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New Hampshire: State Board Votes to Adopt PragerU Video Course Despite Opposition

By dianeravitch
September 17, 2023 //
13

Gary Rayno of InDepthNH reports on the state board’s unanimous decision to endorse PragerU’s videos for a financial literacy course despite overwhelming public opposition. PragerU is not a university. Its founder Dennis Prager is a rightwing talk show host, not an educator. He has boasted that the goal of his videos is to indoctrinate children into his views. New Hampshire’s state commissioner Frank Edelblut homeschooled his 10 children and has repeatedly pushed for nonpublic choices; he created the “Learn Everywhere” program to grant credits for out-of-school learning (neither audited nor held accountable). Governor Chris Sununu has mildly criticized Trump to mark himself as a GOP moderate, but his anti-public school appointments of rightwing zealots to the state board and the top superintendent job show who he really is.

Open the link to read the entire article.

Rayno writes:

CONCORD — After three hours of public testimony, the vast majority in opposition to approving a PragerU financial literacy course, the state Board of Education approved the application 5 to 0 with chairman Andrew Cline abstaining.

Last month, the board had tabled the application promoted by Education Commissioner Frank Edelblut, until additional information could be provided by PragerU Kids.

Thursday, the state board faced a packed meeting room of teachers, school board members, parents, state elected officials and advocates on both sides of the issue.

After three hours of testimony, with the vast majority of speakers opposed to the PragerU application as was the case with several several hundred written comments, several board members raised concerns that opponents sought to censor opposing views noting the Prager political philosophy is supported by about half the country.

Board member Richard Sala said he disagreed with the person who said if the proposal had a woke agenda, the board would not be entertaining the application.

There are progressive charter school programs the board approved, he said he deeply disagrees with but trusts parents more than he trusts the government.

Sala argued Prager’s beliefs are mainstream political thought in this country that half or more than half of the people believe.

He said that means more local parents can make the decision that Prager is the more appropriate website than some others.

“What we saw today was not live and let live,” said board member Ryan Terrell of Nashua, “but a political organization flexing its political muscle.”

He said he had not seen such an outcry like this in the time he has been on the state board.

“I love the fact that parents and people are paying attention, but then there is the misinformation and hypocrisy,” Terrell said. “You open the door and then close the door on dialogue.”

Board member Phil Nazzro of Newmarket said he was concerned about setting a precedent of having an ideological litmus test for who could provide education in the state.

He said the way to build critical thinking is with a broad array of ideas presented, instead they had a lot of red herrings.

Several speakers described Prager’s application to provide a free on-line financial literacy course as the camel’s nose under the tent, with many saying it would lead to greater engagement in the controversial organization’s propaganda with the stated goal of changing students’ minds.

“You cannot separate the creation from the creator,” said Realtor Brenda Perkins, who said she is a 40-year resident of the state. “It is like lighting a match to a slow burning fuse.”

Allowing the program would open the door to uncredited opinions to our schools, she said and would be a Trojan horse to the future use of Prager’s other material.

One person questioned if a similar course done by the American Civil Liberties Union or the Southern Christian Leadership Conference would even be before the board.

“If this had a woke agenda, you would not even consider it,” noted the Rev. John Davis from Meriden. “But this agenda is OK to do to students, I hope that is not acceptable.”

But supporters of approving the application said the course was unbiased, and presented a choice for parents and not a mandate for all high school students who are required to master financial literacy as a graduation credit.

Supporters said the attempt to silence Prager’s other content amounts to censorship and does not give students the ability to hear all sides of issues.

Nancy Biederman of New Boston said the PragerU course is not the only course high school students would need to receive graduation credit.

“This is a choice, not mandated,” Biederman said. “This is all about political sides and I do not understand why you don’t want them to hear the other side.”
She said it would be nice to have students with open eyes.

The non-profit organization, PragerU Kids, is not an academic institution, does not confer degrees and is not accredited, and has had some of its videos removed from YouTube and Google because of their “hateful content.”

On its website, PragerU Kids says it teaches “American Values” while “Woke agendas are infiltrating classrooms, culture and social media.”
The organization’s application would provide videos on various financial topics from interest and compound interest to paying taxes, and provide worksheets, with a 45 multiple choice test at the end.

