February 17, 2008
I always loved school carnivals. The elementary school versions always featured silly games and activities to appeal to kids of third grade mentality — right up my alley! Then I joined the PTA board at our kids’ elementary, and saw the numbers. The annual carnival took in several tens of thousands of dollars. A lot of that money bought new library books, some bought new science programs, all of it went for better education.
I really like a well-run carnival now. Here are a few well-run carnival events.
Carnival of the Liberals #58 flew to England, at Liberal England. Double the posts, ten from England, ten from the Americas. Geography and history teachers might be particularly interested in a post at Pickled Politics on whether Australia’s government will follow up with real action following their official apology to the continent’s aboriginals, for past mistreatment.
Will I ever catch up with the Carnival of Education? Teachers ought to browse this weekly — I haven’t looked at it weekly in the past month. Let’s go back to #155: Bluebird’s Classroom has a post about a teachable moment, involving her unit on weather, and the tornado warning that popped up during class. Pay particular attention to her use of the LCD projector and live television link. Odds are that your classroom can’t support such teaching, as mine cannot right now.
The rest of Carnival of Education #155 plays out at Median Sib. But I’m much farther behind. #156 resides at Creating Lifelong Learners. #157 can be found at Colossus of Rhodey. #158 moves in at Instructify. That one features this post (from Creating Lifelong Learners) about using your iPod in class to high purpose. I’ll wager there is not a school of education in the U.S. that teaches iPod use as a tool of classroom control and educational excellence. This is why we need to read these on-line collections. (“Hot 4 Teacher” graphic borrowed from Instructify.)
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
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Anthropology, Education, Education blogs, Education quality, History, Justice, Politics, Teaching, Technology in the classroom, War on Education, Weblogs | Tagged: Education, Edumacation, Politics, Technology | 
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Posted by Ed Darrell
February 16, 2008
Meanwhile, back in reality, the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology signed on to cosponsor the conference on DDT’s effects on human health and the environment at Alma College in Michigan, set for March 14.
Logo for the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology
Religionists and conservative pundits won’t boycott the conference. But they won’t be there, either, I’ll wager. They don’t want to confuse their rants with the facts, you see.
Do we know any bloggers up Alma College way (Alma, Michigan, in the heart of the peninsula) who might attend the conference and provide hourly reports? Ed Brayton, are you close? Got a day to play blog journalist for a good cause?
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
1 Comment | Accuracy, DDT, Education, Environmental protection, Public education, Public health, Science | Tagged: DDT, Junk science, Rachel Carson, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
February 15, 2008
Depression presents a serious occupational hazard, moving back and forth between the classroom and business, classroom and internet. When do administrators and legislators get serious about catching up education?
Microsoft plans a product announcement at the end of this month. Rumors claim it’s a new version of Photosynth. Photosynth mades “3D” touring by computer possible for almost any destination.
I’ll wager not a single classroom in the nation is ready to make this work. If you disagree, I’d love to hear about the class that can make use of it.
System requirements for Photosynth won’t tax the computers that most high school gamers use, but they are beyond most of the classroom computers I’ve seen in the last five years.
Probably more to the point, curriculum designers in public schools don’t even have Google Earth on their horizons. Photosynth? I’ll wager it’s not even on the radar screens of GIS users in the nation’s Council of Governments (COGS).
Geography is an exploding discipline. GIS and computerized map programs make cell phone companies go, not to mention oil and gas exploration, coal mining, air pollution monitoring (for building new power plants, for example), and road building. GPS helps drive express shipping, and all other shipping. RFI and GPS together are revolutionizing retail.
You must know how to read a map just to get a job delivering pizza.
But 9th grade geography classes? The exciting stuff is absent today.
At the Texas Education Agency (TEA), officials fret about how to stop science from being taught in science classes, for fear the facts will skew the religious beliefs of their children. They need to worry about their children not even getting hired by the pizza delivery company for being ignorant of nature and science, and the maps that show them. In a competitive, technologically savvy world, inaction, dithering and damaging action by the TEA mean our kids won’t even have a prayer.
