SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT

One union doesn’t fit all

Here's an interesting concept for Ontario teachers who are sick of paying $1,000 dues to a union that they would rather not belong to:  start your own union! 

Especially relevant in light of this above-the-fold story in today's Globe and Mail about how the Ontario government diverted money from special education students in order to buy labour peace!

Readers’ Digest

Poster for Calgary Early Learning Conference - a poster child for the power of the status quo (please note the $395/$450 price)   H/T JG

Compulsive Texting Takes a Toll on Grades - new research suggests the importance of screen-free zones   H/T JE

1895 Grade 8 Kansas Test - see how you would do   H/T CT

Teach for America Vignette - illustrating the power of flexibility in teacher recruitment   H/T TB

Norwegian Blues - an article from The Economist suggesting that only the rich can afford socialism   H/T FG

An Interview with Bill and Melinda Gates - illuminating insight into why their lavish spending on education reform has achieved nothing   H/T CT

Slipping and Sliding

GUEST BLOG BY TOM BEREND

There are two graphs on the right. The left-hand graph compares GDP in USD for Canada and Korea (source: IMF).  The right-hand graph compares education outcomes, specifically high-school math (source: PISA/OECD).

Korea and Canada are very similar, with small populations and dominant neighbours.  And 15 years ago we were ranked together one-and-two in education.

But Korea followed the path of high-value manufacturing and technology, and they are obsessive about education.  Canada focused on resources and branch plant assembly, plus we let our education outcomes slip downward, year after year.  So today we buy Korean cars and smartphones, and sell them our minerals, cereals, and pulp.

Didn't work so well for us. Our GDP is back where it was in 2010 and dropping fast. Korea will soon overtake us as the 11th largest economy.  In fact, since the IMF numbers don't include our recent currency tumble and widening trade deficit, Korea may have already passed Canada.

Sunday at the Movies (We Don’t Want School Choice)

Here's a really cute video, complete with monster, about parents who don't want school choice because they want to be told what to do.

The loss of our faculties

Not too many people would be keen to trust their lives to a doctor who hadn't graduated from a reputable medical school, and rightly so. And so it goes for most professional people - dentists, nurses, lawyers, and so forth. We trust them - because we know that their professional education draws on an established body of knowledge, teaches them how to do their job, and has well-honed standards they must meet and refresher courses they must take. 

And many (most?) people would include teachers in the same category - thinking of teachers as professionals with a strong grasp of their subject content and training in research-based pedagogical methods who are periodically required to learn about advances in their field. However, sadly none of this is true when it comes to teachers.

• Teachers' grasp of their subject matter is rarely if ever examined, and in any case they are often required to teach out-of-field.
• Few if any faculties of education teach research-based pedagogical methods or practical subjects like class management.
• There is no requirement for teachers to remain current.

This Education Next article elaborates on these points. Although it focuses on the US, the situation is precisely the same in Canada (actually it's a bit worse here because there is little or no realization that the faculties of education are dreadful and zero impetus to  improve them).

A Modest Proposal to Minimize the Risk of Experimental Education

My latest Huffington Post article has been published, but the editors apparently didn't like what I had to say and so they buried it deep in their archives and no one has noticed it. The article concerns the new provincial curricula in BC, Alberta, and Ontario and proposes that not all schools be forced to follow them. If you think there is merit to my article, I would be greatful if you would give it some publicity. Otherwise, its sweetness will be wasted on the desert air.

19 Jokes Only Grammar Nerds Will Understand

What do you say when you're comforting a Grammar Nazi? 

There, their, they're.

Click here for 18 more jokes.

Putting the Wolf in Charge of the Hen House

Today's post is a bit wonkish, but I found this column on regulatory capture very interesting. It cautions against the danger of giving vested interests power over their sector, since inevitably they use their power to advance their own interests. The column includes a video of an interview by Phil Donahue with Milton Friedman. Dr. Friedman's views will challenge many of your own dearest beliefs, but it's pretty hard to argue with him.

JUMP Start the Toronto District School Board

Click here to sign a petition to the Toronto District School Board to use JUMP Math. 

Ode to Autumn by John Keats

HAPPY THANKSGIVING.

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
        Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
    Conspiring with him how to load and bless
        With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
    To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
        And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
          To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
        With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
    And still more, later flowers for the bees,
  Until they think warm days will never cease,
          For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.

2.
  Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
      Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
  Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
      Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
  Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
      Drows'd with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
          Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
  And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
      Steady thy laden head across a brook;
      Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
          Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

3.
  Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
      Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
  While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
      And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
  Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
      Among the river sallows, borne aloft
          Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
  And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
      Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
      The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
          And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.