Teaching our children... some propoganda from Queens Parent.

Just read an article in a local parenting magazine about what we can learn from Asians about education that quoted the 2009 OECD Programme for International Student Assessment.  She pointed to the importance of learning to take tests and memorizing by rote, which I thought was odd.  After 15 minutes of research and actually reading the assessment on which she based the ENTIRE ARTICLE, I realized she was either a lazy or intentionally misleading readers. 



From the assessment:  In 2001 China moved "away from repetitive and mechanistic rote-learning towards increased student participation, real-life experience, capacity in communications and teamwork, and ability to acquire new knowledge and to analyze and solve problems." 

Yeah... I just blew up your entire thesis to justify our regressive fifteenth ranked education system by doing a google search and actually reading the source material.  (The irony of the 2009 PISA focusing on reading and comprehension was not lost on me.)

She also did not take into account what the top three schools have in common:  Equity.  The goal of the Shanghai/Hong Kong system, Korean system and Finnish system is educational equity.  PISA is specifically testing students ability across social and cultural lines, assessing "how far students near the end of compulsory education have acquired some of the knowledge and skills that are essential for full participation in society. In all cycles, the domains of reading, mathematical and scientific literacy are covered not merely in terms of mastery of the school curriculum, but in terms of important knowledge and skills needed in adult life."

In making education equitable, these countries have actually made their educational systems better; more effective; more relevant; increased the pay, training and respect for teachers. (In Finland, teaching is one of the most respected professions, accepting only the top 10% of students into the field.)

Shanghai and Hong Kong have taken very different approaches but both have implemented a goal of "universal education."   They are integrating rural and urban schools and removed "key" schools at the elementary and junior high level.  Their goal of equality of education has gone hand in hand with the removal of "learn by rote" education.  This change truly took effect in 2001.  By 2009, they ranked #1 in the PISA assessment.

In Finland, the road to reform was slow and steady, nearly four decades, and its "current success is due to this steady progress, rather than as a consequence of highly visible innovations launched by a particular political leader or party."



"Finland is one of the world’s leaders in the academic performance of its secondary school students, a position it has held for the past decade.  This top performance is also remarkably consistent across schools. Finnish schools seem to serve all students well, regardless of family background, socio-economic status or ability...  possible factors behind this success include political consensus to educate all children together in a common school system; an expectation that all children can achieve at high levels, regardless of family background or regional circumstance; single-minded pursuit of teaching excellence; collective school responsibility for learners who are struggling; modest financial resources that are tightly focused on the classroom and a climate of trust between educators and the community."

Finnish schools are also so much more:

The first thing to note is that these schools offer more than education. These are full-service schools. They provide a daily hot meal for every student. They provide health and dental services. They offer guidance and psychological counseling, and access to a broader array of mental health and other services for students and families in need. None of these services is means-tested. Their availability to all reflects a deep societal commitment to the well-being of all children.

A commitment to the well-being of all children.

Doesn't this sound like a place you want to send you child?  How you want them educated?



What none of these systems have is an emphasis on testing.  In one case (China) they moved from a test based system to an integrated "real life" practical methodology to increase student involvement.  Finland does not test its students until they are in their teens, children don't start school until they are seven and art, music, play time and hands on education are  integrated and balanced with traditional subjects.

It is telling that all of this comes from a final report called Strong Performers and Successful
Reformers in Education:  Lessons from PISA for the United States (emphasis mine)

We have much to learn.

And unfortunately we have to deal with journalists/writers, like this hack from my local parenting magazine, using falsehoods to push an agenda or simply doing shoddy research and politicians who use education as a tool of electoral politics or, in the case of the Texas school board, as a weapon to spread a specific theological or ideological way of thinking.   We also seem to have fallen into a trap of blaming educators, making it a profession that no one would want to go into, and our flippant use of the word "accountability" instead of giving them responsibility and empowerment and focusing on the student.

PISA's goal in the assessment is to show us what similarities successful systems have.  Sadly, we in the US seem determined to trudge in the opposite direction.  Here's to hoping we change our mind.

You can see more about the most recent PISA results here.

You may also read the report, Strong Performers and Successful Reformers in Education:  Lessons from PISA for the United States  here


And find more presentations on Strong Performers and Successful Reformers in Education here.





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The Baby Gear Guy

No idea why it took me so long, but I just found out about the Baby Gear Guy.  Possibly because I'm a bit of a nerd and I am totally into testing this stuff myself.  And baby things sort of make sense in my head, too.

