My Beauty Best Teacher

One of the other school districts that I worked in has a gifted and talented program that I thought would interest some of my readers because it shows how possible and how extensive the liberal agenda can stretch into the government-run schools in our country.

In some schools, gifted and talented programs for students may offer increased enrichment opportunities, ask students to take more leadership on important issues, hold seminars to improve critical thinking skills, or include visits to local museums. But in other schools, just the the program that I observed in a local middle school, the gifted and talented programs instead are serving as laboratories for molding future communist-left-leaning Democrats.

In this government school, gifted and talented students are usually identified in elementary and middle schools and then put into a program apart from other students, where they learn and work on an additional or alternative curriculum. They are told over and over that they are not different from other students, just unique- separate, but equal. Myself, I'd just tell these students the truth- 'hey, you're farther along and advancing more rapidly, so let's put you in a different class or give you additional projects and challenge you.' But the liberals who run the education system instead say to these students 'we're all equal, but we're going to put you in a special class to mold your unique skills.'

And the scary part is what they are trying to mold the best and brightest into. Apparently what this school is trying to mod its most gifted and talented students into is government planners, communists, bureaucrats, and solid liberal Democrats. They do this molding in several ways.

These gifted and talented students have to create and run United Nations type projects. That is, the United Nations projects that are funded with other people's money, unaccountable, full of corruption, and tend to make the situation they are supposed to 'fix' worse. Students work on projects that have to deal with environmentalism (how to force businesses through government power to do certain things, or propose laws to do this, etc.), global appeasement policies (peace on earth, how to stop the war, stop the war in Iraq, how to make friends with France, etc.), tax and spend schemes (pretend money comes from air and isn't stolen from hard working people's pockets, and think up ways to spend it, etc.), wealth-redistribution schemes (collect for charities, can drives, etc.), and focus on human rights abuses (especially caused by the US).

The gifted and talented programs that some government-run school districts are setting up for their impressionable youth steer clear and never mention anything related to individualism, morality, or personal rights. In fact, not a single project touched on those issues. The goal apparently with these programs is to emphasis themes of government control and elitism, but steer clear of morality, individual rights, and individual responsibility.

The students get the time to put together these projects by being pulled out of classes that are deemed 'unimportant' by the liberal elites who run the school- they are pulled out of business or economics classes, they are pulled out of shop, home economics, or auto mechanics classes, and they are pulled out of gym and physical education classes. According to the liberals who run the school, these are 'dumb' classes for the 'dumber students', and the gifted and talented students should instead be learning how to rule us, make decisions for us, and control our behaviors.

Where gifted and talented students could take on more real life examples and challenges, and begin to train to be our future business leaders, and improve their discipline and teamwork skills, and be part of the tradition that made our nation great once- skilled mechanics, dedicated farmers, good shop keepers, smart accountants, and hard-working factory workers- these students instead spend vastly more time talking and learning about government intervention in business and society in the belief that if our country had more lawyers, bureaucrats, and communist leftist pinko's, it would be a better country.

It is a scary thought- in schools all around the nation, our future leaders- our most gifted and talented- are being put into government re-education programs designed to make students into liberal Democrats. Scary indeed.

Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan - It should be about the student!

My children take tests all week. They are in AP, accelerated classes and they have to take them. This isn't really about that kind of test. I've been thinking about the modern implementation of the standardized testing procedure.

What if we had a modern doctor that practiced bloodletting?
Protests. An angry outcry against a practioner who had ingnored the past 200 years of medicine to go back to the archaic and harmful habit of draining a sick person's blood into a bowl in order to remove the body of impurities. Complete and utter nonsense. Not only nonsense, harmful.

Is standardized testing a modern day bloodletting? Perhaps not that extreme, but extreme enough to have an outcry from the masses demanding that education system be reformed. At the heart of this outcry is perhaps the standardized testing-centric curricula and methods we've adapted in order to "improve our scores."

So you want to know why this overtesting has made so many mad?

Here are the reasons I think that the modern implementation of the archaic standardized test scrapes at the sensibilities of a modern parent and teacher.

1 - The intense "drill and kill" leading up to the test themselves.
Runners know that in order to prepare for a big run, they must first scale back. In fact, no runner competing in a big race would schedule another big race in the two weeks prior. This is because the body needs time to recover. If you give everything you have, you don't have anything to give in the big race, especially when you need that extra kick. So, you drill and work hard and then a week prior you begin your taper, which is enough work to get you ready for the big day.

There is no taper in this activity. In fact, some schools give their own versions of the standardized test throughout the year to try to diagnose problems. Some even the day before. They figure if they give a monstrous test the day before the big test that things will be fresh on the student's minds. Perhaps there is some truth to that, but the fact is that the student who is supposed to do well on the test is exhausted.

2 - The intense pressure adults put on the kids about the tests
We do pep rallies, we lecture. We cajole. We bribe. We do everything we can to get the kids to take the test "seriously." In doing so, we perk up the ears of the majorly rebellious and perhaps all the kids. Except for graduation tests or advancement tests, the kids rarely have any "skin in the game" the only way the tests are high stakes is when the school is involved. Many parents don't have "skin in the game" either. Those who care have kids who make better test scores.

This is kind of like having a group of runners and telling them that if they can finish as a group, first, that their coaches will get a ribbon. The students won't get a trophy on their wall or a picture or anything. Just the coaches. While some students love their coaches enough to do this, it is rare.

Additionally, we don't even tell the kids if they won or not. We don't show them their test scores. They don't know how they did. It is a black box of agony and they don't see the point.

3- Measures of improvement are unrealistic
Our football team right now is entering the playoffs. While the coaches want to win as much as the students, these playoffs are about the kids on the field. Coaches know that some years they have more talent than others and do the best to win with what they have. We've had 23 games of winning in a row. Our coaches have done a great job advancing our kids and improving every single game.

