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| tinkering toward utopia: Tinkering Toward Utopia David B. Tyack, Larry Cuban, 1995 This book documents the tension between Americans’ faith in education as a panacea and the moderate pace of change in educational practices. The authors suggest that reformers need to focus on ways to help teachers improve instruction from the inside out instead of decreeing change by remote control. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Tinkering toward Utopia David B. TYACK, Larry Cuban, David B Tyack, 2009-06-30 For over a century, Americans have translated their cultural anxieties and hopes into dramatic demands for educational reform. Although policy talk has sounded a millennial tone, the actual reforms have been gradual and incremental. Tinkering toward Utopia documents the dynamic tension between Americans' faith in education as a panacea and the moderate pace of change in educational practices. In this book, David Tyack and Larry Cuban explore some basic questions about the nature of educational reform. Why have Americans come to believe that schooling has regressed? Have educational reforms occurred in cycles, and if so, why? Why has it been so difficult to change the basic institutional patterns of schooling? What actually happened when reformers tried to reinvent schooling? Tyack and Cuban argue that the ahistorical nature of most current reform proposals magnifies defects and understates the difficulty of changing the system. Policy talk has alternated between lamentation and overconfidence. The authors suggest that reformers today need to focus on ways to help teachers improve instruction from the inside out instead of decreeing change by remote control, and that reformers must also keep in mind the democratic purposes that guide public education. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Tinkering toward Utopia David B. Tyack, Larry Cuban, 1997-03-25 This book documents the tension between Americans’ faith in education as a panacea and the moderate pace of change in educational practices. The authors suggest that reformers need to focus on ways to help teachers improve instruction from the inside out instead of decreeing change by remote control. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Tinkering Toward Utopia David B. Tyack, Larry Cuban, 1995 This book documents the tension between Americans’ faith in education as a panacea and the moderate pace of change in educational practices. The authors suggest that reformers need to focus on ways to help teachers improve instruction from the inside out instead of decreeing change by remote control. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Seeking Common Ground David B. Tyack, 2003 The American republic will survive only if its citizens are educated--this was an article of faith of its founders. But seeking common civic ground in public schools has never been easy in a society where schoolchildren followed different religions, adhered to different cultural traditions, spoke many languages, and were identified as members of different races. In this wise and enlightening book, filled with vivid characters and memorable incidents that make history but don't always make history books, David Tyack describes how each American generation grappled with the knotty task of creating political unity and social diversity. Seeking Common Ground illuminates puzzles about democracy in education and chronic conflicts that continue to make news. Americans mistrusted government, yet they entrusted the civic education of their children to public schools. American history textbooks were notoriously dull, but they were also highly controversial. Although the people liked local control of schools, educational experts called it democracy gone to seed and campaigned to take the schools out of politics. Reformers argued about whether it was more democratic to teach all students the same subjects or to tailor curriculum to individuals. And what was the best way to Americanize immigrants, asked educators: by forced-fed assimilation or by honoring their ethnic heritages? With a broad perspective and an eye for telling detail, Tyack lets us see that debates about the civic purposes of schools are an essential part of a democratic culture, and integral to its future. |
| tinkering toward utopia: So Much Reform, So Little Change Charles M. Payne, 2008 This frank and courageous book explores the persistence of failure in today's urban schools. At its heart is the argument that most education policy discussions are disconnected from the daily realities of urban schools, especially those in poor and beleaguered neighborhoods. Charles M. Payne argues that we have failed to account fully for the weakness of the social infrastructure and the often dysfunctional organizational environments of urban schools and school systems. The result is that liberals and conservatives alike have spent a great deal of time pursuing questions of limited practical value in the effort to improve city schools. Payne carefully delineates these stubborn and intertwined sources of failure in urban school reform efforts of the past two decades. Yet while his book is unsparing in its exploration of the troubled recent history of urban school reform, Payne also describes himself as guardedly optimistic. He describes how, in the last decade, we have developed real insights into the roots of school failure, and into how some individual schools manage to improve. He also examines recent progress in understanding how particular urban districts have established successful reforms on a larger scale. Drawing on a striking array of sources--from the recent history of various urban school systems, to the growing sophistication of education research, to his own experience as a teacher, scholar, and participant in reform efforts--Payne paints a vivid and unmistakably realistic portrait of urban schools and reforms of the past few decades. So Much Reform, So Little Change will be required reading for everyone interested in the plight--and the future--of urban schools. