I love my PLNs. And, yes, the plural is there on purpose. Last night I ad dinner with Karin Perry. BH joined us. It was a PLN kind of meal. In addition to the chicken fried rice, there was talk about books and reading and charter schools and libraries. Having the perspective of someone outside of education (though one could easily argue that ( Read more... )

I should know better than to follow a link (http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-teacher-prep-20141129-story.html) with this headline: U.S. proposes new guidelines on teacher education programs. I should know better. I should know ( Read more... )

I have written about this principle before. It states that prizes will not be for predicting rain but for building boats. It seems to be that many of the de-formers in education are happier predicting rain. Few are helping build the boats. Count among their numbers now, Campbell Brown. She appeared on The Colbert Report this week to talk about ( Read more... )

Here is Alfie Kohn's take on grit ( Read more... )

A headline on one of the ads I received from an online "leadership" journal asked if Arne Duncan would leave behind a legacy of teacher leadership. They have to be kidding, right? First, Secretary Duncan is not a teacher. He may have the degree. But he does not deserve the title. In order to be a teacher, one must actually TEACH or HAVE TAUGHT ( Read more... )

The problem with announcing topics for the week is that sometimes I just have to write about something else. The good thing about posting topics: I have a record of them and will blog them, I promise. But as I was driving in to the office this morning, traffic came to a standstill. Apparently, someone thought starting construction on a major ( Read more... )

As I drank my morning smoothie and scanned my calendar and to-do list, MSNBC played on in the background. I caught the words CCSS and immediately turned up the volume. What now, I thought. I already know there is a decided bias toward the Common Core given the interviews and commentaries I have seen. Chris Hayes spent the better part of an ( Read more... )

Since David Coleman announced his plans to change the nature of the SAT, there have been dozens of stories and interviews and segments on TV. I did a Google search which yielded some interesting results, ones that mirror the history of this test (and other college entrance exams, too). Here is a screen shot of the first 7 results of the search.


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The Washington Post's Valerie Strauss scores again with this column entitled SECRET POLICY-MAKING ON SCHOOL REFORM IS ONE THE RISE: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/12/12/secret- ( Read more... )

Lately it seems as though I am being told to EMBRACE REFORM. I thought that perhaps I was ascribing a wrong definition to the verb embrace, so I went to the good old dictionary to check. Here are the most used definitions:

hold (someone) closely in one's arms, esp. as a sign of affection ( Read more... )