for in the classroom are not even that simple to understand. Students aren’t scored according to percentile rankings, at least not directly; rather, the scores are converted through some nebulous derivatives that require several pages of instructions to begin to understand. Scores are combined to give schools rankings, that are also a little difficult to understand. I can’t say for a fact that these results are intentionally obfuscated, but they’re certainly not accessible to just anyone. The lack of accessibility allows for information to be communicated and translated in all sorts of alarmist ways. For example, “Your child received a score of basic in math, he will be placed accordingly,” “This school is a low performing school because the majority of the students received a score of basic or minimal.” This language is used to condemn schools, place students, and label teachers without ever providing a clear answer as to why the label was received. Did the student only master 70% of the skills? Who knows? He is basic though.

The “standardized” tests used for labeling schools are a form of massification. They generate hysteria and obfuscate the problems existing in education. They are neither norm-referenced or criterion-referenced. They are some hybrid akin to carnival games. No one wins, at least not with any consistency or without cheating. Assessment is a good thing. Mass testing is a different story. (If I am wrong in any of this, please show me where, I would like to be mistaken in this case. educatedtodeath@gmail.com)

#education #lexicon #doublethink

Student centered learning cannot exist in a system that is based around a standardized test. “Student-centered” is a relatively old buzzword that is still used to evoke some feeling of benevolence among teachers. It’s a motivation technique that requires great skill at doublethink. We are to somehow motivate the learners into believing they want to learn the standardized curriculum and then do well on the test. We are given the task of making the oppressed believe that the oppressor has their best interest at heart. Student centered learning is impossible if it is not directed by learners needs and guided by their curiosity. Student centered learning requires classrooms to function as small democratic organizations where the teacher is the facilitator of discussion and maybe intervenes ever so slightly when an impasse is reached. Please don’t allow yourself to be confused by the lexicon of public education. Student centered instruction does not exist if knowledge is deposited into the learner. Our standardized education is quite authoritarian. Freedom within the system is an illusion. Surely, that does not come as a surprise. There are false choices. We can choose between a few very similar pedagogical methods. We can even conjure various methods of creativity to spice up a lesson. Regardless of technique the desired outcome is the same. We are all working toward the same outcome. We all work at the same pace. We all produce the same ill-formed sprocket, at least that’s the intention. If we we turn our eyes to the human instead of the sprocket, there will be dire consequences—reprimand, the label of ineffective, dismissal, etc. Is it possible to nurture the human and produce the sprocket? Can we create a conscious sprocket? What can we do? We must stimulate learning where we can. We must engage in parallel curriculums, that is we must allow and promote student curiosity. We must bother with things that don’t even come near the prescribed curriculum. Teach your test if you must, but for God’s sake chase rabbits.

#education #edreform #agism

Over the past year or so I’ve noticed an increase in improvement plans among veteran teachers. These have been skilled teachers with a record of providing quality education. Many of these teachers serve as advocates for students, teachers, and public education. These are people who have given their lives to educating children. They are being harassed at the end of their careers because they cost the district a little bit of money, but that is not the story told to them. They are called ineffective, poor classroom managers, out of touch, among other things. Harry Wong and Marzano texts are being handed out to these teachers to help them “improve”. These teachers feel eyes upon them at all time. There is recourse for their every indiscretion, from arriving a minute too late to sending a child with severe disciplinary problems to the office. These teachers emerge from an era when administrators were to be trusted only to find their once trusted boss is laying the groundwork for their dismissal just before their retirement. Difficult students are placed in their rooms. They receive no help. They are stripped of every ounce of dignity they have. Their careers will end in obsolescence and strife. They are not supported.

But, is this actually because they are obsolete? Surely not. These teachers have endured the span of modern public education. They know what they’re doing. They have committed and they’re being pushed out. This is not to say that all veteran teachers are good teachers, some are not. There are many ineffective, bad, low-quality, whatever you want to call them, teachers, but this certainly is not all teachers. The unfortunate truth is many veteran teachers are being abused simply because they cost the district too much. They don’t cost the district more than they’ve earned, they have done what they were supposed to do for years. They’ve stuck with it. The districts just don’t want to pay them, and they certainly don’t want to pay them their retirement. It’s a problem. It must be stopped. Share your stories with newspapers, in blogs, wherever. People need to be aware.

