Mark Naison, co-founder of the BATs, sent me this story by a teacher:
The Child Abuse Imposed by Testing:
By Bronx Teacher Chris Whitney
I had a student leave my classroom in an ambulance last year during the middle of a practice test. He was having an asthma attack brought on by panic. He kept saying, “I can’t do this.”
As his teacher, I knew him. I knew that “school” was hard for him and he was trying his best. We all were trying our best to support him: his mom, brother, teachers old and new, staff at school, and the class… his community. Yet, it was not enough that day. I encouraged him to take the test, to keep going, but to what end? To engage with something I knew that he, and many other students were and are not ready to do?
Except, the “expectation” is that all students must take the state exam by third grade – just 8 years old – and the “rigor” and “standards” keep going up every few years. More is expected from an earlier and earlier age. So, it becomes “necessary” to begin practice testing in second grade to “get the kids ready.”
We do not need to be holding each other accountable, instead, we should be finding a way to support each other. Federal education policy right now is punitive, developmentally inappropriate, and in the case of my student above – downright abusive.
Carl Jung said, “It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”
I do not want to be the kind of teacher that “gets kids ready” for “college and careers.” I want kids to feel the joy of being alive, I want kids to sing out in the middle of class “just because,” I want kids to laugh, cry, and hold each other when things get hard, I want kids to know that they are not alone, and I want kids to feel love. Most of all, I just want to teach the joy of living… and state testing does not have any place in that vision.
School is hard for the students, families, and those that work there. Mothers say goodbye to their own flesh and blood, trusting that they will be safe and that they will come home at night. Many mothers then go to work to try to provide for their child. Work, lack of sleep, lack of time… repeat. Mother and child. Work. Rigor. Evaluation.
Teachers work 12, 13, 14 hour days with little time to do much else besides plan, grade, teach, observe, collect data, enter data, communicate, set expectations… repeat. Forget it if you are BOTH a parent and teacher. Then, you have no time for yourself. Does it have to be this hard? No. A different world is not only possible, but it is necessary.
Mark D Naison
Professor of African American Studies and History
Fordham University
Co-Founder, Badass Teachers Association
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on Transparent Christina.
Saw secial ed kids cry after the test, also gen ed. That’s why suicide rate high in Asian countries
Amen!
This is what everyone should want from their children’s teachers and what all children need…
“I do not want to be the kind of teacher that “gets kids ready” for “college and careers.” I want kids to feel the joy of being alive, I want kids to sing out in the middle of class “just because,” I want kids to laugh, cry, and hold each other when things get hard, I want kids to know that they are not alone, and I want kids to feel love. Most of all, I just want to teach the joy of living… and state testing does not have any place in that vision.”
When you write, “I do not want to be the kind of teacher that “gets kids ready” for “college and careers.” I respectfully disagree with you. You, like all good teachers and educators, do not want to subject students to endless rounds of tests whose validity is questionable at best and whose results are being misused. That does not mean you ar not preparing children for college and careers. When you write “I want kids to feel the joy of being alive,” you are expressing the most profound commitment a teacher can have to help prepare a child to be “college and career ready.” You want to help a child appreciate learning, not be afraid of failure. Your goal is to help a child develop self-esteem based on real skills and strengths so that s/he can face the challenges of life and succeed, Helping a child fully develop his or her unique talents is the only true way to help them become “college and career ready.”
Debbie-Perhaps you are being a bit concrete here. The author is referencing Bill, Barrack, and Warren’s definition of “college and career” ready ala Common Core State Standards and it’s ceaseless testing regimes. Of course the author wants to make his/her students ready for college and a rewarding career, however, he/she being an actual educator, knows that when children are taught to love life and learning, the readiness takes care of itself. Sadly, this known fact is overlooked, conveniently, by the non-educators who have taken it upon themselves to “fix” education in the USA by narrowing it’s focus, standardizing it, privatizing it and turning it into a cash cow for the 1%. Rest assured Debbie, the author knows what’s up.
What Debbie is doing is taking back the rephormers’ language and restoring it to its intended meaning. Controlling the language is one of the most important steps to controlling the war.