The course would be under the Department of Education’s Learn Everywhere Program, which according to its annual report discussed at Thursday’s meeting, had 32 students participate, including nine in the other on-line financial literacy court FitMoney.

PragerU said last month it would create a stand-alone website for the literacy class so New Hampshire students would not need to access their website and its more controversial videos that have been called misleading, biased and that marginalize certain groups and issues.

Brandon Ewing of PragerU said he believes the company has made the changes the board sought at its last meeting, and urged them to give the course a half a graduation credit, although board chair Drew Cline unsuccessfully argued for only a quarter credit.

A number of speakers at Thursday’s meeting were concerned students may still go to the PragerU website and watch the videos.

Louise Spencer of Concord and founder of the Kent Street Coalition, said she accessed some of the videos and soon after received an email urging people to take a survey about transgender individuals after statements about the transformation process and calling the group a mob.

Spencer also noted people from the PragerU organization were aggressively filming people who were outside the building opposing the application.

“That very aggressive recording of those of us shows you today what I believe is unethical behavior from a vendor,” Spencer said. “Is this appropriate behavior for a vendor.”She called the on-line course “a foot in the door for the indoctrination of our youth.”

Categories Education Reform

Justin Parmenter: North Carolina Funds Bigoted Christian Academy

By dianeravitch
September 16, 2023 //
2

NBCT high school teacher Justin Parmenter frequently tweets (X’s) about politics and schools in North Carolina. He has been reviewing the religious schools that take vouchers. Here is the latest.

Fayetteville Christian got $1.3m NC taxpayer dollars this year. They deny admissions to non-Christians and LGBTQ (whom they refer to as “deviate and perverted”).

I don’t want my public dollars going to institutions that can discriminate this way. #nced #ncga #ncpol

His Twitter handle is his name.

Categories Bigotry, Education Industry, Extremism, North Carolina, Privatization, Racism, Religion, Vouchers

Don’t Fall for This Telephone Scam!

By dianeravitch
September 16, 2023 //
23

CNN reports that telephone scams now use artificial intelligence to recreate the voice of a loved one who is in desperate trouble and needs help or ransom money right away. In this example, a mother gets a call from what sounds like her daughter, who has been kidnapped, and the gruff voice of a man demanding $1 million to ransom her. It’s a scam, but sometimes it works. If you get a call like this, don’t fall for it. Call your child, call the police, record the call.

The Boston Globe reported on a scam that has become commonplace. An elderly person gets a call from someone with a youthful voice who says, “Grandma, I’m in trouble. I rented a car and ran a red light. I crashed into a car driven by a pregnant woman. I’m in jail, and I need money to make bail. Please help me.”

This happened to a 93-year-old woman in Massachusetts. She rushed to the bank, withdrew $9,500, spoke to a smooth-talking man who claimed to be a lawyer, and handed the money over to a LYFT driver.

I mention this because I received the same scam call. A young man called, claiming to be my grandson. He was in a car accident, he said. It was his fault. He needed money right away for bail. He gave me the badge number and telephone number of the arresting officer. I asked if he had called his mother. He said he couldn’t reach her. I hung up, called his mother, and she said the grandson in question was in his dorm, preparing for finals. I didn’t fall for the scam.

But this grandmother did.

Last month, a 93-year-old grandmother from Pembroke took a call from someone she thought was her granddaughter Abby. Through sobs, Abby begged for money to get out of jail.

Yes, it was a scam, and the grandmother ― who asked that her name not be used for fear of being targeted by other scammers ― fell for it.

The scammers used a somewhat elaborate ruse that included having “Abby’s lawyer” come on the phone to matter-of-factly explain the necessary steps to secure her release.

It was a cruel and wicked exploitation of a grandmother’s love and concern, perpetrated by slick con artists who have no decency.

But the grandmother and her family said they were also upset that Bank of America, from which she hurriedly withdrew $9,500 in cash, did nothing to stop her from throwing away thousands of dollars.