But to tell them that they have to keep winning forever and always be better. Is that realistic. All schools go through an ebb and flow. For whatever reason, we don't know, some of our classes at school are full of boys and others are a mix of boys and girls. We don't know why. Sometimes the same happens with academics. We have a strong class one year and the next year the class isn't so strong.

4- We're not measuring the delta but rather a raw, unscientific measure of scores
To be fair, you should measure a single class all the way through and how that class advances. To compare one year of eighth graders to the next isn't an apples to apples comparison. A set of kids may have a great test score but compared to their prior year, they fell back. To compare this year's 8th grade to last year's 8th grade (unless you have an incredibly large "sample size") in most schools just isn't a fair comparison of whether the school improved. A measure of this year's 8th grade to the scores of the same students last year is a better measure. We're not looking at the delta.

The delta is the change. To be the most fair, a student's test scores would travel with him/her no matter what school the child went to. Each year, a child would have their scores this year versus their scores last year compared and the delta would be calculated. (The increase or decrease.) The addition of all of those deltas would help us see if those students were improving or not improving.

You'd also have to factor in that at some age levels kids naturally improve more than at others. (During puberty, for example, a child has a problem learning a lot and you're lucky if they hold steady - their body is just too busy doing other things to learn a lot. -- Geil Browning of Emergentics told us this at a Leadership Georgia workshop some time back.)

Material is everything. My husband runs several production lines.He runs the same line every day. Sometimes everything goes wrong in the line. It might be the temperature or a certain person who is out who is a key player but most often it is something subtle wrong with the materials.

You can't always blame it on the kids. But the fact is that some classes are smarter than others. For whatever reason, who knows. But the fact is there. So it becomes a matter of punishing a school when they have a class that doesn't measure up to the prior year.

5 - The test is standard
When you have a standard test, you make it easy to cheat. Everyone is given the same test. The stakes are high. The kids don't care. This class of kids is not as smart. I may lose my job. My husband lost his job and I can't afford to lose my job. What can I do? I've taught them everything I can. What is going to happen?

There is no excuse for cheating. None. But when met with a hopeless situation there are very few people who will fall on their sword. There just are. Teaching is noble and when teachers cheat it brings us all down. If you're perfect, please message me on Twitter, so I can meet you. I am not excusing the cheating but I am saying that good teachers make bad mistakes every day. Usually when we're tired or upset or under a lot of pressure but it happens.

The real world isn't standard.
One year I was upset about one of my children's K4 performance on the "environment section" of the standardized test. The teacher showed me what he missed. He didn't properly identify a SUBWAY TURNSTILE. He also didn't identify a judge (shown in a gray english style wig with a gavel) and he didn't know what a bus stop was. While my urban counterparts may argue that every 4 year old should have been on a subway, we are in a rural community and that is simply unimportant for a 4 year old to know here.

Schools teach different things. They are in different environments. The things that call out words and experiences that most kids have in urban areas penalize rural students and vice versa. There should be a way to control for this, however, we are trying to standardize.

The real world isn't multiple choice.
There are only 4 answers - multiple choice. In the real world when a factory worker needs to use a gauge to measure, there are no multiple choice answers. I know a local plant that turns away 80% of applicants because they don't know fractions. Even more than that they have to take metric, convert to inches and go back to metric again.

The reason we did multiple choice in the first place was so a computer could grade it an we could test cheaply. The only reason we keep doing it is because the testing companies prefer it that way. There is no reason at all to keep having multiple choice as the only mode of input. That is ludicrous.

Why don't we have adaptive testing?
Right now, if a child doesn't know decimals he/she may still have to answer 10 decimal questions. How many questions does it take to know a child doesn't know decimals? Probably just two or three. At that point, a computer could start going "down" to see if a child knows fractions. It should adapt and say "OK, what does this child know?"

If a child is reading below grade level, the test is on grade level. If they can't read it, they can't answer the questions. At all. The entire reading section is pointless. Instead, the test should adapt and say, "OK, what reading level IS this child on?" The same with every subject.

The fact is paper and pencil can't adapt. And adaptive testing is really about personalizing the knowledge of the student. It is about understanding the individual student. If we can understand enough individual students and then aggregate that together then a school can create a plan to help those students progress and move ahead.

But it isn't about really understanding and helping an individual student at all. No. It seems to be more about finding more heads to put on pikes than it is about helping every child get ahead.

A paper, standard, non adaptive test is a waste of time for a child who is underperforming. It is also a waste of time for a child who is overperforming. One of mine scores 99% on math every year. Well, how high is this child in math, anyway? We do not know, "because the test only goes up to a certain grade level and then it stops." We could have some real math prodigies among us and not know it. If a child is exceptionally gifted in an area, that test should adapt and go up to the level so we can see where that child really is.

Teach well and test when it is time.
At our school we just teach away, take a few days to test and then we keep teaching. Not much of a lead in. Not a big fanfare. We just work hard to teach exceptionally well and then we take a look at what happened. Our leaders look at the teachers to see if a class of kids drops from one year to the next to see if there is a weak link.

The parents get a copy of the test scores. I always tell my children their strengths and their areas where they are going to have to work.

Standardized Testing: The Modern Bloodletting
So, all of these things add together to go against the modern sensibilities of parents. When they see questions that don't line up to experiences and to the curriculum of the local school. When they see their children stressing out. When they see test prep starting earlier and earlier and even going year around. They realize that the customer is wrong.

The customer of education should be the individual child about 5-10 years after getting out of high school. Is that child thankful and feel well prepared for being successful in the world? Did that child learn something to make their life better.

The customer of education has become the DOE and the standardized testing data keepers who determine the money and resources that flow to a school because of  a test score that is flawed at its very core.

Many of us are sick and tired of what public education has become because we see that the students coming out are not well educated.

Perhaps I should go back and restate. I think that perhaps standardized testing is the modern bloodletting of education. We are zapping our resources, our time, and our energy on something that is not truly measuring what our kids are learning. We are bringing all of the kids to the middle and bringing down our gifted and we are missing a valuable opportunity to really personalize learning for students.

