December 16, 2006
Seymour Papert remains in a coma following surgery for a head injury suffered when he was struck by a motorcycle in Hanoi. Latest news is that he was to be flown to the U.S. on Saturday, December 16. Papert, a professor at MIT, is known as a creative thinker in technology and education. He is credited with the $100 laptop idea.
Ironically, he was discussing computer models of Hanoi’s out-of-control traffic at the time he was struck, according to his colleague Uri Wilensky of Northwestern University.
Update Sunday morning: The Boston Globe has a longer story on Papert’s contributions and how his work could help understand Hanoi’s traffic difficulties.
Update December 22: This group came up with the idea of sending the largest virtual bouquet ever to Dr. Papert. You may join to send a virtual flower; instructions are here: http://www.flowersforseymour.com/en/index.php.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
December 16, 2006
I’m a bit surprised. Chester Finn, president of the Fordham Foundation, recommends we read and take seriously the recommendations of the New Commission on Skills of the American Workforce. I had thought he’d be a lot more skeptical a lot earlier.
Which means a couple of things: One, we ought to read and take seriously the report, as Finn urges; two, Finn continues to think originally about problems of education, and can’t be pigeon-holed into positions that he personally finds difficult to defend on the evidence, or into positions that others “think” he ought to have.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
December 15, 2006
If we continue to get education wrong, a new report argues, America’s decline will follow. So, the report urges radical changes in U.S. education.
The report of the New Commission on Skills of the American Workforce departs from other recent reports in a number of interesting ways, including advocating a national system of teachers, with higher pay. It urges abandoning requirements for four years of high school, moving instead to a more European model where students may leave after 10 years for junior college. It is titled Tough Choices or Tough Times, published by Jossey-Bass for $19.95.
An earlier commission in 1990 issued a report titled High Skills or Low Wages. The new report continues in that vein, warning that international competition and automation threaten all low skill jobs in the U.S.
This commission was assembled with funding from the Gates Foundation and other sources.
Some details are available in The New York Times. A longer, much different view in in the Chicago Tribune. From the Tribune’s summary of how testing would allow 10th graders to get out of high school early:
How the testing would work
PASS
In 10th grade, students would take a rigorous test.
With a passing grade, the student and parents would choose between two options:
OPTION 1: Stay in high school for junior and senior years to prepare for elite 4-year university or to enter state university with college credit.
OPTION 2: Enroll at community college with possibility of moving on to 4-year university.
FAIL
If the student fails, he or she would stay in high school to take remedial courses and retake test until he/she passes it.
The executive summary is available here in 28 pages. The report is the cover story for the December 18 edition of Time magazine. You’ll probably see it in your local newspaper today.
More to come, surely.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
December 6, 2006
Carnival of the Liberals! (at Neural Gourmet)
Carnival of Education #96! (at History is Elementary, which is a blog you probably should be reading)
History Carnival! (at Barista)
(Can any of them really be carnivals without a bearded lady, or the human frog boy?)
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Posted by Ed Darrell
December 3, 2006
Almost inevitably I want a map different from those provided by the text and all my ancillary and auxilliary sources. It’s maddening for a non-cartographer. So, I can see uses for custom map-making tools.
You can figure out what to do with this, if you have a computer and access to project it to a class — or if you send your class out on the ‘net to work: Maplib.
Tip of the old scrub brush to If:book. Be sure to check there for examples.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
December 2, 2006
Teachers in the U.S. do not get the respect they deserve, especially middle school and elementary school teachers. It’s an age old problem — Shakespeare wrote of a man being executed by a coup d’etat for knowing how to read and teaching young boys to read.
It’s still true, sadly — see Ed Brayton’s remarks at Dispatches from the Culture Wars. The Taliban in Afghanistan are literally drawing and quartering teachers.
Teachers are revolutionaries, breakers of slavery’s chains, fighters for freedom. It shouldn’t be a fight to the death. Ignorance has long knives, and uses them. As Shakespeare noted, “Small things make base men proud.” (Henry VI, Part 2, act IV, scene 1)
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Posted by Ed Darrell
November 28, 2006
Some people were relieved when voodoo history maven Davin Barton’s term as vice chair of the Texas Republican Party expired.
Dallas Morning News editorial writer and occasional columnist William McKenzie warns that we have not seen the last of Barton’s involvement in politics — and textbooks are in Barton’s gunsights.
McKenzie wrote about Barton in the November 28 paper:
Pay attention to his work, because, as Newsweek reported after the election, the religious right is at a crossroads. With big-name leaders declining, lesser-knowns like Mr. Barton will fill the gap. And they will come with their own approach.
The most interesting thing I learned from him was that the next wave will revolve around networks of activists, not the big names who lobby Washington. Look for e-mail blasts that start with a small group upset about a comment or decision about abortion, homosexuality or textbooks. In the decentralized technological world, a David Barton doesn’t need the podium of a Jerry Falwell or a Ralph Reed to trigger a prairie fire.
