Friday's Odds and Ends

First off, I just have to say a few words about the launch of the Winnsboro pictorial history book that I wrote with our local historian, Bill Jones. The official title is Images of America - Winnsboro, and it was published by Aradia publishing. Regular visitors to my blog have probably figured out that I live near this small town in East Texas, and I have loved it since we moved here almost 12 years ago. Not only is it a beautiful setting with lots of trees and gentle rolling hills, the town is a mecca of creative energy. We have lots of artists, musicians, actors, and writers who live in and around town, and it is a wonderful place to nurture creativity of any kind.

I am thrilled to have this book out to showcase the town and the people, and doubly thrilled to have the launch party this Sunday at the Winnsboro Center for the Arts, which is also dear to my heart as I get to play there on stage a lot. 

NSA chief Army General Keith Alexander recently spoke at a cybersecurity convention and told the attendees, "You're the greatest tech talent anywhere in the world. Help us."

I'm not sure I want the NSA to have any more help in gathering data on what people are doing on the Internet. Yesterday I joked on Facebook about doing research about drugs and drug trafficking for the next book in the Seasons Series. I said I might have to worry about the NSA and then maybe a DEA agent showing up on my doorstep. While that was a joke yesterday, today I wonder. 

Courtland Milloy, a columnist for the Washington Post recently wrote about innovation in schools, or rather the lack of it. In his piece, Let's Teach Innovation Like Amazon, he wrote,

"Have backbone, disagree and commit," Amazon encourages. In all but the very best high schools, that kind of attitude is often quashed.

And once quashed, it's hard to get back. Obedience to the point of subservience, rote learning -- that's what passes for success at many public schools.

After mentioning the fact that Amazon founder, Jeff Bezos likes to find solutions to complex problems in ways that appear messy and encourages teams to tolerate approaches that appear chaotic, Milloy followed with:

In many public schools, students never get a chance to experiment with such styles of problem solving. Many schools no longer offer art. No instrumental music, no choir, no theater and no debate. There's no money, or no room in the standardized curriculum.

After 12 years of that kind of creative repression, a student is hardly prepared for more than servitude on the bottom rungs of the American economic ladder.

Yet still our education systems continue to push for rote, standardization, and very little that encourages critical thinking and creative problem solving. And the arts continue to disappear. I saw the importance of the arts during the drama camp we had recently at our local theatre. Those kids did some amazing creative problem solving as they came up with set designs, props, light designs, story elements, and music. Don't tell me that does not help them academically.

Now for just a bit of fun from Baby Blues:

There are several pictures of Wanda and Darryl at a restaurant. In each picture one of them is holding the baby, Wren, while trying to eat, or take a drink. They are doing all the usual things to quiet a fussy baby, patting her, bouncing her, and swinging her back and forth. In the last panel when the family is walking out the door, Darryl says, "Do you ever wonder what it would be like to sit down for a whole meal?"

Wanda says, "People do that?"

I could really relate to that one. How about you? What do you think about the arts - or lack thereof - in education?

Monday Morning Musings

Timothy Hallinan, a terrific author whom I discovered when I read and reviewed Breathing Water, has just received some good news about his latest, The Fear Artist. The book was chosen one of the Best Crime Novels of 2012 by Deadly Pleasures Magazine.The Fear Artist continues the Poke Rafferty series that just keeps getting better and better.

Congrats to Tim!

"Governor Goodhair", as some people refer to Texas Governor Rick Perry, is fostering another proposal that doesn't seem to be in the best interests of higher education. He proposes to cut funding for universities that are not graduating their students. That is just as bad as rating teacher's based on the student's test scores. Granted, the teachers and the educational institutions do have a responsibility to make sure that the learning environment is healthy and supportive, the staff committed and qualified. However, to put the full responsibility for outcomes on their shoulders is a huge disservice.

Students make poor choices all the time that affect their success, or lack of success. Parents make choices all the time that either help or hinder the ability of their children to succeed.

To punish the teachers or the schools does not seem like the right thing to do.

I do hope you will come back on Wednesday. I have a special guest, Mary Deal, who shares the pages of 25 Years in the Rearview Mirror with me. She has also written a thriller,  Down to the Needle, about a woman’s search for her abducted child. Could her daughter be that woman on death row?

Wednesday is also the day for the Did I Notice Your Book blogfest hosted by Alex J. Cavanaugh and  Ciara Knight. There is still time to sign up to participate in the blogfest and you can do that at either blog. Here are some of the specifics:

Did I Notice Your Book Blogfest, October 17, 2012
Post about a book you’ve noticed.