Say no to all classroom activities related to the common core and high-stakes testing. Return mass produced corporate worksheets to the principal and teacher. Opt-out of practice tests and high-stakes testing. Write letters to all state legislators with copies of the corporate busy work that was returned to the school. Post the worksheets on the internet and ask for comments. Write open records requests for contracts and for purchase orders using tax funds that local and state officials misused to funnel classroom resources to the insiders.
And then lose your job. While I applaud anyone who is able to do what you suggest, particularly posting tests on the internet and opting out of the tests, people need to realize that not all of us can do that. I have a family to support, as do a lot of us, in a terrible economy. I do everything I can to ameliorate the effects of all of this, but I can’t figure out how to let people know about these horrible tests and their ability to opt out without losing my job.
Make a sheet that gives info. including opt out web sites. Copy the sheet. Stick it under cars’ windshield wipers at the grocery store and other places that you go. That’s what I do.
Now that’s good “direct action.” I like it.
Don’t worry about losing your job. Do you have friends who are not educators who will help you file open records requests? It’s difficult to get fired if you have the facts. I didn’t suggest to post high-stakes test questions on the internet – just the for-profit silly worksheets with a @ symbol at the bottom promoting Common Core treadmill practice.
I am a parent of five. I hate the phrase “college and career ready,” and it is one of the reasons I’m fighting this educational experiment. When I asked the CC promoter at our elementary school, “What college and what career specifically are you talking about?” She replied, “This CC will be good for all colleges and all careers.” I quickly explained to the parent-group that Jason Zimba, main writer of CC math feels CC is best for non-specific schools, not schools like Berkeley. And, before she could cut me off, I told them how California actually lowered their standards in math, making it difficult to get to Calculus by 12th grade. Most parents just sit at these meetings and believe everything they are told (schools are failing, students are dumb, and CC will save America)…rarely is a question ever asked, and those nasty slogans live on.
Good job keep informing. Many parents have no idea what’s going on or they need you to supply the facts. We don’t like to question authority in this case because we grew up trusting and believing in our school system. People find it hard to imagine that an entity this big nation wide could succomb to crooks.
Momoffive: thank you for being the kind of parent advocate that the “education reformers” loathe and fear. Meaning, the kind of parent advocate that was missing in the school where Michelle Rhee made the mouths of dozens of small children bleed, yet as far as anyone knows, literally not a peep from the parents…
Only a wonderful pep talk from her principal that she had taken her students from the 13th to the 90th percentile. *Which the former DCPS Chancellor later admitted she couldn’t document, and which the principal has never ever confirmed.*
Courage, facts, logic. You already had the advantage.
Keep on keepin’ on.
😎
I agree with momoffive.
College and Career Ready means nothing. It’s just another slogan like Subway, Eat Fresh, What’s in Your Wallet, Melts in Your Mouth, Not in Your Hand or Just Do It. The College and Career Ready slogan was developed by the “reformers” and we all know why. Parents and teachers who believe the College and Career Ready propaganda are just as quick to believe the Green Giant slogan – Picked at the Peak of Perfection!
I have been in education for 19 years. I have suffered from depression, weight gain, hair loss, and chronic respiratory issues. I’ve have therapists and doctors to gently recommend that I find a new profession. Students aren’t the only ones who are suffering…
Indeed!
A shrink friend of mine in CT recently asked me at a holiday party,”What are they doing to teachers these days? My office is full of them all of a sudden!”. My response- ill conceived, unscrupulous, child abusing corporate backed ‘reform’ is being forced on us by Washington. Although a mother of school aged children, she had no idea what CCSS was doing to her kids’ classrooms.
Yolanda, you’re not the only one. My high school, in a successful suburban district in Indiana, had always gotten good grades (for whatever that’s worth).
When “reformy” Superintendent Tony Bennett pushed through his harmful policies in my state, the administration in our central office and in my building bought his line of BS hook, line and sinker. They lowered the boom on us to “crack us into shape.”
