Are you kidding me… close Oak Ridge Elementary School?! In what is already less than a banner year for education in general, it was painful to start my morning with a local story, the Sac Bee‘s front page story: 3  area schools told: Reform or close. Oak Ridge Elementary School is part of the Sacramento [...]

I’ve been periodically listening to Tom Chapin’s audio version of “It’s not on the Test” for the past couple of years. So I was delighted to find the video version on YouTube:

In the 140 classrooms studied, both low- and high-achieving students learned most in mathematics, reading, and writing, when teachers emphasized conceptual understanding, complex problem solving, advanced skills and performances, discussions of alternative solutions and points of views, extended writing, and student-generated ideas and products rather than restricted skills practice.” Linda Darling-Hammond, The Right to Learn [...]