But if you want to bypass all the work, go here!  Plus he's giving stuff away!  Free swag!  Go!

Thanks to Cynthia Silver at http://babyintow.com for the recommendation. 

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The Protesting Parent, the parents of OWS.

Just found this blog and blogger and wanted to pass her along.  She's done what some of us were too chickenshit to do...  take her child to OWS and say, "I'm a parent and I'm here for my kid."  Turtle is the same age as her little one and we stayed home... not because we weren't able to go down, not because the twenty minute train ride was too long for him, but because dad is kind of a pussy and was afraid.  I'll admit it.  So, I stayed home and posted updates like crazy from friends down there, like a damned carrier pigeon.  I was a simple carrier pigeon and this woman... She was an eagle, strapping on her baby and jumping headfirst into battle.

So, check her out.  I'll be reading her book (The Protesting Parent) and joining her...  Time to man up, I think.

http://occupyingmama.tumblr.com/
http://www.babygblog.com/post/12997787386/thank-you


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The Actor's Wife: black eyes and two dollar waffle irons

This is my wife's blog. I agree with her 1000%. I would write on the subject, but why? She's said it all perfectly.

Don't forget, today is Small Business Saturday. Please go out and support the small businesses who struggle to stay open as more and more gigantic box stores pull business from them.

The Actor's Wife: black eyes and two dollar waffle irons:

At the end of the day yesterday, Chris read snippets of news from around the country: riots, arrests and pepper spray. And, he wasn't reading about Occupy Wall Street. The headlines were coming straight from the local Target, WalMart and Best Buy.
It was Black Friday. People camped out for days, bypassing Thanksgiving altogether to buy a $200 television or even more ludicrous a $2.00 waffle iron. I mean our waffle iron is on the fritz but I'm not risking my personal safety (after all, the sale madness broke into a full scale riot) to save a few bucks.

I just find it interesting that the same country that bashed our president Thursday for not mentioning God in his Thanksgiving address, turned into a national mob that was rude, myopic, and in some cases violent. I'm sorry kids, but the hero of my Sunday School lessons was the one who turned over the merchants' tables in the temple not the one who pushed his way into the front of the line for a deal on goat meat and cornmeal.

Perfectly said.

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It's small business Saturday!

Go out and support a small business today.  They are the engine of our economy.

Black Friday observation:


It is apparently okay to camp out overnight on public or private property as long as you are going to buy something.  There will be absolutely zero police presence.  And the shoppers of Black Friday were more violent and aggressive in one day of shopping than any Occupy protest has been in two months but no police will show up in riot gear...

Just something to think about.

 

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Thanksgiving Memories

 This is cross posted at www.cowboysvsindians.com, the site about the film that will "rock your face off."  (That quote belongs to my co-writer and director...)

Happy Thanksgiving from Skinned Knees In Short Pants and the tambourine playing trio at Cowboys Versus Indians (Ambarish Manepalli, Geoff Quan and me).

Happy Thanksgiving from New York!

Written by Chris VanDijk, co-writer, Cowboys Versus Indians: The Movie (2012)

I have been writing about Thanksgiving for nearly four years and yet somehow, engrossed in the tale of our characters, I have had little chance to reflect upon the Thanksgivings of my youth save the remembrances of pick up football games and the feast itself.

Looking back now I am struck by the vivid memories that I seem to have locked away just for this post:  The snows of Utah blanketing the Salt Lake valley and the purple veins of the rock peaking out of snow covered mountains surrounding us, the crispness of frozen air in my nose and lungs, the emptiness of a ski slope on a holiday. 

There are family memories, of course, most notably my Grandma L’s kitchen in Green River, Wyoming, where the red rock formations and flat plains blow and drift with snow, the Green River frozen to a crawl.  I remember my mother staying up with her all night making her famous stuffing.  As a teenager I would stay up late, just to get the first taste with them.  It is one of my three earliest food memories along with my Grandma V’s Dutch and Indonesian feast on New Years and my mother’s chicken and polenta.  It is what drew me into the kitchen and perhaps why I find myself there so often, crafting food infused with love.  It’s how I was raised.

I still stay up late, this year dissecting a turkey late into the evening.  A full turkey for a two adults and a toddler is overwhelming.  And also meals for weeks.  Thanksgiving is not only a celebration of overabundance, but a time to consider our humility and frugality.