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Public Schools in Hard Times David B. Tyack, Robert Lowe, Elisabeth Hansot, 1984 In the first social history of what happened to public schools in those years of the locust, the authors explore the daily experience of schoolchildren in many kinds of communities--the public school students of working-class northeastern towns, the rural black children of the South, the prosperous adolescents of midwestern suburbs. How did educators respond to the fiscal crisis, and why did Americans retain their faith in public schooling during the cataclysm? The authors examine how New Dealers regarded public education and the reaction of public school people to the distinctive New Deal style in programs such as the National Youth Administration. They illustrate the story with photographs, cartoons, and vignettes of life behind the schoolhouse door. Moving from that troubled period to our own, the authors compare the anxieties of the depression decade with the uncertainties of the 1970s and 1980s. Heirs to an optimistic tradition and trained to manage growth, school staff have lately encountered three shortages: of pupils, money, and public confidence. Professional morale has dropped as expectations and criticism have mounted. Changes in the governing and financing of education have made planning for the future even riskier than usual. Drawing on the experience of the 1930s to illuminate the problems of the 1980s, the authors lend historical perspective to current discussions about the future of public education. They stress the basic stability of public education while emphasizing the unfinished business of achieving equality in schooling. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Five Miles Away, A World Apart James E. Ryan, 2010-08-06 How is it that, half a century after Brown v. Board of Education, educational opportunities remain so unequal for black and white students, not to mention poor and wealthy ones? In his important new book, Five Miles Away, A World Apart, James E. Ryan answers this question by tracing the fortunes of two schools in Richmond, Virginia--one in the city and the other in the suburbs. Ryan shows how court rulings in the 1970s, limiting the scope of desegregation, laid the groundwork for the sharp disparities between urban and suburban public schools that persist to this day. The Supreme Court, in accord with the wishes of the Nixon administration, allowed the suburbs to lock nonresidents out of their school systems. City schools, whose student bodies were becoming increasingly poor and black, simply received more funding, a measure that has proven largely ineffective, while the independence (and superiority) of suburban schools remained sacrosanct. Weaving together court opinions, social science research, and compelling interviews with students, teachers, and principals, Ryan explains why all the major education reforms since the 1970s--including school finance litigation, school choice, and the No Child Left Behind Act--have failed to bridge the gap between urban and suburban schools and have unintentionally entrenched segregation by race and class. As long as that segregation continues, Ryan forcefully argues, so too will educational inequality. Ryan closes by suggesting innovative ways to promote school integration, which would take advantage of unprecedented demographic shifts and an embrace of diversity among young adults. Exhaustively researched and elegantly written by one of the nation's leading education law scholars, Five Miles Away, A World Apart ties together, like no other book, a half-century's worth of education law and politics into a coherent, if disturbing, whole. It will be of interest to anyone who has ever wondered why our schools are so unequal and whether there is anything to be done about it. |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Politics of American Education Joel Spring, 2011-01-12 Turning his distinctive analytical lens to the politics of American education, Joel Spring looks at contemporary educational policy issues from theoretical, practical, and historical perspectives. This comprehensive overview documents and explains who influences educational policy and how, bringing to life the realities of schooling in the 21st century and revealing the ongoing ideological struggles at play. Coverage includes the influence of global organizations on American school policies and the impact of emerging open source and other forms of electronic textbooks. Thought-provoking, lucid, original in its conceptual framework and rich with engaging examples from the real world, this text is timely and useful for understanding the big picture and the micro-level intricacies of the multiple forces at work in controlling U.S. public schools . It is the text of choice for any course that covers or addresses the politics of American education. Companion Website: The interactive Companion Website accompanying this text includes relevant data, public domain documents, YouTube links, and links to websites representing political organizations and interest groups involved in education. |
