Harvestr.Org

Okay, first I should tell you that the healthy school lunch isn’t to be found in an American public school.  Chef Dominique Valadier is the man who purchases the majority of the food served at the school within a thirty mile radius of the school and then prepares it with little or no frozen ingredients.  All at the cost of about $3 per student.  If you want the full story you can check it out here.  Makes cafeteria food sound yummy!

So here is what I was wondering…why can’t we do the same kind of thing here.  I mean I’ve heard the odd story about our schools getting healthier and you hear about the ‘war on obesity’ all the time BUT I don’t see many changes in actual school lunches.  At the schools I’ve worked at the usual lunches were pizza, some variety of meat nuggets, fried this and that.  Yes, we started having salads but they consisted of iceburg lettuce a few slices of tomato and cucumber and cheese.  Uhm…not so nutritionally superior in my opinion. 

Wouldn’t it be great if all public schools were required to follow health guidelines just as they are required to follow curriculum guidelines?  If the government is going to control the schools then dang it they could do something about the food while they were at it.  Or, and this is probably the solution I like better, they could privatize schools completely.  I’m pretty sure if parents were picking where their kids were going to school and had an influence in where their education dollars were going they’d be more vocal and more insistent in their cries for healthy food.

Do you think school lunchrooms should strive to make healthy food a priority?  Do you think the government should force public schools to serve healthy (and tasty, of course) food?  OR do you think the government should back off all the regulating and let the private sector take over?

Source: admin

This is what I’m talking about!  Some decent media coverage about putting education front and center in the presidential election.  It makes me happy that someone who can do something (as in not just me and my little blog) is trying to make this a national issue.  As a matter of fact the article says that polls are showing that education and the economy are ranking as more important than the war in Iraq. 

I was all kinds of shocked to hear that.  I mean the war in Iraq IS important and all of the men and women over there should definitely be in our minds this election season but that is what everyone is focusing on in the media.  There cause doesn’t need me to go around waving the banner.  Education on the other hand does need some banner waving. 

One last thing, I’m not by any means saying I’m with Watts on what he thinks needs to be done with education but any discussion at all is better than what I have been seeing!

Do you think education will play an important role in the presidential election this year or am I just dreaming??

Source: admin

As a follow up to the adverb video thought I’d post the Grammar Rock adjective video.  An excellent and cute video.  Kids (heck adults for that matter) often learn better when something is put to music.

So is the song stuck in your head?  Do you love or hate these videos?

Source: admin

According to this article McCain is saying some things but nothing that I feel strongly one way or the other about.  The part of the article that really interested me is that McCain is to discuss his education platform at the end of summer.  I’m so excited that there will BE an education platform that I hardly know what to do with myself.  One assumes (yes, I know where assumptions can get me) that a platform might have actual information.  That would be so wonderful!  Don’t get me wrong I’m not going to go with a candidate just based on what he has to say about education but it is going to have a lot of pull.  After all, the way our children are taught will have one of the most long lasting affects on our country.  As a teacher I can tell you that I’m a bit worried about how our country is going to handle the generation that is coming up for graduation. 

What issues in education are you hoping McCain addresses at the ‘end of summer’?  I’m looking forward to some information about No Child Left Behind, vouchers, standardized tests and national standards.

Source: admin

I bet that got your attention.  You are probably either really for it or really against it.  Either way here is an interesting little story from across the pond for you.  This story talks about children who after a lesson on Islam were asked to pray to Allah.  Ummm what?  That would soooo never happen here.  Additionally, they were punished when the refused.  Can you believe that a school actually disciplined children for not wanting to recite something that was showing allegiance to a god they did not worship (never you mind that Allah and the Christian God are the same, from a historical and theological stand point anyway)?

I bet you’re wondering where I’m going…well I’m almost there   American schools do this ALL the time.  It is called the Pledge of Allegiance.  Does the phrase “one nation under God” sound familiar?  Hmmm??? Whose God do you think that little bit of wording is referring to?  The Christian God.  That isn’t mandatory, you say?  Oh really?? Every principal I’ve ever worked for told me to make the students say it through example or intimidation or whatnot.  Of course, I didn’t do it.  As a matter of fact I’d stand and be respectfully silent every morning as it was said.  The students finally got around to asking me why I didn’t say it and I said I had a variety of reasons.  The one I usually gave was that I once had a student from another country (in this case Canada) who at the end of one school year asked me what the pledge meant and why we said it every day.  I asked her why she’d done it all year long if she didn’t know and she said she’d been afraid not to because she thought it was mandatory.  She thought it was mandatory because in practice it is even if it isn’t in law.  Peer pressure at its best, people.  I explained what it was etc and told her she didn’t have to say it if she didn’t want to (boy would I get chewed out about that if it got back to our superintendent).  From that moment on I refused to be a part in the brainwashing/peer pressure culture of our school. 

All rambling aside, for those of you who were outraged that a child would be ‘forced’ to pray to Allah please take a moment to reflect on the Pledge of Allegiance.  How would you feel if it said “one nation under Allah” (Allah just means God, folks)  Would you be comfortable with your child being pressured to stand and say the pledge if it was rewritten to say Allah?  No?  Then why is it ok to pressure students to say the pledge now?? 

Source: admin