Ms. Peña, a Disney researcher with a background in the casino industry, zeroed in on a ratty rock ’n’ roll T-shirt. Black Sabbath?
“Wearing it makes me feel like I’m going to an R-rated movie,” said Dean, a shy redhead whose parents asked that he be identified only by first name.
Jackpot.
Ms. Peña and her team of anthropologists have spent 18 months peering inside the heads of incommunicative boys in search of just that kind of psychological nugget. Disney is relying on her insights to create new entertainment for boys 6 to 14, a group that Disney used to own way back in the days of “Davy Crockett” but that has wandered in the age of more girl-friendly Disney fare like “Hannah Montana.”
What if you could make algebra 2 or world history feel like going to an R-rated movie?
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Creationism is not taught at any major university, as science. It’s difficult to find creationism taught in any curriculum, including theology schools, because it’s not a part of the theology of most Christian sects. And yet, creationism continues to pose hurdles to good science education in almost every state (especially Texas).
The hard work of spreading creationism is long entrenched, and continuing, though largely out of the view of most observers of cultural and scientific trends.
We need to more aggressively promote good science teaching in public schools.
Here’s one thing we might do, as I noted in the comments at Pharyngula. We need to create institutions to aggressively promote good, powerful science teaching. Here is what I wrote there, essentially.
Remember Scopes lost his case, and was fined; the overturning on appeal was due to a technical error in the fine, not due to other obviously major flaws in the law (which was signed and promoted by Gov. Austin Peay, who also has a college named after him). The law against teaching human evolution remained effective in Tennessee until after 1967, and the Supreme Court’s decision in Epperson v. Arkansas — which finally persuaded the Tennessee legislature to repeal the act.
Some people thought H. L. Mencken’s mocking judgment on the Scopes trial was final. Not creationists. While the rest of the world went on, fundamentalists developed a powerful, out-of-the-major-media network to spread and promote their ideas. Part of this network was the establishment of Bryan College, and to some degree, I think Austin Peay State University (though, as a state university with serious intentions on educating people, APSU is in the evolution camp in curricula).
Why is there no Clarence Darrow College? Why is there no John T. Scopes Institute for Teachers (say, at the University of Chicago, where Scopes went back for his advanced degree)?
Unless we get out there and fight in the trenches of education and religion and culture, evolution will continue to face silly opposition. Feynman warned us of the dangers of cargo cult science. (Honestly, though, Wood’s stuff looks like cargo cult cargo cultism, it’s so far removed from real science — doesn’t it?)
In the end it’s odd that a progressive-on-most-issues guy like Bryan would be memorialized by naming a college after him to preserve his most profound errors. It’s effective propaganda. I’d be willing to wager Bryan would have come around to evolution with the evidence stacked as it is now. His error was emotional and theological, I think. Education can prevent and correct such error. Bryan College doesn’t do that in evolution — something else needs to be done to fight what Bryan College does.
The John T. Scopes Institute for Teachers could run in the summer months, it should have a thousand teachers of science from primary and secondary education in every session, and it should emphasize the best methods for teaching the best science we have. We really need such an agency — or agencies — now. Our children lose interest in science between fourth grade and graduation, their achievement in science plunges in comparison to other nations.
Our economy suffers as a result.
Creationists have Bryan College to help them spread their versions of cargo cult science, with that mission specifically in mind. We can fight fire with fire, but we have to fight ignorance with education. And, my friends in science education, we are behind.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
A study published this month in the journal Pediatrics studied the links between recess and classroom behavior among about 11,000 children age 8 and 9. Those who had more than 15 minutes of recess a day showed better behavior in class than those who had little or none. Although disadvantaged children were more likely to be denied recess, the association between better behavior and recess time held up even after researchers controlled for a number of variables, including sex, ethnicity, public or private school and class size.
The lead researcher, Dr. Romina M. Barros, a pediatrician and an assistant clinical professor at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, said the findings were important because many schools did not view recess as essential to education.