Relevant posts:
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
1 Comment | Classroom technology, Economics, Education, Education quality, Geography - Economic, Geography - Physical, Geography - Political, Teaching, Technology, Technology in the classroom | Tagged: Business, Education, Education reform, geography, Politics, Technology, Texas | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
February 13, 2008
The Waco Tribune published an opinion piece three weeks ago that I should have noted earlier. Trib columnist John Young noted that creationism isn’t science, and that generally creationists are not friends of science education (or any other education, sadly, not even Bible education).
Conditions surrounding Texas science standards, and education standards in general, have deteriorated very rapidly, with the chairman of the State Board of Education going on the warpath against mathematics, English and science teaching. For quick destruction to get the foolishness out of the way, one might hope he’ll go on the warpath against football and cheerleading. I’ve not had time to pass along all the sad details.
But then, not all crazies are stupid.
Earlier:
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
111 Comments | Creationism, Education, Education quality, Evolution, TEKS, Texas | Tagged: Creationism, Education, Politics, Religion, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
February 8, 2008
Everyone who knows him thinks highly of him. When the rest of the teachers in the department need help, they turn to him. The school is struggling to achieve the state’s testing standards, and much hope rides on this guy.
So, yesterday in the staff meeting, when he complained the news media were aiming specifically at him, the generally noisy teachers fell suddenly silent.
Studies may be generally accurate, but they are, by nature and design, generalizations. Across Texas yesterday, good teachers in struggling schools took a hit they don’t deserve.
I’m sure that’s not what the authors intended.
See this story in the Dallas Morning News. Check it out in the Houston Chronicle, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Lubbock Avalanche-Journal.
Look at the report, from the Education Trust, here.
So far, I can’t tell if the study said anything about improving conditions for teachers to encourage the good ones to stay in the profession and take the tougher assignments. Conservatives will see this as a call to fire more teachers, I’m sure. Reaction will start any moment now.
Tip of the scrub brush to Aunt Betsy.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
4 Comments | Education, Education quality, Teacher Pay, Teaching, Technology in the classroom, Texas | Tagged: Education, Education quality, Politics, Teacher Pay | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
February 5, 2008
Students perform better when schools adjust schedules to accommodate the realities of biology: High school students don’t learn or test well in the morning. Go here for an introductory discussion of the issues.
Of course, in order to boost student performance by starting high school later, bus schedules would have to change. Change costs money. Anyone care to wager whether this quick, proven method for boosting student performance will catch on, considering it costs a little?
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
4 Comments | Brain development, Brain learning, Education, Education quality, Education spending, Education success, Health care, Learning, Learning styles, Public education, Public health, Testing | Tagged: Education reform, health, Politics, sleep, state tests, student performance | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 28, 2008
Bloggers are out there looking for the good posts, the real meat of Bloggovia, to serve it up to you in a tight bundle. Here’s where you find such purveyors:
- At Green Gabbro, you’ll find Accretionary Wedge #5, a carnival of geology. Tip of the scrub brush to Pharyngula for pointing it out.
- Carnival of Space #38, over at Sorting Out Science
- Carnival of Education #155 at Median Sib; it includes such little gems as this: “Daniel Lafleche presents A fascinating clip from the film Malaria Parasites posted at Film and Video Marketplace Blog, saying, ‘Why is it that 30 years ago malaria in Africa was no more serious than the flu? This 5-minute educational video provides an overview on what has happened. Can be a useful resource for related lessons.'” (It’s one more problem that DDT can’t solve, and whose solution is put off by the junk science purveyors who claim DDT is the answer to malaria, or any other problem — I may have to pull this one out for further comment.)
- You haven’t checked out the 60th Carnival of History yet? It’s at Victorian Peeper. I didn’t know: “The Library Thing Blog announces that Thomas Jefferson’s library has been added to Library Thing, an online service that enables users to catalog their books. Now Jefferson’s author cloud, tag cloud, author gallery, and stats page are available for all to see. You can also find out how many books your personal library has in common with our third president’s.”
