Bronwyn Harris, Author

This is off-topic, but I just have to sing the praises of my dog right now. Some of you have met my dog, Solomon. He is very gentle, so much so that my friends' 16 month old can feed Solomon his entire dinner one piece of kibble at a time out of her little hand. She can also try to push his head into the water dish so that he won't be thirsty and he doesn't retaliate in any way. He has not fussed when toddlers have pulled his tail, stuck fingers up his nose, when I step on his feet (which are frequently in the way), or at any other time. But he knows who the bad people are. I didn't get to witness his heroism, but my roommate, "T," was home when our upstairs neighbor tried to break up with her boyfriend. Apparently, boyfriend was not too pleased about this and yelled enough that our neighbors who run a rat dog day care called the police. The neighbor brought her 3 year old down to stay with T and eventually came down herself to hang out in our apartment becaus...

First of all, Stephanie is in Europe at this very moment! She is probably the only kid on the trip whose daddy couldn't just write a $4500 check for the trips, judging by the surprised response I got from the agency when I asked about fundraising possibilities. But I don't think she will care. Her dad deserves some serious credit for working double and triple shifts to get her there, and my friends who donated money are pretty awesome too. I'm excited to hear how it has gone. Secondly, Oakland's middle schoolers created a poetry anthology that has been made into a real book and is for sale at the Barnes and Noble in Oakland on Saturday, April 12. I think it will be a very interesting read.

In honor of testing season (already!!), here is my favorite testing story. Both of these stories are from a friend who will remain nameless but may be related to the person I'd like to be president. During my friend's first year of teaching, one of her second graders was so freaked out by the CST [standardized test] that while she had her back turned, he stood up and peed on the test. He, of course, told her there had been a leak in the ceiling, but the other kids ratted him out. And anyone who's ever even seen these tests sympathizes with the poor child. I'm not sure what the teacher did with the test though. Another story from the same person: The other story was about a student and the ice cream in his desk. A girl told her teacher earlier in the morning that this boy had ice cream in his desk. The teacher went over to check and found 4 melted otter pops. She threw them away and the class continued about their day. During workshop right before lunch, she l...

I'm not forgetting to go to jobs that I signed up for (although, from the teacher's perspective, I can tell you plenty of stories about subs who do forget!) I'm forgetting that I meant to sub. That subbing was a major part of my plan for this year. That I was going to keep in touch with the kids that way, support the schools, have more blog material, and oh yeah - make $118 per subbing day. But I just keep forgetting. Forgetting to check the site for jobs, forgetting to tell the teachers I know that I can sub for them, and forgetting to decide if I'm going back to teaching next year. Avoidance? Possibly.

(or: Why Pat Buchanan is an idiot). I can't let this go. Read it. Then all who are in favor of dumping Pat Buchanan into a violent neighborhood with polluted air, no grocery stores, bad schools, and falling down housing projects, please raise your hand. Where to start? I'm not even going to talk about Rev. Wright. Except to say that Obama is absolutely right when he says that we need to take into account the fact that there is the baggage of 350 years of segregation and slavery that he (and many black people) are dealing with. No, let's focus on what Buchanan said. He says that we need to have a two-way conversation about race. That white America needs to be heard from, not just lectured to. Two problems come up already. 1. Anyone who can deny that white America is heard from has absolutely no idea what it is like to not be white in America. White America is heard from and has been heard from since there has been an America. 2. Anyone who thinks that Obama was lect...

Someone told me once that portable classrooms contain formaldehyde in the walls . I just read an article about formaldehyde being found in particleboard, medium-density fiberboard, and plywood. The article cites formaldehyde as being the cause of not only cancer, but respiratory allergies, asthma, coughing, wheezing, and chest tightness. Now, I realize that I am only a sample size of one, but I taught in a portable classroom for 5 or 6 years, and during those years, thought I had really bad asthma. I was sick a lot, I got bronchitis every year, which turned into at least a month of illness-induced asthma, complete with trips to the emergency room. After I left the portable classroom, I have not had any of these symptoms. No coughing, no wheezing, no asthma. Hmmmm.