The article in the science section of the New York Times put it well:
The best way to improve children’s performance in the classroom may be to take them out of it.
A convicted murderer in prison gets an hour a day for exercise. But our kids, the high-performing ones we depend on for our nation’s future? We treat them worse than convicted felons?
PEDIATRICS Vol. 123 No. 2 February 2009, pp. 431-436 (doi:10.1542/peds.2007-2825) (subscription required for full text), “School Recess and Group Classroom Behavior,” Romina M. Barros, MD, Ellen J. Silver, PhD and Ruth E. K. Stein, MD, Department of Pediatrics, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Children’s Hospital at Montefiore and Rose F. Kennedy Center, Bronx, New York
OBJECTIVES. This study examines the amount of recess that children 8 to 9 years of age receive in the United States and compares the group classroom behavior of children receiving daily recess with that of children not receiving daily recess.
Another teacher writes to the Bathtub complaining about printing progress reports on his computer at home — his district’s computer system is notoriously weird in remote access mode. Why is he printing the reports at home? “It’s been 11 months since we got a delivery of toner cartridges for teachers’ in-room printers, and we’re out of paper again.”
When do you think was the last time New York Mayor Bloomberg had to run the city budget on his home computer?
Is it really cynicism if it’s dead right?
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
With this blog’s occasional focus on flag etiquette and my concern for faux patriotism, I’ve been getting barbs all day on a story out of Clark County, Nevada (home of Las Vegas).
It’s a threefer of hatred, slamming President Obama, teachers, and public schools, all at once. Plus it is rather disrespectful of the U.S. flag.
The Clark County School District calls the story “bogus!!” with the exclamation points clear. Spokesmen for the district complain they’ve been fielding calls all day, none with details. Their check of the district’s schools turns up nothing.
The claim is that an elementary school student wants to drop out of school after being “forced” to say the Pledge of Allegiance to a picture of President Barack Obama backed by several U.S. flags.
Bloggers fume. “The gall!”
Press spokesmen for the district say they encourage parents to call any principal of any school in the district with any complaint. A survey of principals finds none who knew of such a complaint.
None of the bloggers bothered to check the facts, it appears. The story so far checks out to be a hoax. No one can name the school, no one can name the kid, no one can corroborate the story.
U.S.. Nevada and Clark County flags fly at Moapa Valley High School in the Clark County School District, Nevada. Wikipedia image
Students in Clark County schools say the Pledge of Allegiance every morning as a usual practice. School officials were unsure whether this is done by state law, district ordinance, or tradition. Through much of the 20th century, it was common for schools to have a picture of the sitting president in every classroom. That tradition fell to budget cuts years ago.
What motivates people to invent such stories? What motivates bloggers to spread stories without bothering to make the simplest check to see whether the story is accurate? One of the things that screams “Hoax!” in this story is the complete inaction of the student and parent. Were they worked up about it, why didn’t they bother to complain?
Here’s the wall of shame, bloggers who got suckered and repeated the story without bothering to check it out (isn’t it odd that they all seem to know exactly what photo of Obama was used, and they show it on their blogs, but they don’t know where it was used? Isn’t it odd that they use a color photo while saying it was projected on an overhead projector, which would turn that photo into gray and white mush?):
I spoke again with David Roddy at the Clark County School District offices. He confirmed that as of late this afternoon (January 30) no one had stepped forward to identify the school where the event is alleged to have occurred, nor the name of anyone involved, nor any other fact that could be corroborated to vouch for the accuracy of the story.
Update, September 5, 2009: No evidence of this event has ever been produced outside of the original two anonymous blog posts. My investigation found no such incident in any school in or around Las Vegas, nor anywhere else. Pure hoax.