For several years, we suffered with pointless paperwork, worse-than-useless professional development, endless data reporting, and other tasks which did nothing to improve our teaching. As a result, these symptoms showed up among teachers in my building (some of the symptoms listed below were mine):
(1) depression; (2) high blood pressure; (3) heart palpitations; (4) suicidal thoughts; (5) unhealthy weight gain; (6) loss of sleep; (7) irritability; (8) shortness of breath.
One colleague of mine was known to keep his/her alcohol consumption modest, and only on weekends. He/she freely admitted to drinking during the week. Another colleague was unable to sleep without leaving a lamp on in the bedroom. Another took an overnight visit to a sleep disorder clinic. Others had nervous gastric trouble. Yet another said he/she could get their hands on an ADHD medication that would help them sit still; this colleague would take one of these pills so they could plow through a large pile of papers on th weekend. This teacher said there were whisperings of teachers who regularly helped each other get pharmaceuticals to ease their problems. Another one was so upset after a threatened loss of job that they spent a whole night tossing and turning in anguish; the next morning they checked into a hospital for an appendectomy.
Many chose teaching as a noble profession out of their love for children or their desire to help others. While the monetary rewards were paltry, at least we had job security and reasonable chance of making a comfortable living at the end of our careers. That’s all gone as all of these fool legislators (and some in the media) have cried for greater accountability for “those lazy, privilged elite teachers.”
This rant is too long and doesn’t begin to address your health problems (or mine). Just be aware that others are in the same situation. I think reading this blog is therapeutic, and I take vicarious pleasure in seeing some of the reformers get into hot water of their own hubris or stupidity!
Thank you Chris Whitney for speaking up. I have been an educator for 25 years and retiring because I can no longer participate in a system that abuses children. What I am observing in classrooms across our district has become more of a mental health issue than an academic issue. I feel like a helpless bystander watching children suffer. I have tried speaking up but those making school policy and administrators are too self absorbed and narcissistic to listen. I think our social culture of bullying is now scapegoating children who are suffering psychological abuse. We know that chronic shame in childhood from “never fully measuring up”, leads to Borderline PD in adulthood, yet we continue to create this toxic environment. What can we do? We can’t all move to Finland; however, we can model those methods of Montessori that are healthy & build strong children. What we are creating now is a mental health disaster of ruined young lives.
Harping on college & career is the last thing our elementary children need. They need “nurturing” which allows them to develop a strong sense of self. They need teachers & parents who can validate them and give them unconditional love and acceptance, who can inspire them to love learning through a cooperative and creative environment, not send them to a “work camp” prison like environment every day. Teachers who function under such stress are often desensitized and emotionless, and children can’t make healthy attachments to them. Our schools have become Institutions for creating Narcissistic & Borderline PD. Parents must take action to this abuse, and more teachers like you must speak up for the children who have no voices!
Great comment ! So agree!
I agree with this teacher. And with Jung. The only place to escape to from this “public school folly,” however, is into charter or private education. You COULD teach the way you want, but not under administrators who are aligned with the expectations of the federal bureaucracy. If you are serious, resign, and go teach at a school where real teaching is possible. I don’t detect any hypocrisy in your letter, but there is a certain “sheepleness” to the fact that you are going along with “the system.” The system should be better, and you shouldn’t have to compromise your principles to keep a job, but when you are part of a corrupt government bureaucracy, what do you expect?
At least in Utah, charter schools are also required to follow CCSS, so there’s really no “escape” there. And shame on you for assuming that only public bureaucracies are corrupt. I know you read this blog enough to see the stunning corruption of charter companies and other groups. Corruption is not simply confined to public groups. And, actually, because of public scrutiny, public bureaucracies are often less corrupt than these secretive charter organizations.
Exactly. Where is the choice if all schools (public and charter) have to follow the same script and pass the same test? We were told this is a “thinking skills” set of standards.
If my children are told HOW they must think, and then are made to demonstrate the appropriate “though process” on the test – which IS part of the math by the way – and getting the “correct” answer is seen as nothing more than a parlor trick, I don’t want any part of this. THAT is abusive and stressful – and is not for everyone.
