Valerie Strauss again nails it… from her blog in the Washington Post:

“Teachers have long been accustomed to ‘going along to get along’ but increasingly are raising their voices to protest standardized test-based education reforms of the last decade that they see as harmful to students.

“In this post, Georgia teacher Ian Altman explains what he and his colleagues are really sick of hearing from reformers. Altman is an award-winning high school English teacher in Athens, where he has lived since 1993, as well as an advocate for teachers and students. He has presented at several national conferences and published in the Journal of Language and Literacy Education. He won the 2014 University of Georgia College of Education Distinguished Alumni Crystal Apple Award as well as the 2012 University of Chicago Outstanding Educator award.

“Altman’s list of seven things that reformers should stop saying to teachers comes from conversations he has had with educators across the country and speaks to the fury felt by many teachers who see their expertise being devalued and their profession denigrated…”
Melinda Gates and Arne Duncan share a chuckle (probably) at our expense.

 Those seven things educator Ian Altman lays out are…

  1. Don’t tell us that you know more about good instruction than we do.
  2. Don’t talk to us about the importance and rigor of the standards.
  3. Don’t tell us about testing data.
  4. Don’t tell us “The research says…” unless you’re willing to talk about what it really says.
  5. Stop with the advice about teaching critical thinking skills.
  6. Stop using education reform clichés.
  7. Don’t tell us to leave politics out of the classroom.

Continue reading.