Don’t let others be misled; spread the word:
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
For you Austinites, or someone close enough to make this training:
The Bill of Rights Institute at the
Texas Law-Related Education Conference
February 6-7, 2009
Event Website
Date: February 6-7
Where:
Hilton Austin Airport 9515 Hotel Drive Austin, TX 78719
The Bill of Rights Institute is pleased and honored to be exhibiting and presenting at the 2009 Texas Law-Related Education conference on Friday and Saturday, February 6 & 7. We hope while you are attending the conference, you will stop by our booth in the exhibits area and see our wide range of materials and programs that can enrich as well as bring new excitement to your lessons. Also, on Friday at 10:00 AM, we will be presenting a session at the conference on Lincoln’s Leadership: Secession and Emancipation (with free lesson plans distributed at the end of the session!).
Have a terrific time at the conference and we hope to see you at our booth or our session!
Bill of Rights Institute
200 North Glebe RD
Suite 200
Arlington, Virginia 22203
703-894-1776
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
A few teachers resist technology with everything they have. Several years ago I ran into a history teacher who had a “Jeopardy” style quiz on PowerPoint, for one chapter of Texas history. She loved it.
But that one quiz was all she had. I got a copy of it, did a quiz for the next chapter by simply replacing the questions and answers, and passed it back to her. She treated me as if I had done some magic incantation and filled the room with smoke. It had not occurred to her that she had it in her power to use the template to make her own quizzes.
VHS can now be considered dead, really most sincerely dead.* New tapes are not being produced for almost all programs, and the last, die-hard distributor who sold pre-recorded VHS tapes announced the company will stop those sales in the next few weeks.
For projecting programs in the classrooms in your school, is your school ready to switch to DVDs? I’ve never tried a poll here before, but I hope you will answer this one, especially if you’re a teacher.
Reminder: Dr. Barbara Forrest, the noted science historian whose testimony was key to the decision in the Dover, Pennsylvania, evolution trial, is speaking at 6:00 p.m. at SMU tonight, November 11, 2008.
If you’re in Dallas, go.
Also, I got word today that Texas teachers can pick up CEU credits for this event, sponsored by the science and philosophy departments at SMU together with the Texas Freedom Network. Check in at the registration table.
Forrest’s presentation will serve as a warning to Texas: “Why Texans Shouldn’t Let Creationists Mess with Science Education.”
Update: Teachers may sign up to get CEU credits for this event. Check in at the sign-in desk before the event — certificates will be mailed from SMU later.
It will be one more meeting of scientists that Texas State Board of Education Chairman Dr. Don McLeroy will miss, though he should be there, were he diligent about his public duties.
Dr. Barbara Forrest,one of the world’s foremost experts on “intelligent design” and other creationist attempts to undermine the teaching of evolution, will speak in the Faith and Freedom Speaker Series at Southern Methodist University (SMU) in Dallas. Her evening presentation will serve as a warning to Texas: “Why Texans Shouldn’t Let Creationists Mess with Science Education.”
Dr. Forrest’s presentation is at 6:00 p.m., in the Hughes-Trigg Student Center in the Hughes-Trigg Theatre, at SMU’s Campus. The Faith and Freedom Speaker Series is sponsored by the Texas Freedom Network’s (TFN) education fund. Joining TFN are SMU’s Annette Caldwell Simmons School of Education and Human Development, Center for Teaching Excellence, Department of Anthropology, Department of Biological Sciences, and Department of Philosophy.
Dr. Barbara Forrest
is Professor of Philosophy at Southeastern Louisiana University. She is the co-author with Paul R. Gross of Creationism’s Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design (2004; 2007), which details the political and religious aims of the intelligent design creationist movement. She served as an expert witness in the first legal case involving intelligent design, Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District. She is a member of the Board of Directors for the National Center for Science Education and Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Widely recognized as a leading expert on intelligent design, she has appeared on Larry King Live, ABC’s Nightline, and numerous other television and radio programs.
Dallas isn’t the only school system in trouble in America. Financial woes plague many, perhaps most of the nation’s schools systems.