I want to know that my child knows how to calculate problems to get an answer. But please, leave the demonstration of their thought process out of the assessment.
That’s a failure of the Utah legislature, not of the charters. Yes I hear of the corruptions among charter companies and other groups but I KNOW personally of two charters which are not corrupt.
OOOOO…TWO whole charter schools that aren’t corrupt? I’ll see you those two schools and raise you Academica, White Hat, KIPP, the American Indian Charter School, and others that ARE corrupt.
I actually think that the Utah Legislature did something right for education (for once!) by requiring charters to adhere to the same curricular requirements. How else can we compare the two if one doesn’t have to do any of the other things that the other schools do? In Utah, regular public schools educate 93% of students in the state, and do pretty well, considering the appalling lack of funding. Several legislators are very pro-charter because they or their relatives work for charter companies, so I guess it could be worse.
A lot of Catholic Schools are using CCSS, too.
You mean a charter or private school in which admin calls 100% of the shots and is answerable only to the board (which such board is as much or more interested in profit as they are education)?
Do you understand what democracy is supposed to be (or democratic republic, if you prefer)? Do you understand who the government is supposed to be in a democracy? Do you understand that democracy – and the government in a democracy – is what creates “public” space. There is nothing public about a private company. Customers of a private company have no say so in how a private company is run. They can try to take their business elsewhere, but that assumes there is reasonable competition where one could actually find something better. As we see with McDonald’s vs. Burger King, WalMart vs. Target, AT&T vs. Sprint, etc., that “something better” tends to be quite elusive for most of us.
Still trying to get control of people, I see, through a concept of democracy unrelated to market places. I understand perfectly what democracy means, and the voluntary cooperation between buyers and sellers in the marketplace is a more democratic form of democracy than any public body run by elected representatives who depend or organized labor for support.
Your complaint that you have less choice than theoretically appears because of the similarity of products I find rather puerile. If you know how to do anything better than the choices you have, start a business yourself. Your victimhood is so moldy and fungusy.
Your anger is so palpable and bullying. Please tone down your rage. Thisis about reasonable discourse.
Harlan? Tone himself down? Curb the righteous anger and he/him/himself approach to discourse?
Never.
I’m afraid Harlan is too busy consuming unsalted butter to better his health . . . .
Any teacher who determines a child’s physical or mental health is at risk must intervene immediately to protect the child. It should not have reached the Ambulance stage. Child abuses by policy, action, or acquiescence are equally heinous.
Ours is a profession that suffers from reporting injustices, emailing others with indignation, and pontificating after the fact.
Until We step up, step in. and stop it, we are the Capos of the ED Reform Movement.
Holocaust Educator here: “Kapo” is spelled with a “K.” And we are all doing what we can. But do you expect all of us to fall on our swords and get fired in order to stop this? I have responsibilities to my family and they need to be protected, too. I have done everything I can, including opting out of any optional test that is given, but I have to keep my job.
I have actually emailed my state legislator about the CCSS and the length of testing that is required. He is supportive of education, but he actually doesn’t believe me that the tests are so long.
That’s a horrible thought, Jim, but I guess it’s what I have been drifting toward. But it isn’t just a question of survival, a question of sending children to the testing gas chambers because you yourself as a teacher want to survive, its a matter of Stockholm syndrome too.
Some teachers fall in love with the reform ideology, and willingly anticipate that higher standards will be good for the children, themselves, and the schools. They may have overestimated their ability to deliver of the promise of the CCSS.
But I think they’ve joined the Nazi party for the good of the Vaterland, not because, like the great mass of Germans who really were antisemitic, but because they are communist, socialist and anti-business. The Jew teachers hate is the capitalist.
So if you willingly drink the communist Kool-aid (Jim Jones allusion there for those too young to remember), why shouldn’t you suffer? YOU are members of the party elite. You have your job BECAUSE you mouthe the socialist line, not because you could make a living at anything else but bureaucratic political correctness. Go into any faculty room in America and you’ll hear the same complaints about plutocracy, and big business, and greed, and money, and Wall Street, and Walmart, same as here on this blog, but it’s all ignorant clap trap.
