We have heard numerous calls for NY’s Commissioner of Education John King to resign. He disrespects parents. He brooks no dissent. He accuses them of refusing to engage in dialogue after they sit patiently through his hour-plus monologue. And when they boo and hiss him, he storms away and cancels all future scheduled meetings with parents, fearing, no doubt, the same humiliating response.
This blogger, Teacherbiz, has a fresh look at the whole sorry episode. She sees the event presaged in “Hamlet” and demonstrates how literature helps us to understand life (with apologies to David Coleman, who may find greater meaning in “informational text”).
Can’t do it today, but I DO want to see it!
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Diane…I think you will be heartened when you go to the NY BATs Facebook page. Teachers are buying up copies of “Reign…” and sending them to every administrator they can. Some are buying several copies every payday and giving them away. It’s truly amazing!
(These comments are under a post regarding the NYSSBA (non profit school board association which is promoting core!)
On a lighter note, I thought you might enjoy my latest post’ “All Hail The King” if only for its image of a guillotine: yomizthebook.com. I applaud him because he has done more to energize our movement than anyone could have imagined.
“The play’s the thing wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the King.”
Posts like this are precisely why the so-called reformers intend to do away with literature: it offers too clear a window into human motivations and frailties, and threatens to undermine the robotic compliance that is the true purpose of these standards.