Free Republic

I guess this is one way to deal with public schools utterly failing to educate: just lower the standards for what counts as proficient.New York state has decided to permanently lower the math and reading proficiency standards due to the dramatic fall in test scores since the COVID lockdowns destroyed children’s educations. A committee has reported that student performance has been permanently damaged and that lower competence has become “the new normal.”New York will make it easier for students to reach “proficiency” on state math and English language arts tests, calling last year’s lower scores the “new normal.”A scoring committee...

Members of the UNC Board of Governors are not happy. A years-long effort to align teacher training with the best scientifically proven methods to teach reading has fallen flat on its face. Given the grim state of literacy in the state, a January report outlining UNC-System schools’ failures is particularly egregious. According to a recent third-party review of UNC educator preparation programs (EPPs), only UNC Charlotte’s EPP is properly grounding teachers in research-based literacy instruction methods, also known as the “science of reading.” The skills addressed in that science include phonological and phonemic awareness, phonics and spelling, fluency, vocabulary, and...

Recent reports attribute the nationwide low reading proficiency for K-12 students, in part, to progressive curricula from teachers colleges. Progressive approaches to teaching reading, one education advocate said, come from a 'desire to ... move away from what had been thought of as the drudgery and pain of institutional style education.' ... Recent reports show that school districts are ditching progressive curricula from teachers colleges and returning to best practices for reading. The nationwide low reading proficiency for K-12 students is attributed, in part, to these curricula. Though Campus Reform has identified teachers colleges as sites of social justice and...

A lovely aphorism holds that education isn’t the filling of a pail but the lighting of a fire. But too often, neither are pails filled nor fires lit. One of the most bearish statistics for the future of the United States is this: Two-thirds of fourth graders in the United States are not proficient in reading. Reading may be the most important skill we can give children. It’s the pilot light of that fire. Yet we fail to ignite that pilot light, so today some one in five adults in the United States struggles with basic literacy, and after more...

230,000 children who failed to show up for class when public schools reopened after the pandemic. It’s a tragedy without parallel in American history as many of the no-shows are very young — K through 3rd grade. Critical skills learned in early education were not taught to these kids, who are now hopelessly behind. ... Consider the fact that 65% of American fourth-grade students can barely read. This is a result of a radical shift to a new way of teaching children how to read. What was wrong with the old way? Well, it was old. ... What exactly are...

Some schools are now requiring that students read books that are too racy to be read aloud to school board members.How is this possible, and why is it allowed?The why is pretty simple: they are grooming kids. In fact, some of these books give explicit instructions on how to sign up for apps like Grindr, along with explicit instructions on how to perform sex acts–usually homosexual, but not always. That the descriptions are of homosexual sex is hardly the point; straight, gay, bi, queer…this is the promotion of illegal activities and enabling of sexual predators of all sexual persuasions.GRAPHIC: A...

KNOXVILLE, TN — Local wife Chelsea Hammond has just proposed a brand new 4,155-page Target funding bill to her husband but is only giving him 2 days to read through it all. Chelsea claims that if the omnibus spending package is not passed in its entirety, then their household will have to shut down and will be unable to buy necessities such as groceries and cute fuzzy socks with candy canes on them. "How am I supposed to read through all of this in just 2 days?" said concerned husband Kurt Hammond. "And don't get me wrong, honey, of course,...

Episode 76: Dyslexia is a Fancy Word for Sabotage ======================================= Ladies and gentlemen… 1: INTRODUCTION: every year our public schools spend more billions to help children become readers. But nothing works. Scores remain flat. The majority of children do not learn to be good readers Common sense tells you that your school officials do not know what they're doing. Don't let your children be sabotaged. Insist on phonics. The official story is that a fifth of all children suffer from a brain disorder which they have named dyslexia. In fact, the phonics people say that so-called dyslexia is usually not...

I am thinking of ordering Highlights magazine for my grandchild. She is 3 going on 4 and I know I loved it as a kid.The excitment of getting her own mail and then looking thru it would be fun and educational. Is it too woke these days?

An illegal immigrant murdered two men when he set his block of flats on fire in an attempt to kill as many of his neighbours as possible after he lost his job at BT and faced eviction. Hakeem Kigundu, 32, started a fire inside Rowe Court in Reading that trapped residents inside - killing Richard Burgess, 46, and Neil Morris, 45.

Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), is in Ukraine. Miguel Cardona, the Secretary of Education in the Biden Shipwreck, is worried about contraception for children. Your children were kept out of school for two years. Their reading and math scores are in the septic tank. This is not an accident or incompetence. And not us let forget that the Attorney General Merrick Garland considers complaining parents to be domestic terrorists. The elites of our country are intentionally destroying your children. You cannot sit this one out. Randi Weingarten (AFT) had the gall to Tweet that she...

It's been a number of years since I last posted this and recently decided to start doing this again. As you know, I regard most Freepers to be very well-read individuals. I like to know what people are currently reading. it can be anything - a NY Times bestseller, a technical journal, a magazine you picked up at the grocery store, etc. Please do not ruin this thread by posting "I'm reading This Thread". It's not that funny. Seriously. I'll start... I'm reading "Gettysburg: the Second Day" by harry W Pfanz. It's a deep book covering in extensive detail -...

In a surprise to nearly no one, children’s reading and math scores have plummeted. National Assessment of Educational Progress, nicknamed “the nation’s report card,” results show the first-ever drop in math and the largest drop in reading in more than 30 years. Black children had an even bigger collapse in scores. Decades of educational progress undone. Poof. Horrific. Stupid. Unnecessary. We know the school closures did this. It wasn’t the COVID virus. It was the hyper-political reaction, from the left, on reopening schools during the pandemic. The orders came from the top. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued...

Nine-year-old students' reading and math scores have dropped dramatically over the last two years, according to a new report from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), a branch of the Department of Education. In 2022 the average reading score for nine-year-old students declined 5 points from 2020, the largest drop since 1990. Average math scores for 2022 fell for the first time in the program's history, dropping 7 points from 2020. The NCES's nationally representative report specifically examined student achievement during COVID-19 lockdowns. The center is expected to release a broader report later this year as part of the...

I have a question that I hope someone here can help with – especially if you taught elementary school education in the late 1950s to early 1960s or have knowledge of public education history of that era. I remember nothing about how I learned to read! I recall that my parents never really talked ‘baby talk’ to us; as soon as we were able to learn words and speak, they spoke to us in more or less adult language. So, I grew up knowing a lot of words, and probably using a lot of them without really knowing them except...

Commentary: Why Johnny can’t read — 100 years of teaching without phonics Minnesota reading scores will remain dismal, and the gap between African Americans and Latinos and whites will persist, until our schools adopt systematic pure phonics to teach our children to read. The Minnesota Department of Education just released test scores for 2022. More than 50% of Minnesota third-graders didn’t pass the state reading test. Over 70% of African-American third-graders didn’t pass. Eighty-five percent of African-American third-graders in Minneapolis Public Schools didn’t pass. How did this happen? Because a majority of our schools still do not truly embrace systematic...

Any science fiction fans out there? Interesting article about a new scifi book dealing with the Chinese genocide against the Uyghurs. Sounds like the author is a conservative Catholic.

The largest teachers’ union in the country recently proposed that its summer 2022 reading list for students include a book that defends the act of disrespecting the National Anthem by kneeling for it before sporting events. As reported by The Daily Caller, the National Education Association (NEA) lists the book “Why We Fly” on its website for suggested reading in August of 2022, as students prepare to return to school. The book includes marijuana use by teenagers and focuses on two cheerleaders who decide to kneel for the National Anthem after being inspired to do so by a football player...

Finally—my 6th book, Educational Elephant’s Guide, Study School : Easy Brain Tools for Every Subject just launched, and you can download the digital version for free—this weekend only (through Sunday)! Regular price is $3.99. Study School focuses on life-time learning. For this purpose, the Educational Elephant organized content by subjects rather than grade levels. As we build study skills, however, our grades in school can also improve. Each Study School level reveals fun ideas to overcome challenges, study smart, build on your strengths, and pursue interest-led studies. Students can gain higher test scores in reading, writing, math, science, social studies,...

Police departments facing more and more all-terrain vehicles, dirt bikes and motorcycles on the streets are using any tool possible to stem the illegal traffic. In Reading, that now includes smashing seized off-road vehicles. On May 12, for the first time, the city in Berks County had an excavator pulverize two dumpsters filled with ATVs and dirt bikes. The department filmed the destruction and posted it on its Facebook page, in part to send a message to drivers, Sgt. Mel Fegely said. There were varying responses from viewers. Some people were upset, and wanted to see the vehicles reused or...