Free Republic

We hear a lot about bullying as if it’s as common as cheering at a football game. But who is really the Big Bully in our public schools? Who is throwing their weight around all the time? More specifically, who is insisting on the use of bad methods that never seem to work better this year than 10 years ago? Who is making lame excuses for poor performance so that nothing seems to get better? Who fills the air with propaganda and sophistry so that no one can think clearly about the issues facing us? Consider Whole Word. Rudolf Flesch...

Here's a theme I've been talking about for a few years. The country's intellectual and financial decline is partly due to the mediocrity of the public schools. This decline can be reversed by adopting proven theories and methods. That's a doable project: --------------------------------------------------------- Free The Schoolsa simple four-step plan Our Education Establishment has an 80-year record of praising and protecting bad pedagogies. Enough. Here is what we need instead, starting now: -------------------------------------------------------- 1. REAL READING. That means systematic phonics for several months until children learn to read. That means no Whole Word, no sight-words, no Dolch words, no high-frequency words....

Warning, this article contains superlatives and extreme statements. How should we teach the young? I believe everyone should be passionate about the answers. The country’s fate depends on it. Over the years I often heard the name John Saxon but knew for sure only that his books were popular among homeschoolers. I was under the impression that he wrote his books for them. Not true. He wrote his books for every kid stuck in a classroom. I’ve just finished “John Saxon’s Story: a genius of common sense in math education,” an excellent biography by Nakonia Hayes. It is a smart,...

What follows is just a short review of a book nobody would think of reading, a paperback published in 1964 to help parents understand New Math. But if you've been wondering how our Education Establishment has managed to sabotage math skills in this country, this review will be helpful:---------------- "New Math was one of the silliest, most pretentious, and finally most unsuccessful educational gimmicks ever devised; and this book perfectly captures the idiocy of it all. In fairness, the authors were trying to do a good job but their mission is to explain the preposterous. Prefatory copy in this book...

"Reform math", sometimes called "fuzzy math" or "rainforest math",is taught in the vast majority of public schools even though it is a demonstrable failure. While those of us who follow k-12 education can tell you that these curricula cripple children and are a threat to our economy and national security, this brief, lucid video by an appalled mom who also has a local TV job makes the point very effectively by showing a small part of what the problem is. Here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tr1qee-bTZI By the way, note that McDermott fails to point out that the even the alternative...