It’s important to pay attention to how discipline will be used in a child’s school. On the first day, a parent might be shocked upon entering their child’s kindergarten classroom to be handed a student conduct code or rule book by a smiling teacher. This book will have all the dos and don’ts involving behavior. […]
Common Core’s Next Generation Science Standards! Where’s the Debate?
My dear young fellow,’ the Old-Green-Grasshopper said gently, ‘there are a whole lot of things in this world of ours you haven’t started wondering about yet. Roald Dahl, from James and the Giant Peach We have heard little about Next Generation Science Standards which are being pushed into schools across the country, yet NGSS is […]
Missing Socialization in Today’s Public Schools
How do democratic public schools address the socialization of students? How are children brought together to make a kinder world? Does anyone even ask that question today? This past weekend I read “My Pedagogic Creed” by John Dewey (a little light reading on a Sunday afternoon), and I was struck by how far our public […]
Parents Working With School Districts To Make Public Schools Work
For our team and the members of our group, gifted education is not about speeding through school or having Ivy League kids. It is about our children receiving an education that causes them to work hard, overcome obstacles, and fail and recover. It is about finding friends who understand them and are OK with their […]
4 Reasons Why Charter Schools Should Not Do Special Education
A common complaint about charter schools is that they don’t provide special education. This makes charter schools much different from traditional public schools which provide services to all children. Charter schools should not get district special education funding for services they do not provide. But I don’t think charter schools should provide special education. Here’s […]
Some Good Education News from 2015
Writing about education is interesting, but it can also be depressing. Sometimes it feels like being a hamster on one of those wheels. So as we close out 2015, here is a list of some good news that happened in 2015. If you have something to add, let me know! Happy New Year! These are […]
Students with Serious Behavioral Disabilities and Inclusion: Effect on Students WITHOUT Disabilities
Contrary to Arne Duncan, and the latest DOE report claiming IEPs should be written the same for everyone, students with behavioral/emotional disabilities–should have the right to services to address their problems. If their difficulties go unaddressed, left to the general education teacher with a class of 30 students, it could affect not only the student […]
Student Socialization in Public Schools
Socialization you could say is how a child interacts with their peers. There are many definitions, but in school, socialization mostly involves how children play and get along with each other. We think of recess when considering socialization. We wonder how much socialization children miss when they don’t get recess. Public schools can go a […]
School Choice v. Local Control—Oil and Water!
Republican Presidential candidates claim to be for choice, including vouchers, charters and opportunity scholarships, and they also claim to be for local control of schools. But school choice and local control are like oil and water. You must choose one or the other. For example, Brandon Wright, in “Donald Trump Quotes about Education” from The […]
Stealing the Joy of Reading—How Common Core Destroys Reading Pleasure
Who would have believed that it would come to this? Education Week is having a webinar on new approaches to reading aloud in K-2nd grade (New Strategies for Reading Aloud to K-2 Students, Thurs. June 18, 2-3 p.m ET). The underwriting for the webinar is through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and with Common […]