In other words, watch him.
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2 Comments | Accuracy, Bad Quotes, Bogus history, Education, Freedom - Political, History, History Revisionism, Politics, Textbook Selection, Voodoo history | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
November 26, 2006
The National Endowment for the Humanities is prepared to give away collections of classic books to school libraries.
Here is the NEH press release, unedited by me:
National Endowment for the Humanities Offers Free Classic Books to Libraries Through the We The People Bookshelf Program
WASHINGTON (Sept. 18, 2006)–The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) today announced the fourth annual We the People Bookshelf, a program that offers sets of classic books to 2,000 community and school libraries throughout the United States. Recipients of the NEH awards program will receive a collection of 15 classics which were selected to illustrate this year’s theme, “The Pursuit of Happiness.”
The We the People Bookshelf is part of NEH’s We the People program designed to strengthen the teaching, study, and understanding of American history and culture. Again this year, NEH has partnered with the American Library Association (ALA) to distribute a set of books, posters, and educational CDs to 2,000 selected libraries that offer the best programs for young readers using the awarded materials.
“These classic books are rich in stories about individuals who embrace the ‘unalienable’ right of free people–the pursuit of happiness, a phrase written indelibly in the Declaration of Independence by Thomas Jefferson,” said NEH Chairman Bruce Cole. “Young readers will find in these books the spirit of hope that has contributed to the growth and strength of our great nation and its citizens for more than two hundred years.”
The We the People Bookshelf on “The Pursuit of Happiness” features the following books for 2007:
- Grades K-3: Aesop’s Fables by Aesop; Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost; Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel by Virginia Lee Burton (also in Spanish).
- Grades 4-6: Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt; The Great Migration by Jacob Lawrence; These Happy Golden Years by Laura Ingalls Wilder; and Journal of Wong Ming-Chung (donated by Scholastic, Inc.) by Laurence Yep.
- Grades 7-8: A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle; Esperanza Rising (donated by Scholastic, Inc.) by Pam Munoz Ryan, (also in Spanish); and Carry On, Mr. Bowditch by Jean Lee Latham.
- Grades 9-12: Kindred by Octavia Butler; O Pioneers! by Willa Cather (also in Spanish); The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald; Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman; and Common Sense by Thomas Paine.
As a bonus, each library receiving a We the People Bookshelf set will receive a music CD, Happy Land: Musical Tributes to Laura Ingalls Wilder.
Libraries wishing to participate in the We the People Bookshelf program can find more information and application instructions online at www.neh.gov. Applications can be submitted from Sept. 19, 2006, through Jan. 31, 2007.
Media Contact: Michele Soulé at 202-606-8454
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Posted by Ed Darrell
November 26, 2006
Superstar historians rare get recognized on the street. The BBC’s use of historians, even natural history professors, however, has made a few stars in Britain. Neil Oliver is one of the latest, dubbed “The Naked Historian” for reasons I haven’t figured yet.
The Sunday Times has a profile on November 26:
Neil Oliver is draped languidly over a sofa in Glasgow’s Millennium Hotel. He is fully clothed and only doing the photographer’s bidding, but it is easy to see why the presenter of the hit series Coast has been dubbed the Naked Historian.
It’s not just a surname he shares with television’s sexiest chef. Both were “discovered” by screen queen Pat Llewellyn, of Optomen Television, and both exude that unquantifiable essence that can be detected only through the lens of a camera.
It’s partly enthusiasm, partly a lack of self-consciousness and partly hair. You could bet your last tub of Brylcreem that a bald Jamie Oliver, Alan Titchmarsh or Gordon Ramsay would be unable to command their multi-million-pound fees. Neil Oliver’s Jacobite locks — stereotypical among his fellow archeologists — give him an instant recognition factor on television.
It’s not all fluff; Oliver gets down to talking history and the importance of studying history:
Oliver, 39, says Scots’ knowledge of their history is generational, with people over 40 being the most well-informed. But most of them were taught in a system that favoured British and world history. The resurgence of Scottish history in schools is a recent phenomenon. So why are young people so ill-informed? It may be they have lost sight of the bigger picture as history is taught in modules without an overview.
Oliver, whose perspective goes back to the Palaeolithic, is concerned about this. “If you have a generation without that broad framework, it fundamentally changes how things are viewed,” he says. “History affects the way you understand the world. People who don’t have that education drummed into them become dislocated.”
Could such a thing happen in America, could historians become media stars? Historians can dream about a future, too.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
November 25, 2006
Scandal in education? Perhaps not so directly — certainly my education-issue alarm bells didn’t go off when I first heard of the controversy about pay and spending in the California State University system (see San Francisco Chronicle story here).