Funding for schools is difficult in an environment where even good schools get stuck with the label “failing school” due to seriously misdirected programs from the federal government. The situation is complicated by a non-booming economy, especially in districts that had been gearing to build new schools to accommodate increased student populations.
What will the future bring?
It’s enough to merit its own little impromptu carnival. Oy.
In Hawaii, libraries may not have enough money to stay open — in Hawaii, the libraries fall under the jurisdiction of education. Long gone are the days when Republican war hero/president Dwight Eisenhower found libraries to be the fount of information necessary for civilization, and proposed to spend $100 million to be certain even the smallest counties in America had a good library. (From The Honolulu Advertiser)
It’s this bad: In Missouri, Republicans campaign on the idea that education funding is bad. You don’t believe there’s a War on Education? Look at the local races, such as the race for the Missouri House of Representatives between Democrat incumbent Sara Lampe and Republican Michael S. Goodart, Jr. “Goodart criticizes his opponent as a polished, one-issue politician, referring to Lampe’s background as an educator and proponent of education funding.” Oh, yeah, those fat cats in public education. (From the Springfield News-Leader)
Perennial crab William Murchison complains in the East Texas Review that public schools are the problem, and invites Joe the Plumber to Texas where he can get a plumber’s license without knowing anything about plumbing. Ignorance about plumbing among plumbers good for business, Murchison says. He probably feels the same about ignorance in other areas — good for business. Murchison blames school funding woes on the schools. If only they’d close, Murchison says, things might be better. (Heck, Murchison even complains about Brownsville ISD’s winning the Broad Prize — according to Murchison, they don’t deserve it. Crabby, crabby, crabby.)
NCSE is the only group in America — which means it may be the only group in the world — that stands for science education so stoutly, especially with regard to the teaching of evolution.
Arrayed against much more munificently funded “ministries” of many stripes, against the oddball but money-rich Discovery Institute, NCSE is the only organization that stands to defend the teaching of the hard science of evolution in America’s schools.
Particularly in times like these, when forces of darkness mass to assault science education, we need NCSE. Go check out their website.
And, teachers: Bookmark that site. It’s one of the verifiable, good sites you can point your students to for any research project. Click on the logo to see.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
A couple of recent studies show the moral, intellectual and educational bankruptcy of the so-called No Child Left Behind Act. The groundswell necessary to scrap the thing has not caught up to the urgency of doing so, alas.
I ponder the research I’ve seen over the years, both inside the Department of Education and out, and the statistical and anecdotal stories that show art training and education (not the same thing) improve academic performance, and I wonder what squirrels have eaten the brains of “reformers” who kill arts programs for the stated purposes of “improving test performance.” Einstein played the violin. Feynman drummed. Churchill painted, as did Eisenhower. Edison and his team had a band, and jammed when they were stuck on particular problems, or just for fun. When will education decision makers see the light?
Or, until that account is unsuspended by the forces supporting Donald Trump: Follow @FillmoreWhite, the account of the Millard Fillmore White House Library
We've been soaking in the Bathtub for several months, long enough that some of the links we've used have gone to the Great Internet in the Sky.
If you find a dead link, please leave a comment to that post, and tell us what link has expired.
Thanks!
Retired teacher of law, economics, history, AP government, psychology and science. Former speechwriter, press guy and legislative aide in U.S. Senate. Former Department of Education. Former airline real estate, telecom towers, Big 6 (that old!) consultant. Lab and field research in air pollution control.
My blog, Millard Fillmore's Bathtub, is a continuing experiment to test how to use blogs to improve and speed up learning processes for students, perhaps by making some of the courses actually interesting. It is a blog for teachers, to see if we can use blogs. It is for people interested in social studies and social studies education, to see if we can learn to get it right. It's a blog for science fans, to promote good science and good science policy. It's a blog for people interested in good government and how to achieve it.
BS in Mass Communication, University of Utah
Graduate study in Rhetoric and Speech Communication, University of Arizona
JD from the National Law Center, George Washington University
Posted by Ed Darrell 
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 