I remember my cousins, their blond hair and pink skin so different from mine, and riding down the snowy hills on anything with a slick bottom that would propel us.  No helmets.  Nearly every Thanksgiving or Christmas was spent with them. 

I remember Uncle D’s comb-over.  I remember staring at the beer steins in my Grandpa L’s cabinet, made of some kind of ceramic with hand written notes marking an event sitting next to his photos with the members of his mine rescue team.   I remember my Grandpa V’s photo in his Sherrif’s uniform in front of the Utah state capitol.  I remember aunts and uncles and distant cousins.  I remember the children’s table. 

I remember antelope bounding in herds of thousands across the relatively flat lands of the Utah/Wyoming border.  Drive through there today and you’ll be lucky to see one. 

I remember Johnny Cash on the television, my Grandpa V’s slippers, my father’s smoked turkey, my Uncle J grinding left over turkey into a spread with cheddar cheese, bread and butter pickles and a little mayo and mustard (and loving it), and my Grandpa L’s wool and leather winter hat.

I remember my first Thanksgiving with my wife’s family sixteen years ago, and it was awkward… we were just kids then.  I remember standing with my soon to be father-in law and not being able to figure out if the smoked turkey was done and having to call my father for advice.  We ate a turkey-less feast that year and then had turkey sandwiches later that night.  I remember introducing my eigh- month old son to my wife’s entire family, four generations, as we cruised the Caribbean and I chose to forego tradition and I ate lamb for Thanksgiving on the ship.

And I remember football. 

I can remember every living room where we watched it on the holiday.  I remember playing pick up games in the street with friends and a nerf football in front of our home in Salt Lake.  And when that couldn’t hold us anymore we’d sneak onto a field, whether it be the windy field of Green River High School or the frozen, iced over Highland High School gridiron or the beautiful view provided by my alma mater, Judge Memorial High School.  We’d hop the fence, toss over a hard leather ball, put on our gloves and hats and play.  Our attire evolved as we grew up from four layers of thermals, ski bibs and parkas, to sweats and sweatshirts to the complex fibers of branded attire and therma-core-compression-wear-goodness. 

The last time I was able to play an honest to goodness knock down drag out was over ten years ago.  Although NYC is one of the great cities of the world, a pick up game on a field on Thanksgiving is not one of the things it easily affords.  And this saddens me.

My last game, I drove my truck to the field and geared up.  I’d pulled out my old h.s. football gear, my tacky receiver gloves, towels, wristbands and cleats and pretended to be Jerry Rice or Ronnie Lott, emulating the greats I’d watch later that day as I settled my stuffed self in for an afternoon nap. 

It was slow motion smash-mouth.  We’d felt like giants. 

Gods.

Driving home to my small apartment in the avenues.  I passed a 6’9, 250 lb. beast on a Harley Davidson, decked out head to toe in fringed black leather on his way home from an early morning practice.  I looked over at Karl Malone, still in his prime, sitting astride his bike at a stop light and we gave each other a wave and a nod - two warriors heading home to grab a drumstick and feast.

Today we create new memories: a toddler’s first turkey, the joy of decorating the house, making creations out of glue, fallen leaves and popsicle sticks, standing in the cold with hot drinks watching the Macy’s parade, walking through the red/yellow/brown trees of Central Park, trying to put a parka on a squirmy little one and tracking down a missing boot, making pumpkin and five spice or sweet potato and toasted marshmallow ice creams and sharing with friends, rediscovering holiday classics with family and realizing that I am the grown up and the traditions and the memories of my past are all flowing through me into this small person, teaching him lessons I learned long ago. 

And curling up with him on the couch to watch the Lions and the Packers while he points at the screen and says, “ball?”

Yes, son, ball.

 


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Enjoy your Thanksgiving

If you're making your minimum wage employees show up for work at 1 or 2 am so you can open in the middle of the night for a few extra bucks, thus forcing them to sleep during the day and miss a holiday at home with family, you should be ashamed. (looking at you, Children's Place) 

If you are one of those people choosing to line up and storm the store so you can save $5, you're culpable as well. 

This is the one holiday that truly celebrates our own humility and the act of being thankful for simply being here; for the people who make our lives complete.  

Can we enjoy it before we jump headlong into the cynical consumerism that marks Christmas in America and the annual ritual of spending more than we have?

Stay at home, enjoy your family, be thankful for the blessings you have - the kind that you can't purchase.

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