For talented black spellers in the 1960s, the segregated local spelling bee was the beginning and the end of the long road to Washington, D.C.
schools
Posted inHistory
The Word Is ‘Nemesis’: The Fight to Integrate the National Spelling Bee
For talented black spellers in the 1960s, the segregated local spelling bee was the beginning and the end of the long road to Washington, D.C.
Posted inEditor's Pick
The Floor is Lava
“Because children needed to play, to let their imaginations explode. Because pretending was sometimes the only way to get through the day.”
Posted inNonfiction, Reading List
Day Care (and Its Discontents): A Reading List
Eight stories about modern-day child care, from 24/7 facilities to Montessori wonderlands.
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
Taking A Different Approach to Kids and Bad Behavior
Writer Katherine Reynolds Lewis, in Mother Jones, examines the latest approaches to addressing children and discipline—most notably, that timeouts, negative consequences, and other traditional punishments might not be as effective in many cases as helping kids manage their own emotions. It’s based on “Collaborative and Proactive Solutions,” a program that was developed by psychologist Ross […]
Posted inBooks, Nonfiction, Quotes
We Keep Testing, and Nothing Changes
It is worth noting that American students have never received high scores on international tests. On the first such test, a test of mathematics in 1964, senior year students in the US scored last of twelve nations, and eighth-grade students scored next to last. But in the following fifty years, the US outperformed the other […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
Education Reform, Spent on Consultants
During the next two years, more than twenty million dollars of Zuckerberg’s gift and matching donations went to consulting firms with various specialties: public relations, human resources, communications, data analysis, teacher evaluation. Many of the consultants had worked for Joel Klein, Teach for America, and other programs in the tight-knit reform movement, and a number […]