The family also wondered about Lyft, the ridesharing giant, which picked up the cash and delivered it to the scammers, apparently unwittingly.

The family contacted me to call attention to the roles played by two of the country’s biggest corporations and to warn other elders and their families to be on guard, they said.

When the grandmother answered the phone in her home on the morning of Feb. 25 she was stunned to hear a hysterical “Abby” pleading for help.

Here’s what happened:

“Grandma, you got to help,” the voice said. It sounded like Abby, who is in her early 20s. She grew up nearby and spent plenty of time with her grandmother.

She told “Grandma” she was accused of texting while driving and causing an accident in which the pregnant driver of the other car was hurt and taken to the hospital. “Abby” insisted it wasn’t her fault and told “Grandma” she broke her nose in the accident.

“Abby” swore her grandmother and grandfather (he’s 96) to secrecy before putting someone purporting to be her lawyer on the phone. He told her, among other things, that the money was “fully refundable.”

The grandmother hurried off alone to a Bank of America branch office in nearby Marshfield, where she regularly does her banking, feeling anxious and afraid.

At the teller’s window, she showed her driver’s license and presented a check made out to cash. Very few words were exchanged before the teller put a small stack of bills into a white envelope and slid it to the grandmother.

The grandmother was so preoccupied with her mission that she left the bank without counting the money or even looking in the envelope, she said.

Back home, she called the telephone number the phony lawyer had given her. He instructed her to find a small box into which to put the envelope.

The “lawyer” told the grandmother someone would come to her house to pick up the box and gave her the license plate number, make, and model of the car.

A few minutes later, the “lawyer,” still speaking in a reassuring voice on the phone, told her to bring the package to the driver. The driver said little before driving away with it.

About 30 minutes later, the “lawyer” called again and told the grandmother he had bad news: The pregnant woman’s baby had died and Abby was now charged with manslaughter. He needed $9,000 more to get her released.

That’s when she told her son, who happened to be visiting, what was happening. He spoke with the “lawyer,” whom he described as sounding “unbelievably calm and professional.” The “lawyer” told the son the name of the jail where Abby was supposedly being held.

The son hung up and called his niece. She answered. The jig was up.

The son called back the “lawyer.” The call went dead. (I called the same number several times but kept getting a fast busy signal.) The son gave the police the license plate number given to the grandmother. Police said the pickup was made by a Lyft driver.

The reporter for the Globe, Sean P. Murphy, was able to persuade Bank of America to refund the woman’s payout. The scammer got away with it.

Categories Corruption, Fake, Fraud, Hoax, Lies

Jim Hightower: The New McCarthyism and Ways to Fight Back

By dianeravitch
September 16, 2023 //
13

Jim Hightower is an old-fashioned Democratic liberal in Texas. He blogs about conditions in his home state and nationally. In this post, he sizes up the New McCarthyism.

He writes:

Little Kevin McCarthy has again been cowed by his House Caucus of Rabid Hyenas, this time bowing to their squeals to investigate whether there’s anything to investigate in Joe Biden’s past. In turn, a Democratic lawmaker is shoving McCarthy’s wimpyness up his nose by demanding an investigation into Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner’s grossly corrupt money deals with the royal ruling thugs of Saudi Arabia.

Meanwhile, millions of low-income Americans are denied health care, the planet is exploding with climate change, inequality is raging as Congress pampers the super rich, the “Supreme Court” has become a very bad partisan parody of justice… and most Americans wonder whatever happened to Woody Guthrie’s upbeat, democratic ideal of “This Land Is Your Land.”

But don’t wring your hands.

Reach out and join hands in rebellion against the pathetic thieves of our hard-won values of economic fairness, social justice, and equal opportunity for all. Pogo famously said, “We have met the enemy, and it is us.” I say we have met the SOLUTION, and it is us. Organize, Strategize, Mobilize–that’s the only way we democrats have ever defeated the plutocrats, autocrats, theocrats, and kleptocrats. Onward!

