Kids need access to books and school libraries to read better
This letter appeared in The Los Angeles Times, in response to the fact that reporters made no connection between was made between low literacy scores and the gutting of school library funding in California in . . .
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Bill Nye, The Science Guy shouldn't believe everything he reads about the Common Core...
On Big Think, Bill Nye (The Science Guy) advises us to "use your critical thinking skills. Evaluate evidence. Don't believe everything you read or see" (December 20, 2016). Mr. Nye is a nearly good example . . .
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Suggestions for the U.S. Department of Education...
These are suggested priorities for the US Department of Education for the next four years. None of the ideas presented here are original with me.
Focus on poverty
By far the most consistent . . .
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Some Gaps in 'Fixing the Achievement Gap'...
Ronald Brownstein published the same article in two major publications: On May 19, “The Challenge of Educational Inequality” appeared in the Atlantic and one day later “Fixing the achievement gaps” appeared in the Los Angeles . . .
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LETTERS: Senator Alexander is wrong -- the issue is not 'feds v states'
Is the issue Feds vs. States? Lamar Alexander says: "Most of the controversy that exists today is the result of Washington getting involved [in state education policy] over the last six or seven years." (http://time.com/3681776/lamar-alexander-no-child-left-behind/)
. . .
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Common Core? Really -- 21st Century Skills?
"I contend that, instead of insisting on more and more standardization, we should be increasing variety, flexibility, and choice in what we offer in our schools (Noddings, 2009, p.243). " ... useful knowledge changes as . . .
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Nostalgia for 'history standards' goes back nearly two hundred years... 'Complaints about school quality go back at least to the 1830's...'
Once again, someone has discovered that children in the United States don't know "history." It's not the first time, and probably won't be the last. On February 2, 2014, Nicholas Meyer wrote an opinion to . . .
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COMMON CORE: The Common Core: A Disaster for Libraries, A Disaster for Language Arts, a Disaster for American Education ... 'There never has been a need for the common core and there is no evidence that it will do students any good....'
Ohanian Comment: After laying out the template of what children need and what Common Core delivers, in this article in Knowledge Quest(January 2014)Stephen Krashen warns that under CCSS, language arts will consist entirely . . .
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Reading for meaning must be defended! Libraries and interesting reading materials -- not 'explicit and structured phonics' -- key to reading success for all children
[Editor's Note: As Substance and others report almost daily, the Neoliberal attacks on the education of working class and poor children -- and their teachers -- are international in scope. The following letter from the . . .
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COMMON CORE...The Common Core Disrespects Self-Selected Pleasure Reading
I have seen this quote in several places: “Students need opportunities to stretch their reading abilities but also to experience the satisfaction and pleasure of easy, fluent reading within them, both of which the Standards . . .
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Academic Jibberish
[Editor's Note: The following essay, "Academic Jibberish" by Stephen Krashen, was originally published in the RELC Journal. 43 (2): 283-285, 2012. It is reprinted here with the permission of Dr. Krashen].
. . .
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Job Requirements for Federal Policymakers in Education... Real educators need not apply
In a letter published in the Oklahoma Observer (January 9), Iris Lochner asked a very good question. We require candidates for State Attorney General to be licensed attorneys, so why don’t we require that candidates . . .
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Duncan to pump $21.5 million into College Board
U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has announced that the US Department of Education will provide $21.5 million to high poverty students to pay fees for taking AP tests. In other words, $21.5 million of . . .
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Chicago's new teacher evaluation system deeply flawed
[Editor's Note: The following brief critique of the new teacher evaluation system in Chicago from Stephen Krashen was published in the Chicago Sun-Times as a letter to the editor on April 1, 2012. It is . . .
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Scholastic’s Exaggerated Claim... 'US DOE Striving Reader Study Proves READ 180 Works!'
A recent ad from Scholastic claims that READ 180 students have made “tremendous progress” in three locations: Newark, Springfield Mass, and Ohio, citing a US Department of Education report on Striving Readers programs. Scholastic notes . . .
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American high schools have been terrible for more than 100 years... Just ask Harvard or the 'experts'
[Editor's Note: The following, titled "Our history of dissing high school grads" was sent to the New York Post, Jan 23, 2012. It is followed by the latest from the Post on how terrible our . . .
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Against National Standards and National Tests
The movement for national standards and tests is based on these claims: (1) Our educational system is broken, as revealed by US students' scores on international tests; (2) We must improve education to improve the . . .
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American teachers don't need the 'incentives' being proposed... America needs to bring children out of poverty, not bring them more tests
[Editor's Note: With a signifiant confrontation looming during the national convention of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) at Chicago's Hilton and Palmer House hotels beginning on November 17, 2011, Substance launches our . . .
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SUBSCRIPT: Rumor that Krab, Umbridge to start own testing company to get 'Common Core' right
The Washington Post's blogger Valerie Strauss recently conducted an excellent interview with SpongeBob, published in a recent Answer Sheet column (http://tinyurl.com/6xfussu). I added a comment that included some information that might not yet be . . .