Wake up a bit and look at the essential and complex web of democratic cooperation between people which the capitalist marketplace permits and requires. Identification with the ignorant proletariat is deliberately choosing to be a government serf. No one can take your social morality seriously. When push comes to shove, you’ll shut up, knuckle under, and keep your job. Who would blame you for that? But to pretend that in doing so you aren’t essentially a Capo when you are following the CCSS, now THAT is riding the hypocritical horse.
Hey, Harlan, mind explaining this comment of yours: “The Jew teachers hate is the capitalist”. Please revise for clarity, as we say.
Teachers don’t hate Jews, but this Jew here (that’s me) is sort of getting to not like you and your twisted, self absorbed narrative.
Think before you write, Harlan.
I loathe Mike Bloomberg, Merryl Tisch, Joel Klein, and Rahm Emanuel, but not at all because they are Jewish. I hate them because their policies are antithetical to true democracy, justice, equality, and freedom.
Harlan, it may be time to put your mouth back on its leash . . . . if not, please go get neutered.
We all know very well that when anyone plays the Nazi card, discussion has degenerated. I accept your advice to go roll in the snow.
I DO think, though, that the hatred of businessmen, big or small, evinced by a portion of the teaching cadre is a knee jerk anti-capitalist bigotry rather similar to the anti-semitism created in Germany for political purposes by the regimes, including the Nazi regime, looking for a scape goat for Germany’s defeat in WWI.
The parallel is this: the Germans didn’t examine themselves after WW I to try to see what they did wrong, but rather blamed others, Jews and Bolsheviks, and it took a second world war for them to confront themselves over their spiritual sins of Junkerism and Prussianism.
Many teachers, you included, Robert, seem to harbor a deep seated antipathy to individuality and business. I have no idea why. The teaching cadre, in my view, is partially blaming others for their problems rather than looking within, conducting self examination. The victim mentality eventually produces tyranny. I don’t know who is exploiting this teacher mood for power, but that’s your problem, if you’ve joined it, rather than mine.
OK, snow drifts, here I come.
I’m not Jewish, but oy vey, Harlan! You’re in fine form today, and that’s not a compliment. Watch what you say. You may not be antisemitic, but the comment sure was.
Read it again carefully, and you will see otherwise. I grant it was convolute, but anti-semitic not. I’m comparing liberal teachers who blame big business to Nazis who scape goated Jews for the problems of Germany. Sometimes that hatred even extends to the tea party people who merely want to limit government and return it to constitutional limits. You have to admit that the anti-tea party rhetoric is as filled with lies and hatred as the anti-semitic rhetoric of the Nazis. It’s because at heart most teachers are Bolsheviki.
DNFTT
I see a major difference between hatred of Jews vs. hatred of Wall Street and big business, and I feel compelled to point it out, sir.
Hatred of Jews was perpetrated by those in power; Jews did not possess the tools or political support to stand up to the Nazi party in those days. The Jews were the underdogs.
This supposed hatred of big business or the “greedocrats” is not the same thing, especially since we are now seeing that many of these uber-rich are pulling some of the levers of power in our democracy. And I don’t think this hatred is motivated by jealousy either–it’s the simmering anger of people who are forced to abide by rules of a game that they didn’t intend to play and have no say in revising the rules.
I think to equate teachers with socialists or (gasp) Bolsheviks/communists is shallow thinking. The educator frustration you are referring to is widespread, yes, but I think it is more in the form of “gosh I was duped” or “I’m part of a corrupt education system, but I never signed up for this.”
I understand, Harlan, that you were an educator for 40+ years, so no doubt you heard your share of complainers in the staff room during your career. In the early part of my career, I heard some of the same problems, but as a rookie teacher I didn’t understand what the fuss was about because they were desribing battles I didn’t understand, or else I had no stake in them. From my view on this sideline, it appears that your absence from the classroom has made you unaware of the problems of the current reform movement. But yet you are a frequent contributor here, and your comments seem well-reasoned, even if I find myself on the opposite side of the fence a lot.