Here are some groups we recommend getting involved with:

  • People’s Action has a roster of affiliated organizations who work in 29 different states to make grassroots change at the local level: https://peoplesaction.org/member-organizations/
  • Public Citizen has spent decades fighting the good fight, and Hightower is proud to serve on their board: https://www.citizen.org/
  • RuralOrganizing.org is working on a number of campaigns and policies to bring equity to rural America. We particularly love their daily rural press clips email! https://ruralorganizing.org/
  • What does it look like to have a home for popular education and organizing? Look no further than The Highlander Center in eastern Tennessee. You may know of it because of its historical role in many struggles, and the Center continues to train and educate activists of all ages (literally—they have youth programs!). https://highlandercenter.org/
  • We’re sure you know of Farm Aid’s concerts and events, but do you follow their movement-building and activism, too? Check out what they’re working on here: https://www.farmaid.org/take-action/

I have a few to add to that list:

1. The Network for Public Education. NPE opposes privatization of public funds and misuse of standardized testing. We fight for better schools for all. Join us in D.C. on October 28-29 for our 10th anniversary conference.

2. The States Project raises money to fund state legislative races, recognizing how important states are in today’s politics.

3. Indivisible organizes grassroots groups in every State and district.

There are many more groups organizing to protect our Constitution, our democracy, and our freedoms. Please feel free to add your suggestions.

Categories Biden, Elections, Politics, Resistance

Peter Greene: The Microschools Fad

By dianeravitch
September 16, 2023 //
8

Peter Green learned that New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu awarded $6 million to a for-profit organization called Prenda, to establish microschools in the Granite State. It’s not as if Prenda has a track record of success.

He writes:

New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu just gave Prenda a whopping $6 million cut of the granite state’s pandemic school relief. It’s a relatively small slice (the full pile of money is $156 million), but it’s notably a larger per-pupil amount than the state gives in normal “adequate aid.” So who is Prenda, and what is the money for, exactly?

Prenda is a company riding the new microschools wave. Microschools are the next evolutionary strep in homeschooling. Says the Micro Schools Network website, “Imagine the old one-room schoolhouse. Now bring it into the modern era.” Or imagine you’re homeschooling, and a couple of neighbors ask if you’d take on their children as well. Or to look at it another way, imagine back to the beginning of a public system, only this time, your system would only include the students and families you wanted to include.

Microschools like to emphasize their modern awesomeness. From the Micro Schools Network site: While no two micro schools are identical, most share several common traits: a small student population, an innovative curriculum, place-based and experiential learning, the use of cutting-edge technology, and an emphasis on mastering or understanding material. The education that micro schools provide is highly personalized.”

The microschools movement seems marked by a lot of educational amateur columbussing–the breathless announcement of “discoveries” plenty of people already knew. Again, from the network’s website:

Teachers typically guide students’ curiosity rather than lecture at them. Instead of utilizing a fixed curriculum, they integrate subjects that students are passionate about into daily lesson plans and account for each student’s unique strengths, learning style, and existing knowledge.

Because nobody who works professionally in education ever thought of any of those things. Or you can check out a video from Prenda founder/CEO Kelly Smith in which he may tell you ecitedly about how cool it was running his own microschool and seeing students become lively and excited about something they had learned. The microschool movement seems to be very much excited about its discovery of the wheel….

Needless to say, Prenda CEO Kelly Smith is not an educator.

Prenda has said it wants to be the Uber of education, but that really only makes sense if Uber were a service where the state paid the company and then you drove (or “guided”) yourself to your destination. Prenda does exist in a grey area that allows it to escape virtually all oversight. In Arizona, they don’t need a charter, don’t have to get their curriculum approved, and are not subject to any kind of oversight or audits.

There’s no explanation out there of why Sununu decided to spend $6 million on Prenda of all things. Their administration claimed that the microschools “are particularly helpful to students who have experienced learning loss and will thrive with more individualized attention,” but when the individual attention comes from a guide with no educational training (but lots of caring) and a computer program, it’s unclear how helpful it will be. Last fall they had 400 pods of roughly ten each in action; there’s virtually no information about how well these things actually work.

And yet, New Hampshire is handing over a sweet $6 mill in federal dollars. Said Rep Mel Myler (D), member of the House Committee on Education:

Chris Sununu’s decision to use federal funds to advance his anti-public school agenda and help a shady for-profit organization, rather than providing public schools the resources they need to prepare for the next phase of the pandemic, could have serious consequences for our teachers and students.

