King Corn
King Corn follows an acre of corn to market and a future as ethanol, food sweeteners, and animal feed. The journey anchors a curriculum on the international food crisis and how much choice we have over what we eat.
Features
Taking Teacher Quality Seriously
If test-based evaluation of teachers is unfair and unreliable, whats a better approach? A negotiated union/district plan in Montgomery County, Maryland, offers an alternative.
Professional Development
Race to the Top timelines create pressure on winning states to farm out professional development. Is online “canned” PD the wave of the future?
Plotting Inequalities, Building Resistance
This content is restricted to subscribers
Who’s Crazy? Students Critique the The Gods Must Be Crazy
This content is restricted to subscribers
Trigger Laws – Does Signing a Petition Give Parents a Voice?
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
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
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?
“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
The everyday experiences of a 1st grader push a teacher to confront gender issues in the classroom.
The New Model of Teacher Evaluation
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.”
Candles in April
This content is restricted to subscribers
Scholastic Inc – Pushing Coal
Rethinking Schools exposes links between Scholastic and the coal industry. Three days later, Scholastic promises to stop distributing pro-coal curriculum.
Tiger Moms and the Model Minority Myth
The media splash around Amy Chuas writings about Chinese mothers exploits Asian stereotypes, exacerbating racial tensions and creating additional obstacles for vulnerable youth.
Te Tremble – An Unnatural Disaster
Who was responsible for the enormous impact of the earthquake in Haiti? High school students use a mock trial to explore the economic, social, and political background to the tragedy.
Early Childhood Military Education?
The U.S. military advocates for early childhood education, but for all the wrong reasons.
My Failing School
A faculty boat trip becomes a metaphor for a school condemned to closure.
Testing What Matters Least
Teacher educators are disturbed by the implications of the high-stakes test for literacy specialists.
Shhh!! No Opinions in the Library
IndyKidsand kids’ right to an independent press. A current events magazine for young people, written from a social justice perspective, has to fight for space in public libraries.
The Birth of Rethinking Schools
An excerpt from the autobiography of one of Rethinking Schools’ founders.
For or Against Children
Originally an organization of parents fighting for better school funding, Stand for Children has made an alarming U-turn. What’s up?
Science for the People
Ninth graders develop science literacy as they become neighborhood environmental experts and activists.
Who’s Bashing Teachers and Public Schools and What Can We Do About It?
To build an effective movement against the top-down strategies that are ripping public education apart, we need to take a closer look at who wants reform and why.
Keepers of the Second Throat
When Chicago stole my mother’s tongue, it also stole all her yesterdays. A poet’s lyric plea for teachers to nurture their students voices and stories.
Talking Back to the World
Student poetry about what raised me is woven into graphic art.