I have no objection to measuring more indicators, but I want more accurate, more reliable, more frequent measurements - especially for existing key indicators like reading and math. 

It would be no bad thing if our school system started carefully measuring their outcomes.  In the real world, outcomes are continually measured and almost nothing else matters. We don’t care about our supplier’s preparation for his career, we measure the quality, timeliness, and costs of his services. We look for accomplishments on resumes, and then hire the person who we believe will deliver the maximum outcomes.

We measure outcomes in our social lives. We check the visible markers of success in what our friends are wearing, what they are driving, what they do for a living – correlating their success to their desirability as friends or spouses. This is the world that our students live in. They will be measured in subtle and overt ways, every single day.

The annual cost of each public school student is about the same as a small car. (really – Ontario kicks in $11,500 per year per student, and you can buy a Nissan Micra for under $10,000).

But you say, that’s a crappy car. Wouldn’t be caught driving it. Well, yes.

Where have they been?

They are about fifty years behind the times.

Wasn’t that what Dewey was all about?

Laugh, cry or sigh?

If we teach and we DON’T follow up to measure the learning, we are signalling that the teaching wasn’t important.  That silent message is clearly heard by students, teachers, and parents.

So we move kids from year to year, never telling them how they are doing.  Or worse, telling them how excellent they are.

Basketball scores are measurements.  Kids know how important it is to practice, even if just for pickup games.  Regent Park has a wonderful basketball program. 

I’m helping a high-school graduate fill in the forms to apply to the military.  He can’t fill them out by himself.  An aptitude test is required, and based on the practice test, he isn’t going to do well on the math questions (If a child can run 10 meters while a car travels 30 meters, how many meters can the child run while the car travels 66 meters?). 

I hope he gets in.  But I’m surprised at how little awareness he has about his deficits in reading and math; he’s quite determined that if the military doesn’t take him then he will go to university.  Perhaps no one ever told him what was expected and how he was doing against that expectation.

#1 education system in the world in terms of post secondary grads. Guess who? Canada.

Best 15 year old readers in the world. Finland. Almost no testing. 5% child poverty.

Huge wave of antitest parents across the USA roiling. Parents furious at overtesting.

Canada best in world outside Asia at problem solving

Your entire thesis and analysis is off track.

Universities aren’t a hot-bed of outcome measurement either.  I went back to earn an MEd a few years ago, and while I was there my university held an open-house to introduce their new VP-Research.  I figured that was something I was an expert at, so I attended.

The President gave the new VP a laudatory introduction, which was followed by a long powerpoint breaking down research funding that the university had received by source, and how it had been distributed by department (to much muttering, clearly this was a tender issue). 

Then they opened the floor to questions.  I stuck up my hand and asked if they had tracked the outcomes of their research - patents, start-ups, joint-ventures, licenses, copyrights, earned revenue, and so on.  Seemed like a reasonable question, but all they had talked about was the fund-raising side.

But you could actually feel the temperature in the room drop, people were shifting in their seats to move away from me.  Ummm, no they didn’t, not anything they were interested in, next question please.

That’s exactly what I have seen.

Elementary reading, writing and math tasks have that elementary school graduates and high school graduates are incapable of doing.

>>But I’m surprised at how little awareness he has about his deficits in reading and math; he’s quite determined that if the military doesn’t take him then he will go to university.  Perhaps no one ever told him what was expected and how he was doing against that expectation.<<

They can’t write a few correct, meaningful sentences in their own language!
They can’t calculate change or a bill.
How has this become acceptable, let aside world-class education?

What Is A FRONT ORGANIZATION?

Simple search functions produce some answers:

1. A front group is an organization that purports to represent one agenda while in reality it serves some other party or interest whose sponsorship is hidden or rarely mentioned.

2. It can be structured to look like a voluntary association.

3. It attempts to appear independent and non-partisan while secretly serving agendas kept out of sight.

4. It provides “cover” for make-work projects and solicits funding for such projects.

This was a quick skim of the literature, excluding areas such as crime and paramilitary operations.

I hope I’m not exaggerating but I do see some relationship between front organizations and People For Education (P4E).

Looking at the #s above, re #1 — It is clear the main agenda here is to preserve the “public education” industry — its monopoly status and all it’s attendant appendages dependent on an assured captive audience of students and compliant parents. This new project to “Measure What Is Important” to broaden what is to be measured responds to the fear that “things that are easy to teach & easy to test are also easy to automate & easy to out-source”.  Irrelevancy and extinction are being signaled.