Good luck to the children of New Hampshire.

And good luck to New Hampshire’s taxpayers, who usually expect recipients of public dollars to have some accountability.

Open the link to see who’s funding this latest “innnovation.”

Categories Accountability, Corporate Reformers, Deregulation, Education Industry, New Hampshire

North Carolina: Voucher Teachers Required to “Speak in Tongues” at This School

By dianeravitch
September 15, 2023 //
16

Justin Parmenter, an NBCT-certified teacher in North Carolina, has been posting interesting facts on Twitter (X) about religious schools in North Carolina that accept voucher students. That is, the public is paying most or all of their tuition.

Here is the latest:

NC requires public school teachers to hold a license.

Durham, NC’s Mt. Zion Christian Acad receives public $ for vouchers. They require their teachers to demonstrate their relationship w/the Holy Spirit by speaking in tongues.

A license is optional. #nced #ncpol #ncga

@justinparmenter

Categories Accountability, Education Industry, North Carolina, Privatization, Religion, School Choice, Vouchers

Dana Milbank: Biden Faulted by GOP for Liking Dogs and Ice Cream

By dianeravitch
September 15, 2023 //
34

Republicans have spent the past four years portraying Joe Biden as a senile fool, a bumbling idiot, giving him no credit for his legislative achievements. They boast about the infrastructure projects in their districts, but never mention that they voted against the legislation that funded the projects.

Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank wrote recently that Republicans have found new reasons to ridicule Biden: he pets dogs and he likes ice cream. Shocking!

Milbank writes:

White House spokesman Andrew Bates is a happy warrior. For years, he has spiritedly fended off whatever calumny Republicans alleged at the moment, whether about President Biden’s age or Hunter Biden’s laptop or some imaginary scheme to take away Americans’ hamburgers or, most recently, their beer.

But Bates has found that he cannot in good conscience defend the man he serves against a deeply troubling new charge that the Republican National Committee has leveled at him. “I’m just coming to grips with the fact that I work for a dog-petting monster,” he told me.

It’s true. A couple of weeks ago, when Biden was touring the devastation in Maui, Hawaii, he encountered a golden lab named Dexter who was assisting with the grim search. He noted that Dexter was wearing booties to protect his paws from the scorching earth, and — Outrageously! Unforgivably! — Biden leaned over and petted Dexter on the top of his head.

The RNC swung into action. “Biden gets distracted by a dog: ‘That’s some hot ground, man!’” the GOP tweeted (or whatever one does now that Elon Musk has wrecked the platform) from its @RNCResearch account. It appended video of the offense.

This was not the first time the RNC caught the president in a scandalous act of canine affection. “Biden gets distracted by his dog on the balcony as he returns from Japan,” the RNC tweeted in May. The month before, @RNCResearch mocked Biden for answering “a child’s question about his dog” and for attempting to greet the Irish leader’s Bernese mountain dog (the animal barked at the president). “This dog wants nothing to do with Joe Biden,” the RNC tweeted.

Offensive though it is that Biden likes dogs, the RNC has exposed him for worse: enjoying ice cream. @RNCResearch has gone after him no fewer than 12 times for this deplorable behavior, tweeting out indefensible things Biden has said on the topic, such as “I know some really great ice cream places around here” and (parental discretion advised) “I got a whole full freezer full of Jeni’s chocolate chip ice cream.”

Impeach!

The GOP’s goal, of course, is to portray Biden as doddering and feebleminded. “Was Biden dozing off in Maui?” @RNCResearch tweeted with video that did not, in fact, show Biden dozing. “Biden looks confused as he heads back to his vehicle,” it tweeted in late August. “BIDEN: *stares blankly*,” it tweeted a few days later, after he ignored questions from a Fox News reporter. “BIDEN (very confused): ‘Who am I yielding to?’ ” @RNCResearch tweeted after the president inquired about the speaking order at a news conference with foreign leaders….