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Poverty is the problem that must be solved... Our Schools Are Not Broken...
[Editor's Note: The following — Our Schools are Not Broken: The Problem is Poverty — by Stephen Krashen was originally given as the Commencement Speech, Graduate School of Education and Counseling, Lewis and Clark College . . .
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SUBSCRIPT: Let's get really serious about extending the school day
Let's get serious about extending the school day
Sent to the Chicago Tribune, June 10, 2011
It was inspiring to read Jean-Claude Brizard's bold suggestion that Chicago
extend the school day ("A push . . .
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'Please test us too: A bad solution to a non-existent problem...' Education Department officials are proposing the greatest amount of testing in the history of the planet
[Editors Note: The following was originally submitted to Newsday but was not published by them].
Please test us too: A bad solution to a non-existent problem (S. Krashen)
. . .
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Free Voluntary Reading Wins Again, or: How Norway Can Do Even Better in Academic English Development
Hellekaer (2009) examined predictors of self-assessed ability to read academic texts among 578 Norwegian university students. The ability to read academic texts in Norwegian was a clear predictor (r = .43), in agreement with claims . . .
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What President Obama actually said about tests
The President's remarks about tests were widely quoted since he made them on March 28, 2011. Here is the exact exchange as reported by the White House on the Web. For those who cannot . . .
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Is breast feeding the answer to our literacy problems? Probably not.
A recently published Australian study on the impact of early breastfeeding on school test performance at age 10 captured the interest of the media, but the most important results for educators were typically not included . . .
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Answering Arne Duncan... 'The problem is poverty'
[Editor's Note. Early this year, the Washington Post did another one of those mindless interviews with Arne Duncan, currently U.S. Secretary of Education, wherein Duncan is able to say the most outrageous things about U.S. . . .
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Is Breastfeeding the Answer to our Literacy Problems? Probably Not.
A recently published Australian study on the impact of early breastfeeding on school test performance at age 10 captured the interest of the media, but the most important results for educators were typically not included . . .
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The problem is poverty: Evidence from Gerald Bracey
The entire basis for the national standards/testing movement is our low scores on international tests when compared to other countries. Our scores, however, are only low because we have such a high percentage of children . . .
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Testing in schools. It's going to get worse.
[Editor's Note: the following letter — "Testing in schools: It's going to get worse" — was sent to the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle, October 14, 2010, and is published here for the benefit of our . . .
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Value-added should not be used at all
[Editor's Note: The following letter to the editor was sent to the Seattle Times following the publication of a Seattle Times article on so-called 'Value-added' assessment of teachers. We are publishing it here as part . . .
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'Value-added' doesn't add anything relevant to real teaching and learning
[Editor's Note: The following letter was published in the Los Angeles Times and is reprinted here from our colleague Stephen Krashen. Readers who want to know more about Stephen Krashen's lifelong commitment to democratic public . . .
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Fix poverty, and until then focus on comprehension
Dr. Stephen Krashen is a professor emeritus at the University of Southern California. He has written numerous books on his research into literacy and language acquisition. In recent years he has emerged as a persistent . . .
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There is a 'magic bullet' for improving children's literacy: Libraries and trained librarians
The following letter was sent to the Desert News (Utah), March 24, 2010
In "Reading scores hold steady on nationwide test" (March 24), Sacramento Superintendent David Gordon is quoted as saying . . .
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An Odd Pattern on the ISAT: Confirmation of S. Zupin's Results
Susan Zupan noticed that there were unusual gains on the ISAT between grades 5 and 6 and between grades 7 and 8 in Illinois. She found this was so for a random sample of 42 . . .
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Charter school in New York kicks public schools kids out of their school library... Educators Need to Know More about Libraries: The Case of JHS 126
"There's this whole library full of new books bought for our school, and we can't even use it," (8th grader at JHS 126 in Brooklyn).
According to an article in the NY . . .
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The MDRC Policy Brief, Reading First, and An Allergy to Reading
The MDRC Policy Brief, Reading First, and An Allergy to Reading
By Stephen Krashen (www.sdkrashen.com)
Understanding Reading First, a "policy brief" published by MDRC (Herlihy, Kemple, Bloom, Zhu,, and Berlin, 2009), presents a . . .
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Scholastic 'Research'... The Scholastic 2008 Kids and Family Reading Report... Why Scholastic's Researchers Need to Read More
Scholastic recently released a survey on how much and what children are reading these days, interviewing 501 children, ages 5 to 17, and their parents or guardians from 25 cities (Scholastic, 2008).
. . .
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Letters: NEA ‘Reading’ debate continues
NEA ‘Reading’ debate continues
January 2, 2008
Substance:
The NEA as a Messenger of Complacency?
In his discussion of the suppression of the Sandia Report in December’s Substance, Gerald Bracey notes . . .
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The 'Decline' in reading in America: Another case of the "Shock Doctrine"?
The recent report from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), To Read or Not To Read, announced that Americans are reading less and reading worse. This resulted in a flurry of articles and reports . . .
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