Marshall Memo 760

A Weekly Round-up of Important Ideas and Research in K-12 Education

November 5, 2018

 

 

 

In This Issue:

1. David Brooks on American nationalism

2. Skillfully speaking truth to power

3. Do trigger warnings overprotect high-school students?

4. The debate about leveling texts – and students

5. Teacher questions and prompts in grade 4-5-6 science classrooms

6. Two ways of looking at personalization

7. Short item: Retrieval practice website

 

Quotes of the Week

“It is not one thing that you love but the confluence of a hundred things. Yes, it is the beauty of the Rockies, but it is not just the land. It is the Declaration of Independence, but not just the creed. It’s winning World War II and Silicon Valley, but it is not just the accomplishments. It is the craziness, the diversity, our particular brand of madness.” 

            David Brooks on national pride (see article #1)

 

“One of the greatest deficits in leadership is to not command respect for knowing where you want to go. If people doubt the mission or how it will be carried out, you’ve got a problem.”

            John Kerry in “Life’s Work” in Harvard Business Review, November-December 2018 

(Vol. 96, #6, p. 156), https://hbr.org/2018/11/lifes-work-an-interview-with-john-kerry

 

“[S]tudents learn to do what they are asked to do.”

Vandana Thadani et al. (see article #5)

 

“The long-term benefit of getting through algebra ahead of your peers loses its cachet by the time you’re 30.”

            Orly Friedman (see article #6)

 

“We can use reading levels to help guide student choice, but levels should never be used to shackle a reader.”

            Jennifer Serravallo (see article #4)

 

“One of the roles of the high-school English teacher is to be courageous enough to bring elephants into the classroom – heavily laden topics so incendiary that they shake students from the comforts of their normative experiences, push them to reconsider their own ideologies, and – through significant, intelligent risk – bring about real changes in thought and experience.”

            Adam Wolfsdorf (see article #3)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1. David Brooks on American Nationalism

            In this New York Timescolumn, David Brooks asks whether we feel most attached to our neighborhood, town, county, state, nation, or humanity as a whole. When he puts this questions to audiences, about five percent say they bond with all of humanity and most others say it’s their neighborhood or town. Brooks grew up in Lower Manhattan and has deep connections there going back five generations, but his primary attachment is to the United States. “You could take New York out of my identity and I’d be sort of the same,” he says. “If you took America out of my identity I’d be unrecognizable to myself.” 

            What does his love of country look like? “It is not one thing that you love but the confluence of a hundred things,” says Brooks. “Yes, it is the beauty of the Rockies, but it is not just the land. It is the Declaration of Independence, but not just the creed. It’s winning World War II and Silicon Valley, but it is not just the accomplishments. It is the craziness, the diversity, our particular brand of madness.” 

            Brooks quotes the 19th-century philosopher Ernest Renan: “These are the essential conditions of being a people: having common glories in the past and a will to continue them in the present; having made great things together and wishing to make them again. One loves in proportion to the sacrifices that one has committed and the troubles that one has suffered.” Brooks salutes great nationalists like Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, A. Philip Randolph, and Walt Whitman, as well as Gloria Steinem and Phyllis Schlafly, “those who stand for the anthem and those who kneel.” 

            “Love for nation is an expanding love because it is love for the whole people,” he continues. “It’s an ennobling love because it comes with the urge to hospitality – to share what you love and to want to make more love by extending it to others.” 

            But today, says Brooks, “our common American nationalism, our mutual loyalty, is under strain… If you stop the love songs to America, take the celebration of America out of public life, you leave people spiritually bereft, robbed of a great devotion. The results are what you see – loss of connection, a tendency to catastrophize, feelings of anger, isolation and powerlessness. People begin to feel that the injustices in American society are the whole and there is no hope of redemption. They get the urge to burn everything down.” 