Sadly this is a very accurate of teaching in the 21st century. We shouls run away from, not toward this model of living.
What a shame that Naison has seen fit to turn BATs into an exclusionary echo chamber where no ideas are allowed that are not his own, even when his own ideas are factually flawed.
We have to rely on the state BAT groups on Facebook because Naison and his henchmen ban anyone that presents any ideas or facts that conflict with their “vision”. Even in the state groups, admins have had to fight off takeover attempts by Naisons soldiers.
His effectiveness is and will continue to be very limited. It is up to public school teachers (which he is not) to combat the assault on schools. We can’t rely on anyone else.
You certainly can’t rely on radical socialists like the BATs.
Quite a combination; Harlan hit the ‘daily double’: red baiting and anti semitism. Why does any poster waste their time attempting to reply to this provocateur? Do you expect him to change his tune? Stay on topic. Mr. H is nothing more than a diversion from the struggle to save the public schools. He has received far more attention than he is worth. Ignore him: don’t reinforce negative behavior. Fight the fights that are worth fighting. This ain’t one of them.
Red baiting, yes. Anti-semitism, no. Although even the phrase “red baiting” implies that there is a validity to red political philosophy which the ‘baiter’ does not see and is only, and irrationally, attempting to stir up anti-red feeling, when reds are perfectly good people only wanting the best for society.
I do believe that the red philosophy of society so prevalent in the public school teaching cadre works against them in the general population, and should work against them.
I’m hoping to alert one or two of you to its self destructive nature, to save a few of you for American exceptionalism, old fashioned patriotism, mom, and apple pie. The vital essence of America is NOT equity but freedom. People who keep on arguing for equity, and revolution, and mass movements, and Bad Ass Teachering are likely to fail because they don’t understand fully what life is FOR.
But who am I to say? If I’m not persuasive, what does it matter?
“liberty and justice for all”–that ring a bell. Justice,as in “social justice”.
Thank you Charlotte, for you clarity and explicitness. “Justice” does NOT mean “social justice”=equal or at least minimum money for everyone, but rather “justice” mean equality before the law, nothing more. You illustrate my point perfectly.
Yes, but, all people are not getting equal justice before the law. That’s why the fight for social justice will never end. Those who have “super-equality” will use all the tools they posses to maintain an unequal balance of power.
This is, of course, true. Money talks, through lobbyists, but we still need to spread the notion that no citizen, at least theoretically, is at a disadvantage with respect to the law. Indigent defendants MUST be provided legal representation. My wife worked on a number of such cases in Detroit. The Supreme Court has up held that concept.
But people MUST give up the notion that “justice” means what the socialists and communists mean by “social justice,” which is that the poor have a RIGHT to some of the money of the rich. Now it is good public policy to look after our brother in life, but the notion that one man has a right to another’s money (i.e. stored work), is a form of slavery, a form of enforced work.
No one thinks slavery is a good thing any more. No one justifies it (except some Islamic cultures). But liberals advocate it all the time in a different form without realizing their moral error. The Southern Democrats of the pre-civil war era, having lost a war over slavery, came back after the war to reinstitute a slightly lighter form of black slavery in the form of Jim Crow laws. When THOSE were struck down after the civil rights movement, under the leadership of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Lyndon Johnson, the Democrats nationwide turned from just enslaving black people to trying to enslave everyone in the country, and are still trying to do so with Obamacare, government by regulation, RTTT and CCSS.
They, of course, would deny it, and say they are only acting out of compassion, and are only seeking social justice for their constituents, but properly understood, Democrats in congress are still the same old slave owners of the pre-civil war era. Curiously enough, the overwhelming support by African Americans of Democrats and President Obama in attempting to reenslave the entire American citizenry is puzzling. They should know better, because their ancestors once suffered physical slavery.
I can’t even excuse President Obama, just because he spent his formative years in Indonesia as a Muslim, and didn’t really absorb the root democratic American culture of freedom. He is part of the academic elite which hates messy American freedom and wants everything made nice for everyone, BUT at the price of thievery disguised as higher taxes for noble causes and at the price of attacking any utterance not politically correct.