#community #revolution #occupy

Maybe education would be better if it was designed to enable people to to learn how to participate in an open society. People would have to be stakeholders in their education, not just passive recipients, if this were true. Schools would not just be a building in a community; rather, it would be a part of the community. The school would work to empower community members aka students of any age to work for the betterment of their own community. The democratic experience gained there would better enable the citizenry to participate in larger democratic institutions like a democratic national government. In such a system the school wouldn’t be the shame of the community, but the center of the community. There would be no way to separate the school from the community because they would be one in the same, each working to embrace and improve the other. The goal of school here would not be to colonize the mind or the spirit, but to set it free. It would enable thinkers and innovators and creators and so forth. Freire said that it becomes more difficult to keep a group of people ignorant as they become more active in democracies. If we had a democracy people would be active. They would have to be. Further, they would want to be because they would see that their participation mattered. Apathy is a result of powerlessness, real or perceived. Schools breed powerlessness in students, teachers, administrators, and so forth. Bureaucracies harbor the power elite. They are distant demigods to the people. They are untouchable. An existential god is not a god for mankind, but for some other lot that we will never know. Power belongs in the hands of the people. The governed should be the government. Schools should teach for democracy; rather, they are oppressive arms of the power elite. Teachers, teach for democracy. Students demand it. Communities take back the schools. This is our world. Our future. Our lives.

#Gates @arneduncan #education @StudentsFirstHQ

What has testing done? Has it increased the consciousness of the masses? Has it increased the functional literacy of the people? Has it reduced the overwhelming poverty in our nation? Are more people entering college or the workforce prepared for global participation? Are there fewer minorities in special education? Are fewer minorities entering the prison system? Are teachers better teachers? Are jobs more secure? Is upward social mobility more plausible? Are there more jobs available?

The answer should be yes. Quality education is not a standardized test.

#edreform #SOS @arneduncan @StudentsFirstHQ @RheeFirst #occupyedu

My students attend a school that is on the cusp of being taken over by the state. The test is an ever present threat. Kids learn here. Teachers work hard. The administration works hard. We all struggle to do better, and in the end it all comes down to some test. It comes down to some number derived from some markings on a bubble sheet. My kids are worth much more than a number. Watch them gather together to support someone in a time of need. Watch them remind each other of things to keep each other out of trouble. See how they stick together in times of adversity. See how much restraint they use when they’re upset and want nothing more than to throw the first punch, but the punch never flies. See how they push themselves to learn more. Come sit with them on Saturday when they walk to school and eagerly participate in tutoring. How dare anyone give us a number. How dare “they” call anyone proficient, basic, or minimal. We are not cattle. There are no prisoners here, just human beings. Human beings without adequate healthcare. Human beings who witness untold violence. Human beings who are held captive by a system of perpetual strife, and yet they thrive as human beings. They do not simply lay down and die. They rage against anything that threatens their souls. Some do not know why they rage, but continue forward, and often to no avail. To you who call yourselves reformers, and cannot see humanity for the numbers, you are tyrants and oppressors. May the wrath you inflict return to you swiftly.

Sincerely,
A Concerned Teacher, ETD

#education #life #EtherSec

I arrived at my class this morning to find Brianna on the ground sobbing violently, two of my others girls were comforting her. “Is she hurt or upset?” I said. Andrea told me her mother was taken off life support this morning. A mix of snow and rain were falling. They were getting wet. We went inside. A few minutes later one of my boys walked in with tears in his eyes. He said he didn’t want to have class today. I said, “We need to get some stuff done…why?” “Jarvis’ Mom passed this morning.” I was quiet. I walked to my computer to take role. I called De’ron over. “What should we do today?”, I said. “I don’t know.” Jevon was at the piano hammering out a sweet song in a pentatonic scale. Nearly everyone had tears in their eyes. It was not time to push for anything. No need to concern ourselves with fast approaching deadlines today. Riyah started crying and stepped out. I went out a few minutes later to find her violently sobbing on the ground in the cold. She looked at me and volunteered, “My grandmother died two months ago, and I tried to forget about it so I could make good grades. I can’t stop crying now.” “Just cry,” I said. I went back in. We sang “Let It Be”. We all cried. The bell rang.

I think everything is in order now. I apologize for an confusion. For some reason numbering has challenged me today.