 

“Yes, I’m an American Nationalist” by David Brooks in The New York Times, October 26, 2018, https://nyti.ms/2OtlwdX

Back to page one

 

2. Skillfully Speaking Truth to Power

            In this Harvard Business Reviewarticle, James Detert (University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business) tells the story of a woman who for years had endured risqué comments and sexual innuendo from her boss, the company president. Then at a staff gathering he grabbed her inappropriately, treating it as a joke. Later in the day, she confronted him in his office, prepared to quit if he didn’t change. She told him that his behavior made her uncomfortable and signified that she would never advance in the company because he didn’t see her as an equal. Perhaps he was trying to promote a fun work environment, but for her that wasn’t working. She expected him to get angry, tell her to toughen up, or fire her. 

Instead, he apologized and said he was horrified that she felt that way; probably other women in the company did as well. He praised her for having the courage to speak up, and in the weeks ahead, continued to seek her advice on the issue and made a formal apology to the staff. A year later, this woman was promoted to a coveted vice president position. 

Detert is quick to say that things don’t always work out this well: “Courage, after all, is about taking worthy actions despite the potential risk. If no one ever got fired, was socially isolated, or suffered other consequences for a particular action, we wouldn’t consider it courageous.” But he’s found plenty of people at all levels who have spoken up without ruining their careers. “Their success,” he says, “rested primarily on a set of attitudes and behaviors that can be learned, rather than on innate characteristics. I call people who exhibit these behaviors competently courageous…” Here are the key steps:

• Laying the groundwork– It’s very helpful to have accumulated a stock of goodwill derived from a history of competence, positive relationships with bosses and colleagues, and support in the organization. Conversely, those with a history of selfishness and ill will have less success when they challenge authority. 

• Choosing your battles – The key questions are, Is this really important? and Is this the right time? “Competently courageous people are masters of good timing,” says Detert. “They observe what is going on around them, and if the timing doesn’t look right, they patiently hold off.” A cue for action might be an organizational change, the arrival of a new ally, or a public upwelling of enthusiasm for the issue. 

• Being persuasive in the moment– Detert has identified three key factors: framing the issue in terms the audience will relate to; making effective use of data; and managing the emotions in the room, especially your own. Competently courageous people “connect their agenda to the organization’s priorities or values,” he says, “or explain how it addresses critical areas of concern for stakeholders. They ensure that decision makers feel included – not attacked or pushed aside.” 

• Following up– No matter how things turn out, this is a key strategy for the competently courageous. “They manage their relationships with the people involved,” says Detert: “When things go well, they thank supporters and share credit. When things go badly, they address lingering emotions and repair ties with those who might be hurt or angry… Following up also means continuing to pursue your agenda beyond the first big moment of action.” 

• Starting small– Sometimes less momentous workplace acts call for courage, says Detert, and tend to be avoided. “Humans naturally fear rejection, embarrassment, and all sorts of other social and economic consequences,” he says. His advice: “Don’t jump into the deep end right away. Instead, approach the work incrementally by trying smaller, more manageable acts before proceeding to progressively harder ones. That might mean having a difficult conversation in some other sphere of life, or broaching a tough topic with a colleague you like and respect, before confronting a boss about demeaning behavior… Then, as you tackle each step, focus on what you learn, not whether it goes perfectly the first time. Above all, keep your values and purpose front and center.”

 

“Cultivating Everyday Courage: The Right Way to Speak Truth to Power” by James Detert in Harvard Business Review, November-December 2018 (Vol. 96, #6, p. 128-135), 

https://hbr.org/2018/11/cultivating-everyday-courage; Detert can be reached at

[email protected]

Back to page one

 

3. Do Trigger Warnings Overprotect High-School Students?

            In this article in English Journal, Adam Wolfsdorf (Bay Ridge Preparatory High School and New York University) says that many high-school literary texts contain some controversial and emotionally charged content. For example:

-  Hamlet: intimations of mortality, murderous intent, suicidal ideation;

-  Huckleberry Finn: slavery, racism, abusive parenting, religious indoctrination;

-  The Great Gatsby: unrequited love, obsession, substance abuse, murder;

-  Death of a Salesman: suicide;

-  Beloved: rape.