- Alternative Economic Review #4 is due up this week; you should review Alternative Economic Review #3 at Gavonomics to see how the economists did forecasting the last month’s activities, perhaps?
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Leave a Comment » | Astronomy, Economics, Education, geology, Weblogs | Tagged: Astronomy, blog carnivals, Economics, Education, geology, History | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 27, 2008
Adding legal irony to the Texas legislature’s running from education problems in the state, a federal court in Dallas upheld the state’s “moment of silence” law a few weeks ago, saying it is not an illegal establishment of religion. The fact that many or most of the students in the state refuse to follow the law earned no mention in the decision.
It’s more shooting at education and educators in the continuing War on Education.
So the law is legal, but largely unenforced, and maybe unenforceable. The law is on the books. I have yet to find a school in Texas that is ambitious about enforcing the law. A suggestion that kids should “honor a moment of silence” is often met with laughter, and generally met with conversations and actions that do anything but follow the law. The lesson the kids take away is that laws can be flouted, or maybe that they should be flouted. I’m imagining a bit — I don’t know what lesson the kids are taking away. The Texas moment of silence is not honored by students in many schools; administrators are reluctant to enforce it with any disciplinary action. Students are not learning respect for religion, nor respect for any God. Sadly, they’re not learning respect for others’ faiths, either.
Teachers are charged with assuring compliance with the law. The legislature decided not to punish students for disobeying it, but instead hold teachers responsible for making sure students obey it.
I imagine the defenders of the law, including Kelly Shackleford at Plano’s Liberty Legal Institute, think this law is a boon to faith. It seems to function much as the establishment laws in Europe, however: It discourages kids from making their faith their own, discourages an honoring of faith, and ultimately pushes kids out of the pews. Students do not think the moment is anything other than a time for prayer in my experience. Some schools get around much trouble by making the legally required minute last about 15 seconds.
There’s no law on the books that says legislators and judges must be intelligent and show common sense. One wishes they would use common sense once in a while. Mark Twain noted that God goofed in prohibiting the apple to Adam; God should have prohibited the snake, then Adam would have eaten it instead, Twain said. In this case, the legislature has prohibited talking. Guess what happens.
Plaintiffs plan to appeal according to David Wallace Croft, the chief plaintiff, at his blog. Teachers and students are stuck with the law as it is (see the actual opinion), an embarrassing moment in the day. According to an Associated Press story in the Houston Chronicle:
David and Shannon Croft filed their initial lawsuit after they said one of their children was told by an elementary schoolteacher to keep quiet because the minute is a “time for prayer.” The complaint, filed in 2006, named Gov. Rick Perry and the Carrollton-Farmers Branch Independent School District, which the Crofts’ three children attended in the suburbs of Dallas.
District Judge Barbara Lynn upheld the constitutionality of the law earlier this month, concluding that “the primary effect of the statute is to institute a moment of silence, not to advance or inhibit religion.”
Resources:
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6 Comments | Education, Education reform, First Amendment, Religion, School prayer, Texas Lege, War on Education | Tagged: Education, Establishment Clause, First Amendment, Religion, Texas Lege | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 23, 2008
Ben Stein’s movie defending science crackpottery has been delayed in release.
In the meantime, real science is under assault. Maybe Stein could stand up for paying attention to real science sometime?
O Ceallaigh’s Felloffatruck Publications laments:
I read in today’s news of the school superintendent in Montana who cancelled a scientist’s speech because of pressure from antagonistic members of the community.
Professor Steven Running is quoted as saying that he’s “never before been canceled in any venue by any organization.”
How does it feel to be an evolutionary biologist, Steve? Of course, global warming is fast joining evolution as a science topic that has to confront a large “faction of society that is willfully ignorant” about it. Like the current President of the United States and several of the current candidates for the position.
If Science no longer has the ear of society, if it cannot put forth the results of its findings, good or bad, favorable to me or not, without being shouted down by those who have both reason and the resources to suppress those findings, then we have lost far more than the future benefits of scientific and technological contributions to society. Contributions that, over the last two hundred years, have permitted the human species to achieve a standard of living far beyond the wildest imaginings of pre-Industrial Revolution humanity.