You can choose a book that you’ve read, something you saw on a blog or social media site, Goodreads, or a sales website. Anything that caught your eye because of a great cover, blurb or reviews, but DON’T tell the author that their book has been noticed. Instead, shout out on social media sites, and encourage others to do the same, until the author finds his/her book.

Leave a blog comment at Ninja Captain Alex or Ciara Knight when the author finds their book.

Only two rules:
1) You can’t post about your own book.
2) The book shouldn’t be on the New York Times or USA Today bestseller list. This is your chance to shout out about a book that might not have been noticed by others.

What's Wrong With Education Today?

For a long time, I thought the education system in most states was way off the mark, and I am not alone in thinking that. I was reminded of the importance of a classical education when I found an interesting article in School Book, an online magazine for the NYC school system.  A Lesson in Teaching to the Test was written by Anne Stone and Jeff Nichols, both associate professors at NY colleges and the parents of eight-year-old twins in the third grade in New York City schools. They recently introduced their children to E.B. White’s wonderful book, The Trumpet of the Swan, about a mute swan given voice by a trumpet stolen for him by his father.

The book contains a passage that the couple cite in their article about a teacher who is in the midst of a mathematics lesson. This is what she asks one boy. as well as his response.

“Sam, if a man can walk three miles in one hour, how many miles can he walk in four hours?”

“It would depend on how tired he got after the first hour,” replied Sam.

What follows is a lively discussion among the students and the teacher covering all kinds of things that might factor into the distance and the timing. I encourage you to go read the entire piece as it is quite interesting. Unfortunately, that exchange is not something that would probably happen in a classroom today, although it should. The authors make the point that the little scene from White's book  "...captures what volumes of education research have shown: we are born curious, and the best education models do not proceed on the basis of 'what we want students to learn.'"

My interest in this topic was spurred by a recent column I read in The Dallas Morning News. The author of that column, Kim Rice, wrote, "My entire educational experience consisted of learning one happy fact after another. A name here, a date there and those delightful little rules all over. Alas, I was a miserable memorizer."

That opening to her column resonated with me, because facts fall through my brain as if it had holes. Like, Kim, I was lucky to have a college professor who "cracked open a door that exposed the difference between being trained to do and being educated to think. I discovered ideas."

I was also lucky enough to have a bit more of a classical education in high school - this was before the idea of standardized testing came to be. It's hard to quantify what I learned because I did not come out with facts and figures that could be measured. What I did come out with was a mind that was quick and eager to learn, and really has not stopped.

What about you? What kind of education did you receive? Do you think we are losing something vital by not offering a classical education anymore?


On another note, I just have to share part of this wonderful review I recently received for One Small Victory. 
"Excellent! That is one small word that hardly describes a novel written with such heart. Maryann Miller is an accomplished writer, weaving her tale of intrigue, romance and determination. She takes her readers on a wild ride of adventure that will not be soon forgotten." Highly Recomended by Reviewer: Elaine Fuhr, Allbooks Reviews Int.

Could We Find a Middle Ground?

The state of Texas is in a flap about curriculum content for social studies and science classes.

At issue is whether new social studies textbooks should include information about the religious influences on people who had historical significance. All of us who even faintly remember our American history know that religion and religious beliefs played a large role in history. That is an undisputed fact. Some members of the Texas State Board of Education want the textbooks to include information such as a the fact that during the Constitutional Convention Benjamin Franklin called on the delegates to utilize prayer as they considered how to build the framework of the constitution.

People who wear their religion on their sleeve and think everyone else should, too, are pushing for those facts to be included. They are also pushing to include the Christian belief of creation versus evolution in the science textbooks.

People who are a bit wary of those people, and maybe rightly so, don’t want any mention of religion in textbooks. They believe that if it is written that George Washington was a Christian, that somehow that is endorsing a particular religion. Some of these people also believe that the mention of a religion is imposing that religious belief on students.

How absurd is that? If I tell you I am a Christian does that mean I am saying you have to be a Christian, too?

An integral part of educating young people is to encourage a broad world view and critical thinking. A Christian, Muslim, atheist, Buddhist, or Jew should be able to read about another religion without feeling threatened. And if a threat is perceived, then maybe that says something about the person doing the reading.

Hopefully, there is a middle ground between these two groups on the Board and this issue will be resolved in such a way that it benefits the students, not a faction.

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As always, I am open to another point of view. What do you think about this issue?

What is this World Coming To?