Given the turbulence of adolescence and the personal traumas many students have experienced, doesn’t it make sense to give advance notice – trigger warnings – of possibly disturbing content in the literature they’re required to read in school? Research from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention has found that:

-  One in five Americans was sexually molested as a child.

-  One in four was beaten severely enough by a parent to leave a mark.

-  One in eight has witnessed his or her mother being beaten or hit.

-  One in four grew up with alcoholic relatives.

-  One in three couples engages in physical violence.

 “Part of being a teacher is acknowledging that we are working with a diverse group of students,” says Wolfsdorf, “each living with a psychological history far more extensive than any of us may realize.”

Trigger warnings originated in the 1960s for soldiers returning from the traumatic events of the Vietnam War, and have recently been revived to shield students from classroom content that might awaken memories of violence, racism, sexual abuse, or other extremely upsetting events. Wolfsdorf says trigger warnings are well-intentioned, but he believes they “are not only ineffective but also anathema to the type of courage English teachers can foster when teaching literature to adolescents.” 

There may even be negative unintended consequences, he says. Specifically, trigger warnings can:

-  Encourage students to avoid intense literary moments that they may perceive as too powerful or emotionally charged;

-  Deprive students from experiencing some of the critical, aesthetic, and transformative moments of a text;

-  Foster a culture where student fragility is promoted over the development of resilience;

-  Depress artistic freedom by arbitrarily sanctioning what is and what is not appropriate for class discussion and student experience;

-  Constrain English teachers by censoring or casting certain literary moments as taboo;

-  Draw too much attention to controversial literary scenes, thereby offsetting the natural balance and order of the text.

In short, high-school English class “is a boot camp, not a hotel,” says Wolfsdorf (quoting Alan Levinovitz).

Wolfsdorf makes two additional arguments against trigger warnings. First, he says, there are indications that they simply don’t work. PET brain scans of trauma survivors being reminded of past experiences show high negative arousal, even when they have been forewarned of what’s coming. “The psychological impact of trauma is far greater than the cognitive behavioral practice of forewarning,” he says. Second, being shielded from emotionally powerful literature deprives students of experiences that will build resilience. One high-school English teacher said, “I feel strongly that we are confusing comfort with safety. I want my students to be safe. I don’t want them to be comfortable.” 

Wolfsdorf agrees: “In the high-school classroom, controversy equals opportunity. One of the roles of the high-school English teacher is to be courageous enough to bring elephants into the classroom – heavily laden topics so incendiary that they shake students from the comforts of their normative experiences, push them to reconsider their own ideologies, and – through significant, intelligent risk – bring about real changes in thought and experience.” 

            Wolfsdorf remembers a senior in one of his classes asking him to review her college essay. Reading it that evening, he was horrified to learn that the girl’s father, whom the family had left behind in their home country and hadn’t seen for seven years, had tragically died over the summer. Wolfsdorf’s class had just spent three months going through every line of Hamlet. “I had attempted to gaze into the souls of my students,” he says, “urging them to reach for the inevitability of loss and encouraging them to feel, experience, and confront life’s powerful counterpoint, death.” Wolfsdorf felt ashamed that he had “failed terribly as an educator – digging so deeply into themes that so immediately touched her own life and experience.” The next day, he apologized profusely. 

To his surprise, the girl said she wouldn’t change anything in the way he taught Hamlet. “Obviously, it sparked some emotions, and not all good ones, to be fair,” she said. “But I think a text like that, it can always – you can’t avoid things in your life regardless of how much you want to. So it’s better to deal with them rather than just pretend that they’re not happening… So when it’s in a controlled environment like that and, in addition to that, you’re feeling like this character is going through some sort of struggle in their life just like you are, I guess – and maybe you opened your mind to ‘someone else is going through that, someone else is experiencing this,’ and I think it was more helpful than harmful.” 