The fact is that we are falling behind in international test scores. Is it because we're so busy testing that we've hurt learning? Is our desire to improve our test scores actually having the opposite effect because we're focusing on the wrong thing? We have to get better, but how.

If you improve every student in the country then the entire country will improve.

But some will say that this isn't about the student anyway.

And such is my point.

Since my my last post (My Personal Experience Fighting the Worship of Earth Hour) was so serious, I'm going to follow it up with a lighter post today, about stuff that I find funny.

First, take a look at the picture of the bear- according to the US Fish & Wildlife Service office in Kalispell, Montana, that little fella has taken to sitting every day at the picnic table apparently waiting to be fed and to have his winter den dug by government employees. Although he once was self-sufficient, he now begs for a handout every day from our generous government. Because of this, residents have taken to calling him Bearack Obama!

Next, according to the Detroit News, a new industry is starting up in Detroit, and I suspect that it actually is the fast-growing industry in the city (other than working for the government). The new industry is urban hunting and skinning. Yes, like a scene out of I Am Legend, the wilderness is retaking the city of Detroit, and the animal population is moving into areas that were once inhabited by productive men. Years of Democrat control in action!

The story in the Detroit News is the story of a young 69-year old entrepreneur, who has to supplement his Social Security checks by hunting raccoons in the city of Detroit. Apparently this guy kills coons with the help of his rifle and coon dog, butchers the meat, and sells it to local residents, and he also sells the skins- but doesn't pay taxes on these sales (must be a Democrat). The meat is not USDA approved (probably something to do with rabies), but the video about the story (go to the link for the article to watch it and howl with laughter) shows coon meat being served with liver and onions and Faygo red pop- just the way mom made it!

In other news, Obama recently was in England, and since he had to talk to people over there, he brought with him 5 speech-writers and 12 teleprompters for the weekend. I don't think that was enough- I heard some of his stammering and stuttering in a press conference- but still- 12 teleprompters? Can't you just bring one and move it from place to place? Or do they have to put a separate one up everywhere he goes and load it with his thoughts?

Sadly the teleprompter didn't let his wife know that you aren't supposed to touch the Queen of England- it's apparently a big no-no. Doesn't anyone on his staff do any research on this stuff? I guess not- Michelle put her arm around the Queen and gave her a noogie on national television- probably not a good idea, but at least her arms were fantastic!

Lastly, least we forget how low the bar was for Presidents (and yet Obama still gets under it), here is a hilarious clip from a George W. Bush press conference where he is talking about fighting the biggest threat to our lives- zombies. That's right- laugh if you want, but apparently zombies are a big threat, and I am glad our President did everything he could to wipe them out- click on the link if you don't believe me. Enjoy!

NOTE to NEW READERS: New readers, please feel free to also check out some of my recent good posts like Obama is a Caudillo, The Inside Deal: Obama's Economic Program, Employment-Population Ratio Drops to 58.5%, Earth Day: Is it just one big Communist Plot?, Gifted Programs in Schools Training Future Liberals, or Obama On Inner and Outer Circles of Leadership. Also feel free to link to blog-curhatanku.blogspot.com on your blog, and bookmark conservativeteacher.blogspot.com so you can become a regular reader of the battles of a conservative teacher's attempt to advance the principles of liberty and freedom.

• QR Code Treasure Hunt Generator from classtools.net

  QR Code treasure hunt generator. Classtools.net has long been my favorite place for graphic organizers, easy video game review games, and Fakebook, but now there is a QR Treature hunt generator. It does all the work for you. So cool. Take a look and do a kind of treasure hunt kids will love.

  tags: education teaching qrcode

• Terronez Library Media Center - “He is wise who knows the sources of knowledge — where it is written and where it is to be found.” — A. A. Hodge

  Since August 2006 this Media Center has been blogging, sharing links and information. Such useful information here. Sometimes we show by example more than we can say by giving assignments. You can tell students blogging is important but if you don't do it. You can also see how assignment are given on this blog. For teachers and media centers to review who are considering blogging.

  tags: education teaching blogging librarian library

• ICDL - International Children's Digital Library

  International Children's Library includes many ebooks that you can download onto your Kindle. The books are organized by grade level and there are over 10,000 of them. (A big hat tip to Peter Fogarty who shared this resource over at the TES forum, a place where I find a ton of great things for my classroom.)

  tags: ebook teaching education kindle free literature

• Challenge Toolkit - Resources - TES

  A challenge toolkit. If you are a gifted and talented or teacher of children who have challenges, there are 50 activities in this powerpoint that can you can adapt to any subject.

  tags: education teaching all_teachers

• Active minds make learning fun - Resources - TES

  Tons of resources and lesson plan ideas in this article. The best thing is that every idea is linked to free downloadable items.

  tags: education teaching

• firework safety - Resources - TES

  If you are a parent or homeschooler, you'll have time to use this powerpoint between now and New Year's. This is a lesson about how to design a poster for firework safety.

  tags: education teaching safety health fireworks all_teachers

• lordofsurvival / FrontPage

  This wiki used at MICDS (a great school in St. Louis where I've been before) is a Lord of the Flies survival game using a wiki. This is a great idea for a lesson plan with collaborative writing as well as understanding the book content.

  tags: education teaching writing commoncore

• Common Core Resources

  For those who have told me that there is no use for pinterest in schools, here is a common core pinterest curated by Liane Courtney. Most web 2 tools can be useful, it lies in the willingness of users to make them so.

  tags: education teaching commoncore writing

• Cybraryman Writing Prompts

  Tons of writing prompts for composition teachers.

  tags: education writing teaching literature

• Here's Thomas Gladstone's Abolitionist hymnal

  I've found something that is just beautiful here that expresses how I feel about an important cause. yes, education is my primary focus and I'll spend a lot of time helping you teach and use technology well. But a person who teaches should have a heart. My heart will be with those who cannot speak for themselves.
  
