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Yesterday's Washington Post included a somewhat dissatisfying article on critical thinking skills. While the author dutifully provides the Foundation for Critical Thinking's definition of the elusive term, the article's most convincing statement about critical thinking comes in a quotation from Tufts University dean Robert Sternberg: "You know it when you see it." Though some concrete examples may have been in order, the article disappoints us.

As if rising to the challenge, ASCD released a Smart Brief Special Report this morning entitled Teaching Students to Think, Part I, which "explores the many ways educators are developing students' thinking skills."  Stay tuned for Part II (Coming February 21st), which will focus on "best practices and professional development." ...

The New York Times is launching a new multimedia series following a "communitywide effort" to turn around a struggling school in Newark, New Jersey. The result of a partnership between the Newton Street School, Seton Hall University and the Newark Teachers Union, the school's reform strategy includes a longer school day, more attention to teacher professional development, integration of reading and mathematics instruction into other subjects, and more money for enrichment programs.

It's worth a look. ...

The Road to American prosperity might not be paved with engineering degrees alone.

At least, that's one conclusion I draw from the most recent issue of AASA's School Administrator, which includes a fascinating conversation between best-selling authors Tom Friedman and Dan Pink (whose PublicSchoolInsights.org interview you can find here).  As most people know by now, Friedman's book The World is Flat claims that ubiquitous information technology (among other forces) will level the global playing field, putting Americans in direct competition with well-educated people in countries such as India and China.  Many education reformers have used the "flat world" mantra to justify expanding time for mathematics at the expense of other important academic disciplines. ...

I wish the above title were my own creation, but it's the very clever title of a new poll demonstrating that Americans of all stripes see imagination as a core ability all schools should teach.  Perhaps that's not so shocking, but another finding really did surprise me:  Namely, that most Americans believe our schools are falling behind other countries' schools in their ability produce imaginative, innovative students. 

Ouch. 

It seems we're losing our formerly unshakable belief in America as a country where Thomas Edisons and Bill Gateses come as naturally as the leaves to a tree.  Other countries might be good at math, we've told ourselves, but we're the natural-born innovators.

Maybe not.  Americans appear to understand that developing an innovative spirit takes work, and that such work begins in our public schools.  More and more worry that policies focusing too exclusively on mathematics and reading threaten to crowd out innovation and dull our competitive edge.  ...

Nowhere are the "Christmas wars" more explosive - and nowhere do people feel the stakes are higher - than in public schools. In schools around the country, the December "holiday" (aka "Christmas") assembly has become a high-stakes contest that stirs deep emotions.

For many people on all sides, the argument isn't really about Christmas songs or Nativity pageants - it's about who gets to decide what kind of society we are. Schools, after all, are where we define who we are as a nation.

The depth of the divide is illustrated by two requests for help I recently received. The first was from an elementary-school principal struggling to figure out if her school's plans for the December program would pass constitutional muster. The proposed script includes a skit about Santa Claus that ends with a Nativity re-enactment during the singing of "Silent Night."

The second was from a parent in another town who is upset because all mention of Christmas has been banned in her child's school.

Both approaches are wrongheaded and divisive. Both violate the spirit, if not the letter, of the First Amendment. ...