What Wolfsdorf took away from this was a strong conviction that high-school English teachers need to create a space that is “accepting and comforting for students,” where it is safe for students to experience strong emotions and be supported as they deal with life experiences. That obviously includes “maintaining a positive attitude toward students, encouraging them to feel respected and acknowledged, responding to them empathetically when they seem shaken, and having a plan in place with the school’s guidance department, should a student get triggered and need intervention.”

“But the trigger warning is not a solution,” he says. “In some ways, it is a cop-out. The issue of trauma deserves more respectful and thoughtful approaches that fully consider and account for the potential ways that students with psychological trauma can negatively respond to experiences in the classroom… Part of the way that English teachers can do this is by helping students to enter into rich aesthetic engagement with literature. If we hold back, walk on eggshells, or shy away from full participation, we may unwittingly be teaching our students fear. But if we believe in literature’s innate therapeutic benefits, we just might find that there’s more value to a text when it’s fully loaded.” 

 

“When It Comes to High-School English, Let’s Put Away the Triggers” by Adam Wolfsdorf in English Journal, September 2018 (Vol. 108, #1, p. 39-44), https://bit.ly/2AN9fNL; Wolfsdorf can be reached at [email protected].

Back to page one

 

4. The Debate About Leveling Texts – and Students

            In this Cult of Pedagogyarticle, Jennifer Gonzalez follows up on a much-discussed Twitter message sent by balanced literacy gurus Irene Fountas and Gay Su Pinnell: “The classroom library should NOT be organized according to level, but according to categories such as topic, author, illustrator, genre, and award-wining books.” (See Marshall Memo 714 for a full article on this by Fountas and Pinnell.) Gonzalez interviewed literacy consultant and author Jennifer Serravallo, whose book on the subject was published last summer (Understanding Texts and Readers, Heinemann, 2018). Some key takeaways:

            For starters, what’s up with leveled texts? In the 1960s and 70s, SRA kits attempted to provide teachers with passages at different levels of difficulty. Looking back, says Serravallo, the SRA cards didn’t provide very interesting storylines or authentic language; they weren’t real children’s books, which are not written with levels in mind. Then in the 1990s, two ways of pegging the reading levels of real literature emerged: 

-  Quantitativeleveling using computer programs measuring text length and complexity – for example, Lexile levels;

-  Qualitativeleveling done by humans, considering not only technical characteristics but also idea density and background knowledge required – for example, Fountas and Pinnell’s text level gradient.

Almost all children’s books have now been leveled using these and other methods.

            Serravallo goes on to describe what she believes are common mistakes that schools make with leveled texts:

            • Mistake #1: Leveling students by text levels– “Levels are meant for books, not for kids,” she says. “There’s really no point in time when a kid is just a level, just one. There’s a real range, and it depends on a lot of other factors.” When students know their supposed reading level, it can cause unhealthy competition, students racing through levels, as well as embarrassment, even shame for students reading at levels lower than their classmates. Things get worse when schools peg their student learning objectives (SLOs) to students progressing through the levels – for example, measuring progress by the percent of students reaching a particular level, or making a certain number of gains in level by the end of the school year. In some cases, teachers’ evaluations are partly based on students meeting SLO goals. 

            All this can lead to ineffective pedagogy, says Serravallo: “You’ve got this kid being pushed through because they can maybe decode the text but not because they’re actually getting everything they can from it in terms of comprehension and meaning making. If the kids are not thinking on that level, why be pushing them into harder and harder books? Why not work with them in texts that they choose to help them get more from the texts that they are reading?”

            Rather than focusing narrowly on text levels, says Serravallo, teachers should get to know students from a variety of angles: “Factors such as motivation, background knowledge, culture, and English language proficiency should all be on our radar when considering how to help students find books they’ll love, and how to evaluate students’ comprehension and support them with appropriate goals and strategies.” 

            • Mistake #2: Restricting book choice based on a single assessment– Some teachers use a computer assessment on a short text, or a running record, to peg students to a narrow text range, and then tell students they can only pick books from that level range. But that doesn’t take into account all the other variables that kids bring to the table – motivation, prior knowledge, stamina, command of English, and familiarity with different genres. 