  Chorus from "I am an abolitionist" taken from this page of hymns that make you ask why.
  
  "I am an Abolitionist!
  No threats shall awe my soul,
  No perils cause me to desist,
  No bribes my nets control;
  In freedom will I live and die,
  In sunshine and in shade,
  And raise my voice for liberty,
  Of nought on earth afraid."
  
  January 2012 has been proclaimed National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month here in the US.

  tags: education abolition teaching

• I Can Stalk U - Raising awareness about inadvertent information sharing

  If you're teaching students about digital citizenship, perhaps you should start at the site, icanstalku.com. It starts off by explaining meta data and the settings in your cell phone that reveal way too much about where you are located.

  tags: education digiteen digitalcitizenship teaching

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

 

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In today's segment of "Meet your Overlords," we meet alleged former US Communist party member and current WMD Policy Czar Gary Samore. His technical title is "Special Assistant to the President and White House Coordinator for Arms Control and Weapons of Mass Destruction, Proliferation, and Terrorism," most people know him as the guy that is working to destroy all the United States weapons of mass destruction unilaterally as a show of good faith.

Unlike other Obama czars (Aneesh Chopra, Technology Czar, I'm looking at you), he is an expert on the science, technology and policy issues related to weapons of mass destruction, having worked on these issues as a policy advisor for various nonproliferation institutes for the last 10 years and before that working in the Department of State and National Security Council. There is no doubting his resume, as he has headed up the attempts to make sure that Iran and North Korea do not aquire nuclear weapons.

Obama may have met Mr. Samore at Harvard, where he was a teaching fellow in the late '70's, or met him in the course of his work for the Department of State or NSC, or met him through the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, where Mr. Samore was serving as VP recently. This Foundation is a major grant-making private foundation based in Chicago, and has awarded more than US$4 billion since its inception in 1978, some of which I imagine went to various causes community activist Obama raised money for during his time with ACORN. It appears that this group is a liberal group, so one might imagine that Mr. Samore also shares a liberal world view.

Like most of Obama's czars, we really don't know much about him or what he does, since he is operating beyond the power of law and was never confirmed by the Senate. If you know anything else about him, please email me and I'll update this segment of "Meet your Overlords".

NOTE to NEW READERS: New readers, please feel free to also check out some of my recent good posts like Obama is a Caudillo, The Inside Deal: Obama's Economic Program, Employment-Population Ratio Drops to 58.5%, Earth Day: Is it just one big Communist Plot?, Gifted Programs in Schools Training Future Liberals, or Obama On Inner and Outer Circles of Leadership. Also feel free to link to blog-curhatanku.blogspot.com on your blog, and bookmark conservativeteacher.blogspot.com so you can become a regular reader of the battles of a conservative teacher's attempt to advance the principles of liberty and freedom.

A new story of common wisdom from the bestselling author of The Traveler's Gift.

Orange Beach, Alabama is a simple town filled with simple people.  But like all humans on the planet, the good folks of Orange Beach have their share of problems - marriages teetering on the brink of divorce, young adults giving up on life, business people on the verge of bankruptcy, as well as the many other obstacles that life seems to dish out to the masses.

Fortunately, when things look the darkest - a mysterious man named Jones has a miraculous way of showing up.  An elderly man with white hair, of indiscriminate age and race, wearing blue jeans, a white T-shirt and leather flip flops carrying a battered old suitcase, Jones is a unique soul.  Communicating what he calls "a little perspective," Jones explains that he has been given a gift of noticing things that others miss.  "Your time on this earth is a gift to be used wisely," he says.  "Don't squander your words or your thoughts. Consider even the simplest action you take, for your lives matter beyond
measure…and they matter forever."

Jones speaks to that part in everyone that is yearning to understand why things happen and what we can do about it.

Like The Traveler's Gift, The Noticer is a unique narrative is a blend of fiction, allegory, and inspiration.  Gifted storyteller Andy Andrews helps us see how becoming a "noticer" just might change a person's life forever.

 

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Mfonobong Nsehe asks? in an American Chronicle article:

Are there any universities at all which are as supportive of student entrepreneurs as to organizing business plan competitions to fund businesses of students which have mega potential?...Where are you going to find venture capitalists in Kenya or elsewhere in Africa who will be willing to swallow their pride and listen to a student entrepreneur who is armed with nothing but a world-shaking idea?

He believes that:

We have such bright student entrepreneurs in Africa. But until African financiers and the self-proclaimed 'Venture capitalists' are easily accessible and listen to student entrepreneurs in our African Universities, Africa may never have its own answers to such mega, internationally famed corporations like Google, Yahoo, TicketAdvantage, CollegeHumor and Facebook which were all the brainchildren of student entrepreneurs. We need financiers who will believe in and support the dreams of African student entrepreneurs and get those big ideas out of the boxes and into the pages of history. African student entrepreneurs are equally as smart, gifted and visionary and if supported can come up with big, world-changing ideas that would change the world.

And so, will the venture capitalists in Africa please stand up?

via eikonne

Basil Enwegbara asks "...Can Africans learn something from today’s Chinese and Indians? Can we learn that a strong market for goods and services is a leading cause of economic growth, and that market is itself a major cause of capital, investment, and technological advancement? Are we now convinced that economic growth is an organic process, involving many interrelated factors? What about understanding that even the banking industry and other financial institutions do not create the conditions for economic growth, since they are only important when an economy is sufficiently sophisticated to make efficient and creative intermediation between savings and business?...Have we now finally realised that a continent that does not educate majority of its young men and women in job-enhancing education (science and engineering) to prepare them as useful citizens is not building its future high-value carrying workforce? Are we still in doubt that Africa having the world’s single largest number of highly educated professionals in the US and yet they could not be made to work closely with their African counterparts—like their Chinese and the Indians counterparts—to help jumpstart continental economy is our collective sin future generations will find difficult to forgive us? Have we now come to pose the question: How come our well-trained scientists and engineers, those that refused to migrate are allowed to roam our streets without being fully mobilised? What about the understanding that the future of our economic development lies in the mobilisation of Africa’s entrepreneurs, especially our highly gifted men and women who have the psyche of economic warriors? Put differently, are we now fully aware that it is this lack of entrepreneurial dynamism that today separates us from the developed economies of the West and recently Asian economies..."