#2 re voluntary nature: Just who are the sponsors, past and present, who guide the P4E mission?

#3 re agendas:  A global “transformation” of public education is now underway — quite surreptitious and led by well-know “change-agents” to replace hard skills and content with 21st C competencies. Citizenship and Social Emotional Learning are already P4E projects.  If the global template is being followed — wait for Collaboration, Critical Thinking and Creativity to be next.

#4 re make work projects: One just has to look at the long list of BROADER MEASURES OF SUCCESS ADVISORY COMMITTEE http://www.peopleforeducation.ca/measuring-what-matters/about-us/#advisors First., my estimate is that 9/10s are politically left oriented missionaries for ever more government funding of services.  Secondly, most are associated with groups or agencies with tons of people employed or looking for work in “social sciences and humanities”. 

A five-year plan embarked on by P4E includes developing Measurement Instruments and Scales for Canada and at the moment a race is on — internationally — to prepare such psychometric tools to feed the epidemic of man-made mind-change projects.  Please see my last entry on Changing Worldviews on the April 02 SQE post or see it in my blog Adjusting Worldviews To Sustainability Agendas         http://www.parentsteachingparents.net/2014/04/adjusting-worldviews-to-sustainability-agendas/

OMG Tunya people have been laughing at that Red under every bed McCarthyite talk since 1960.

PLEASE keep it coming.

A Cataract Operation Needed — One Eye At A Time

It’s so hard to believe.  So impossible!  How can all this “conspiracy” to take over our schools be happening — in front of our eyes?  Doesn’t anyone object?

All I can say is at least be open — hear, see and read.  You don’t need a double cataract operation to see beyond the lens of obfuscation, bamboozlement and even the still trusting beliefs of those in the system.  Open up one eye at least.

I said in earlier posts that more people are seeing an emerging pattern. It wasn’t me who said this, it was Len: “ . . . it is most odd that these massive changes are being foisted on so many states and provinces simultaneously with little, if any, supporting scientific evidence.”

And the way in which they are being “foisted” is not pretty.  There is not only furtiveness behind the moves but outright certainty. A fait accompli. An accomplished, irreversible deed or fact.  Something already done and beyond alteration.

This is something I actually witnessed. 

April 06, 2013.  I attended a meeting for parents at which a Ministry Official spoke about changes to BC education under the BC Ed Plan.  She did a huge spiel — assessment was to change.  You measure what you care about.  There will be “deep learning”. . . We know the provincial election is next month, but these changes will go ahead regardless of who wins the election. 

I was shook up by this barefaced statement and only later — days later — did I start looking into the Plan and similar moves elsewhere — particularly the US Common Core and what I saw happening in Alberta.  The same change-agents were travelling between these points. 

In October an incredible book tracking deliberate global education change — Yes, even with UN connections — came out.  It’s not an easy read, partly because it’s so scary.  It might be best to read the Amazon.com Reviews first.  The book — Credentialed to Destroy: How and Why Education Became a Weapon.  http://www.amazon.com/Credentialed-Destroy-Education-Became-Weapon/product-reviews/1492122831/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?showViewpoints=1 

To explain the title, read my review on the Reviews page.

I said more people are coming forward with their misgivings about what’s going on. Do go to April 02 SQE post and read Drew’s and Len’s contributions.  Especially see today’s piece by a Parent trained as a teacher who realized that injection of transdisciplinary themes across the curriculum was a form of indoctrination.  She is grateful for the choice to still be able to home educate.

Part 1 of 2

Keep on laughing Doug, but Tunya is correct. The P4E is a front for union and education faculties activities, to filtered their knowledge of private and often political agendas unto the suspecting public, without media interference. To tied it and put a ribbon on it, the TVO network packages to bite size chunks for the viewers to slowly buy into the new packages of education, that are really the same old packages all dressed in new finery.

P4E are not there to answered the questions of parents.  The P4E are there only to provide the forum that allows the teachers’ unions and education faculties a place to interact with parents in a controlled environment. The parents are controlled. On the About page of P4E - People for Education is an independent organization working to support public education in Ontario’s English, Catholic and French schools.
http://www.peopleforeducation.ca/about-us/what-we-do/

Anne Kidder heading up P4E, is a poor choice for any parent having her to advocate for children with learning disabilities. Kidder’s advocacy is always about the advocacy of the public education establishment, and never about truly advocating for parents and their children to received a quality education. And for your viewing pleasure - TVO - 1 hour long - Government’s Role in Education Innovation - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vO28yCZO7sE&feature=youtu.be&t=9m58s