| tinkering toward utopia: When School Reform Goes Wrong Nel Noddings, 2007-08-27 In this much-needed volume, Nel Noddings uses her extensive experience at every level of schooling to challenge the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). Noddings invites readers to think critically about the ideas underlying NCLB, the reform movement that shaped it, and the processes it has put into play. She considers such questions as, Is money the answer to raising test scores? Are failing schools mainly attended by poor children, or are all of our schools failing? Do all students need courses in advanced mathematics, physics, and chemistry? Should special education students be expected to meet the same standards as regular students? Does one standard curriculum serve the needs and interests of all students? Does our current system of schooling undermine the democracy it should support? This dynamic book: Challenges almost every provision in the No Child Left Behind Act. Argues for educationally justifiable interpretations of equality, accountability, standards, testing, and choice. Suggests an educationally and morally acceptable way of employing an enriched form of tracking to meet the needs of all students. Considers what is at stake for our children, schools, and democracy and offers suggestions for fresh thinking. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Ghetto Schooling Jean Anyon, 1997-09-19 In this disturbing but ultimately hopeful personal account, Jean Anyon provides compelling evidence that the economic and political devastation of America's inner cities has robbed schools and teachers of the capacity to successfully implement current strategies of educational reform. She argues that without fundamental change in government and business policies and the redirection of major resources back into the schools and the communities they serve, urban schools are consigned to failure, and no effort at raising standards, improving teaching, or boosting achievement can occur. Based on her participation in an intensive four-year school reform project in the Newark, New Jersey public schools, the author vividly captures the anguish and anger of students and teachers caught in the tangle of a failing school system. Ghetto Schooling offers a penetrating historical analysis of more than a century of government and business policies that have drained the economic, political, and human resources of urban populations. Provocative and controversial, this book reveals the historical roots of the current crisis in ghetto schools and what must be done to reverse the downward spiral. |
| tinkering toward utopia: How Teachers Taught Larry Cuban, 1984 |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Blackboard and the Bottom Line Larry Cuban, 2007 In an incisive examination of the cliché that schools should be more businesslike, the author demonstrates why no one has shown that a business model can be successfully applied to education. |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Making of an American High School David F. Labaree, 1988 |
| tinkering toward utopia: Suing Alma Mater Michael A. Olivas, 2013-07 Suing Alma Mater provides a clear-eyed perspective on the legal issues facing higher education today. |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Politics of Institutional Reform Terry M. Moe, 2019-02-21 In this ground breaking analysis, Terry M. Moe treats Hurricane Katrina as a natural experiment that offers a rare opportunity to learn about the role of power in the politics of institutional reform. When Katrina hit, it physically destroyed New Orleans' school buildings, but it also destroyed the vested-interest power that had protected the city's abysmal education system from major reform. With the constraints of power lifted, decision makers who had been incremental problem-solvers turned into revolutionaries, creating the most innovative school system in the entire country. The story of New Orleans' path from failure to revolution is fascinating, but, more importantly, it reveals the true role of power, whose full effects normally cannot be observed, because power has a 'second face' that is hidden and unobservable. Making use of Katrina's analytic leverage, Moe pulls back the curtain to show that this “second face” has profound consequences that stifle and undermine society's efforts to fix failing institutions. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Education for Everyone John I. Goodlad, Corinne Mantle-Bromley, Stephen John Goodlad, 2004-02-06 Schooling for everyone -- Agenda for education in a democracy -- The context of schooling in a democracy -- An essential narrative for schooling -- Democracy, education, and the human conversation -- Renewal -- Leadership for educational renewal -- Experiencing the agenda. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Inside the Black Box of Classroom Practice Larry Cuban, 2013 Inside the Black Box of Classroom Practice takes as its starting point a strikingly blunt question: With so many major structural changes in U.S. public schools over the past century, why have classroom practices been largely stable, with a modest blending of new and old teaching practices, leaving contemporary classroom lessons familiar to earlier generations of school-goers? It is a question that ought to be of paramount interest to all who are interested in school reform in the United States. It is also a question that comes naturally to Larry Cuban, whose much-admired books have focused on various aspects of school reform--their promises, wrong turns, partial successes, and troubling failures. In this book, he returns to this territory, but trains his focus on the still baffling fact that policy reforms--no matter how ambitious or determined--have generally had little effect on classroom conduct and practice. For forty years, Larry Cuban has been a voice of thoughtful analysis amid the overwrought rhetoric of American education reform. His distinctive contribution--updated, deepened, and extended in this book--has been to focus our attention on the persistent gap between the misconceptions of policy elites and the realities of daily practice in the classroom. One hopes that the next generation of American educators will learn the essential lessons of Cuban's analysis more deeply than the current generation. Young people considering a career in education should hold the lessons of this book close to their hearts. -- Richard F. Elmore, Gregory R. Anrig Professor of Educational Leadership, Harvard Graduate School of Education Larry Cuban's well-written book convincingly demonstrates why current education reforms don't work, can't work, and won't work. -- Diane Ravitch, research professor of education, New York University