            Instead, says Serravallo, teachers should take all those other variables into account and allow students to read a wider range of books. “So I have a kid who knows a lot about dinosaurs who typically reads books around level O-P,” she says. “If it’s a dinosaur book and he wants to read it, and it’s a Level R or S, maybe that’s okay.” 

            • Mistake #3: Inflexibility– “Saying to a student, ‘You’re a Level __, so you can only read Level __ books’ is deeply problematic,” says Serravallo. “We can use reading levels to help guide student choice, but levels should never be used to shackle a reader.” Sometimes students want to challenge themselves with a book that will require more support to get through, and sometimes students want to read easier books for fun – and teachers should support those choices, while guiding students to books that will help them grow.

            • Mistake #4: Organizing books by level– Serravallo admits that she had bins of leveled books in her classroom years ago, but, she says, “I’ve changed my thinking after seeing the consequences of what that does to kids’ reading identity. What ends up happening is kids go to the classroom library and they say, ‘I’m a Q. I’m going to pick a Q book.’ And they go to the Q bin and they only look in the Q bin.” 

Instead, as Fountas and Pinnell advised in their tweet, books should be organized by topic, genre, author, etc. so that the first thing students see is types of books rather than levels. “And they think about themselves first before they think about level,” says Serravallo: “Who am I as a reader, and what am I interested in reading?”

            She does advise recording each book’s level in an inconspicuous place, like inside the front cover, for the teacher’s reference. “That way,” she says, “when a child is holding a book, it’s not like everyone can see the level on the book, so it’s a little bit more private. But I like having them on the book, because if I haven’t read that book, I can peek at the level and be like, oh yeah, okay. Complex characters in this one. And I can use that to guide my discussions when I’m working with kids.” 

 

“What Are the Best Ways to Use Leveled Texts?” by Jennifer Gonzalez in The Cult of Pedagogy, October 21, 2018, https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/leveled-texts/

Back to page one

 

5. Teacher Questions and Prompts in Grade 4-5-6 Science Classrooms

            “[S]tudents learn to do what they are asked to do,” say Vandana Thadani, Melanie Seyarto, Jennifer Thompson, and Nicole Froidevaux (Loyola Marymount University), Kathleen Roth (California State Polytechnic University), and Helen Garnier (University of Colorado/Boulder) in this article in The Journal of the Learning Sciences. In other words, the quality of teachers’ questions, prompts, and tasks is a key element in learning outcomes. The researchers analyzed whether professional development on the Teacher Tasks and Questions (TTQ) framework had an impact on upper-elementary teachers’ classroom practices and their students’ achievement. Here are the TTQ areas, with examples of teachers’ questions and prompts:

Higher-order TTQs:

• Reason:

-  Prompts to synthesize or apply information, generate hypotheses, or draw conclusions;

-  Examples: “Can anyone make a hypothesis or an educated guess how the carbon dioxide gets in the plant?”  “How does energy travel in a food chain? Give me your insights.”

• Metacognition:

-  Prompts to think metacognitively, including reflecting on one’s knowledge or performance, setting one’s own sub-goals for a major task, or revising strategies based on reflections;

-  Examples: “What are you doing now that is different than what you were doing before?”  “I want you to write two things that you learned that you didn’t know before today.” 

• Approach:

-  Prompts that indicate how students can generalize cognitions/learning behaviors. This includes informing students of lesson/learning goals and reorienting students to those goals; also suggestions about how to regulate motivation and affect. In contrast to metacognition, the teachers provide direction on goals and next steps rather than asking students to generate them.

-  Examples: “The focus question for today is how do we get this light bulb to light up.”  “Try your best to use the language we’ve been learning.”  “You have to have a logical reason for your belief.” 