In the report - “People for Education, working with experts and the public from across the country, is identifying a broader set of goals for education.Equally important, the goals will be measurable, so students, parents, educators, and the public can see how Canada is making progress.”  I can assure you it is not to provide a quality education for each child. The goals as stated by P4E is to be used as their accountability measures when parents and the public are complaining about some aspect of education. What P4E and partnering with the larger education networks of Ontario and the Ontario K to 12 education establishment are trying to do is to co-opt the education conversations taking place across Canada in the present time to get Canadians to buy into the new education norms and moving away from the academics. Achieving Excellence is the template that P4E is following and P4E is the vehicle being used to convinced Canadians to buy into the new education norms. http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/about/video.html

And here are the documents for Achieving Excellence. Notice the similarities to the P4E initiative? Its no coincidence either. Other similar initiatives are the second and first level tiers of the Ontario education establishment are the conduits to connect to the national education networks across Canada.  Unless you think that P4E has national influence because they do not have that type of political capital and influence outside of Ontario. The Ontario Teachers’ Unions, the Ontario School Boards and the big education faculties including OISE are the main networks who also have very similar initiatives that matches nicely with the Achieving Excellence documents. The last major player is the Conference Board of Canada, that has formed an advisory panel to be consultants on the Achieving Excellence initiative that will be going across Canada.

I suspect the Ontario teachers’ unions did not buy into the Achieving Excellence initiative until they could extract assurances that suited their best interests. Their new initiative has many similarities to the goals of the P4E and the Achieving Excellence documents. http://buildingbetterschools.ca/

And the response of the ETFO and the Secondary Teachers’ Federation respectively for the next stage - 1. http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CEAQFjAC&url=http://www.etfo.ca/Publications/BriefstoGovernmentAgencies/Documents/RESPONSE_Nov2013.pdf&ei=8WFIU5rCCaiF2AWEmoGIDA&usg=AFQjCNHBH44RyAtB8-bMdUUjIJg1GYD9mQ&sig2=BSEvOXsIkv6usQ2AsW58lA&bvm=bv.64542518,d.b2I 

And 2 - http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CEEQFjAD&url=http://www.osstf.on.ca/adx/aspx/adxGetMedia.aspx?DocID=782cf513-2b51-45ad-ad70-9a3258f31a75&MediaID=309e15af-5932-406d-9594-75ea265dccd6&Filename=submission-building-next-phase-education-strategy.pdf&l=English&ei=pI1EU5vRIOrF2wXohYGAAQ&usg=AFQjCNFGV0jsLqsv1HpXRMemOq8nSOCnNA&sig2=Rfky14-g58ZHXgCDJ0iYfg&bvm=bv.64507335,d.b2I

Part 2 of 2

Not a word on the foundational skills that must be acquired and mastered before a student can progress and learned. However, lots on the constructivism pedagogy that will allow the students with weaker sets of the 3 Rs to be provided modified curriculum outcomes by dumbing down the knowledge sets. Not a word on the corrective remediation to addressed the deficits of the 3 Rs of students, but lots on giving the students the skill sets to innovate and think creatively.

As an American parent voiced out loud on the parents blogs, it sure looks like another round of dumbing down education is in the works, global wide. And guess what folks?  The education access doors are locked, and the K to 12 are still tossing students off the education ramp, to prevent access to the education doors.  In the news today, the UK, the USA and Canada education systems are laying off the teachers’ aides, and all are using the same reasons. Crazy as that sounds, Kidder in the TVO video, is moaning about the low youth voter turnout , and wondering what to do about it. Newsflash Anne, its time to bring back the subject history starting at the grade 5 level, and make one and all take history until grade 11. Youth turnout was no problem when I was young, when students came out of the K to 12 well-rounded with the full understanding what governments has done in the past to justified their self-serving actions at the expense of the welfare of their citizens. 

Bears repeating - “If public schools can’t give all of their students these basic tools, the answer is not to play down their importance. The answer is to make it possible for public school students to escape to schools that will give them the basic tools they need.”

Emasculated Politicians Regarding Education

I’ve mentioned how in BC politicians would have no say in how the public school curriculum was being developed.  Regardless of which party was to win the last election May 14, 2013, the BC Ed Plan would carry on. — with education “transformation”.  This certainly violates the notions I have about how politicians should relate to government policies and programs.

It’s different in Australia where the new Conservative government is not afraid to have launched TWO Reviews:  1) into National Curriculum developed under the Labor government and seen as slanted and 2) Teacher Training, where the Minister of Education saw the program as “faddish” and “ideological”.