Anyone with a deep interest in public schools should read Inside the Black Box of Classroom Practice. Cuban takes the reader through the history of earnest efforts to improve our schools--through technology, structural reforms, and accountability systems--and shows why they have met with mixed and often disappointing results. His recommendations for us are both cautionary and hopeful, and always respectful of the dilemmas that teachers face each day they walk through the classroom door. -- Gary Yee, board director, District Four, Oakland Unified School District, and retired vice chancellor, Educational Services, Peralta Community College District Larry Cuban is professor emeritus of education at Stanford University. |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Utopia of Rules David Graeber, 2015-02-24 From the author of the international bestseller Debt: The First 5,000 Years comes a revelatory account of the way bureaucracy rules our lives Where does the desire for endless rules, regulations, and bureaucracy come from? How did we come to spend so much of our time filling out forms? And is it really a cipher for state violence? To answer these questions, the anthropologist David Graeber—one of our most important and provocative thinkers—traces the peculiar and unexpected ways we relate to bureaucracy today, and reveals how it shapes our lives in ways we may not even notice…though he also suggests that there may be something perversely appealing—even romantic—about bureaucracy. Leaping from the ascendance of right-wing economics to the hidden meanings behind Sherlock Holmes and Batman, The Utopia of Rules is at once a powerful work of social theory in the tradition of Foucault and Marx, and an entertaining reckoning with popular culture that calls to mind Slavoj Zizek at his most accessible. An essential book for our times, The Utopia of Rules is sure to start a million conversations about the institutions that rule over us—and the better, freer world we should, perhaps, begin to imagine for ourselves. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Tinkering Toward Utopia David Bruce Tyack, Larry Cuban, 1995 |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Finnish Education Mystery Hannu Simola, 2014-11-20 Finnish education has been a focus of global interest since its first PISA success in 2001. After years of superficial celebration, astonishment and educational tourism, the focus has recently shifted to what is possibly the most interesting element of this Finnish success story: that Finnish schools have been effectively applying methods that go against the flow of global education policy with no testing, no inspection, no hard evaluation, no detailed national curriculum, no accountability and no hard competition. From a historical and sociological perspective the Finnish case is not merely a linear success story, but is part of a controversial and paradoxical struggle towards Utopia: towards egalitarian schooling. Bringing together a collection of essays by Hannu Simola and his colleagues, this book analyses the key dimensions of schooling in Finland to provide a critical, analytical and uncompromising picture of the Finnish education system. Going beyond the story of success, the book reveals the complexities of educational change, but also identifies opportunities and alternatives for smart political action in complex and trans-national societies. Including a selection of key chapters on Finnish education policy and governance, teacher education and classroom cultures, the book will be of interest to researchers, academics and postgraduate students in comparative education, teacher education, educational policy and educational reform. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Demoralized Doris A. Santoro, 2021-02-09 Demoralized: Why Teachers Leave the Profession They Love and How They Can Stay offers a timely analysis of professional dissatisfaction that challenges the common explanation of burnout. Featuring the voices of educators, the book offers concrete lessons for practitioners, school leaders, and policy makers on how to think more strategically to retain experienced teachers and make a difference in the lives of students. Based on ten years of research and interviews with practitioners across the United States, the book theorizes the existence of a “moral center” that can be pivotal in guiding teacher actions and expectations on the job. Education philosopher Doris Santoro argues that demoralization offers a more precise diagnosis that is born out of ongoing value conflicts with pedagogical policies, reform mandates, and school practices. Demoralized reveals that this condition is reversible when educators are able to tap into authentic professional communities and shows that individuals can help themselves. Detailed stories from veteran educators are included to illustrate the variety of contexts in which demoralization can occur. Based on these insights, Santoro offers an array of recommendations and promising strategies for how school leaders, union leaders, teacher groups, and individual practitioners can enact and support “re-moralization” by working to change the conditions leading to demoralization. |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Testing Charade Daniel Koretz, 2019-02-27 For decades we’ve been studying, experimenting with, and wrangling over different approaches to improving public education, and there’s still little consensus on what works, and what to do. The one thing people seem to agree on, however, is that schools need to be held accountable—we need to know whether what they’re doing is actually working. But what does that mean in practice? High-stakes tests. Lots of them. And that has become a major problem. Daniel Koretz, one of the nation’s foremost experts on educational testing, argues in The Testing Charade that the whole idea of test-based accountability has failed—it has increasingly become an end in itself, harming students and corrupting the very ideals of teaching. In this powerful polemic, built on unimpeachable evidence and rooted in decades of experience with educational testing, Koretz calls out high-stakes testing as a sham, a false idol that is ripe for manipulation and shows little evidence of leading to educational improvement. Rather than setting up incentives to divert instructional time to pointless test prep, he argues, we need to measure what matters, and measure it in multiple ways—not just via standardized tests. Right now, we’re lying to ourselves about whether our children are learning. And the longer we accept that lie, the more damage we do. It’s time to end our blind reliance on high-stakes tests. With The Testing Charade, Daniel Koretz insists that we face the facts and change course, and he gives us a blueprint for doing better. |