David Kaiza writing in the East African discusses the wider cultural impact of Nollywood:

The future impact of this is beyond what Pan Africanists a generation ago would have dared dream: Almost at one stroke, these films have ring-fenced the African world. Once, not too long ago, scholars looked at the African world as a fractured existential context in which Africans craved for Western objects by which to present themselves.

Elaborating on the burgeoning cultural capital of West Africa in comparison to East and Southern Africa he asks:

Were they more gifted? No. They had the advantage that the pre-colonial cultures their peoples developed remain, to this day, intact and wholesome. Along the length and breadth of Nigeria, annual cultural festivals provide a rich heritage of types, symbols, language, narratives and drama that creative Nigerians dip into time and again.

This is the view from where I sit right now.I am taking up money at the softball gate in 90 something degree weather in the hot blazing sun. Or I was a minute a go.

A Little Umbrella 
Another teacher came by and she gave me her umbrella. It means a lot because now I can read, grade papers on my iPad, and blog!

 You can see the umbrella there in the picture looking out on the field where our 16-0 football team is practicing. (3-0 on this season)If you look hard, you might just see our headmaster / head football coach, Ross Worsham, out there working.

I mention him because he did a little thing on Monday in our faculty meeting. Except it meant a lot.

A Little Question that was a Big Deal
Ross read our devotional made 3 announcements and then he said,

"I want to hear from you. Is there anything I need to notice or be aware of even if it is little, I want to know."

So the teachers told him a few little things - noise in the hall after middle school lunch and small things that if left unchecked could have grown.

The fact that he asked, listened and acted meant so much! In fact this may just be a little thing that means everything.I wish every school could be gifted with a man as good as Ross Worsham and a woman as good as our curriculum director, Betty Shiver. They are in our rooms, they work hard, they love us and the students. We love them.


It is the little things that mean a lot. 
If you are a principal or administrator out there, I hope you'll ask and care about the little things. If you are afraid to ask, you have problems.

If you are a teacher, you can do little things that mean a lot too! Loaning an umbrella is just the beginning.

 If you are a parent, you can encourage. I used to buy my son chocolate milk and put a sticky note one it and say " Love, Mom." The way to my son's heart is his stomach and beef jerky, gum, chocolate milk, and Big Macs all help him know I love him. (I did draw the line last week when he asked me to bring him 4 Big Macs after football practice- I told him 3 was enough. But you get the point!)

 Will you take a minute today, right now and do something little? It might just mean a lot!

 Due to a blogger API problem this could not be posted live from my iPad. I have found that both Diigo (they fixed it in less than 24 hours after I emailed them) and Blog Press on my iPad wouldn't link to my blogger account!

This is my first live blogging attempt- here are my thoughts and notes from Sarah Palin's speech today at the RNC Convention.


10:30- Longest applause ever. Either shows that people really like her, or it shows that as a women she doesn't have any control over crowds (kidding- but watch for this comment in the fever swamps tomorrow). I get a feeling early on that she is too scripted- what made Rudy's speech so great was it's 'unscripted' quality. Watch Rudy's speech here.

10:32 Palin talking about McCain is rather boring. Palin talking about herself is exciting. Palin talking about ideas and ideals is exciting. Palin going after Obama is exciting. Is Palin just a perfect candidate- mother, NRA, son joining up, etc- or is she a perfect example of how great typical American families are? Parents of special needs- that is an interesting demographic to go after- how many bases does she cover?

10:37 There is the nod to families having lots of challenges, public and private- great joys also great challengers- that's a reference to her daughters pregnancy. Harry Truman reference, impressive. Argument in favor of small towns- that's traditional. I work in a small town, and think the people there are a lot more impressive individuals than the people out of the inner cities.

10:41 Hockey Moms for Palin signs- gotta lover America. I read some of the transcript of this speech prior, but she delivers the lines well. She delivers. Purpose for entering politics- challenge the status quo, further the common good, and leave nation better.

10:47 In Michigan, home to the 6 year single state recession, our Governor has two fancy mansions, private cars, and a slew of perks- maybe auction off our governor on ebay too? So they had a 'windfall profit' in Alaska- and she gave it back to the people- would Obama do that, or would he channel to his friends and special interests?

10:51 Her talking about energy policy has more detail and specifics mentioned than the 'alternative fuel' and 'hope' vagueness that makes up the Democrat platform. Check- all of the above. Obama is all wind and noise- over and over people talk about his dramatic speeches, but nobody ever says what are in them. Good rip- Obama written two books but never any pieces of legislation. Another good rip- Obama talks about victory, but not about in Iraq, only about his own campaign.

10:57 Palin says Obama's platform is all wrong- mentions lots of issues- energy, security, and taxes. Those are very important- and are the areas where the federal government is supposed to play the largest role- but the problem with this is that a lot of people do care about education, poverty, healthcare, environment, etc.- we can't avoid those issues, Palin. Shout-outs- cheer, she said my state! Choice Americans face- change to promote careers, careers to promote change. Compares that McCain's name is on landmark legislation- Obama's name is on buttons and signs. This is getting a little long- she needs a thunderous closing.

11:02 American Presidency is not supposed to be a story of person discovery- love it. Not a world to organize- huh, never thought of it like that- Obama does want to organize us, like he isn't one of us, like he doesn't like us almost. He wants to use government to control us, and put us in what he thinks is the proper place. Community organizer. Is this yet another election on the Vietnam war- are our soldiers from this war hero's or not? For a season, a gifted speaker can inspire with words- will the season of change pass? What happens to past Democratic nominees- do they achieve great things, or disappear?