Foundational TTQs:

• Organize:

-  Prompts about taking notes or requesting information through tables, graphs, or images for the purpose of remembering or visualizing it;

-  Examples: “You need to write down, ‘Experiment number two.’”  “The first thing I want you to put on this page are the steps. So you’re going to list what you did first, what you did second, what you did third.” 

• Collaborate:

-  Instructions about whether and how to work with classmates;

-  Example: “I want you to work with a partner, because sometimes you may not have an idea, but your partner will.” 

• Remember:

-  Prompts to recall/reproduce events or previously learned information;

-  Examples: “What words did we use for clouds that means that they had water in them?  Do you remember what that word was?”  “Can you name one ecosystem that you have learned so far?”

Practical TTQs:

• Status check:

-  Quick checks on student progress or understanding;

-  Example: “Does everybody have any questions about the water cycle?”

• Replicate:

-  Prompts for students to reproduce or describe without further transforming information (e.g., reading from the text, reporting observations without meaning making);

-  Examples: “What colors do you see in these leaves? The little specks. What color are they?”  “Yes, I’d like everybody to say photosynthesis.” 

• Execute:

-  Instructions to execute a behavior in the moment without information about how to generalize; includes prompts that guide students’ attention or instructions to follow along during a demonstration;

-  Examples: “Put the battery on top of that.”  “You can also look at our diagram and our paragraph about photosynthesis, as well as our photos and your own notes.” 

• Other:

-  Providing instructions for work to be done outside of that day’s lesson;

-  Example: “Tomorrow, we’re going to check and see what other types of materials allow the electricity to flow through it.” 

The researchers believe that teachers using only the last (Practical) domain of TTQs without the first two domains (Higher-Order and Foundational) are probably engaging in “a traditional, didactic approach to teaching.” 

            What did the study find? That teachers exposed to professional development on these types of science questions, prompts, and tasks improved their daily use of TTQs in the first two domains and used fewer of those in the third (which was a good thing), and their students’ learning improved significantly. The researchers recommend this approach to looking at science instruction and teacher training, especially the emphasis on student thinking.

 

“What Can a Cognitive Coding Framework Reveal About the Effects of Professional Development on Classroom Teaching and Learning?” by Vandana Thadani, Kathleen Roth, Helen Garnier, Melanie Seyarto, Jennifer Thompson, and Nicole Froidevaux in The Journal of the Learning Sciences, October-December 2018 (Vol. 27, #4, p. 517-549), https://bit.ly/2F5bLD1; Thadani can be reached at [email protected]

Back to page one

 

6. Two Ways of Looking at Personalization

            In this article in Education Week, Orly Friedman reflects on the many interpretations of “personalization” that she encountered working with parents and educators as head of a California elementary school:

-  Tracking by achievement;

-  Differentiated lessons;

-  Giving students “flex time”;

-  90 students sitting in a gymnasium working on adaptive software;

-  Never presenting a child with work that was too easy or too hard;

-  One-on-one teaching throughout the day;

-  Turning over to students all decisions on how, when, and where to work.

Amidst this Babel of definitions, Friedman discerns two distinct camps. This first focuses on efficiency, using technology and one-on-one instruction to cover the curriculum at a faster pace, without unnecessary repetition or boredom for children. The second approach lets students slow down, immerse themselves in subjects they’re passionate about (dinosaurs, Lego, songwriting, poetry) and get the support they need to learn more deeply. This camp also lets students figure out how they fit in socially, nurture relationships with teachers and peers, and develop the “soft skills” that are so important down the road.

Friedman favors the second approach. “Students may not learn as much content as quickly, but end up with a deep understanding of themselves as learners,” she says. “The long-term benefit of getting through algebra ahead of your peers loses its cachet by the time you’re 30. On the other hand, the long-term benefits of understanding yourself as a learner and the strategies that work best for you will last a lifetime.” 