The RNC, which has defended Donald Trump’s lies that led to a violent attempt to overturn the 2020 election, has repeatedly faulted “SERIAL LIAR” Biden for exaggerating the damage done by a fire in his home decades ago. The accuracy standard of @RNCResearch’s attacks is little higher than the former president’s. It spread false storiesabout an unseen White House official silencing Biden with a mute button, about a bird pooping on Biden, about Biden making an antisemitic remark and about Biden being disoriented.

“Did Joe Biden just announce he has cancer?” the RNC ridiculed one day, apparently unaware that Biden has had various non-melanoma skin cancers removed.

“Joe Biden says the length of Barack Obama’s signature is shorter than his. Obama’s is 3 letters longer,” the RNC mocked on another day, clearly unaware that Biden signs his name “Joseph R. Biden Jr.”

There is nothing Biden does that will escape the ridicule of the RNC.

But what could be worse than petting dogs and liking ice cream?

Categories Biden, Elections, Humor, Republicans, Stupid

Nancy Bailey: The Folly of Destroying Play in Kindergarten

By dianeravitch
September 15, 2023 //
16

Nancy Bailey criticizes the ongoing campaign to raise academic expectations and academic pressure on children in kindergarten. She traces the origins of this misguided effort on the Reagan-era publication “A Nation at Risk” in 1983.

Although the gloomy claims of that influential document have been repeatedly challenged, even debunked*, it continues to control educational discourse with its assertion that American schools are failing. “A Nation at Risk” led to increased testing, to the passage of George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind in 2002, to the creation of Barack Obama’s Race to the Top in 2009, to the release of the Common Core standards in 2010.

Despite nearly a quarter century of focus on standards and testing, policymakers refuse to admit that these policies have failed.

And nowhere have they been more destructive than in the early grades, where testing has replaced play. Kindergarten became the new first grade.

But says Bailey, the current Secretary of Education wants to ratchet up the pressure on little kids.

She writes:

In What Happened to Recess and Why are our Children Struggling in Kindergarten, Susan Ohanian writes about a kindergartner in a New York Times article who tells the reporter they would like to sit on the grass and look for ladybugs. Ohanian writes, the child’s school was built very deliberately without a playground. Lollygagging over ladybugs is not permitted for children being trained for the global economy (2002, p.2).   

America recently marked forty years since the Reagan administration’s A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform which blamed schools as being eroded by a rising tide of mediocrity that threatens our very future as a Nation and a people.

Berliner and Biddle dispute this in The Manufactured Crisis: Myths, Fraud, and the Attack on America’s Public Schools. They state that most of these claims were said to reflect “evidence,” although the “evidence” in question either was not presented or appeared in the form of simplistic, misleading generalizations (1995, p. 3). 

Still, the report’s premise, that public schools failed, leading us down the workforce path of doom, continues to be perpetuated. When students fail tests, teachers and public schools are blamed, yet few care to examine the obscene expectations placed on the backs of children since A Nation at Risk.

Education Secretary Cardona recently went on a bus tour with the message to Raise the Bar in schools. Raising the bar is defined as setting a high standard, to raise expectations, to set higher goals.

He announced a new U.S. Department of Education program, Kindergarten Sturdy Bridge Learning Community.

This is through New America, whose funders include the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Waltons, and others who want to privatize public education. Here’s the video, Kindergarten as a “Sturdy Bridge”: Place-Based Investments, describing the plan focusing on PreK to 3rd grade. This involves Reading by 3rd and the Campaign for Grade Level Reading.

Cardona says in the announcement:

Getting kindergarten right has to be top of mind for all of us, because what happens there sets the stage for how a child learns and develops well into their elementary years and beyond. 

Ensuring that kindergarten is a sturdy bridge between the early years and early grades is central to our efforts both to Raise the Bar for academic excellence and to provide all students with a more equitable foundation for educational success. The kindergarten year presents an opportunity to meet the strengths and needs of young learners so they can continue to flourish in the years to come.

Raise the bar? Kindergarten is already the new first grade. What will it be now? Second? Third? Fourth? What’s the rush? How is this developmentally sound? One thing is for sure: there will still be no idle time for children to search for ladybugs.