11:07 Speech came to an okay close- again, talking about McCain is not her strong suit- she was amazing through most of the speech though- very exciting. McCain comes out- I always get the impression that he is very proud of Palin- like she represents all that is good about America, if only given a chance, and he gave her that chance. McCain is a grandpa in some ways- like Eisenhower was, and Eisenhower is more and more appreciated as time goes on. Some people in the fever swamps pointed out that he doesn't stand close to Palin or hang on her- they suggest that's because she doesn't like him, or he doesn't like her, and they insinuate something of a dirty old man to it. I think it's because he doesn't want to steal her spotlight- he is proud of her and what she represents.

Fox coverage- brilliant speech. MSNBC- effective speech. CNN1- sounded good. CNN2- running a Spears-Palin Connection graphic, skipping speech entirely. PBS- annoyed with how good it was. Obama response- ironic attempt to divide people, make her ideas a Republican-Democrat thing, and stay in the muck of the Bush world by claming it was divisive, partisan, and writen by Bush.

Michelle A. Rhee is the former chancellor of the District of Columbia Public Schools system of Washington, D.C. From 2007 to her resignation in October of 2010, she aggressively sought to reform the D.C. school system by closing schools, adding early-childhood programs for the gifted and talented, adding programs for art and music classes, adding special education services to District schools, fired several central district administrators and school principals, and passed a contract with teachers that traded weaker tenure protection for higher bonuses.

The results? In the two years that we have data (2008 and 2009), the graduation rates increased by 6%, reading pass rates had increased by 14 percentage points, math pass rates had increased by 17 percentage points, and enrollment decreased by only one percent (which was a slower decline than prior years).

The results? Rhee's approval ratings decreased from 59% to 43% from 2008-2009, parents began complaining, teachers fought her tooth and nail, the media turned on her, political support fell out from under her, her co-workers increasingly threw her under the bus, and the teachers union even went so far as to demand that Rhee apologize for her actions.

The results? Adrian Fenty, the mayor who had nominated her and stood by her lost his re-election bid in the 2010 Democratic primary election, to Vincent Gray, who was a community activist strongly supported by the teachers union. After this, Michelle Rhee resigned from her position, feeling both that the incoming mayor should be able to appoint a new chancellor and that she was doing more harm than good in her current position.

That's the story of Michelle Rhee, boys and girls, and is a good lesson for the challenges that those who want to reform the system faced. She gave more money to good teachers, got better results, cut out the inefficient and wasteful parasites in the educational system, graduated more students, and shook up a culture- and because of that, she and her supporters were punished. The Democrats, the teachers union, and the media had a chance to continue the progress, to give real reform a chance, but instead decided to support the parasites in the central office, support the bad and lazy and unqualified teachers in the system, and punish success. That's what we are up against as teachers, and that is why I blog.

Check out these books on Michelle Rhee: THE BEE EATER: Michelle Rhee Takes on the Nation's Worst School DIstrict and American School Administrators: Michelle Rhee.

From Publishers Weekly

Don't buy the narrative that the main-stream media is selling regarding the Republican Primary- the truth of the matter is that Mitt Romney is not having trouble putting away a weak field of Republicans because he is unlikable and doesn't connect with voters, but rather he is doing pretty much exactly as good a job as other past non-incumbents did in close primary races and is doing a good job of winning over key voters and will soon with the nomination over a highly qualified and determined primary field. Although the liberals and progressives and elites in the media want you to think otherwise, analysis and data (as usual) destroys their uneducated arguments and shallow judgements.

Via Powerlineblog comes this excellent analysis from John Hinderaker called THE MORNING AFTER:

...So Romney has won 56% of all of the delegates that have been chosen so far. Normally that would be considered a strong performance, but Mitt struggles to get respect from the commentariat.... But by historic standards, there is no reason to scoff at Romney’s performance so far. After Super Tuesday in 2008, John McCain had won 740 of the 1,235 delegates that had been selected, or 60%. On the Democratic side, Barack Obama had a hair over 50% of the delegates, leading Hillary Clinton 965-951. Were reporters then talking about the Democratic contest “plodding on” as Obama “failed to land a knockout blow?” Of course not: they thought the contest was a thrilling one, because they liked both candidates.

Or consider 1992, when the Democratic presidential field was considered so weak that the candidates were called the “seven dwarves.” Bill Clinton, who we now know was a politician of genius, won that race. But as of early March 1992, Clinton was running behind “uncommitted” and, of the committed delegates, he had won just 57%. By early April, Clinton had 68% of the committed delegates (a much lower percentage if uncommitted delegates were counted) against some of the weakest competition ever: Paul Tsongas and Jerry Brown....

...So by historic standards, Romney is within the ballpark of what one would expect from a non-incumbent candidate who goes on to win his party’s nomination.

The truth of the matter is that Mitt Romney is winning against a very good field of candidates- a two-term Senator who is a gifted speaker and has a solid person life named Rick Santorum (a resume that is superior to President Obama in 2008), a former Speaker of the House of Representatives named Newt Gingrich (a resume that is superior to President Obama in 2008), and a long-time Congressman who is a veteran and doctor and has a committed following (a resume that is superior to President Obama in 2008). And Romney has already knocked out of the race several other good candidates- the Governor of booming Texas named Rick Perry (who has a resume that was superior to President Obama in 2008) and a former Governor and Ambassador named John Huntsman (who has a resume that was superior to President Obama in 2008).

This is a strong field, especially at a time period when the Republican Party is transitioning away from the old guard liberal establishment of Bush and McCain and Dole towards the new conservative talent of Paul Ryan and Bobby Jindhal and Sarah Palin and others. The GOP is at an odd place where the Reagan and conservative revolution generation is too old or too discredited and the new tea party generation is too young and untested- and yet a guy like Mitt Romney has a strong resume and background and talents that has enabled him to ably bridge this gap.

