by Gary Kaplan
photo by Matthew Kaplan
Skills and the Workplace: The Lesson of Inland Steel was our Labor Day post in 2016. Its two main themes are even more relevant five years later: technology is transforming the skill content of work; and post-secondary education or training is necessary to be competitive in the labor market.
![The World of Instruction, [Podcast], Start with Student Engagement](https://jfynet.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/JFY_08-24-21-PODCAST-Dr.-John-Brown_BLOG_MozJPEG-700x454.jpg "The World of Instruction, [Podcast], Start with Student Engagement")
Narrated by Greg Cunningham
by Joan Reissman
Nobody’s saying the pandemic has been easy. Many families have suffered terrible losses. People have lost loved ones, jobs, homes. Students have felt isolated and disengaged. They’ve missed interaction with their peers. Teachers have felt overwhelmed trying to manage online and in-person students at the same time, forced to do an academic juggling act. But even though the pandemic has exposed many systemic problems, there have been surprising success stories, and some teachers and students have flourished during this time.
by Gary Kaplan
The Declaration of Independence is a curious document. Much of it consists of grievances against the actions of King George III which are summarized as “the establishment of an absolute Tyranny.” There are 27 discrete articles in the catalogue of complaints.
The themes are familiar: arbitrary governance and legislation; usurpation of justice and the rule of law; military occupation; economic imperialism in taxes and trade; overt military aggression and incitement of domestic insurrection. All tourists on the Freedom Trail and fans of the Boston Tea Party have heard these complaints recited since childhood.
by Greg Cunningham
“Check your egos at the door.”
This sign, inscribed by Quincy Jones, greeted 46 world-famous singers who showed up at the A&M Studios in Los Angeles the night of January 28, 1985, to record We Are the World for USA For Africa to raise money for famine relief in Ethiopia. A drought of a magnitude never seen in the region had caused famine-scale food shortages. Thousands were dying every month and horrific images of starving children haunted nightly news broadcasts around the world.
The song soared up the charts as soon as it was released, juiced by a promotion hatched by Georgia DJs Bob Wolfe of WROM-AM and Don Briscar of WKCX-FM that brought it to a wide audience, including President Ronald Reagan aboard Air Force One.
by Gary Kaplan
Our customary rituals of gathering and sharing will be at best constrained, at worst cancelled. The very idea of social distancing is antithetical to the spirit of the season.
by Eileen Wedegartner, Blended Learning Specialist
Growing up, I remember there were high school students around me who had either attempted to take their own life or had done so. As a teen, it shook me to think that anyone felt that alone. It was sad, but it was also an anomaly.
In the last few years, a community near mine experienced a spike in suicides among high school students. It was enough of a crisis that the Boston Globe wrote about it in the article “After suicides in Acton and Boxborough, A Communion of Sorrow.”
by Greg Cunningham, Blended Learning Specialist
Adults are not always on their best behavior. One need only drive on the Expressway during rush hour to confirm this truth. We do the best we can, especially around children, but sometimes we’re forced to explain the behavior of other adults who should absolutely know better.
by Greg Cunningham, Blended Learning Specialist
These are difficult times for teachers. With MCAS looming, budgets due (and most likely cut from last year), and antsy students counting the hours to year-end, teachers have a small mountain of things on their plate. Add the storm of controversies in pop culture (which students pay more attention to than Algebra) and the classroom can be a complex and complicated storm center. Students who grew up listening to R. Kelly are going to have many questions even before getting to the recent revelations about Michael Jackson. And now English teachers have to confront the news that Charles Dickens tried to have his wife committed to an insane asylum so he could be with another woman. (Divorce was apparently too much trouble.) Throw in John Wayne’s recently rediscovered racist rants and Joe Biden’s hair fetish and your head spins like a scene from The Exorcist.
by Eileen Wedegartner, Blended Learning Specialist
The job of the English teacher is to ensure that students can read a complex text with comprehension and formulate ideas about it orally and in writing. Teachers often walk a fine line between imparting their own views and facilitating an environment where students can formulate their own judgements based on their own knowledge, values, ethics and beliefs.
