School Closures: A National Look at a Failed Strategy

by Carol Burris

Twelve community activists on the south side of Chicago are capturing national attention by putting their health on the line to save their school. It is their third week of a hunger strike designed to force Chicago’s Rahm Emanuel to keep Dyett High School open.

Dyett serves the community of Bronzeville on Chicago’s south side. Bronzeville was the…

Why should teaching the processes of learning be on the front burner this year in your classroom? I think this familiar proverb answers that question best, “If a man is hungry and you give him a fish, he will eat for a day; teach man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. These words (articulated pre climate change when people had no concept of disappearing water and wild life and pre women’s liberation when we lived in a one gender world) take on added significance now that any bit…

School leaders hold the key to the development or shift of culture within districts and schools. They share the responsibility of cultural development and integrity with the faculty, staff, students, and parents. With the leaders' responsibilities increasing, their own well-being and life balance are essential for the success of the organization and of the others within it.  What is missing in k-12 education leadership preparation is a focused attention on well-being.      …

Back-To-School Backpack: Think About Assessment…

August 2015

Volume XII Issue VIII

Bruce facilitating a Leading the Learning^® workshop

There is never a…

3 lessons for teachers from Grant Wiggins 

The start of the school year offers the perfect opportunity to reflect on the life and work of Grant Wiggins, an extraordinary educator and author who died unexpectedly at the end of last school year. In this Inservice blog post, Wiggins' longtime collaborator, co-author, and friend Jay McTighe shares three of Grant's lessons for teachers to use in 2015-16. This advice is offered so…

The Common Core assessment strategy was designed to compare student success across the nation in relation to the acquisition of knowledge and skills in the Common Core Standards. Tests were designed, purportedly, to reflect where the students (and teachers) stand and to allow valid comparisons. The results are in and the lower than usual results were no surprise to most educators. But, the comparison objective was also not achieved due to capacities and choices of states and…

Although my profile subject is computer science I also had to write at least a dozen of essays. And although it was difficult for me, it allowed me to broaden my skills in writing.

Preparing to another long year of teaching at school I made a thorough research about essays. Apparently most of our students don’t like them the same way as I did. But conversely to my experience, they don’t see it as a chance to improve their writing skills, they see it as useless waste of time.…

One of my favorite intellectual activities is trying to explain sight-words so that the ordinary doctor, lawyer, or politician  understands what I'm saying.

This has turned out to be extremely difficult. Rudolf Flesch thought, in 1955, that he had said the final word on why phonics is essential, and why Whole Word will inevitably destroy children by the millions. Unfortunately, he didn't  make his case well enough. So we do have more than 40 million functional…

On a national stage with an audience invested in learning about all the candidates, left and right, Democrat and Republican...with everyone listening, the announcement that schools are filled with teachers who gather in "teachers' lounges" to complain to one another is ludicrous.  Read more...

Successful change begins within the leader. Sustainable improvement and motivation of others calls for the ability to form and articulate the vision, build a culture of trust, reflect on decisions, coach, encourage, reinforce, take risks, and celebrate just to name a few. All of these abilities spring from the integration within the "mind-body-spirit" domain.  Yet, typical annual goals exclude the personal well-being as they focus on professional skills and knowledge …

There are schools and districts that have stepped outside of the fray and, within the design context that remains our framework, have made inroads toward something new. But no matter the measure, we keep getting the same results. Challenges remain as achievement gaps, schools that struggle to raise mastery and graduation levels, issues presented by poverty and race, students whose poor attendance prevents successful learning, and now a …

This little article  explores the big paradox of the 20th century. Social reformers (particularly, socialists, communists, totalitarians of all types) always make very big claims about what they will do for the People. Finally, we are told, the People will have fairness, equality, and justice.

 Almost inevitably, the People get more misery than they had before. That is really the underlying theme of George Orwell's 1984. The various power-seeking groups fight among themselves;…

The ability to listen influences trust, work productivity, job commitment, safety, student achievement and can even reduce burnout. Here, Dr. Kluger shares his findings from a meta- analysis done on the value of listening and its positive effects on behavior of both the listener and the listened to, and his own life experience.

The recognition that I needed to improve my listening skills changed both my personal life and my…

I was saddened to read that new episodes of Sesame Street will air first on HBO, a paid cable network.  There are so many levels of genius behind Sesame Street, but perhaps the most significant is the gap it filled for underprivileged children.  Any educator knows that all children do not start kindergarten with the same foundation.  All children are not immersed in print-rich homes with books on the shelves and magazine and newspaper subscriptions.  All children don't see…