Matthew Davidson, a philosopher at Cal State San Bernardino, makes exactly that claim, however, in a letter to Brian Leiter. CSU trains about half the teachers in California. If that system is broken, it will indeed have national ripples.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
November 21, 2006
Looking for books to put on my ad hoc list of top history books, for giving or getting, I took at look at the list of Pulitzer Prize winners in the history category, a list of books that dates back to 1917. (You may make nominations for the list here — please do!) Prizes for the past dozen or so years are all books I liked and have found useful. Some of the books, like Acheson’s winner from 1970, grew to be classics in some circles. But I was struck by how many of the books seem to have sunk from view.
Where are they now?
Here’s the Pulitzer website for the prize itself, where you can find lists for all the prizes; I reproduce the complete list of winners in history, below the fold.
Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by Ed Darrell
November 19, 2006
Everyone is for it, no one wants to pay for it. Education reform still hits the wall when we ask “who pays?”
The Seattle Times said funding is the key to reform, in an editorial November 19:
THE education panel Washington Learns proposes a bold approach to injecting every level of education with rigor and accountability.
The elephant in the room, however, is education funding. Sidestepping this massive beast threatens the very underpinning of reform efforts. Gov. Christine Gregoire promised a new way of looking at education and investing in it. The smart, holistic proposals from her committee give us the former. Now, where’s the latter?
This is a critical question that won’t wait. The piecemeal approach to education spending — funding a program here, a program there — hasn’t served schools well and would crack under the weighty intentions of Washington Learns.
Meanwhile, Jonathan Kozol was at the University of Alaska in Anchorage a week earlier, and he pulled no punches:
“They say a good teacher can do OK with 40 kids, but they (those teachers) could work wonders with 18 kids,” he said.
Kozol said that today students are viewed with price tags on their heads and that equality in education is not a current reality.
“In the eyes of God, I’m sure all children are equal – but not in the eyes of America,” he said.
Now, there is an interesting indicator to measure whether God is in the schools: Money.
Both articles, in full, below the fold. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by Ed Darrell
November 15, 2006
It’s amazing what is not available on video for use in the classroom.
Texas kids have to study the “Grito de Dolores” in the 7th grade — the “Cry from Dolores” in one translation, or the “Cry of Pain” in another (puns in Spanish! Do kids get it?). Father Miguel Hidalgo y Castillo made the speech on September 16, 1810, upon the news that Spanish authorities had learned of his conspiracy to revolt for independence. The revolution had been planned for December 8, but Hidalgo decided it had to start early.
This date is celebrated in Mexico as Independence Day. Traditionally the President of Mexico issues an update on the Grito, after the original bell that Father Hidalgo used is rung, near midnight.
Hidalgo himself was captured by the Spanish in 1811, and executed.
It’s a great story. It’s a good speech, what little we have of it (Hidalgo used no text, and we work from remembered versions).
Why isn’t there a good 10- to 15-minute video on the thing for classroom use? Get a good actor to do the speech, it could be a hit. Where is the video when we need it?
Statue of Father Hidalgo in Dolores, Mexico
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4 Comments | Education, History, History video sources, TAKS, TEKS, Texas | Tagged: Education, Father Hidalgo, freedom, Grito, History, Mexico, Mexico's Independence, Travel | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
November 7, 2006
According to the Washington Post, education was on the ballot in a number of states on November 7. Here is a rundown of the issues, to be updated as we learn results. Latest update: November 12. See below the fold.
Below the fold, states with their education initiatives are listed in alphabetical order. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by Ed Darrell
November 5, 2006
Just in time for the November 2006 local, state and national elections, we get the Carnival of Education #91, over at Median Sib.
One indication that this is not a normal election year is this fact: Education is not the chief issue in any state, nor in most local races. With the release of the Fordham Foundation study last week that showed education reform is foundering and floundering, with the great difficulty in Texas in getting court-ordered education reform through the legislature, with record college tuition costs, etc., etc., etc., education still is not the top concern of most Americans.
I wonder: Were education the top issue, would Republicans be in better shape, or worse shape?
Textbooks are in the news — with a solid legal and ethical question about whether accepting equipment to deliver material to students amounts to bribery, as California alleges (in a post at California LiveWire). It’s an incredibly salient question. The U.S. Department of Education used to leverage its limited budget for automation by requiring groups that provided computer services for which the department contracted to provide the department with computers to monitor the products. When I discovered the practice I thought it a very innovative way to get compliance with the law; unless the California officials were using the equipment for their own gain, I wonder how any state official can justify removing from the classroom machines that are used to deliver quality education. Where is the Gubernator when he’s needed?
Next week’s Carnival of Education will hit the day after the elections; will it reflect changes wrought on Tuesday night, if any? The 92nd Carnival of Education will be hosted by NYC Educator. Submissions are due Tuesday night — of course, you’re excused if you’re out at the election party, celebrating. (Notice how cleverly that applies regardless your politics — or mine.)
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Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 