It’s different in the UK where the Education Minister is warning educators to not turn students into “foot soldiers of the green movement”.  See —  Heads are breaking the law if they preach eco agenda, warns Gove: Education Secretary’s ‘concern’ at report that accuses ‘activist’ teachers.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2601179/Heads-breaking-law-preach-eco-agenda-warns-Gove-Education-Secretarys-concern-report-accuses-activist-teachers.html?ITO=1490&ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490

Indoctrination Can Emerge From Our “New Age” Curriculum

Annie Kidder’s P4E is fully embracing radical transformation of the curriculum in Ontario.  One feature that is common to all these plans — UK, US, Canada, Australia — is that there are cross-curricular “themes” that are supposed to be embedded across subjects.  Usually it’s sustainability or environmental stewardship or something like that. 

We do not, in our North American School Laws have anti-indoctrination laws but they do in UK.  The link I provided in my post on emasculated politicians is a story about “brainwashing” and the green agenda.  For our information and advisement, here is an article I did on the UK laws.

ANTI-INDOCTRINATION LAW IN UK SCHOOL ACT (1996)

Section 406 says that education authorities “shall forbid…the promotion of partisan political views in the teaching of any subject in the school”. Controversial topics, under Section 407, requires that students “are offered a balanced presentation of opposing views”.

When Gore’s film was shown in 2008 in class without any balance a father took the issue to court. He won, was awarded 2/3 costs against the Government and changed history in that any future showings of the film in UK government schools must follow these:

GUIDELINES for showing “An Inconvenient Truth”

1. State that the Film is a political work and promotes only one side of the argument.

2. If teachers present the Film without making this plain they may be in breach of section 406 and guilty of political indoctrination.

3. Nine inaccuracies have to be specifically drawn to the attention of school children.

Error one — A sea-level rise of up to 20 feet would be caused by melting of either West Antarctica or Greenland “in the near future”. The judge’s finding: “This is distinctly alarmist and part of Mr Gore’s ”wake-up call“. It was common ground that if Greenland melted it would release this amount of water – “but only after, and over, millennia.”

Error two — Low-lying inhabited Pacific atolls are already “being inundated because of anthropogenic global warming.” Judge: There was no evidence of any evacuation having yet happened.

Error three — The film described global warming potentially “shutting down the Ocean Conveyor” – the process by which the Gulf Stream is carried over the North Atlantic to Western Europe. Judge: According to IPCC, it was “very unlikely” it would be shut down, though it might slow down.

Error four —Two graphs, one plotting a rise in C02 and the other the rise in temperature over a period of 650,000 years, showed “an exact fit”, said Gore. Judge: Although there was general scientific agreement that there was a connection, “the two graphs do not establish what Mr Gore asserts”.

Error five — The disappearance of snow on Mt Kilimanjaro was expressly attributable to global warming. Judge: The scientific consensus was that it cannot be established that the recession of snows on Mt Kilimanjaro is mainly attributable to human-induced climate change.

Error six — The drying up of Lake Chad was used in the film as a prime example of a catastrophic result of global warming. Judge: “It is generally accepted that the evidence remains insufficient to establish such an attribution. It is apparently considered to be far more likely to result from other factors, such as population increase and over-grazing, and regional climate variability.”

Error seven — Hurricane Katrina and the consequent devastation in New Orleans was due to global warming. Judge: There is “insufficient evidence to show that”.

Error eight — For the first time, polar bears were being found that had actually drowned “swimming long distances – up to 60 miles – to find ice”. Judge: “The only scientific study that either side before me can find is one which indicates that four polar bears have recently been found drowned because of a storm.” That was not to say there might not in future be drowning-related deaths of bears if the trend of regression of pack ice continued – “but it plainly does not support Mr Gore’s description”.

Error nine — Coral reefs all over the world were bleaching because of global warming and other factors. Judge: The IPCC had reported that, if temperatures were to rise by 1-3 degrees centigrade, there would be increased coral bleaching and mortality, unless the coral could adapt. But separating the impacts of stresses due to climate change from other stresses, such as over-fishing, and pollution was difficult.

In Tunya’s link - “The study, by a think-tank set up by former Tory Chancellor Lord Lawson, warned that ‘eco-activists’ in the education system were urging children to use ‘pester power’ to ensure parents are forced to adopt lifestyle choices dictated in schools.”

