A Better Path to Learning

Author: svb802

  • The Question of Research

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    Donald Trump doesn’t impress me as someone who is interested in the value of research. This was evident last week when his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) minions, led my Elon Musk, shut down grants and contracts for various research activities at the institute of Education Sciences (IES). Today, in an article published in The…

  • Friday News Roundup

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    It’s Friday! And it’s warming up here in Iowa. Time for the News Roundup. Standards Gap: Why So Many Students Score Proficient on State Tests But Not on NAEP (The 74) Why are state standardized test scores so much higher than scores on NAEP, or our Nation’s Report Card? The 74 reported this week that,…

  • Musk and Trump – Saviors of Learning?

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    Until we find a better system of learning for our kids, we have a moral and ethical responsibility to provide the best K-12 educational system possible for current students, their families, and their communities. Blowing up the current system, without a viable alternative for students to migrate to, won’t work. We learned this during our…

  • Raised to Obey

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    “The expansion of primary education in the West was driven not by democratic ideals, but by the state’s desire to control citizens, and to control them by targeting children at an age when they are very young and susceptible to external influence and to teach them at that young age that it’s good to respect…

  • A Matter of Money

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    I remember sitting in a district leadership meeting one morning, listening to a fellow high school principal lament about how strapped for money his school was (his school wasn’t hurting for resources). Finally, he exclaimed “Just once I’d like to try ‘more money’ as a solution to all of the problems his high school and…

  • A Presidential Review

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    It’s President’s Day, so it might be a good time to look back at how our presidents approached K-12 education, beginning with Jimmy Carter. Today, EducationWeek spotlighted presidential challenges and successes in a series of online articles. Below are excerpts from those pieces:  Jimmy Carter – “Jimmy Carter campaigned for president on a promise of…

  • Friday News Roundup

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    It’s Friday! Time for the News Roundup. Exclusive: 12 Education Chiefs Ask McMahon for More Control over Federal Funds (The 74) The 74 reported late last week that, “Some state education chiefs aren’t wasting any time letting the new administration know what they want.” “A dozen state leaders, all from Republican-led states, wrote to Linda…

  • Building Around a Passion

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    Imagine a world of learning where everything started with this question: “What would you like to learn today?” And then, everything else filled in from there. Education Reimagined shared a story this week that encompasses that type of learning spirit: “Aboard a tall ship, learners step onto the bowsprit, suspended over the open ocean, trusting…

  • Lack of Imagination in DMPS

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    I write a lot about public schools in three states: Texas, Vermont, and Iowa. I worked in the Texas public school system for 35 years, and I’ve lived in Vermont and Iowa over the past seven years. All three systems are different when it comes to providing public education to their youth. Texas has one…

  • Research Out the Window

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    I’ve asked this question before: In public education, why don’t we do what we know is the right thing to do? The answer to this question points to the importance of research, and, more importantly, how we often ignore that research when it comes to best practices in teaching reading, writing, problem-solving, and character development.…