| tinkering toward utopia: How Scholars Trumped Teachers Larry Cuban, 1999 Examining a century of university history, Larry Cuban tackles the age-old question: What is more important, teaching or research? Using two departments (history and medicine) at Stanford University as a case study, Cuban shows how universities have organizationally and politically subordinated teaching to research for over one hundred years. He explains how university reforms, decade after decade, not only failed to dislodge the primacy of research but actually served to strengthen it. He examines the academic work of research and teaching to determine how each has influenced university structures and processes, including curricular reform. Can the dilemma of scholars vs. teachers ever be fully reconciled? This fascinating historical journey is a must read for all university administrators, faculty, researchers, and anyone concerned with educational reform. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Failure to Disrupt Justin Reich, 2020-09-15 From MOOCs to autograders to computerized tutors, technologies designed for large-scale learning have never lived up to the hype. Despite its promise, Justin Reich shows that technology cannot transform our classrooms on its own. Successful education reform, he concludes, will focus on incremental institutional change, not the next killer app. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Schools and Society Jeanne H. Ballantine, Joan Z. Spade, Jenny M. Stuber, 2017-10-25 The authors are proud sponsors of the 2020 SAGE Keith Roberts Teaching Innovations Award—enabling graduate students and early career faculty to attend the annual ASA pre-conference teaching and learning workshop. This comprehensive anthology features classical readings on the sociology of education, as well as current, original essays by notable contemporary scholars. Assigned as a main text or a supplement, this fully updated Sixth Edition uses the open systems approach to provide readers with a framework for understanding and analyzing the book’s range of topics. Jeanne H. Ballantine, Joan Z. Spade, and new co-editor Jenny M. Stuber, all experienced researchers and instructors in this subject, have chosen articles that are highly readable, and that represent the field’s major theoretical perspectives, methods, and issues. The Sixth Edition includes twenty new selections and five revisions of original readings and features new perspectives on some of the most contested issues in the field today, such as school funding, gender issues in schools, parent and neighborhood influences on learning, growing inequality in schools, and charter schools. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Distilling Democracy Jonathan Zimmerman, 1999 Zimmerman (educational history, New York U.) examines the history of Scientific Temperance Instruction, a curriculum on the evils of alcohol which was originally developed and advocated by a grassroots movement, and ultimately was mandated in all American schools for a time. He traces today's debate on drug and alcohol education to issues raised in this seminal episode. The debate over STI, claims Zimmerman, was really about the balance between expertise and populist desire in determining what should be taught to America's children. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR |
| tinkering toward utopia: Degrees of Inequality Ann L. Mullen, 2011-01-03 2011 Educator's Award. Delta Kappa Gamma Society International2011 Outstanding Publication in Postsecondary Education, American Educational Research Association, Division J Degrees of Inequality reveals the powerful patterns of social inequality in American higher education by analyzing how the social background of students shapes nearly every facet of the college experience. Even as the most prestigious institutions claim to open their doors to students from diverse backgrounds, class disparities remain. Just two miles apart stand two institutions that represent the stark class contrast in American higher education. Yale, an elite Ivy League university, boasts accomplished alumni, including national and world leaders in business and politics. Southern Connecticut State University graduates mostly commuter students seeking credential degrees in fields with good job prospects. Ann L. Mullen interviewed students from both universities and found that their college choices and experiences were strongly linked to social background and gender. Yale students, most having generations of family members with college degrees, are encouraged to approach their college years as an opportunity for intellectual and personal enrichment. Southern students, however, perceive a college degree as a path to a better career, and many work full- or part-time jobs to help fund their education. Moving interviews with 100 students at the two institutions highlight how American higher education reinforces the same inequities it has been aiming to transcend. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Transforming School Culture Anthony Muhammad, 2009-11-01 Busy administrators will appreciate this quick read packed with immediate, accessible strategies. This book provides the framework for understanding dynamic relationships within a school culture and ensuring a positive environment that supports the changes necessary to improve learning for all students. The author explores many aspects of human behavior, social conditions, and history to reveal best practices for building healthy school cultures. |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Story of Utopias Lewis Mumford, 1922 |