We have lost the essence of Liberty.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
5 Comments | Climate change, Education, Education quality, Global warming, Politics, Religion, Science, War on Science | Tagged: Education, First Amendment, knowledge, Politics, Religion, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 21, 2008
Too early for Mardi Gras!
Not in the worlds of education, and history, and archaeology, and . . .
Catch up with these Carnivals of Education:
Short and maybe better for it, Carnival of the Liberals:
Expand your reading and thinking:
- Tangled Up in Blue Guy hosts the current Carnival of the Godless. I don’t usually note this carnival, partly because evangelizing atheism is not my goal; but that’s not the goal of the carnival, either. TUIB Guy is an occasional reader and commenter here; his hosting job takes an interesting view of carnival hosting. Carnival of the Godless frequently features informative and useful posts. In this one, especially if you are involved in science education, or you know a Ron Paul supporter, you should read this post, from the Atheist Ethicist.
Great material for the classroom:
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
1 Comment | Archaeology, Education, Education blogs, Evolution, History, Paleontology, Weblogs | Tagged: blog carnivals, Education, Evolution, Politics | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 16, 2008
January’s meeting still has the item on the agenda, officially, but the actual vote won’t come without considerably more study.
The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board had been scheduled to consider the proposal by the Dallas-based Institute for Creation Research at a meeting Jan. 24.But Eddy Miller, dean of the institute’s graduate school, said in an e-mail to the coordinating board Monday that the school needs more time “to do justice to the concerns you raised,” according to a news release issued by the coordinating board. Miller asked the board to delay consideration of the matter until its April meeting.
Texas’s science community panned the motion. Rumors say many of Texas’s top scientists wrote or called to urge disapproval of the motion.
There’s still time to send a letter calling for a stand for good, hard science. Details, as always, at the Texas Citizens for Science page.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
3 Comments | Creationism, Education, Education quality, Higher education, Religion, Science, Texas, Texas Citizens for Science | Tagged: Creationism, education standards, Religion, Science, Texas | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 15, 2008
Utah’s Cache Valley is home to the city of Logan, and to Utah State University, the land-grant college for the state. For several humorous reasons, some of them good, the place sometimes is called Happy Valley.
Small county in a beautiful setting + good university with a good school of education = good conditions for teacher recruiting. Logan’s schools have been very good over the years, in academics and all forms of competition.
As we discovered with the voucher fiasco in 2007, Utah’s education situation is not completely happy any more. Classrooms are crowded, teachers are overworked, and for the first time since the Mormon pioneers first settled Utah, educational achievement is declining.
The editorial board at Logan’s Herald-Journal noticed the problems. It’s tough to recruit teachers. If Milton Friedman were alive, we’d look for a classic free-market economics solution, something like raising teacher pay to stop the exodus from the profession.
Milton Friedman is dead. His ghost doesn’t seem to have much clout in Logan, Utah, either. What does the Herald-Journal propose? Loosen standards, look for uncertified people to teach.
When people leave the job they worked hard to earn certification for, what will happen with people who are not certified and are untrained in classroom management?
Why not just raise teacher pay, and attract more well-trained teachers?
Let me ask the key question, more slowly this time so I’m sure it’s caught: Why not just raise teacher pay?
Fishing for teachers? Bait the hook with money.
(Full Herald-Journal opinion below the fold.)
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2 Comments | Economics, Education, Education quality, Education reform, Teacher Pay, Teaching | Tagged: Education, Politics, Teacher Pay, Utah | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 14, 2008
State legislatures shouldn’t micromanage the classroom, parents should monitor student progress, and students should take difficult classes, to get a better education. Utah math teacher Allen Barney lists inexpensive — and unlikely — methods for improving education, in Salt Lake City’s Deseret Morning News.
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4 Comments | Education, Education quality, Education reform, Teacher Pay, Teaching | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 