"To develop a literacy program, Alvarado pursued an unusual strategy."

This educationist reasoning is something to behold: A questionable premise followed by a non sequitur.

-- CharlesH - 18 May 2006

Here is some background on how Snowball came to be: http://www.pbs.org/makingschoolswork/dwr/ny/instruction.html

To develop a literacy program, Alvarado pursued an unusual strategy. Through research, he learned that Australia and New Zealand had the highest literacy rates in the world, and so he decided to import the lessons learned there. At about that time, Alvarado met Diane Snowball. Snowball, a former Australian schoolteacher, was founder of a professional teacher development center for literacy and mathematics in Australia, and was in New York participating in a six-month literacy program at Columbia University. Alvarado convinced her to stay in New York after the program was over to work for District 2.

-- CharlesH - 18 May 2006

NYC is spending $2.4 million per year on AUSSIE contracts.

Here's a Google tip:

If you search for AUSSIE, Google will assume you mean AUSSIE or Australia or Australian or any other variation thereof. If you want to search for the exact term AUSSIE, then put it in double quotation marks.

I found loads of stuff by searching for: "AUSSIE" writing instruction program

-- GoogleMaster - 18 May 2006

"Charles, how did you find that???

This one defeated my skills."

The acronym itself is unsearchable (it might work with dots after the letters). I knew that the acronym stands for "Australian and United States Services in Education." Searching for the phrase had a snowballing effect. The PD being offered is constructivist boilerplate and another snow job.

-- CharlesH - 18 May 2006

wow

Charles

great find (the Wolf column)

thanks

THANKS

(I'm feeling emphatic this morning)

-- CatherineJohnson - 18 May 2006

Charles, how did you find that???

This one defeated my skills.

That's the one - the 'aussiepd' link.

PD

sigh

-- CatherineJohnson - 18 May 2006

PD is so-called professional development -- a hugely expensive and massive effort to indoctrinate teachers in progressive/constructivist mumbo-jumbo.

In a more rational world, districts would save themselves untold millions by foregoing PD and instead give teachers and administrators a copy of E.D. Hirsch's The Knowledge Deficit. http://www.aft.org/pubs-reports/american_educator/issues/spring06/hirsch.htm

There, they would find out that the exclusive focus on "comprehension strategies" is doomed to fail and what is needed is knowledge-based instruction.

-- CharlesH - 18 May 2006

what is PD?

(sorry to be thick - )

-- CatherineJohnson - 18 May 2006

I found a site of this AUSSIE thing. It's all about PD. http://www.aussiepd.com/

As Andrew Wolf points out, if you are an educationist and can't admit that students fail because the theories are wrong, then the failure must be attributable to inadequate teacher implementation of the faulty theories. Therefore more and more resources must be poured into PD.

Here is stuff from Ms. Snowflake herself: http://www.teachingk-8.com/archives/articles/comprehension_for_all_by_diane_snowball.html

-- CharlesH - 18 May 2006

"Apparently our school district is adopting, or contemplating adopting, a writing program called "AUSSIE," all caps."

It could be part of a hugely expensive whole language program shrouded in some mystery.

See Andrew Wolf: http://daily.nysun.com/Repository/getFiles.asp?Style=OliveXLib:ArticleToMail&Type=text/html&Path=NYS/2003/12/05&ID=Ar00900

It was Ms. Calkins who organized the response of 100 education “experts” to offer support to Mr. Klein. As I pointed out at the time, virtually every one of the 100 or the institutions they were affiliated with was a recipient of DOE largess. Defending Mr. Klein and his controversial curriculum seems to have worked out just fine for Ms. Calkins, her institute, and her highend publishing career.

However, it may have worked out even better for another signatory to Ms. Calkins’s letter, Diane Snowball. Ms. Snowball hails from Down Under and runs a private company with her husband, Greg, called Australian and United States Services in Education (Aussie).

In Bronx Regions 1 and 2 alone, the total of their contracts for just this year certainly approaches and perhaps exceeds $10 million. Aussie is also working for six other New York City regions, as well as for the DOE itself. An enormous amount of money is being funneled to it, nearly enough to place an additional teacher in every New York City public school. So who are these Aussies that they should be rewarded so lavishly? That’s a question being asked in schools all over the city.

-- CharlesH - 18 May 2006

what is Aussie?

Apparently our school district is adopting, or contemplating adopting, a writing program called "AUSSIE," all caps.

What is it?

Does anyone know?

-- CatherineJohnson - 17 May 2006

<!--

• Posted by: CatherineJohnson
• LogDate: May 17, 2006 @ 18:33

Back to main page.

Comments