| tinkering toward utopia: Policy Analysis as Problem Solving Rachel Meltzer, Alex Schwartz, 2018-12-07 Drawing extensively from real-life cases, Policy Analysis as Problem Solving helps students develop the analytic skills necessary to advise government officials and nonprofit executives on a wide range of policy issues. Unlike other texts, Policy Analysis as Problem Solving employs a pragmatic, heterodox approach to the field. Whereas most texts on policy analysis are anchored in microeconomics, emphasizing economic efficiency, this book takes a broader view, using realistic examples to illustrate the full scope of policy analysis. The book provides succinct but thorough discussions of the key elements of the policy-analytic process, including problem definition, objectives and criteria, development of alternative policy options, and analysis of these alternatives. The text’s practical approach and extensive downloadable resources—which include interviews, case studies, and further readings—will be of enormous benefit to both students and instructors of policy analysis. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Why Busing Failed Matthew F. Delmont, 2016-03 Busing, in which students were transported by school buses to achieve court-ordered or voluntary school desegregation, became one of the nation's most controversial civil rights issues in the decades after Brown v. Board of Education (1954). Examining battles over school desegregation in cities like Boston, Chicago, New York, and Pontiac, [this book posits that] school officials, politicians, courts, and the news media valued the desires of white parents more than the rights of black students, and how antibusing parents and politicians borrowed media strategies from the civil rights movement to thwart busing for school desegregation--Provided by publisher. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Teaching Machines Audrey Watters, 2023-02-07 How ed tech was born: Twentieth-century teaching machines--from Sidney Pressey's mechanized test-giver to B. F. Skinner's behaviorist bell-ringing box. Contrary to popular belief, ed tech did not begin with videos on the internet. The idea of technology that would allow students to go at their own pace did not originate in Silicon Valley. In Teaching Machines, education writer Audrey Watters offers a lively history of predigital educational technology, from Sidney Pressey's mechanized positive-reinforcement provider to B. F. Skinner's behaviorist bell-ringing box. Watters shows that these machines and the pedagogy that accompanied them sprang from ideas--bite-sized content, individualized instruction--that had legs and were later picked up by textbook publishers and early advocates for computerized learning. Watters pays particular attention to the role of the media--newspapers, magazines, television, and film--in shaping people's perceptions of teaching machines as well as the psychological theories underpinning them. She considers these machines in the context of education reform, the political reverberations of Sputnik, and the rise of the testing and textbook industries. She chronicles Skinner's attempts to bring his teaching machines to market, culminating in the famous behaviorist's efforts to launch Didak 101, the pre-verbal machine that taught spelling. (Alternate names proposed by Skinner include Autodidak, Instructomat, and Autostructor.) Telling these somewhat cautionary tales, Watters challenges what she calls the teleology of ed tech--the idea that not only is computerized education inevitable, but technological progress is the sole driver of events. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Someone Has to Fail David F. Labaree, 2012-04-02 What do we really want from schools? Only everything, in all its contradictions. Most of all, we want access and opportunity for all childrenÑbut all possible advantages for our own. So argues historian David Labaree in this provocative look at the way Òthis archetype of dysfunction works so well at what we want it to do even as it evades what we explicitly ask it to do.Ó Ever since the common school movement of the nineteenth century, mass schooling has been seen as an essential solution to great social problems. Yet as wave after wave of reform movements have shown, schools are extremely difficult to change. Labaree shows how the very organization of the locally controlled, administratively limited school system makes reform difficult. At the same time, he argues, the choices of educational consumers have always overwhelmed top-down efforts at school reform. Individual families seek to use schools for their own purposesÑto pursue social opportunity, if they need it, and to preserve social advantage, if they have it. In principle, we want the best for all children. In practice, we want the best for our own. Provocative, unflinching, wry, Someone Has to Fail looks at the way that unintended consequences of consumer choices have created an extraordinarily resilient educational system, perpetually expanding, perpetually unequal, constantly being reformed, and never changing much. |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Struggle for the American Curriculum, 1893-1958 Herbert M. Kliebard, 2004 First Published in 2004. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company. |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Education We Need for a Future We Can′t Predict Thomas Hatch, Jordan Corson, Sarah Gerth van den Berg, 2021-01-19 Improve Schools and Transform Education In order for educational systems to change, we must reevaluate deep-seated beliefs about learning, teaching, schooling, and race that perpetuate inequitable opportunities and outcomes. Hatch, Corson, and Gerth van den Berg challenge the narrative when it comes to the grammar of schooling--or the conventional structures, practices, and beliefs that define educational experiences for so many children—to cast a new vision of what school could be. The book addresses current systemic problems and solutions as it: Highlights global examples of successful school change Describes strategies that improve educational opportunities and performance Explores promising approaches in developing new learning opportunities Outlines conditions for supporting wide-scale educational improvement This provocative book approaches education reform by highlighting what works, while also demonstrating what can be accomplished if we redefine conventional schools. We can make the schools we have more efficient, more effective, and more equitable, all while creating powerful opportunities to support all aspects of students’ development. You won’t find a better book on system change in education than this one. We learn why schools don’t change; how they can improve; what it takes to change a system; and, in the final analysis, the possibilities of system change. Above all, The Education We Need renders complexity into clarity as the writing is so clear and compelling. A powerful read on a topic of utmost importance. ~Michael Fullan, Professor Emeritus, OISE/Universtiy of Toronto I cannot recommend this book highly enough – Tom tackles long-standing and emerging educational issues in new ways with an impressive understanding of the challenging complexities, but also feasible possibilities, for ensuring excellence and equity for all students. ~Carol Campbell, Associate Professor, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto |
| tinkering toward utopia: The Unsettlers Mark Sundeen, 2017-01-10 “An in-depth and compelling account of diverse Americans living off the grid.” —Los Angeles Times The radical search for the simple life in today’s America. On a frigid April night, a classically trained opera singer, five months pregnant, and her husband, a former marine biologist, disembark an Amtrak train in La Plata, Missouri, assemble two bikes, and pedal off into the night, bound for a homestead they've purchased, sight unseen. Meanwhile, a horticulturist, heir to the Great Migration that brought masses of African Americans to Detroit, and her husband, a product of the white flight from it, have turned to urban farming to revitalize the blighted city they both love. And near Missoula, Montana, a couple who have been at the forefront of organic farming for decades navigate what it means to live and raise a family ethically. A work of immersive journalism steeped in a distinctively American social history and sparked by a personal quest, The Unsettlers traces the search for the simple life through the stories of these new pioneers and what inspired each of them to look for -- or create -- a better existence. Captivating and clear-eyed, it dares us to imagine what a sustainable, ethical, authentic future might actually look like. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Making the Grade William A. Fischel, 2009-11-15 A significant factor for many people deciding where to live is the quality of the local school district, with superior schools creating a price premium for housing. The result is a “race to the top,” as all school districts attempt to improve their performance in order to attract homebuyers. Given the importance of school districts to the daily lives of children and families, it is surprising that their evolution has not received much attention. In this provocative book, William Fischel argues that the historical development of school districts reflects Americans’ desire to make their communities attractive to outsiders. The result has been a standardized, interchangeable system of education not overly demanding for either students or teachers, one that involved parents and local voters in its governance and finance. Innovative in its focus on bottom-up processes generated by individual behaviors rather than top-down decisions by bureaucrats, Making the Grade provides a new perspective on education reform that emphasizes how public schools form the basis for the localized social capital in American towns and cities. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Doc Susan Kammeraad-Campbell, 2005 This riveting account of Dennis Littky and how his ideas turned around a troubled rural high school---the first school named to the acclaimed Coalition of Essential Schools---gives you a behind-the scenes perspective on how principal leadership can accomplish positive change. Read how Littky's philosophy of personalized learning---one student at a time---quickly achieved dramatic improvements, including a decrease in dropout rates from 20% to 1.5% and record numbers of college-bound graduates. And learn how school improvement ideas that now seem commonplace today---such as high expectations, individualized curriculum, positive learning communities, and a focus on student competencies---had to be carefully nurtured among students, established through collaborative teamwork, and fought for in the community. |
| tinkering toward utopia: Oversold and Underused Larry Cuban, 2003-04-30 One of the most respected voices in American education demonstrates that when teachers are not given a say in how new technology might reshape schools, students and teachers use that technology far less in the classroom than they do at home, and that teachers who use computers for instruction do so infrequently and unimaginatively. |
TINKERING Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
The meaning of TINKER is to work in the manner of a tinker; especially : to repair, adjust, or work with something in an unskilled or experimental manner : fiddle. How to use tinker in a sentence.