#education #SOS #revolution

I spent yesterday afternoon consulting with academic coaches at my school about how to implement content area literacy strategies. The meeting, of course, was intended to develop strategies for covering masses of material to meet curriculum standards. Our school needs to survive this next round of testing. I’ve been summoned to help, but it’s so late in the year. We discussed strategies for increasing reading fluency and comprehension. With discussed vocabulary instruction. We discussed strengthening basic skills. One of the coaches held up her pacing guide pitifully and asked, “How can we do all that and still cover the pacing guide.” “You can’t,” I said, “we can implement a few strategies to hopefully get a few skills in, but quality teaching, questioning, and skill building takes an academic career, not just 2 months.” They all looked defeated. Looking down a coach said, “It’s not intended for us to pass is it?”

The testing crisis has bred futility among our teachers. We show up to work each day swearing there’s hope. We vow to teach, to really teach, but our teaching practice is interrupted. Our concern for the well being, creativity, and critical thinking of our students is brutally stamped out with standardized tests and improvement plans. Good teachers are known as failures. Test drillers are lauded for their efforts. Our schools are in crisis. Further, the next generation is in crisis. The well being of our society is in peril. If we don’t build a critical consciousness among our people—students, teachers, citizens—then we will surely fall prey, if we have not already, to unthinkable tyranny. Teachers do not stop fighting. Teach. Help learners learn to learn. Test be damned.

#education #occupyedu #revolution #school

Public education has been reduced to the narrow teaching of a narrow curriculum by teachers who fear constantly for their jobs. Educators have been or are being rendered powerless by egregious reforms that harm students and teachers. Testing as the goal of education is criminal. It is brainwashing through the systematic dumbing down of an entire generation. The constant test prep and dehumanization leaves untold destruction that we have not even begun to uncover. Our hands are tied. So what can be done? In short, rebel. Tell the truth. Teach the test. Teach about the people who helped make testing a reality. Share the reasons for testing. Share with your students how testing is a tool of class division and community disruption. Tell them how testing has and is destroying people’s ability to think freely. Tell them how test scores are used to close schools and banish committed and caring teaching from public education. Tell them how testing has created a crisis which has opened a market, school privatization, that seeks capital gains. Tell them how the textbook industry starves their brains and provides incomplete curriculum to undertrained teachers in order to sell more remediation. Then teach them the subject matter you’re paid to teach. But, help them learn. Help them learn to learn. Teach them, rather help them learn that they are powerful and have much to add to culture. Instill in them the power to create. Nurture their curiosity. If you teach algebra, teach algebra, not the bastardized Glencoe McGraw-Hill fully aligned version. Teach for the joy of teaching. Help learners learn to crave understanding. Teach the Test as the monster it is. Motivate the students to learn beyond the test, thus crushing it’s power as a tool of class separation and subversion. It’s a beast with which we must reckon daily as teachers, but it’s a beast that we must and shall defeat.

#education #occupyedu

@TeachForAmerica tweeted, “there is nothing more rewarding than seeing your students on the path to college”. At first glance, this statement seems quite true. As teachers we want to see our students succeed. We want to see them reap the benefits of education. High school graduates go to college and get good jobs and become good citizens…and, wait a moment. These are all generalizations. Catch phrases that we have grown up hearing and as adults parroting to those we teach. The reality is quite different, especially now as the economy struggles, I mean we (the People) struggle. College is not so much a ticket out, but a ticket to debt. Maybe it’s a ticket for leaving one’s community only to return disillusioned. And for some it does lead to great things.
Regardless of the outcome, it’s all a gamble, and I think the goal of pushing everyone into college without thought is somehow doing harm to the value of the education we provide. Before I begin, please understand that I push college. I want my students to have opportunities. I want them to be able to compete. But, is that really what I want? I tend to think not. I think I really want my students to
develop a critical understanding of themselves, their community, the world and how those are linked. I want my students to develop a critical consciousness that allows them to decide if college is the right thing for them. Maybe they would rather work to develop some grassroots effort to eliminate crime in their neighborhoods. Maybe they need to work to support their families. Maybe they need to hitchhike across the country or work on an oil rig and save to backpack across Europe. It’s not my choice. It’s not my life.

If we mindlessly push college as the “Way”, then we are failing our students. We need to help our students develop the tools for true learning and decision making. We need to support them as they develop critical consciousness’ that will enable them to rationally participate in and maintain an open society, or create it if it doesn’t exist.

Binding humans to consumptive college education through propaganda in the form of catchy slogans is not teaching. It is yet another form of training. Teachers must be critical in order to develop critical consciousness in their students. We don’t want automatons. Or do we?