Is pester power being used by the K to 12 education establishment?  It is likely to be occurring, and pester power is defined as, “Pester power is a child’s ability to affect their parents’ purchasing decisions, often through the use of nagging, or pestering.”  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pester_power

Quite the science being built around pester power, that originates from the areas of marketing and has now expanded into other areas such as the K to 12 education establishment using the students to target their parents. Teachers’ unions uses the same ploys found in pester power tactics, primed the students so they will go home to convinced the parents that the teachers’ union demands are just and right.

This article talks about how children can turned the tables - “The sound of little voices is influenced by what is taught to them and how they react to such teachings. Just as we have gained more information about the recycling and global warming, we have also seen these same voices speaking out as well. But they did not stop there, they carrying cameras, taking photos of what real life is like for them. This was done on the streets, about gangs, racial thoughts, and even in the classrooms, all to make some change happen. But those who are attempting to control their lives also are taking actions to prevent such freedoms.”  http://www.examiner.com/article/business-pester-power-marketing-now-schools

It is probably the number one reason why the education establishment have place restrictions upon students regarding cameras and recording devices.  A study - “This discussion examines the extent to which Pester Power exists and what influences there are to be considered. It looks at the existing theories and research. The main influences are parents, peers, school and television and have been taken into consideration in order to examine this issue. These factors are placed in the context of child developmental theories. Interviews with parents of young children have demonstrated that Pester Power exists and that parents feel influenced by it.”  http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=10&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CHgQFjAJ&url=http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download;jsessionid=9E50660A35D3BB31BE02EF4C0CE8B8A7?doi=10.1.1.197.7354&rep=rep1&type=pdf&ei=fzBJU_2vDeH92QXDmoHABg&usg=AFQjCNHPLfq_vUCeJ_50gGtXW0FreapBHA&sig2=ScpXOeMVAZWfFw4j78IbUw&bvm=bv.64542518,d.b2I

I suppose the number one job of teaching reading, writing, and math in the public schools, have over the years have been given lower priority status by the subgroups that comprised the public K to 12 education system. Is P4E the ‘pester power’ team, designed to specifically target parents to buy into the vague ideas of Achieving Excellence, that would displaced the academics of the 3 Rs in favour of measuring innovation, creativity and other social-emotional skills.

Time will tell, considering the comments - “. We have been measuring what is really easy to measure, not what is important. Schools have a huge role to play in developing student interest in learning. Learning how to learn and critical thiniking is key - accumulation of knowledge is not the overall goal - some basic knowledge is important, but let’s not forget that psychology tells us that we forget 80% of what we learn within 1 week.”  http://www.peopleforeducation.ca/measuring-what-matters/

Knowledge is being downgraded. The buying in on false assumptions and misguided interpretations of the science of learning, psychology and cognitive sciences.
The new philosophy of teaching becomes a cult of serious undermining society’s ability to progress and advanced,  if over 60 % do not have the skills of the 3 Rs and knowledge banks to understand and make sense of the world around you.

Marketing science defines - “Defines the pester power phenomenon as the repeated delivery of unwanted requests, arguing however that this is not the main driving influence in purchasing behaviour.”  http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=1587804&show=html

Ergo, pester power phenomenon is the beginning to transformed and change the values of the targeted audience. P4E has a big task in front of them, largely funded and controlled by the public education establishment if they want to transformed and change the values of parents. Parents are digging in their heels, across Canada for good reasons and are not happy campers when it comes to the education system K to post-secondary across Canada.

Sticking to the original topic, EQAO in Ontario had been developing just such a set of education indicators almost 15 years ago.  Nothing came of them.  Here’s some indicators I’d like to see.

1. How many parents pay for outside tutoring? and how much and what is tutored? (you can’t say a particular school is making a difference if parents are paying for someone else to teach or are filling in the gaps at home.)

2. What is the staff turnover at a school? Staff absentee rate?  How many snow days have closed a school?  etc.

3.  How do you measure something like creativity or student/parent satisfaction, which is, for the most part, purely subjective?  Kids might be “happy” and full of self esteem, but still count on their fingers.  One parent may love a school and another hate it.

And ultimately, what will this data be used for?  If is isn’t to lead to improvement, then why bother?  It’s just what teachers call busy work (keeps kids occupied while you try to do something else). 

You should Realize that progressives do not consider radical environmental ism to be a political issue. They simply assume that the survival of the world is at stake and deniers are ignorant greedy idiots. 

They feel Al Gore David Suzuki messages should be THE message and there is zero tolerance for opposition. It is like racism to speak against environmentalism in public schools.

