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At this point, I think Sowell needs to send the kid an contrite note of apology.

The more I follow education policy debates, the more convinced I get that many of the leading voices aren't really in it for the kids, but for a particular ideological point of view. They may not be able to re-make the world to make every one sit in rows (or conversely, to make everyone happy group work team members), but give them the level of Federal education policy, and they can re-make public schools.

Amen and double amen! I had an "official" visitor take me to task for giving a worksheet in a language class! He comes in to my class for about 15 minutes as we're going over a worksheet and says I'm not an engaging teacher. I'm livid! I pull out the stops for those kids--bring in special guests, outside materials, multimedia, opportunities for conversation, etc. etc. I can't give them a worksheet now and then?!!! How should I reinforce grammar? Who is this person who gets a glimpse of my classroom and passes judgment?!!! And I'm not the only teacher who has to deal with this junk.

Here's an interesting piece of news. I called the principal of the school today to ask, "What was the assignment?" Was it as big a waste of time as Sowell claimed?

Turns out the kid wrote to Sowell on his own. It wasn't an assignment:

http://blog.coreknowledge.org/2009/10/09/the-thomas-sowell-affair/

Wow, Robert--I wish I had had the foresight and gumption to do what you did! I feel vindicated! You should write Dr. Sowell to see if he's ready to apologize--though I sincerely doubt he's the sort to apologize.

Just to review: A fifth grader is so advanced that he admires a PhD economist and takes the initiative to write that person with questions about the economy. The PhD economist smacks the student down and then uses said student as an example of how schools waste time chatting about TV celebrities. Now that's a virtuoso performance by Dr. Sowell. It's almost sublime in its incoherence. 

Anonymous--Your story reminds me of an experience I had when I was teaching a German class about 15 years ago. Almost the same scenario: a reviewer popped in to my class for about 10 minutes, found us reviewing a worksheet on some rather tricky grammatical points, and scolded me about my over-reliance on worksheets. One of the few (and, I still maintain, necessary) worksheets I used that year, and that microcosm became the basis of a much larger judgment.

Rachel--That note of apology from Sowell is all the more appropriate now, but don't hold your breath. 

A man who once wrote brilliant articles and books on economics and now humiliates a child without knowing the facts probably has a "problem." Need I say more?

Getting away from Sowell's cruelty, your recent posts have made the two essential points that education reformers need more humility and balance. I can't disagree with the thread over at Ed Sector about the future already being here but its being experienced unevenly. The self-segregation of the Big Sort, along with the disruptive innovations of the digital world, and the breaking down of old institutions are creating a proliferation of choices beyond our ability to count much less evaluate.

While devotees of the Market and digital innovations see the great things in these disruptions, I see them as probably being 1/2 basically for the good and 1/2 basically for ill, but others will make a good case that these changes are doing more harm than good.

Yes, digital and video worlds pervade poor as well as affluent schools. While twitter gives students a chance to get up-to-the-second upadates on President Obama and the Nobel Prize, they also allow video of the morning's gang fight to be circulated around school in an endless loop.

At least society is starting to deter text messaging while driving, as it defends students rights to be texting about who is sleeping with who while doing their classwork. But if driving while texting is comparable to driving while high and/or drunk, why don't we take differientiated instruction to the next step and allow our alcoholics to indulge in class, and offer professional devlopment for better instructional methods for students who are high on grass?

That being said, I have no doubt that these technologies are already improving learning for some. Already in the light of the latest murder, students are discussing the ethics of snitching by text-message. My students know how much I hate cell phones, but at least with the older ones, we have occassionally broken my rules in order to bring an outsider into a class discussion or to photograph something when we couldn't wait for a camaera to be summoned.

Often we divide ourselves based on how we feel towards the old systems of higher ed, journalism, liberal arts, rules of evidence, and respect for the cannon. I know the old silos of research, the press, popular media etc. were imperfect. But I still deeply love the traditional institutions that are being displaced by the new. That's why Bill Strauss used to say that Baby Boomers can't stop the tide but we must stand for the old public education values that don't speak to newer generations.

And that brings me back to humility and balance. Learned Hand said that the spirit of Democracy is not too sure of its own righteousness. (I paraphrase and back in the day that rough remembering would horrify purists). Too many liberal "reformers" want to get rid of the checks and balances that the democratic process put on the institution of education. A better approach would be to simply slow down and reduce unforced errors, as we also trust that change will create a lot of good. If fact, at a time of such innovation why do reformers fall back into so much social engineering and top down micromanaging?

And not to be tacky, it will probably be poetic justice that Rhee's impatience, and her lack of politeness especailly dealing with race, that will bring her down. Whether her latest tactic of firing teachers after hiring more is illegal or not is only 1/2 of the story. What are the chances that she sat down with her lawyers beforehand and asked for honest opinions of what the spirit of the law dictated?

Economists are not known for their diplomacy in general, though that was pretty doggone ill-mannered of him. Better just to stick the note into File 13 and be done with it. Let the poor kid think the letter got lost in the mail.

President Bush had a media guy send a picture and standard "response" letter to my son Elf when he wrote about the Sudan when he was seven. My other son decided to write to his preschool teacher to tell her he misses her, he lost a tooth and he is at home for school now.

She never wrote back. At least she didn't write a scathing anti-homeschooling letter in a national newspaper, though. Good grief.

PS. I love worksheets. I hate busy-work though. :]

John--Thanks for your expansive comment. Your thoughts on many of innovations certainly make sense. When it comes to technology, however, the advocates make a very credible argument that students are steeped in social networking technologies--so it's important for schools to help students uncover those technologies' virtues rather than allow students to succumb to their dangers. Still, I agree with your notion that, amidst all the important innovation, it's important to define some non-negotiable characteristics of public education--its core values. Many of the innovators seem to forget that part, it seems. Others, like Sowell, are guided by what seems a fairly clear (or stark?) vision of what public education should be, so they become unhinged by the least signs, real or perceived, that schools aren't fulfilling that vision. Perhaps it would behoove all of us to do a better job of articulating our core values and then supporting innovations of all sorts that support those values. Easier said than done, I know....

Mrs. C. Kudos to Elf for such a serious-minded note. It's not every seven-year-old who would make such an effort. Too bad he got a form letter. Your story reminds me of a time when I was a bit older than seven. I wrote a prominent American historian in hopes of getting a letter back. I was enthusiastic about history but didn't really understand his books at that age. On reflection, I know the letter I sent was inane--a desperate attempt to make contact with a man I truly admired for reasons I wasn't old enough to express very well. He very graciously returned my letter to me with handwritten answers to my questions in the margins. His concluding note: "Good luck to you!" 

Had he written my parents the kind of screed Sowell presumably wrote to the parents of our hapless fifth grader--and if he had then gone ahead to publish a national column drawing all sorts of conclusions about the limits of education and the ignorance of my parents--I would have been devastated. I imagine he could have turned me off of history for a good long while.

Sorry to hear that your younger son's preschool teacher never wrote back. It sounds like he sent her a sweet note! 

Thanks, Claus. It really is a shame to read of Sowell's tirade against the kid. I mean, isn't this the sort of thing we want public schools to encourage? Engage with the world around them? Here the kid isn't just filling in a bubble on a test; he's learning something about the real world out there. (Well, and it's too bad he is, too, isn't it?)