education

Chris Knight's avatar

Comic books and graphic novels – once derided by “experts” as being the bane of adolescence and moral society in general – are now receiving praise for encouraging a love of reading while also greatly increasing the range of vocabulary in children.

According to a new study published in the journal School Library Monthly, comic books are just another form of literature that demands the same amount of reading comprehension as traditional novels or any other written material. Professor Carol Tilley of the University of Illinois notes that…

“Although they’ve long embraced picture books as appropriate children’s literature, many adults – even teachers and librarians who willingly add comics to their collections – are too quick to dismiss the suitability of comics as texts for young readers. Any book can be good and any book can be bad, to some extent. It’s up to the reader’s personality and intellect.

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Matthew Whalen is an Eagle Scout from upstate New York. He got suspended for a month from school for having a pocketknife in his car while it was parked on his school’s campus.

Zachary Christie is a six-year old Cub Scout from Delaware who was sentenced to 45 days in reform school. His “crime”? Bringing a spork (combination spoon and fork) to school so that he could use it to eat his pudding.

Fortunately however, the ensuing public uproar embarrassed administrators enough to bring Christie back to his regular school. And Whalen has been assured by West Point Military Academy that his situation will not be a mark against him when he applies for admission (something he has dreamed of since first grade).

It’s “zero tolerance” craziness like this that has contributed a lot to a loss of faith in America’s public education system. What the hell is going ...

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(Not Marcus after slaughter and sectioning, but an incredible simulation)

Elementary students in Kent, Great Britain have elected to send a lamb they reared as a school project off to be slaughtered and rendered into succulent ribs and chops.

The decision to dispatch the lamb, which the students had named Marcus, has met with outcry from “grown-ups”…

Marcus the six-month-old lamb has now been culled, the head teacher of the primary school in Kent confirmed on Monday, after the school’s council — a 14-member group of children aged 6 to 11 — voted 13-1 to have him killed.

The decision has provoked fury among animal-loving celebrities, animal and human rights campaigners and the parents of some of the children, and led to threats against Lydd primary school and its teachers, according to a member of staff.

Around 250 children at the school take part in a program designed to

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Chris Knight's avatar

Bev Perdue – who for as long as she is Governor of North Carolina will be referred to on this blog as “WORST GOVERNOR EVER!” – is returning $38 million to the school construction proceeds from the North Carolina Education Lottery, which she raided back in February

(However there’s still $50 million from the lottery’s reserve funds that Perdue isn’t paying back yet).

Does Bev Perdue have any clue at all about the mess she has caused for this state’s public schools? Probably not. Here in Rockingham County plans to build four much-needed new schools were thrown into turmoil because the construction funds earmarked from the lottery were swiped by Perdue so that she could play games with the state’s budget problems. Many other school systems across North Carolina were also hit by Perdue’s monetary mayhem.

I would imagine that in the greater scheme of things, Perdue’s unwise fiscal ...

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What’s happening to Star Wars merchandising lately? Is it just me, or has the brand’s licensing gone wacky amid the absence of new movies in the series? A few months ago we were presented with the Darth Vader Toaster.

And now Uncle Milton – purveyor of such classic educational toys as the ant farm – is coming out with the Star Wars Mustafar Volcano Kit. Yes, your kids (or you yourself) can learn all about the physics of vulcanism while reliving the epic first duel between Obi-Wan Kenobi and the just-turned Sith Lord Darth Vader!

And then there’s this lil’ item: the Star Wars Dagobah Frog Habitat…

And when the frogs get bigger, you can feed them to Jabba the Hutt! 😛...

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Any parent who puts this on their child in order to make him or her study should be chemically castrated with the harshest drugs possible. If they must rely on something like the Study Ball (shown at right) then they haven’t a damn clue about what it means to be responsible parents at all!

(Yeah I know: this might just be one of those “tongue in cheek” gag products. But even so: I’d never want to hear of it being taken too seriously…)

The Study Ball is based on the old-fashioned “ball and chain” that prisoners were made to wear so as to inhibit any escape attempts. In the case of Study Ball though, it’s meant to keep a child anchored in one place for a predetermined span of time: purportedly studying for exams instead of watching television, etc. Parents fasten the 21-pound Study Ball to a kid’s ankle and ...

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Try this one the next time you go to see a blockbuster movie like Star Trek in the theater: record it with a camcorder and if you get caught, tell the cinema management that “I’m a teacher who needs this for my students!”

Nutty though it sounds, that is what the Motion Picture Association of America is telling teachers to do instead of ripping video from copyrighted DVDs if they want to get clips for classroom purposes. The MPAA has even prepared an instructional video (left) demonstrating how teachers can set up a television with DVD player, and then aim their camcorder at the screen to record it. Which is not only silly but as the article at Ars Technica notes, this is much more laborious and time-consuming on the part of the teacher as opposed to digitally capturing (AKA “ripping” the video segments that they need).

This should be ...

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That “North Carolina Education Lottery” that we’ve had for going on three years now? The one that was supposed to do nothing but supplement, you know, education in North Carolina?

Well, our newly-minted governor Bev Perdue has raided the lottery’s reserve fund of $50 million. And then she took another $38 million that was marked for new schools construction, and applied it to the state’s budget shortfall.

And now because of her fiscal shenanigans, Rockingham County won’t be getting those four new schools that it direly needs.

I have spoken to quite a few people in this county over the past few days who are, to put it mildly, extremely honked-off that this has happened.

The members of the Board of Education aren’t taking this quietly either. According to the above-linked article Tim Scales has remarked “You don’t want to know what I’ve got to say about it.” Reida ...

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This afternoon I finally got to watch the new version of The Electric Company on PBS. It’s a revival of the very fondly remembered original series from the 1970s.

So what did I think of it? I watched many of the episodes of the original The Electric Company a few years ago when they ran on Noggin, and was surprised at how well the show had held up over the years. The Electric Company circa 2009 remains faithful to the purpose of its parent… but is a fresh and rapid-fire delightful update aimed at a new generation. And I was surprised at how many homages to the Seventies series there are: right down to paying tribute to Rita Moreno’s immortal warcry “HEY YOU GUYSSSSSS!!!” Didn’t spot an appearance by Letterman (no, not the late night TV host) but there was an animated spoof of 24, among other clever ...

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Remember the crazy fight that a lot of good folks here in Rockingham County, North Carolina fought in 2007 (at right) against Standard Mode of Dress: the euphemistic term for what are really school uniforms? It took about four months and the Board of Education had previously approved of the policy… but in the end, with a lot of passion and a little creativity, the board then reversed its decision and the school uniforms went down in flames.

Now comes word that much the same is happening to some of our friends a few counties over in Forsyth. Janet Marsh, the mother of a student at Wiley Middle School, alerts us to this story at the Winston-Salem Journal website. The Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools Board of Education unanimously voted to implement Standard Mode of Dress at Wiley Middle during its January 13th meeting. But opponents of the policy contend that ...

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