Too funny Doug, calling environmentalism found in today’s schools as radical and non-political. Schools certainly have made environmentalism into a money racket to pay for the basic supplies or the late night parties occurring in the teachers’ staff rooms. One day, I was standing in line with my recycled bottles that I paid 8 cents extra at the cashier check-out, to get 5 cents returned on each bottle. The usual grumbling of the people standing in line, with one or two chastising the rest of us for not cleaning the bottles, not taking off the caps, using non-biodegradable bags. Setting the mood, for guilt to override the commonsense of people, but not this time. The person who counted the bottles and determined the amount of cash to be returned, asked the person, will you donate to the school all or part of your cash? I burst out laughing on the response? “What are you nuts?  The school gets enough of my money!”  And the responses were of similar retorts after that.

Environmentalism is big business and very political. Governments loves the new revenue sources of eco-taxes, eco-fees and creating new government armies of clerks to regulate the actions and behaviours of the common citizenry. Schools and school boards loves the particular aspect of regulating environmentalism because it provides the basis of the knowledge content in environmentalism science, without providing the actual science of the environment. What they loved even more is the new revenue sources and the busy environmental programs of the schools without having to be accountable for the outcomes of the programs.

I resent the eight cents deposit, and only getting back five cents. Only to discovered, funds raised are paying for the massive advertising ads and the smaller armies of regulatory bodies to regulate the actions and behaviours of the citizenry. What I even resent even more, are the environmental programs of schools and government outcomes that produced no change in enhancing the environment positively.

If outcomes are not to be measured,  and as Doretta states, ”  If is isn’t to lead to improvement, then why bother? ”  - why go to the bother of new measurements, if the outcomes are not measured in the true sense? Unless the true objective is to measure the degree of acceptance and compliance to the ideologies and dogma of the educrats, and in that case, outcomes don’t matter.

NOBODY actually cares what you think Nancy because so few share your POV.

Malkin:  Doug is trolling, and violating the rules of discourse.  I request you permanently kick him off this forum.

Tom you need to learn to face reality. The public school system is loved by millions. People come from Asia to attend our high schools and universities. Not the other way around.

Some privatizing ideologues, religious types and parents of less successful people who would like to blame the system like to say otherwise but deal with MASS beloved public ed.

What Is More Important For Survival — Environmentalism Or The Human Spirit?

It wasn’t till a little book came out in 1932 did people begin to see a new and radical role for schools.  The book was “Dare The School Build A New Social Order?” by George Counts (1889-1974).  Counts is credited with helping develop the field of “critical pedagogy” and was a leading advocate of teachers’ unions.

Counts built on the earlier work of John Dewey (1859-1952) who saw education for citizenship, the common good and democracy and because of his progressive views was a welcome visitor in China and Russia. 

So, the Counts book validated the idea that schools can actually be used to shape society — even a new social order — one more akin to socialism than to the capitalism of the day.  Much in recent history of education illustrates the back and forth regarding the question — Does Education change Society or does Society change Education?  Of course, differing points-of-view and movements appeared to advance their positions.  Stripped to the simplest duality the main divisions can be narrowed down to a contest between progressivism and traditionalism.

As far as intensity goes, regarding effort, writers and literature, my estimate is that for every one traditionalist activist working away at the cause, there are 9 progressives!  Their literature promotes “emancipatory”, social justice, “critical theory” and similar liberationist narratives designed to empower citizens to change the world. In contrast traditionalists (or neoliberals as they’re called by progressives) largely aim at the transmission of what works and is best practice under the circumstances.

Today, what has been profoundly shifted is that it’s not only “society” as the target of experimentation,  manipulation and deliberate engineering but the human being.  Yes, we’ve had waves of social adjustment and self-esteem and behavior modification in classrooms.  But nothing like what we are seeing, reading and hearing about now.  What we have now is “transformation”. Of consciousness, of feelings, of beliefs, of predispositions, etc. 

Social Emotional Learning (SEL) is a big curricular item.  Did we hear, on a recent TV show, Annie Kidder of People For Education say:  “Social emotional skills can be taught, and we’re going to TEACH IT.”? (Emphasis hers)

And we have the UN involved, no less, in mind change of the masses.  Monica Sharma is an International Expert and Practitioner on Leadership Development for sustainable and equitable change.  She works with UN, universities, leadership groups, etc. Her work is about whole systems transformation and leadership development in both developed and developing countries, using cutting–edge transformational approaches and methodologies.  She says, “New evidence in the science of consciousness is revealing our potential for deeper and higher states of consciousness that reveal our essential Oneness in an interdependent universe.”
http://www.kosmosjournal.org/wp-content/article-pdfs/personal-to-planetary-transformation.pdf

Now, I for one am skeptical about this Oneness.  I do not believe Sustainability programs are the key to Survival.  I believe the “individual” and biological human instincts are key to survival.  I am not an “ignorant, greedy idiot”, yet I am nervous as I see more of the sustainability literature having small references to resistance and am wondering how much covert work is being done, a la 1984, to develop instruments to detect and deal with resistance.

