Dave Eggers on Teacher Layoffs

The lives of public school teachers have never been more surreal. While they're being pilloried in film and in the press - for their unions being too strong, among other things - last week, 2,800 teachers in the Bay Area were told they might not have jobs in the fall. How's that for job security?

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Education on Counter-Earth

A new comic from Tom the Dancing Bug

Test Prep Season

Yes, it's that happiest, most educational season of the year! I would rather see parents working on skills, and we spend too much time saying so at the store, but that doesn't stop the wave of parents buying books to improve scores. This year, we cut the number of titles down to 1. That's right - we chose one series: Prepare and Practice from Teacher Created Resources. We've reviewed many titles - Spectrum, Carney, Kaplan, but all those publishers have failed to keep their books current. The Prepare and Practice series is new, and best of all, it is straightforward, with an emphasis on test-taking skills. These books strike a good balance, and students will finish the book ready to do their best!

What are Libraries Good For?

Philip Pullman defends an alien concept - good things that don't make a profit!

“The greedy ghost understands profit all right. But that’s all he understands... He doesn’t understand libraries at all. That branch – how much money did it make last year? Why aren’t you charging higher fines? Why don’t you charge for library cards?”

The Value of Play

From the NY Times:
SARAH WILSON was speaking proudly the other day when she declared: “My house is a little messy.”Ms. Wilson lives in Stroudsburg, Pa., a small town in the Poconos. Many days, her home is strewn with dress-up clothes, art supplies and other artifacts from playtime with her two small children, Benjamin, 6, and Laura, 3. “I let them get it messy because that’s what it’s here for,” she said.

Ms. Wilson has embraced a growing movement to restore the sometimes-untidy business of play to the lives of children. Her interest was piqued when she toured her local elementary school last year, a few months before Benjamin was to enroll in kindergarten. She still remembered her own kindergarten classroom from 1985: it had a sandbox, blocks and toys. But this one had a wall of computers and little desks.

“There’s no imaginative play anymore, no pretend,” Ms. Wilson said with a sigh.

From BoingBoing

This won't be offered at the Golden Apple any time soon - but I agree with his point that doing things the old-fashioned way is often a much more valuable process.

Happy 2011!

Today's my first day back at the store for this year. Last week, we started moving things around again - with the holidays behind us we can really set things up the way we planned. Our classroom is also a big item this week. We had to put our plan on hold - too busy and we needed the room for extra stock during December. Now it's full speed ahead - we'll be clearing the last storage items out, setting up tables and chairs and putting together a schedule for parents, teachers and kids. Watch for a Game Night coming towards the end of the month, Test Prep and GATE prep classes, Art, Preschool Readiness and some great active learning events! The new year is looking good!