Friedman sees another difference between the two camps: on one side, entitled students for whom the hard parts of learning are done for them; on the other, empowered students who work with peers to make meaning of a broad curriculum, with appropriate support and coaching from teachers. “What we learn from and with our peers about being human is at least as important as the content being covered,” she says. “The same technological progress that makes personalization of content possible is making content learning less valuable and the process of learning and soft skills that go along with it ever more essential.” 

“As more schools search for an effective model of personalization,” Friedman concludes, “they should first clarify what they believe about how children learn, their communal values, and their belief in the purpose of education. Then they should select a set of personalization tactics to match those values.”

 

“What Does Personalized Learning Actually Mean? It Depends on Who You Ask” by Orly Friedman in Education Week, October 31, 2018 (Vol. 38, #11, p. 24), https://bit.ly/2F4OyRA

Back to page one

 

7. Short Item:

            Retrieval practice website – Pooja Agarwal, one of the lead researchers on the effective use of assessments to improve retention, has established a free website and newsletter to share ideas and research: https://www.retrievalpractice.org.

Back to page one

 

            

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

© Copyright 2018 Marshall Memo LLC

 

If you have feedback or suggestions,

please e-mail[email protected]

 

 

 


About the Marshall Memo

 

 

Mission and focus:

This weekly memo is designed to keep principals, teachers, superintendents, and other educators very well-informed on current research and effective practices in K-12 education. Kim Marshall, drawing on 48 years’ experience as a teacher, principal, central office administrator, writer, and consultant lightens the load of busy educators by serving as their “designated reader.”

 

To produce the Marshall Memo, Kim subscribes to 60 carefully-chosen publications (see list to the right), sifts through more than a hundred articles each week, and selects 5-10 that have the greatest potential to improve teaching, leadership, and learning. He then writes a brief summary of each article, pulls out several striking quotes, provides e-links to full articles when available, and e-mails the Memo to subscribers every Monday evening (with occasional breaks; there are 50 issues a year). Every week there’s a podcast and HTML version as well.

 

Subscriptions:

Individual subscriptions are $50 for a year. Rates decline steeply for multiple readers within the same organization. See the website for these rates and how to pay by check, credit card, or purchase order. 

 

Website:

If you go to http://www.marshallmemo.comyou will find detailed information on:

• How to subscribe or renew

• A detailed rationale for the Marshall Memo

• Publications (with a count of articles from each)

• Article selection criteria

• Topics (with a running count of articles)

• Headlines for all issues 

• Reader opinions

• About Kim Marshall (bio, writings, consulting)

• A free sample issue

 

Subscribers have access to the Members’ Area of the website, which has:

• The current issue (in Word and PDF)

• All back issues (Word and PDF) and podcasts

• An easily searchable archive of all articles so far

• The “classic” articles from all 14+ years

Core list of publications covered

Those read this week are underlined.

All Things PLC

American Educational Research Journal

American Educator

American Journal of Education

American School Board Journal

AMLE Magazine

ASCA School Counselor

District Management Journal

Ed. Magazine

Education Digest

Education Next

Education Update

Education Week

Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis

Educational Horizons

Educational Leadership

Educational Researcher
Edutopia

Elementary School Journal

English Journal

Essential Teacher

Exceptional Children

Go Teach

Harvard Business Review

Harvard Educational Review

Independent School

Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy

Journal of Education for Students Placed At Risk (JESPAR)

Kappa Delta Pi Record

Knowledge Quest

Language Arts

Literacy Today (formerly Reading Today)

Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School

Middle School Journal

Peabody Journal of Education

Phi Delta Kappan

Principal

Principal Leadership

Reading Research Quarterly

Responsive Classroom Newsletter

Rethinking Schools

Review of Educational Research

School Administrator

School Library Journal

Social Education

Social Studies and the Young Learner

Teachers College Record

Teaching Children Mathematics

Teaching Exceptional Children

The Atlantic

The Chronicle of Higher Education

The Education Gadfly

The Journal of the Learning Sciences

The Language Educator

The Learning Professional (formerly Journal of Staff Development)

The New York Times

The New Yorker

The Reading Teacher

Theory Into Practice

Time Magazine