School Children As Eco-Activists !

I’ve just come to page 12 of 70 pages of documentation on this Report — Climate Control: Brainwashing in schools — http://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2014/04/Education-reducedportrait-5.pdf

Here are just a few quotes that jump out:

- eco-activism appears to have captured our schools’ curriculums

- the slant is on scares, on raising fears, followed by the promotion of detailed guidance on how pupils should live, as well as on what they should think

- Only a systematic evaluation of what is going on can determine the extent of the indoctrination as well as the emotional and educational harm to pupils that is undoubtedly resulting.

- The corruption of the curriculum in schools in support of a radical worldview that is almost certainly at odds with the majority view in our society has been described in a book of essays edited by Robert Whelan.

- All are at risk of being deprived of a more thorough treatment of subject-matter basics in exchange for time spent on conditioning them for political or personal actions. This conditioning and the associated reduction in basic education are liable to reduce the autonomy of the children as well as of the parents they are encouraged to influence: both are essentially being told what to think and what to do. Children are being treated as political targets by activists who wish to change society in fundamental ways. This is unacceptable . . .

Part 1 of 2

In reality the schools in 2014 - Social Emotional Learning (SEL) has distressingly negative effects on children who are different in learning. In 2014, instead of correcting early reading struggles, the child has a mental health problem of low self-esteem. As a parent, I first experience it back in 2011, when my child was undergoing her third assessment for documentation purposes and to meet the criteria for post-secondary institute. After all,  one can’t walk into Special Services, state you have LD or Autism or any of the other invisible disabilities without documentation. Instead of having a reading problem, my child had a self-esteem problem when it came to reading. Suffice to say, I voiced the words of discrimination out loud to the principal and then I phoned the Ministry of Education, to used their authority and power to stopped the nonsense, and get on with the assessment.

It is written in black and white throughout the education ministries across Canada, that kids with reading struggles are suffering from low self-esteem, and recommend a series of self-esteem initiatives, instead of corrective remediation in reading. Another place to travel is the big teachers’ unions web sites such as Ontario, BC or Alberta, the union literature will go into further details that ties in the radical pedagogy where reading struggles the symptom is low self-esteem and the cure is to fixed the parents low ability to parent and/or fixed the low economic state of the child’s home. All about the poverty theories in the radical pedagogy, but what happens to the children of higher income with reading struggles?  In this new brave world of Oneness, the parents eventually get the hint to go to a private tutor, and the educators of Oneness are thankful the parents are following the protocols of   radical pedagogy theories that states in my own words. Parents with the spare cash shall not stressed the resources and staff of a school. The resources and staff are overburden with long waiting lists for children looking to access special education services and other education services beyond the inclusive classroom. The staff is burdened with the task of producing quality constructivism lessons in the hope, that students will developed strong motivation and persistence traits in their life long learning where knowledge facts are downgraded. Its not about acquiring knowledge, but rather its all about the learning processes to live in Oneness and accept that one was not born with the talent of easy academic learning. After all, learning the ABCs of the 3 Rs should be as difficult as it was in 1914, as it is today in 2014 using 21st century science. Oops I forgot, 21st century science is missing in action in today’s public schools.

What one will not read in the SEL literature of the K to 12 education establishment, are any of the education practices and policies that induces shame upon the individual student or a subgroup of students. When was the last time, you heard anyone at any age, openly boast of their struggles in reading? Not any, and yet the new brave world of Oneness want the LD students to openly announced to their fellow classmates, “Hey I have LD, and I am not a very good reader, can you read the passage, and while you are at it, be my copywriter to correct my many spelling and grammar mistakes.?” 

SEL ideologies calls for more humiliation and shame practices upon the struggling readers to enact the Oneness of average. Instead of correcting the reading struggles of students using the 21st reading science research and directly teaching the rules of grammar, spelling and other handy foundation rules.  the education establishment chooses to asked the child that they are equal to the classmate who is much more advanced in reading. The educators asks the child to set her or his agenda on learning to read, in order to fight the forces of power that imposes standards upon the students. Radical pedagogy is all about fighting the mysterious forces in the now, no matter what harmed the decisions of the ‘now’ will hurt the student in their future.

