WhatWeBethinking

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film, but it was this 20 second clip which destroyed it's legitimacy and perpetuated a view of teaching that I believe is obsolete and harmful.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...