Even in a rather down year, the GOP has a wealth of talent and ideas to offer to contrast to the tired and old partisanship and personal attacks that President Obama is offering, and Mitt Romney has connected with voters and fought a national and organized campaign to take a solid and commanding primary lead. This is the narrative, based on an analysis of the resumes of his opponents and the delegate math in comparison to other primaries, and this is the narrative that the media is refusing to tell because of its sloppy reporting, personal bias, and lack of quality research.

Mitt Romney is doing a great job of rising to the top of a group of able Republicans who would all do a better job of being President than Barack Obama. This is the true narrative of the Republican Primary race of 2012.

Full Disclosure: I endorsed Mitt Romney recently. See my post Endorsement: Vote for Mitt Romney for GOP Nominee.

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly while expecting a different result. And so I am going to say it- the left is insane. They are not logical, reasonable, and acting in a rational manner- instead, the left, the liberals, the Democrats, the Obamacons, are insane- doing the same old communist song and dance and expecting a different result. They say 'oh, maybe 1 trillion in debt spending instead of 2 will work' or 'cap and trade is moderate and not at all like nationalizing the oil industry' and 'reasonable health care is nothing like socialized health care'- I hear these Democrats on the radio every day trying to fool you into thinking that what they are doing is something new, something different, than good old fashioned communism. And not the nice kind of communism that you believe when you join high school model UN- nope, these leftists are practicing and preaching and encouraging you to support the same style of communism, the step-child or direct ancestor of, Stalin's branch of communism.

NOTE to NEW READERS: New readers, please feel free to also check out some of my recent good posts like Obama is a Caudillo, The Inside Deal: Obama's Economic Program, Employment-Population Ratio Drops to 58.5%, Earth Day: Is it just one big Communist Plot?, Gifted Programs in Schools Training Future Liberals, or Obama On Inner and Outer Circles of Leadership. Also feel free to link to blog-curhatanku.blogspot.com on your blog, and bookmark conservativeteacher.blogspot.com so you can become a regular reader of the battles of a conservative teacher's attempt to advance the principles of liberty and freedom.

The rain didn't stop the show at the 23rd annual Black Family Reunion Celebration yesterday September 6, 2008. The National Council of Negro Women, Inc. moved the ecumenical prayer breakfast indoors to the basement of Union Wesley A.M.E. Zion Church. Afterall the church is where it all began. I was happy to be an invited guest. The Howard University Gospel Choir directed by Mr. Clifton Ross, III rocked the house with their gospel musical renditions. Their performance brought to mind the old adage to be young, gifted and black. Wow ! There was nary a dry eye in the house. Bishop Eddie Long of Lithonia, Georgia gave the keynote address with an awe inspiring speech that encouraged African-Americans to not give up on the dream that an African-American would become our next president. Bishop Long encouraged all to find their 'inner child' and dream like we were children- that change is a-coming.

Festivities for the Black Family Reunion celebration continue today on the Washington National Mall beginning at 10:00 a.m.

For a long time, I've had my doubts about the Democrat's much-touted subsidies and tax credits for filmmaking in Michigan. Most of my doubts center around the fact that these subsidies are being given away with very little oversight and are being given away to those with political connections (for example, Michael Moore sits on the board that recommends who gets these tax credits- and recently gave them to himself). This lack of transparency and political favoritism has not received the attention it should, because hidden behind the wall of secrecy that is the Democratic-run Film Office, there are a lot of corrupt deals being made that are screwing taxpayers over. Now it is confirmed though.

Breaking News: The chief-of-staff for a Grand Rapids Democratic State Congressman has been implicated in a million-dollar fraud scheme whereby he would buy a $4 million dollar building for $50 million and then apply $12.5 million dollars in subsidies through the state of Michigan's disgraced Film Office.

Noah Seifullah, who has been forced to resign from Congressman Robert Dean's staff, was in the process of finalizing the details of the Hangar42 studio scheme when the news broke. The Michigan Film Office had already given preliminary approval to the request for over $10 million in film-credits when the news broke.

This Hanger 42 scheme represents just the tip of the iceberg into the corruption that is rampant in the Michigan Film Office, so much so that Janet Lockwood, who is the director of the Michigan Film Office, is being forced to resign amid the growing criticism. Her office has stonewalled efforts to find out more information about the Hanger 42 deal, and many others, and she has attempted to provide citizens as little information as possible about the decision making process involved in the give-away of millions of taxpayers money.

The Mackinac Center was the first to publicly raise questions about the Hangar 42 deal with an essay and investigative video posted on its website May 20. They reported that the studio was on the market for as little as $9.8 million as late as February, but apparently sold for as much as $40 million not soon after that in order that the buyer could claim a much larger film-credit. As of today, the Michigan Film Office, the Michigan Economic Development Corp., the seller and the buyers are all unwilling to answer questions about this scheme, and the Democratic Governor who is so proud of her Film Office (and even bragged about the Hanger 42 deal as evidence of the success of the film-credits in her recent State-of-the-State speech) nor the Democratic-controlled Michigan Legislature have pressed for answers or explanations.

The Grand Rapids Free Press deserves a lot of credit for putting this story together and piecing together the details here. They found the speech where Noah Seifullah outlined a 'hypothetical' situation whereby massive amounts of fraud could bilk the Michigan taxpayers out of millions. They then connected the 'hypothetical' situation described by Siefullah to the real world Hanger 42 project. Give the Grand Rapids Press credit for doing the real work on this story, fighting through government obstruction and attempts by Democrats at every turn to keep the corruption and fraud that is running rampant in their Film Office secret.