This is hardly relevant, but personally, I think A & E should have kicked the whole of the Duck Dynasty family off the air for Phil’s egregious remarks. He has his free speech, but he doesn’t have a right to a job as the subject of a reality TV show in which red-neck bigotry is given a pass as wholesome down-homey religion. In full disclosure, I should record that I’ve never watched the show, I don’t think killing ducks for fun is admirable (for food, of course, if you’re dirt poor), and I see A & E’s caving in to the pressure to reinstate Phil as the most disgusting kind of culture-debasing money grubbing behavior.
So there. Something to offend everyone.
Just proves you,have no idea what you are talking about. Come back when you have learned the definition of the words “radical” and “socialist”.
Oh Harlan,
Don’t let these posters bully you with their negativity.
I personally look forward to your sheer stupidity, rage, lack of intelligence, and pure absence of critical thought.
Keep on posting your carmudgeonly ignorant rants, and I shall with relish read them and even share them with others who disapprove of your mindset and grand canyon sized mouth.
You just keep doing what you’re doing, and do NOT let anyone rain on your one-person pathetic parade.
You are obliged to your fan base . . .
When people, children, are identified as “its”, objects, things, this is what one can expect. What a difference from when I entered EDUCATION a half century ago. Progress? Not in my book.
Louisiana Purchase,
I would never blaspheme the Holocaust – try using a Dictionary to look up “Capo” – you will learn a new word today. Nice try , Kid.
Expect you to fall on your sword ? I do not think you carry one. Do the righteous action by refusing to be a part of the process ? Yes. You would bring honor to yourself and family.
I tried to reply earlier, but I guess it didn’t go through. I DID look up “capo,” and have learned something today. I did not mean to imply that you would blaspheme the Holocaust.
While I admire your integrity and willingness to engage in “righteous action,” and while I try to everything I can to stop the process, and while I want to honor myself and family, I still am responsible to my children.
Louisiana Purchase,
You have my total and complete respect and admiration, Thanks for the reply. I hear you – the ED. Reform leaders are vicious and vindictive. Watch your six , Pard. There if I am needed,
I think Louisiana Purchase sends a strong message to we older Educators – I was fired and moved on, others retired ( many earlier than they would have otherwise ) – time for us to go balls to the wall for our beliefs.
Do not join a cool sounding outfit, do not get a cool tattoo, do not look to Svengalis who jump from “in” cause to “in” cause. do not say “Oh yeah, man, I am so there in the July 2014 March ! ” Get Militant !
I Friend all on Facebook – NSA has a established plugin.
Semper Fi !
Spellman
I’ve been rereading FAHRENHEIT 451 and in 1951 Ray Bradbury saw today coming. He has his protagonist’s boss say, “Give the people contests they win by remembering….names of state capitals or how much corn Iowa grew last year. Cram them full of noncombustible data….and facts….. Then they’ll feel they’re thinking….And they’ll be happy because facts of that sort don’t change. Don’t give them any slippery stuff like philosophy or sociology to tie things up with. …..” He goes on to point out that thinking critically leads to unhappiness because critical thinking leads to conflicting theory and thought. No Utopian society is possible unless everyone is happy and thinking alike.
Gads. Doesn’t that sound like common core? Make all the round pegs fit in the square holes. There is only one correct answer to a MC question. Grade the essay by the number and length of words and the number of mechanical errors. Doesn’t matter if kids are required by law to have accommodations. Doesn’t matter if they just moved to this country and never had a day of education anywhere. Doesn’t matter if a kid sees something new in a book and defends it with evidence from the text.
Teachers should be capos: we tune the student’s mind like a metal bar across a guitar fret changes the key of a song. Capo teachers know their students, recognize that what works for one will not work for another. Capo teachers know that one child’s sculpture can represent the deepest levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy, while another student may write a poem, or even write an essay which also expresses their deep level understanding. But both CCSS and standardized testing are trying to make teachers into KAPOs, a Nazi concentration camp prisoner who was given privileges if they would supervise work gangs.
