Last September, before school began, I made my way to the Brooklyn Historical Society for the launch of Renée Dinnerstein’s new book, Choice Time. At a time of standardized tests for five-year-olds, canned curriculum, didactic instruction, and the Common Core—in a city of deep inequality and segregation—this event was long …
“Millions of workers have gotten a raise!” the Economic Policy Institute exulted in an email on Sunday. Income growth in 2015 merited the adjective “superb,” with the fastest gains among black and Hispanic workers. Yet the early childhood workforce was nowhere to be found. The stewards of our human capital …
As the season of high-stakes testing got underway, winter’s chill unabated, a petition began to circulate, a flower of democracy. “Save Central Park East 1 Elementary School!” it read
It was a moment that called for John Coltrane. The California Alliance of Researchers for Equity in Education—love that acronym, CARE-ED— had revealed the truth about the Common Core State Standards and high-stakes assessment: Overall, there is not a compelling body of research supporting the notion that a nationwide set …
“April is the cruelest month,” T.S. Eliot wrote in the opening canto of The Waste Land. The month in which America celebrates child abuse prevention. Each spring, the English Language Arts, math, and science tests arrive, New York City’s third- to eighth-grade public school students busily filling in bubbles. As …
This morning, succumbing to my raging digital addiction, I opened yet another email from Education Week. The American Society of Addiction Medicine defines this malady as a “process” condition—distinct from an obsession with activities such as shopping, eating, and doing drugs. A primary, chronic disease of brain reward, motivation, memory …
These are dark times for the children in the garden. They have lost their place at the center of education. The shepherds of early development are struggling to move them in from the periphery. But the task is daunting, efforts thwarted in the age of standards-based accountability. Teaching Kindergarten: Learner …
Support for the arts has been steadily dwindling in the United States. Lots of competition out there for a slice of the multi-trillion-dollar American budget. And, besides, we’re too busy with more important stuff, aren’t we? But other, more enlightened views have held sway. Fifty years ago last September, Lyndon …
Early childhood professionals have long been a beleaguered species. For starters, they’ve had to battle the perception that they’re “just babysitting,” providing “day care.” Never mind the field’s heroic history, chronicled in Exchange magazine a few years ago by Roger Neugebauer and Debra Hartzell. Heading the list was the Sheltering …
There’s nothing like a megadose of civic action to boost my serotonin—especially in these dark times. Several days ago, Parent Voices NY posted to their website an eloquent, diplomatic request
