The lack of breaks for children and the misrepresentation of what constitutes recess continues to flourish. School reformers try unsuccessfully to replace recess. But recess is not Playworks, Phys.Ed., meditation, or Brain Breaks controlled by adults who tell children what to do, denying them the ability to learn academic and social skills that recess provides […]
Saving Kindergarten! Real Teachers Write the Kinderchat Guides with Real Solutions!
In 2022, co-authors Heidi Echternacht and Amy Murray wrote The Kinderchat Guide to the Classroom. They’re the founders of the famous #Kinderchat that started on Twitter years ago. Since NCLB, kindergarten has changed with demands far beyond what used to be considered developmentally appropriate. Many kindergarten teachers will recognize themselves facing a juggling act, satisfying […]
41 Ways a Big Lie Continues to Haunt America’s Public Schools
Forty years ago, Americans learned of A Nation at Risk, the troubling and mostly bogus report by the Reagan administration claiming public schools and teachers failed to produce students who were capable American workers. Berliner’s and Biddle’s The Manufactured Crisis: Myths, Fraud, and the Attack on America’s Public Schools disproved the report, but it still […]
Grade Retention is Unnecessary!
Studies have linked dropout rates in Georgia, Florida, Massachusetts, New York, and North Carolina to the effects of grade retention, student discouragement, and school exclusion policies stimulated by high-stakes tests. ~Linda Darling-Hammond, the Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education Emeritus at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and former President and CEO of the Learning […]
Where’s Evidence from The Reading League’s Corporate Sponsors?
The Reading League, which promotes the Science of Reading and evidence-based instruction, recently had a conference sponsored by companies (listed below) selling reading programs and materials, including online instruction. Where’s evidence these companies provide authentic research indicating they work? Some states and school districts now mandate the Science of Reading (Schwartz, 2022). They have ruled out […]
How PICTURE Books Help TEACH Comprehension and Phonics!
When he looks at the pictures, he’ll get so excited he’ll want to draw one of his own. He’ll ask for paper and crayons. ~Laura Joffe Numeroff, illustrated by Felicia Bond. If You Give A Mouse a Cookie Regarding how teachers teach reading, it’s alarming that pictures get a bad rap. One of the best […]
Raising the Bar on Kindergartners: A Nation at Risk Lives On
History is not kind to idlers. ~The Reagan administration’s A Nation at Risk (1983, p.7) 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 […]
10 Years Later: The Continuing Intentional Unraveling of America’s Public Schools
School reform continues to privatize and destroy public schools. August marks ten years since I began blogging. Within that time I have written two books and co-authored a third with Diane Ravitch. I’m proud of all this writing but Losing America’s Schools: The Fight to Reclaim Public Education is the book title that especially stands […]
When One School District Falls: HISD is a Preview for All Schools
I think there is a likelihood that we will be seeing more state takeover of districts. ~Kenneth Wong, education policy researcher and former advisor to U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, March 28, 2023 Houston faces harsh public school reforms, a sad example of the continuing efforts in America to destroy all public education and […]
Little-Discussed Reasons Why Students Might Not Like to Read
Students don’t like to read. These rarely discussed reasons may explain why. Kindergarten is no longer a garden. Kindergartners are pressured to read. Before NCLB, over twenty years ago, this was unheard of and still makes no sense. Formal reading instruction once began in first grade. Children in the not-too-distant past were given time to […]