I will not be a Kapo. I will endeavor on a daily basis to convince my students that they are far more than a data point on a chart, that they and their parents should have a voice in how education continues in this wonderful country of ours.
My hat is off to all the Badass Teachers who stand up for their students. Yes, I need my job as much as the next person, maybe more, as I am my sole support. But I will not be forced into becoming a child abuser through the guise of “rigor” (mortis). The deformers, like Gates and Walton, Rhee and ALEC and Broad have manipulated facts and used scare-tactic rhetoric to mold the public mind for their own financial well being.
I am reminded in the scene in SCHINDLER’s LIST where the older gentleman is registering for the ghetto. The Nazi officer tags him as nonessential. As Stern leads him away to safety, the older man says, “Nonessential? I don’t think he knows what the word means. I am a teacher of history and philosophy”.
I already lost most of my family to the Holocaust. I will not go down this time without a fight.
Your are very brave. I, to my shame, accommodated, and lost my self-respect and, ultimately, my career.
Charlotte, I am not brave at all. I’m terrified. I was terrified when I saw how stressed out my PAP class was to take a semester exam. It’s a good class. They knew the material. But there’s so much pressure on them to “be a GPA” that either they get sick (migraines abound) or they freeze and forget. One of my kids wound up in a psychiatric treatment center. It is for them that I took the minute to make them take deep breaths, and to stand up and stretch before beginning the test.. And I work in a fantastic school!
Good for you, Leah. I wish I was that brave. I do what I can, but maybe I don’t do enough. I wish I could do more. I speak up and encourage wherever I can, but I can’t afford to do too much more.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, the plumber is here. My water heater in my 60 year old house just broke. Yet another thing I can’t afford!
With all due respect to you for the loss of your family to the Nazis, seriously you aren’t a prisoner, the school you work in isn’t a prison camp, nor is your school district run by Nazis or Stalinists (same thing you know). You can walk out any time you want. There is freedom outside the public school system.
Seriously,, Harlan? Do you not recognize an extended metaphor when you see one?
Have a nice day! 🙂
Not only are you braver than I am, Leah, you are also kinder. Good for you on both counts!
STOP ! Never should have used “Capo” without an explanatory before or after it ( Used to do that in the Classroom ). Everybody on the same page now ? OK ?, calm down. ( Damn. I was good ! ) Now , let’s move on to the real topic.
The ED Reform Movement is destroying American Education – fighting it is our Iwo Jima.
In commenting on what it took to win that Battle , an American Admiral said, ” All gave some, some gave all. ”
In this Battle, do not be the one who gave none.
Semper Fi !
JimSpellman
I thank all concerned for engaging in a discussion that has delivered an unexpected post-Xmas present.
The solution to the problem of worst practices and failed ideas in public schools is to eliminate public schools altogether and put the vast majority of children into charters and other privatized schools which have demonstrated that they will relentlessly double down on those worst practices and failed ideas—
This is the gift of cognitive dissonance writ so large that one can’t help but laugh.
😃
“Humor is mankind’s greatest blessing.” [Mark Twain]
But not to fear: the leading charterites/privatizers will be sure to reserve an enriched learning experience for THEIR OWN CHILDREN. It’s only for the children of OTHER PEOPLE’S CHILDREN that the Centres of EduExcellence, with their emphasis on docility and low-level skills, are intended.
$tudent $ucce$$—it makes a lot of ₵ent¢…
Rheeally!
But if you’re having trouble making this work out logically and factually, well then I refer you back to that old Marxist maxim:
“A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five.”
Groucho, of course! Who else?
😎
Some charter schools are pretty good. If you find one black swan does that invalidate the logic?
My student threw up on his test. We had to bag it and send it in because of the numbering and signature system as we sign out our tests. Just ridiculous!
I heard that an angry taxpayer once used his 1040 form as toilet paper before sending it to the IRS (back before digital tax returns). The IRS dutifully laminated it before processing the return.
Perhaps the testing folks will do the same for this unfortunate student’s test paper!?