Few bear the brunt of A Nation at Risk,as do early learners whose schools have been invaded by corporate schemes to force reading and advanced learning earlier than ever expected in the past.

If kindergartners aren’t doing well after all these years of toughness, higher expectations, and an excruciating number of assessments, wouldn’t it seem time to back off, instead of raising the bar higher?

Editor’s note:

*James Harvey and I will discuss the distortions contained in the “Nation at Risk” report at the Network for Public Education conference on Oct. 28-29 in Washington, D.C. James Harvey was a high-level member of the staff that wrote the report. He has written about how the Reagan-era Commissuon in Excellence in Education “cooked the books” to paint a bleak—but false—picture of American public schools. Please register and join us!

Categories Accountability, Childhood, Creativity, Curriculum, Education Industry, Extremism, For-Profit, History, Play

Frank Breslin: Critical Thinking Is the Most Important Lesson in High School

By dianeravitch
September 15, 2023 //
48

Frank Breslin, a retired high school teacher in New Jersey, wrote recently at Medium that critical thinking is the missing ingredient in high school, even though it is the most important tool that students need.

Breslin writes:

The following warning should be affixed atop every computer in America’s schools: Proceed at your own risk. Don’t accept as true what you’re about to read. Some of it is fact; some of it is opinion masquerading as fact; and the rest is liberal, conservative, or mainstream propaganda. Make sure you know which is which before choosing to believe it.

Students are exposed to so many different viewpoints on- and offline and so prone to accepting whatever they read, that they run the very real risk of being brainwashed. If it’s on a computer screen, it becomes Holy Writ, sacrosanct, immutable, beyond question or doubt.

Teachers continually caution students against taking what they read at face value, since some of these sites may be propaganda mills or recruiting grounds for the naïve and unwary.

Not only egregious forms of indoctrination may target unsuspecting young minds, but also the more artfully contrived variety, whose insinuating soft-sell subtlety and silken appeals ingratiatingly weave their spell to lull the credulous into accepting their wares.

To prevent this from happening, every school in America should teach the twin arts of critical thinking and critical reading, so that a critical spirit becomes a permanent possession of every student and pervades the teaching of every course in America.

Teaching students how to be their own person by abandoning Groupthink and developing the courage to think for themselves should begin from the very first day of high school. More important than all the information they will be learning during these four crucial years will be how they critically process this information either to accept or reject it, or to keep an open mind.

It is a rare high-school graduate who can pinpoint 20 different kinds of fallacies while listening to a speaker or reading a book; who can distinguish between fact and opinion, objective account and specious polemic; who can tell the difference between facts, value judgments, explanatory theories, and metaphysical claims; who can argue both sides of a question, anticipate objections, rebut them, and undermine arguments in various ways.

The essence of an education — the ability to think critically and protect oneself against falsehood and lies — is a lost art in America’s high schools today. This is unfortunate for it is precisely this skill that is of transcendent importance for students in defending themselves.

Computers are wonderful things, but, like everything else in this world, they must be approached with great caution. Their potential for good can suddenly become an angel of darkness that takes over young minds.

A school should teach its students how to think, not what to think; to question whatever they read, and never to accept any claim blindly; to suspend judgment until they’ve heard all sides of a question; and interrogate whatever claims to be true, since truth can withstand any scrutiny.

Categories Curriculum, Democracy, Education Reform, Ethics, Students

The Onion: “Dads for America” Join to Harass Your Child’s Favorite Teacher

By dianeravitch
September 14, 2023 //
7

The Onion parodies the news of the day.

In this one, they describe a Looney Tunes group called Dads for America, which tried to run down a teacher for being “woke.”

TERRE HAUTE, IN—Screaming incoherently about transgender girls in sports and the need to teach children cursive so they can learn to read the Constitution, some group called Dads for America is currently trying to run over your kid’s teacher with a car, sources confirmed Thursday. The group of local fathers, who reportedly met on Reddit last week, were seen piling into a vehicle, steering it toward the front doors of an elementary school, and flooring it when they saw Ms. Landers, your child’s beloved fifth-grade teacher.

Open the link and read the rest.

Categories Humor
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