tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post4058248278523637335..comments2024-03-28T19:47:39.985-04:00Comments on CURMUDGUCATION: NY: Those Peoples' KidsPeter Greenehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16511193640285760299noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-66209213209571178372016-02-13T08:30:27.944-05:002016-02-13T08:30:27.944-05:00While I am in full agreement with you on this, the...While I am in full agreement with you on this, there is still a large elephant in the room. The reformers talk about it mainly in code and our side tends to avoid it altogether. This elephant is that portion of students who don't want to learn. At best, these kids will sit in a classroom, oblivious to and completely detached from anything going on around them. More often, they will be disruptive and interfere with those that are trying to learn. These non-learners aren't born that way, they are created. Created by poverty and social circumstances, by parental absence and apathy, created by an education system that labels a kindergartner as behind - a failure from the moment they walk into the school. There are many reasons for a child to become a non-learner, but once there, it is still a reality we must acknowledge. Many schools and classrooms have passed the tipping point where they have too many non-learners, consuming too many resources to effectively teach the rest. The school can be laser - focused on the intent to educate the child, but unless the student Wants the education, the effort will fail. Will an anorexic benefit from the intent of the great chef? <br /><br />Let's look at "those people" through a different lens. It is not a matter of race, economic status, or social background. The defining characteristic is "do you want to learn?" "Are you willing to work to the best of your ability every day?" If not, you are one of "those people". That doesn't mean you don't have value as a human being and doesn't relieve the rest of us of our social obligations to help where we can. However, it DOES mean that placing you in a conventional school setting is indeed a disservice to you and to those students who are there with the will to work and learn.Bill Whittenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13949827122153876200noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-11923017597794384282016-02-10T10:35:16.056-05:002016-02-10T10:35:16.056-05:00I have a friend--an excellent teacher who tried to...I have a friend--an excellent teacher who tried to do just what you describe: re-open a school with exactly the same children, but mostly new teachers and new leadership, in Baton Rouge LA. I wrote about it, over two years, visiting in person three times. The entire culture of the school changed. Scores only nudged up, however. Although federal policy gave them 3 years to "turn around" the RSD announced the school was closing in the middle of year two. AFTER the school was disbanded and kids and teachers sent elsewhere, the second year scores came in--huge bump up. Sometimes, when you actually accomplish what policy-makers say they want, and turn a school in a new, better direction, they still want to believe in failure. Here's one of the blogs about Delmont School: http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/teacher_in_a_strange_land/2012/07/louisiana_turnaround_year_one.html?r=645163669Nancy Flanaganhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00047575960944913289noreply@blogger.com