I’ve settled into Wednesday being my day to spout my opinions about education (and especially educational reforms). Appropriate since it’s also the day HHS Debate meets. My work here is sometimes well researched, and other times quite off the cuff. If I were writing once a week I might have a higher standard for publication, but the truth is I’m mostly speaking off the cuff and I’m sure I will periodically say something ill-informed. Although I’ll be embarrassed to hear it, I would like to know when I go off-track, so please post a comment or send me an email.
The Price of the Three-Year Contract – My most popular blog entry to date, this one seems to have touched a nerve among my fellow union members and other interested parties.
New Jersey’s Learning Standards for Social Studies – I get the goal of wanting to quantify and systematize everything, but it’s doomed to failure. This entry is a very deep dive into state standards… with the promise of a new set in the near future.
Battling Education’s Lowest Common Denominator Mindset – An administrative approach that I think proves somewhat toxic to the greater good.
My, How Things Have Changed – Come for the nostalgia, stay for me pretentiously comparing my teaching to jazz.
Commenting on and at the Board of Education – My thoughts on the two Boards of Education nearest and dearest to my heart, Somerville and Hillsborough.
Yes, You Do Need To Use That Microphone – A simple courtesy that people might take for granted because they are centering themselves in every experience instead of thinking about the needs of others.
Restoring Civility to the Dialogue – Somewhat rambling blog entry looking back at a better time for discourse and trying to figure out where to go from here.
Politics and the Social Studies Teacher – My strongly held belief that there’s nothing wrong with teachers giving their opinion from time to time.
On no, it’s something controversial! – Basically part 2 of the Politics and the Social Studies Teacher blog above, with more specificity.
Rate My School – Yay, our school made the list! But what criteria do they use? How do you compare schools in vastly different communities?
Student Growth Objectives – Data is the answer to everything, yay!!
A chain is only as Stronge+ as its weakest link – I started with SGOs in the previous entry and then launched into a more elaborate takedown of the overall observation method.
Homework Doesn’t Count! – An examination of the fundamental change our district went through a few years ago when we eliminated graded homework. Kind of.
Rubrics: Accountability and Subjectivity – In trying to create a fair and consistent approach to grading essays, we’ve actually just replaced one set of a problems with a new set.
Convenient Absenteeism – What should we do when students are coincidentally absent every time there’s a test? My response to some views I found online that upset me.
Second Chance Learning – Hold onto your horses, I am not being (entirely) negative about an educational form that was foisted upon staff in Hillsborough. Imagine that!
Language and Grammar Snob – I’ve changed my mind. There, I said it.
Gallery Walks: Are You Just Wasting Time? – Oh, how I loathe this fad.
A lack of standard operating procedures – Not one, but two speeches at the Board of Education about approval and reimbursement of professional development and travel expenses.
Normalizing Intolerance – I don’t usually pay mind to what the Hallmark Channel does, but their recent cowardice brought to mind the disturbing trend in our country where people advocate a bizarre form of tolerance, wherein there are two sides to everything, including hatred.
If this is a gift, I would hate to see your version of a lump of coal – Really, it’s just about a bad headline choice, but I couldn’t resist.
Cell Phones in the Classroom – Why they aren’t the bane of my existence.
Technology in the Classroom – My very ambivalent take on the advent of technology in the high school social studies classroom.
Global Compliance Network – A mysterious company holds a near monopoly on training and some nefarious stuff might be sneaking through.
New Jersey’s Mock Trial Scoring Rules Make a Mockery of Evaluations – The title does a pretty good job summarizing the entry.
The Three Branches of Government Are Not and Never Were Equal – The pet peeves of a social studies teacher are not typical, I suppose.
New Jersey Learning Standards for Social Studies, Part II – Here we go again with a sad attempt to “revise” the learning standards.
Robert Lowry Clinton: Marbury v. Madison and Judicial Review – Chasing down a crackpot’s theory.
The Short-Sighted Sick Day Cap – Sacrificing the quality of education to save a few bucks.
Is Black History Month the best we can do? – No, it isn’t.
Athletic Immortality… and Academic Anonymity – The case for recognizing intellectual pursuits.
Teaching During the Coronavirus Outbreak – Trying to come to grips with what can and can’t be done — and what should and shouldn’t be done — with distance learning.
AP Testing 2020 – Faced with a batch of bad options, the College Board opted for one of the worst.
Give Us a Break: Keep Us Working – Sticking with the scheduled Spring Break was the last thing I wanted when I had exhausted things to do in my house.
The College Board’s Sorry State of Affairs – They just keep making it worse.
It’s Past Time to Make the Call on the School Year – So many other states have decided to make the call to close for the school year, but for some reason New Jersey continues to delay the inevitable.
A Return to Normalcy… or I’m Outta Here – Reminding myself why I teach what I teach and not to focus too much on preparation for an exam that I have little respect for.
I Don’t Like the AP GoPo Redesign (Part 1 of 2) – I think the title pretty much covers it. I pick part things I don’t like about the redesign.
How College Board Separates the Wheat From the Chaff – The College Board uses whatever some pretty petty and inequitable methods to differentiate between students.
I Don’t Like the AP GoPo Redesign (Part 2 of 2) – I think the title pretty much covers it. I pick part more things I don’t like about the redesign.
In the Wake of the AP US Government and Politics Exam – More prattling on about how bad the entire process was, now informed by the test actually occurring and an array of problems arising.
Common Assessments and Data – Two of the banes of my existence as a teacher…
The Value of High Stakes Testing – Just to be slightly contrary, I do have some positive thoughts about testing.
It’s the Hand Wringing That’s Undermining Legitimate Protest, Not a Few Acts of Violence – The headline pretty clearly explains the topic, no?
Linguistic Arguments About Anti-Racism – People love to drill down on irrelevancies instead of taking on the real issues.
The Trauma of Shock and Awe – We have to be careful not to traumatize students in trying to reach affective pedagogical goals.
The Disingenuous “Erasing History” and Its Companion Slippery Slope Argument – History isn’t getting erased if a monument gets relocated or torn down.
CNN Article an Extreme Form of Clickbait Misrepresentation – To some extent a follow-up of the previous week’s soapbox blog.
Back to School: The Least Worst Solution – Ramblings about my concerns about opening in the fall.
A Modest Proposal For School in the Fall – A more focused proposal based for what we should be doing to reopen.
Celebrating AP Scores: The Great Divide – A significant cultural divide seems to exist about the appropriateness of this particular approach.
School Reopening: The Path Forward – My third attempt at this, now largely based on a Washington state school’s well thought out approach.
Fenster on Education 