Playing With LEGOs

This weekend, it's back to childhood...

Just a little something

Marni Barron and Leigh Dingerson conducted a short experiment on the system for evaluating teachers in the D.C. public school system (a system heavily influenced by the reform movement in education) and, together, they found out that the lovable Ms. Frizzle of educational cartoon fame, just about failed her teacher evaluation.  Check out the article.

I'm sorry, ma'am, but there just isn't a place for you here anymore.

Up to Your Elbows in Voices

Lately, I've started reading a couple of blogs by teachers and researchers involved in the education field.  Wandering around this corner of the internet, I've run across a lot of really great and inspiring voices in education.  Last time, I mentioned someone I have a lot of respect for, Alfie Kohn.  Timothy D. Slekar has a great list of more voices that I'd like to share here.  Finally, The Frustrated Teacher always has relevant and interesting things to add to the conversation.

Some great issues to look for:
Poverty and education: particularly how these two things get linked together in political discussions.  Hint: they're both huge problems and I'm not even sure that prying them apart is possible.  See Matt Di Carlo's article.
Creative thinking and problem solving: mostly how wonderfully it is used by individual teachers and how often it seems to get left behind in discussions of policy by legislators.  See below:

What education policy should look like.

That said, someone I really admire once advised me to never stop asking questions, so I'd encourage everyone, anyone who cares, to interrogate these links until they are neck deep, or at the very least up to their elbows, in the unfamiliar and the interesting.

It's Been A While

Maybe I'll actually keep this thing going intermittently.

Maybe you’ve never felt that 3a.m. satisfaction of sealing a paragraph airtight with the explanation of a final citation.  Maybe you’ve never understood the joy of understanding your own essay for the first time, followed by the uninterrupted pitter patter of fingers on keyboard keys, a steady stream of letters.  Maybe you’ve never felt like a composer, waving tensed hands at an array of words until they align into perfection, each in its place, each moving together with the whole.

Also here are some terrific articles about teaching by a really smart guy: Alfie Kohn