Archive for March 2023
Risky Business
Of all the claims that schools make, perhaps the most ubiquitous is the assertion that “our students learn to take risks.” Risk-taking is meant to suggest that students are able to “move out of their comfort zones” by trying new things—like befriending classmates from other cultures or leaping into new activities or, especially, engaging with…
Read MoreStruggling with body image, then and now
Content warning: This article discusses disordered eating and eating disorders. I always thought it made sense to obsess over how my body looked. It just seemed irresponsible not to. To be an elite athlete is to strive for perfection— toward an ideal standard of performance and a standard idea of excellence. It is an…
Read MoreBlack history is your history too
People of all races should see themselves in Black history. In elementary school, February was the only time I learned about Black historical figures. I recall cutting out paper dolls of Harriet Tubman, Martin Luther King Jr., and Rosa Parks — all the same shade of brown due to the singular brown crayon. While…
Read MoreOf Dogs and Kids
I’ve been spending a large part of my time recently training and learning to train my partner’s new service dog, who is still a puppy, only about a year old, which, in dog lifeline, makes her an adolescent. It is remarkable how much she and human adolescents have in common. In fact, I have been…
Read MorePhonics Can Cure Cancer
[Editor’s note: Educators may find “A Mathematician’s Lament,” cited and linked in this essay, interesting reading.] Evidently phonics instruction can cure cancer. Well, perhaps I slightly overstate, but a recent New York Times column by Nicholas Kristoff offered some mighty powerful claims of phonics instruction as an educational panacea. According to Kristoff and nearly…
Read More