“It’s critical that children arrive in kindergarten with the cognitive, emotional, and social skills.” Elanna S. Yalow http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2010/07/26/37yalow.h29.html?tkn=RPOF1H0BVbjjC49BoP+txk+WNvszRbq02iTd&cmp=clp-edweek Please Ms. Yalow, tell me more. I thought kindergarten was supposed to help children develop cognitive, emotional, and social skills. When did we shift the responsibilities? It’s this shift that is responsible for the over institutionalizing of… Read more »

The debate over how to improve educational quality for all students in this country is predicated on the assumption that empiricism rather than ideology will eventually prevail. But a recent op-ed in the Boston Globe by Joe Keohane calls that belief into question (“How facts backfire,” July 11). “Facts don’t necessarily have the power to… Read more »

From Comments section of http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2010/07/21/39massachusetts.h29.html?tkn=XMWF2A19ysCcwMLgsAwkZSxFtJVQ9ZfIrIjC&cmp=clp-edweek Frazer112358 wrote:Standards, standards, standards. Hogwash. We are focusing on the WRONG thing. Build rigorous standards and students will come. What deception is being foisted on the educational world!! The research is clear: a competent teacher makes the difference. Building a new baseball park is not going to make your players… Read more »

Posted: 2010-07-11 This essay, which speaks to today’s issues of teacher excellence, was published in the July/August issue of Learning Magazine in 1986. So oldtimers say, “Yes we’ve been through this before,” using the “been there” putdown as an excuse for their current silence. Read on: you’ll see I complained about them then, just as… Read more »

Certainly teachers can be part of the solution, but not so long as we, and the organizations that represent us, have been defined as the problem. It has taken me a long time to get to the point where I would write something as strong as this, because I have been trying very hard to… Read more »

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/rural_education/2010/07/secrets_out_on_school_consolidation_in_mississippi.html http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/walt_gardners_reality_check/2010/07/evaluating_teach_for_america.html http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=1535&section=Article

Tuesdays at 11:00 am you can hear me try to converse with people that want to do away with public education. http://www.wrta.com/WRTA_player.htm

Teachers make too much money. True or False? False. The average salary of a starting teacher in this area is around $31,000.00 a year. The average babysitter in this area makes five dollars an hour per child. If teachers made babysitter wages they would make $135, 000.00 a year. Do the math. The average classroom… Read more »

Merit pay for teachers based on student achievement is a ridiculous idea unless teachers can be guaranteed that all students are heterogeneously grouped and randomly assigned to classrooms. If this doesn’t happen then teachers and schools that are already meeting achievement goals based on an a geographic economic distribution model (property taxes) will receive all… Read more »