Tag Archives: Education

DeSantis’s Orwellian Power Play

A judge recently compared Florida governor Ron DeSantis to Orwell’s Big Brother.

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Children’s Natural Affinity for Poetry

I describe here the remote poetry instruction I have been conducting with my 8-year-old grandson for the past four months.

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The Moment Has Come to Decide

Educator Diane Ravitch’s favorite poem include two 19th century oldies that get at a teacher’s sense of mission.

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Teach Your Children Well

Wednesday My sister-in-law Joyce Bates, beloved by her Clarksville third-graders, recently posted an inspiring quotation by L. R. Knost about how to raise kids. After reading it, I thought of the blind beggar in the Spanish picaresque novel Lazarillo de Tormes (1554), who ascribes to just the opposite philosophy. The author of such books as […]

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How Dangerous Is a Little Learning?

Pope’s “a little learning” seems dangerous at first glance but the alternative is not entirely attractive.

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School under the Sea: Reeling, Writhing…

To welcome teachers and students back to school, here’s a description of education under the sea, as experienced by Lewis Carroll’s Gryphon and Mock Turtle.

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Does School Teach Kids to Hate Reading?

An elementary school teacher is accusing traditional teaching assignments of killing kids’ natural love of reading. Is he right?

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Teachers, Don’t Nip Their Buds

In “Songs of Experience,” William Blake worries that authority figures will nip the promise of budding schoolboys. “The Schoolboy” serves as a timely reminder for all teachers.

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The Inner City: Stay or Leave?

How do we get young people to stay in the inner city and make it a better place? Baldwin’s “Sonny Blues” gives us a sense of what is possible.

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