I was going to try to focus on fun topics for the next week or so leading up to the holidays, but recent news items are just begging for a rant. Actually not a rant, just an expression of dismay and perhaps a discussion about the absurdities of human nature, which is one of the reasons I write this blog. I think we all need to express our frustration with some of mankind or we might explode from trying to hold it all in.

One of the stories I read today was about a south Texas couple who put an aborted 7-month-old fetus in a gift box under a Christmas tree after they were unable to flush the remains down a toilet. The couple has been charged with abuse of a corpse and tampering with evidence. Police believe the woman used pills to induce an abortion last week, then called an ambulance after she began bleeding and told doctors she didn't know where the fetus was.

This is so absurd, I don't even know what to say. What were they thinking? Or were they even thinking?

A story I read yesterday also made me shake my head in disbelief. Apparently some parents in Detroit are so unhappy about the students there doing poorly on standardized tests that they want the teachers and administrators to go to jail.

That's right. Jail.

After release of a report showing fourth and eighth-grade students with the lowest math scores in the nation, Sharlonda Buckman of the Detroit Parent Network is reportedly pushing for prison time and civil lawsuits against teachers and officials in the school district who are not doing enough to educate the city's youth. She is reported to have said that someone needs to go to jail for this and it shouldn't be the kids.

I agree that educators need to be held accountable for their work, but this is a bit extreme, don't you think? Especially since the educator is only one third of a whole that makes for successful learning. The other two-thirds are parents and the student. And they all need to work together in harmony, not be setting up adversarial positions on something so vitally important as education.

And if any authority or court acts on this absurd request, I will really lose all hope in humanity.

What are your thoughts?

I Love Texas But....

I'll admit I love the great state of Texas. I love the beauty of the varied countryside and the great expanse of sky that hosts the most spectacular sunrises and sunsets. I love the whole mystique of good guys like Sam Houston and bad guys like Bonnie and Clyde. And I love cowboys and farmers and ranchers who go to town on Saturday morning to have breakfast at the local diner.

But I do not like the absurd Texas Education system.

First off, they have this method of assessing the schools -- Texas Accountability Rating System -- that has less to do with learning than with statistics: How many students have dropped out? How many students passed the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) tests? How many students are enrolled in AP classes? And one of the most important, how many students are passing?

To deal with that last issue, school districts began forcing teachers to assign a minimum grade to failing students regardless of their classwork and test scores. When the policy was first started, supporters said that it was good for the students. It would give them a better chance of improving the grade by the end of semester and the end of the year. That would in turn improve the self-esteem of the students and create a more successful learning environment.

Right.

What it did was help schools meet those statistical requirements.

There was enough protests from teachers, administrators, and parents, that a new state law was recently enacted that prohibits school districts from using this policy. A student is not to be given a grade of 50, if the work only reflects a grade of 30. Makes sense. A realistic grading system teaches students consequences as well as issuing a challenge.

I remember when one of our sons received a less than stellar grade in math the first semester of his senior year. If he did not bring the grade up to passing in the next six weeks, he wouldn't graduate. The teacher did not offer to give him a sympathy grade. My husband and I did not beg the school to bail our son out. We told him he would bring the grade up or else. And he knew what the "or else" would entail.

The latest installment of this silly school saga is that a number of school districts in and around Houston have filed suit challenging this new law. They claim that minimum-grade policies are good for students. "Minimum grading policies ensure that a student still may gain credit for a course as a whole and in turn continue progressing towards graduation...minimum grading policies for report cards are a key tool for keeping students in school."

Statistics anyone?

Another Absurdity

Joe Deshotel, a Texas state lawmaker, filed a bill this week that would create a pilot program designed to pay cash to students at low-performing schools for good grades in core subjects.

Freshmen could earn $50 for each "A," $35 for each "B," and $20 for each "C" in English, math, science or social studies. They would get half their money at the end of each grading period and the other half at graduation. They would also receive college and career counseling through the program.

Funding for the bill would come from $6 billion in federal stimulus money the state is planning to use on education.

At first glance, that might seem like a good idea. And I'm sure students are all for it, as are the parents who are already paying their kids for grades. Now they won't have to foot that bill.

But is it really a good idea?

Some argue that the kids need the incentive. Those on the "pro" side, also say that this helps kids prepare for the working world in which their pay will reflect their effort.

Those on the "con" side believe that education should be on a different level. That kids should learn for the sake of learning. That education is about so much more than performance and test scores and grades that could earn them a few bucks.

This debate has been going on for several years now, and there are other states already using some kind of payment reward for students. There isn't a consensus about whether it is the best approach or not, and there may never be a consensus.

I'm on the con side of the issue. Where do you stand?