This scandal raises important questions. The Michigan Film Office is Democrat Governor Jennifer Granholm's pet project, one that she brags about often, and yet this scandal raises questions and concerns about how thoroughly corrupt it is. She continually plows taxpayer money into this project, and yet her top example of success for this program (Hanger 42) has proven to be a corrupt sham. Next, at what point in this sham did someone cry foul- who knew what when at the Michigan Film Office about Hanger 42? Perhaps the Attorney General should start asking some questions. Is this the kind of public-private corporate welfare project that Democrats promote, rife with corruption of public officials? Last, is the corruption limited to just the local (state) Representative? Or is this something that many officials in the Democratic party are caught up in?

Stay tuned for further updates, and please feel free to link to this story- perhaps if this story gets big enough the Michigan Film Office and the millions that it is giving out to politically-connected individuals under great secrecy can be brought to light and analyzed and cleaned up.

UPDATE: Here is a video of the story:


UPDATE II: Looks like the Attorney General is getting into this situation- according to this story, Mike Cox (the AG for Michigan, and GOP candidate for Governor) is looking into the Hanger 42 scheme.

NOTE to NEW READERS: New readers, please feel free to also check out some of my recent good posts like Obama is a Caudillo, The Inside Deal: Obama's Economic Program, Employment-Population Ratio Drops to 58.5%, Earth Day: Is it just one big Communist Plot?, Gifted Programs in Schools Training Future Liberals, or Obama On Inner and Outer Circles of Leadership. Also feel free to link to blog-curhatanku.blogspot.com on your blog, and bookmark conservativeteacher.blogspot.com so you can become a regular reader of the battles of a conservative teacher's attempt to advance the principles of liberty and freedom.

In reply to the emails from snarky liberals who ask 'just what do I expect Obama to do about the Gulf oil spill', the reply is 'get the hell out of the way.' See, that's pretty much my response to every question about 'just how can government improve the situation'- to which I reply 'government can get out of the way of our god-given ingenuity, industry, and desire to do goodwill.' Let loose the power of free markets and civil society and restrict government to limited and defined roles, and the world will be a better place. In this particular case, just 'what can Obama do'? Here is one of dozens of examples that are specific and have few drawbacks but Obama isn't doing.

Obama can temporarily waive the Jones Act.

The Jones Act, which is Section 27 of the Merchant Marine Act of 1920, is a United States Federal statute that regulates maritime commerce in U.S. waters and between U.S. ports. It requires that all goods transported by water between U.S. ports be carried in U.S.-flag ships, constructed in the United States, owned by U.S. citizens, and crewed by U.S. citizens and U.S. permanent residents. The purpose of the law was to support the U.S. merchant marine industry, specifically the union bosses who build ships in the US (although the extensive unionization largely destroyed the US shipbuilding industry) and the union bosses who crew ships registered to the US (although the extensive unionization forced most ships to register elsewhere). Many opposed the law because of its anti-free market approach, specifically agricultural interests who argued that it drastically raises the costs of shipping agricultural products.

This act effectively forbids foreign nations from assisting the US in times of need by banning ships flagged, crewed, constructed, or owned by other nations from transporting cargo from one US port to another US port. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff temporarily waived the U.S. Shipping Act for foreign vessels carrying oil and Natural gas from September 1 to 19, 2005, in order to help in the recovery efforts- ie, government got out of the way in order to improve the situation.

As of today, the Obama administration has not waived the Jones Act. When White House Spokesman Robert Gibbs was asked about it, he had a flippant answer that is characteristic of the Obama White House- “If there is the need for any type of waiver, that would obviously be granted. But, we've not had that problem thus far.” Oh, if only that were true.

According to information obtained by Fox News, some of the best clean up ships which are owned by Belgian, Dutch and the Norwegian firms are NOT being used. Coast Guard Lt. Commander, Chris O’Neil, says that is because they do not meet “the operational requirements of the Unified Area Command.” One of those operational requirements is that vessels comply with the Jones Act. Other reports state that Dutch and Belgian companies (countries that are “longtime NATO allies) have technology and resources that, coupled with American assistance could, cut the projected oil spill clean-up time from nine months down to three months.

Now we learn that three days after the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico, the Dutch government offered to help:

It was willing to provide ships outfitted with oil-skimming booms, and it proposed a plan for building sand barriers to protect sensitive marshlands. The response from the Obama administration and BP, which are coordinating the cleanup: “The embassy got a nice letter from the administration that said, ‘Thanks, but no thanks,'” said Geert Visser, consul general for the Netherlands in Houston.

Part of the reason that the Obama administration may have turned down the offer of help from the Dutch government is that it would have required the waiver of the Jones Act, and Obama, under pressure from the labor unions, was not even willing to think about doing that, even if doing so would have saved our nation billions in cleanup costs and saved the jobs of thousands of Gulf residents and saved thousands of animal lives.

Don't kid yourself- there is a lot that the government can do to help the situation in the Gulf- like getting the heck out of the way of people who want to help. Obama could have waived the Jones Act and allowed foreign ships to assist in transporting goods (like oil-skimming booms) in order to help clean up the mess. But he didn't. Obama refused to waive the Jones Act. Likely he didn't even know about it (the reaction by the White House to the Gulf spill is increasingly being described as confused, muddled, unintelligent, uninformed, and amateurish), but that doesn't matter- as President of the United States of America, it is up to him to figure out how to get the federal government out of the way of people who want to help us in times of need. He didn't. Hold him accountable.

UPDATE: New readers, please feel free to also check out some of my recent good posts like Obama is a Caudillo, The Inside Deal: Obama's Economic Program, Employment-Population Ratio Drops to 58.5%, Earth Day: Is it just one big Communist Plot?, Gifted Programs in Schools Training Future Liberals, or Obama On Inner and Outer Circles of Leadership. Also feel free to link to blog-curhatanku.blogspot.com on your blog, and bookmark conservativeteacher.blogspot.com so you can become a regular reader of the battles of a conservative teacher's attempt to advance the principles of liberty and freedom.