Volume 26, No.1

Fall 2011

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  • Blowin’ in the Wind

    We’ll need everything we’ve learned and built in the past 25 years to keep fighting for social justice education.

  • Rethinking Schools and the Power of Silver

    By Christine Sleeter

    A teacher educator reflects on the impact of Rethinking Schools.

  • The Birth of Rethinking Schools

    By Bob Peterson

    An excerpt from the autobiography of one of Rethinking Schools’ founders.

  • For or Against Children

    The problematic history of Stand for Children

    By Adam Sanchez, Ken Libby

    Originally an organization of parents fighting for better school funding, Stand for Children has made an alarming U-turn. What’s up?

  • Trigger Laws – Does Signing a Petition Give Parents a Voice?

    By David Bacon

    Trigger laws are sweeping the country as a new strategy for bringing in charter schools. This investigative report follows the trend from its California origins.

  • Patterns and Punctuation – Learning to Question Language

    By Elizabeth Schlessman

    A 5th-grade teacher adapts student-generated science inquiry to punctuation. Her goal: to help students see punctuation as part of the creative process, not a series of rules to memorize.

  • ‘Before Today, I Was Afraid of Trees’ – Rethinking Nature Deficit Disorder

    By Doug Larkin

    A high school chemistry teacher takes his students to a city park to tap maple trees for syrup. How can we build student comfort with the natural world without seeing city-raised students as “deficient”?

  • What Do You Mean When You Say Urban?

    Speaking honestly about race and students

    By Dyan Watson

    “Urban” has become one of a series of euphemisms for African American and Latina/o students. What preconceptions hide behind the language?

  • It’s OK to Be Neither

    Teaching that supports gender-variant children

    By Melissa Bollow Tempel

    The everyday experiences of a 1st grader push a teacher to confront gender issues in the classroom.

  • The New Model of Teacher Evaluation

    How Would Ms. Frizzle Fare?

    By Leigh Dingerson, Marni Barron

    Remember The Magic School Bus? According to D.C.s new teacher evaluation system, even a teacher who takes her students to the moon is less than “effective.”

  • A Letter to Our Readers

    By Bill Bigelow

    Dear Rethinking Schools friends, To borrow from Dickens, for Rethinking Schools this has been the best of times and the worst of times. The best? We’ve never played a more important […]

  • SOS March Builds Pushback to Corporate Reform

    By Stan Karp

    Pushing back against sustained attacks on teachers and public education, thousands of educators, parents, and activists came to Washington, D.C., July 28–31 to “Save Our Schools.” They responded to the […]

  • Keywords

    By Herbert Kohl

    Keywords By Raymond Williams(Oxford University Press, 1985) Keywords for Children’s LiteratureEdited by Phillip Nel and Lissa Paul(NYU Press, 2011) The writing and content of Rethinking Schools is 25 years young, fresh, and honest—no […]

  • Our picks for books, videos, websites, and other social justice resources 26.1

    Check out these valuable resources, reviewed by Rethinking Schools editors and Teaching for Change colleagues.