The Literate Teacher's Manifesto

This week, Target offered a teacher discount of 15% on classroom supplies-- notebooks, writing utensils, cleaning supplies, and so forth (but not books-- a post for another time). Predictably, there was much rejoicing among the teachers in my PLN, but there was also a not-insignificant amount of pushback. Many teachers in different social media groups advocated a spending freeze; teachers should not spend their own money on classroom supplies. Only by refusing to spend our own money to fund our classrooms, they insisted, could we ever expect to force the state's hand. Others went so far as to imply that it was insulting that Target would even offer the discount, that it was a dismal picture of what the expectations are for educators. I have always been willing to spend my own money to make my classroom what I want it to be. I know that even if some miracle occurred, and funding levels were suddenly restored to pre-Recession levels, it would still not be enough to fund my classroo...

I got sucked into a huge Facebook discussion this afternoon. It all started when a teacher asked the question, "When reading out loud to the class and the n-word appears, do you say it or not?" 334 responses later, and I'm not sure whether the original poster's question has been answered or not. It seems like an innocuous question, right? Any teacher who has ever done a read-aloud has probably been faced with a word that made them pause and think, "Will I say this word?" But the answer here is not as simple as reading a hell , a damn , or even a fuck . There are words that come with their own emotional baggage, that are so heavily weighted with history and policy and society, that's there's not such a simple answer. Ten years ago, before I was the teacher I am now, before Twitter and PLN's and social justice, I was that teacher. The one asking that question. We were preparing to read To Kill A Mockingbird , and I knew that the n-word was coming...

Home "Mid pleasures and palaces tho I may roam/ Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home." I cannot count how many times  I have watched the road unwind before me, awash in sun and promise, or how many times I have seen that promise fade behind me in the glow of taillights. I cannot count how many times I have gazed out a window at a patchwork of unfamiliar fields and hills, on the crashing descent of a mountain waterfall, across a snow-covered wonderland with white-coated trees and frozen lakes, or past sun-bathed vineyards basking in Old World charm. I cannot count how many times I have traversed the last rise of that familiar hill, travel-worn, heartsick, weary, to see home rising in the distance. And felt my spirits lifted, my soul, renewed. I have waited for the white fence, the cornfields, the familiar length of a red barn,, and the white house, reigning peacefully over this small kingdom. Bringing bac...

Most days in the summer, you can find me in this chair. It's my weeding chair. I'd be lying if I said that I enjoy spending time in this chair, but it does give me a lot of time to think. During the school year, everything gets filtered through the lens of my classroom, but the summer gives me the time and space to filter my classroom through the lens of other activities. My Paw Lackey and my Mamaw Grace both taught me that there are lessons to be learned from a garden, and I value the time I spend in my garden for the clarity it gives me. This morning, I was thinking about weeds. Every gardener hates weeds. The battle against them is time-consuming and ongoing, and you never really win it. You may reach a temporary truce if you hit a dry spell or if your hubby sneaks into your garden with Roundup (usually doing more harm than good), but eventually, the weeds will come back. They always do.  So it is with bad ideas in education. I have never been in any other c...