WhatWeBethinking

Alright. I might swear in this one, but here it goes. This entry really stems from listening and reading the news too much this past week. A major theme / question arose as I heard about all the major goings and comings, the actions, the conflicts, and behaviors of individuals, our institutions and political figures. Why can't we stop being dicks? For example, one can hear about the conflict in Syria . At least 3,500 people have been killed . Assad is probably going to be overthrown eventually . He could surrender, escape with his life, but no, he's brutally suppressing his people; he's being a dick. Why can't he choose to not do so? You hear about Egypt and the one year anniversary of the uprising that brought down Mubarak. Women in Egypt still get sexually assaulted quite casually and frequently. Now I'll admit, I too like breasts. But one must remember, we're part of society, and we're actually in the 21st century. Based on these precepts, it...

"Sen. Lamar Alexander likes to eat his cheeseburger with a side of internet!" Last night as usual, I was hoping to look up various Icelandic mythological creatures and biographies of Jay-z during. I was shocked to find that I couldn't access the results of my search that I had worked so hard to find as wikipedia had blacked itself out! Azzah! Not only was this site blacked out, but apparently the whole internet might be in Jeopardy! Upon further investigation, it was found that this black-out was due to some anti-piracy legislation that we have all heard so much fanfare about (I didn't of course as I was on a different plane of reality). There is the Stop Internet Piracy Act (SOPA) and the the Protect IP act (PIPA) . This legislation, backed by many senators and congressman across the aisle, is intended to target rogue websites that infringe on U.S. copyright law. This might include movies, music, counterfeit watches. Imagine those guys who sell the counterfei...

The issue of teacher turnover becomes a huge problem that educator reformers are tackling. Turnover is especially significant in tougher schools where there are less resources for the district and the people living in the community. This is a whole issue I won't begin to address aside to generally say that teaching is very tough especially in areas associated with our "achievement gap", it can thus be incredibly tough to do the job well and to stay with it. One piece of this is how much a teacher has on their plate. In our information age, a quality education demands much more from our education system to provide a knowledgeable workforce. I thus believe teachers have a larger and more complex task than they did in previous eras. I would suggest that the concept of Teacher Partnerships become the norm. No longer should it be expected that one single individual can sustain and develop the intellectual, interpersonal, social, academic, cognitive and moral facultie...

Alright. This one will be much shorter as idea for education reform. I just want to focus on an idea I have revolving around the access of curriculums and lessons which, planning and prepping for, is one of the most significant work endeavors of a teacher.  With all the state and federal standards that have been developed, why is their not more excellent and evolving curriculum that is easily accessible, downloadable and usable for teachers? Why has this not been done? This baffles me.  Part of the answer is there are... sometimes. The American Chemistry Society , an organization that I would be more than happy to kiss, put out this gem that I was lucky enough to find once. This was a full curriculum that was freely available. More importantly, it was good; being inquiry based, and guided by other modern teaching methods and state standards (from what I could tell). It was extensive and comprehensive, including all relevant handouts, relevant activity sheets, clearly listi...

Alright. Here is one of several pieces on education that I'd like to write about; just to get some ideas out. I want to start off by sharing a video that I worked really hard to find. Watch this video below and think about it for a bit. I first saw this clip from the controversial movie, Waiting for Superman . The movie, made some coherent points but did more to frustrate  many working in the field of education rather then be of help. Other things bothered me about the film, but it was this 20 second clip which destroyed it's legitimacy and perpetuated a view of teaching that I believe is obsolete and harmful. It was this clip, that relegated the film to the many other parties in education reform that talk a lot about what specifically needs to be done but don't have the experiences to know what they're talking about.  Others felt similarly about this clip. Our schools should absolutely be doing much more than having teachers "fill their student's hea...