TINKERING | English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary
TINKERING definition: 1. present participle of tinker 2. to make small changes to something, especially in an attempt to…. Learn more.
What You Need to Know About Tinkering, Making, and …
Tinkering trays invite children to create and invent, and they promote independence and decision making. Shallow containers divided into sections, such as a shadow box, drawer, cutlery tray, …
Tinkering - definition of tinkering by The Free Dictionary
1. To work as a tinker. 2. To make unskilled or experimental efforts at repair; fiddle: tinkered with the engine, hoping to discover the trouble; tinkering with the economy by trying various fiscal policies.
TINKERING definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary
The act of making some small changes to something, in an attempt to improve it or repair it.... Click for English pronunciations, examples sentences, video.
What is Tinkering? - TinkerLab
Tinkering is about hands-on experiences, learning from failures, and unstructured time to explore and invent. And through the processes of exploration and invention lies the potential for innovation.
What does tinkering mean? - Definitions.net
tinkering In the arts, bricolage (French for "DIY" or "do-it-yourself projects") is the construction or creation of a work from a diverse range of things that happen to be available, or a work …
Tinkering Definition & Meaning | YourDictionary
An act of tinkering; an experimental fix or change. After a great deal of tinkering and trying, they did succeed in making two paddle wheels.
Tinker Definition & Meaning | Britannica Dictionary
He was tinkering in the garage. The car wouldn't start, but my brother tinkered with the engine a little and got it going again. They are still tinkering (around) with the details of the plan.
Making, Tinkering & Engineering: What’s the Difference?
Feb 22, 2021 · Tinkering is a branch of making that emphasizes creative, improvisational problem-solving. It centers on the open-ended design and construction of objects or installations, …
TINKERING Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
The meaning of TINKER is to work in the manner of a tinker; especially : to repair, adjust, or work with something in an unskilled or experimental manner : fiddle. How to use tinker in a sentence.
TINKERING | English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary
TINKERING definition: 1. present participle of tinker 2. to make small changes to something, especially in an attempt to…. Learn more.
What You Need to Know About Tinkering, Making, and …
Tinkering trays invite children to create and invent, and they promote independence and decision making. Shallow containers divided into sections, such as a shadow box, drawer, cutlery tray, …
Tinkering - definition of tinkering by The Free Dictionary
1. To work as a tinker. 2. To make unskilled or experimental efforts at repair; fiddle: tinkered with the engine, hoping to discover the trouble; tinkering with the economy by trying various fiscal …
TINKERING definition and meaning | Collins English Dictionary
The act of making some small changes to something, in an attempt to improve it or repair it.... Click for English pronunciations, examples sentences, video.
What is Tinkering? - TinkerLab
Tinkering is about hands-on experiences, learning from failures, and unstructured time to explore and invent. And through the processes of exploration and invention lies the potential for …
What does tinkering mean? - Definitions.net
tinkering In the arts, bricolage (French for "DIY" or "do-it-yourself projects") is the construction or creation of a work from a diverse range of things that happen to be available, or a work …
Tinkering Definition & Meaning | YourDictionary
An act of tinkering; an experimental fix or change. After a great deal of tinkering and trying, they did succeed in making two paddle wheels.
Tinker Definition & Meaning | Britannica Dictionary
He was tinkering in the garage. The car wouldn't start, but my brother tinkered with the engine a little and got it going again. They are still tinkering (around) with the details of the plan.
Making, Tinkering & Engineering: What’s the Difference?
Feb 22, 2021 · Tinkering is a branch of making that emphasizes creative, improvisational problem-solving. It centers on the open-ended design and construction of objects or installations, …