Just plugged into the search engine two words - radical pedagogy - over 2 million hits. A few links of some scary reading - 1. What is radical pedagogy? - http://ezrawinton.com/2008/04/08/what-is-radical-pedagogy/  2. Over at the Academia.edu web pages - a potpourri of Radical Pedagogy for your reading. The first one is about Karl Marx - http://www.academia.edu/Documents/in/Radical_Pedagogy  3. A PDF link to the Learning and Teaching theories tied in with radical pedagogy - http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=17&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CGIQFjAGOAo&url=http://www.creativeassessment.org.uk/asstheory/documents/LinktoLearningandTeachingTheoriespracticalone.pdf&ei=RrhKU8G6FoeC2QWY64HIDg&usg=AFQjCNGLn-YPpcUDov34CyA4uuc32HD89w&sig2=4vXuV5atFKU2flTPLcTiQw&bvm=bv.64542518,d.b2I

Part 2 of 2

And finally an example of what one might find in the newspaper where the radical progressive educators are espousing the radical theories of ‘oneness’. “Educators must be prepared to embrace a radical pedagogy and believe that each school should be one of freedom that provokes students to fight against the corridors of power and enforce equality for themselves and others.” http://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/teacher-blog/2014/feb/25/critical-pedagogy-schools-students-challenge

Radical pedagogy is backfiring, and instead of students became change agents to fight the mysterious forces of power, the students focuses upon the school and the educators. When my youngest was in grade 12, which was not a long time ago, her fellow classmates had a problem with a teacher, and unfair practices of the teacher. The reactions of the teacher and principal was typical that the whole class would be suspended for the day. It is typical, because the grade 12 students represented a threat to the teacher’s authority and by extension the authority of the education establishment. I was never so proud of hearing the tale of my LD child, being lead on the rights of students. After all, why bother to attend class if the teacher is unwilling to answered the questions by the students?  To the grade 12 students, that was deemed an unfair practice and to the great relief of parents, things returned to the normal practice of a teacher answering the questions, instead of the radical approach of students finding their own answers. Change agents can work both ways, as the radical educators are finding out to their dismay.

Another example of change agent is changing the practices and conceptions of students with intellectual disabilities that the education establishment has towards this set of students. “. Inadequately trained teachers, low expectations, and lack of role models all negatively impact the prospects for literacy among people with intellectual disabilities around the world. “

What really puts fear into the K to 12 radical educators is the civil and human rights premise that children have rights to access education services for education purposes and that includes the 3 Rs! “All children have the right to an education that enables them to develop, to the best of their ability, skills to interpret and interact critically with their environment. And no child’s education should be foreclosed by low expectations about his capacity to learn.”  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rachel-adams/radical-pegagoy_b_1702096.html

If anything, the radical pedagogues reduces the rights of students and robs them of their ability and skills to interpret and interact critically of their adult environment. Soon the lawsuits will come based on the outcomes of radical pedagogy and education theories that works against the students to imposed low expectations and mediocrity that produces poorer outcomes of the students futures. It is not fun for students to spend two years at the college level on their own dime, retaking high school courses on stuff that the students were never taught and should have been taught at some point in the 12 years. All to get into some trade that required grade 12 calculus. physics and even chemistry.

Doretta, your suggestions for what EQAO should be tracking are excellent.  Do you think that the new CEO, Bruce Rodrigues will make any of these changes?  He’s been CEO since May/13.  Has he done anything positive yet?

Tom,

Doug is trolling?  The only one posting on this blog that makes sense is Doug.

Bev, Just finished marking two labs in environmental science.  That is my Sunday aside from a puppy walk and cooking dinner.  Getting us super early (5:30 am) tomorrow to pick up supplies for an activity for school that will come out of my pocket ($30) as there are no funds for fun activities that support/engage learners.

I still have children in the system and I find the regular ‘bloggers’ are dinosaurs that lost touch and lost their ability to be agents of change.

Doug is a voice of reason.  If you need to strike a voice of reason from you blog—- be happy in the bubble .  But it is a real shame that this group and this site has been handed to silly short term thinking that does not reflect the issues of parents with children STILL in the system. 

Bev, we spoke about this, but Ontarians will likely have to wait for the next round of testing to see if the questions about tutoring are included in the parental surveys.

OK, Doretta, I vaguely remember…

I’ll be watching to see what, if anything, EQAO’s, CEO, Bruce Rodrigues has done to improve things—he’s had plenty of time to get a few balls rolling.