A friend who works in my district recently had an interesting situation at a workshop/seminar type thing (maybe part of a lecture series?) The talk was entitled, "What Do Struggling Readers Need from All of Us." Apparently the woman delivering the talk worked a number of interesting comments into the talk including: Kids running around like "Indians and banshees." Women (in general, all women) not wanting to make left hand turns, but preferring to make four right hand turns. Think about that one. Draw a diagram if you need to. Make sure you don't work your kids like a slave driver. Some sort of homage to September 11 and good old Uncle Sam. I kind of wish I had been there! That's quality professional development time.

Once again, my district shows that they do not value teachers. Well, to be fair, our lovely governator doesn't either, with his 10% education cuts. Seriously? Education cannot survive more cuts! I mean, it really can not. I understand that we have to cut spending to balance the budget, and I'm not sure what should be done, but education can't take any more cuts!! A few years back, instead of getting a cost of living increase, the teachers in my district got a 4% pay cut. It was very discouraging, because we already spend a ton of our own money on supplies and are unappreciated in basically every way possible. Now, the district is thinking about doing it again . The public education system cannot take much more of these cuts. Teachers can't take much more of these cuts. The good people who are competent keep leaving - hey, I did! I can make as much money with a lot less stress - oh, and without being disrespected. I just can't believe that people are goi...

There is an interesting blog post by the Tribune's education reporter on"If I were president..." Written by third graders very near my old school, it touches me because they are very similar responses to those that my students have had in the past. They are from the same area. Note the focus on getting rid of guns. I'd like to take everyone who goes on and on about their Second Amendment rights to come and talk to these kids and hear their experiences with guns. It would make for an interesting dialogue.

From This American Life : the introductory part isn't about education but the first two out of the three main acts are and are very interesting... listen to it. More reasons I'm glad I'm not teaching right now: One of the more "challenging" children - who really has no parental involvement in her life at all and needs STRUCTURE - is apparently prank calling her both at school and on the teacher's cell phone... I don't know what the administration is doing to help the teacher but I would guess absolutely nothing. That's what my district does best - not support their staff.

An interesting article in the Tribune about standardized testing. And yes, parents can opt out of having their children take the tests, but strangely enough, the parents aren't usually informed of this and - in the case of many inner city schools - often are lied to and told that their children must take the tests.

Now Schwarzenegger's proposing sanctions for failing schools. First of all, aren't sanctions things that we impose on say... dictators in Cuba? Not elementary schools?? Second of all, the minute that someone can satisfactorily explain to me how taking away field trips, teachers' aides, and shuffling around teachers from one "failed" school to another helps kids learn, I'll jump right on the sanctions bandwagon. Until then, I fail to see how our ridiculous system of testing and punishing is helping anybody. (If you're reading this on RSS and don't see the image, click through or look at http://davidricardo.net/blog/wp-content/testingforeverything.jpg ; it's good.)

Teachers' hefty salaries are driving up taxes, and they only work 9 or 10 months a year! It's time we put things in perspective and pay them for what they do--baby sit! We can get that for less than minimum wage. That's right. Let's give them $3.00 an hour and only the hours they worked, not any of that silly planning time. That would be $16.50 a day (8:00 AM to 3:30 (or so) PM with just 25 min. off for lunch). Each parent should pay $16.50 a day for these teachers to baby-sit their children. NOW... How many do they teach in a class, 30? So that's $19.50 x 30 = $495.00 a day. However, remember they only work 180 days a year!!! We're not going to pay them for any vacations. LET'S SEE....That' s $585 x 180= $89,100 per year. What about those special teachers and the one s with master's degrees? Well, we could pay them minimum wage, and just to be fair, round it down to $7.00 an hour. That would be $7 x 5 1/2 hours (remember, no planning/p...

I think I know how our district is trying to get out of debt - by not paying the substitutes. Sure, they say they're going to pay them, but think about the process. First, the sub must carry the timesheet with them at all times. This is not uncommon, but I do think it's silly. Instead of submitting time online at each site or something easy like that, a sub may have up to 15 different schools to bring the time sheet to, leave it with a secretary who then tries to track down the principal and get the timesheet back to the sub at the end of the day. Ample opportunities for it to get lost, no? Next, the sub must return the timesheet to the district office in person on specific days of the month. They say you can mail it but that they don't recommend it - having had mine lost twice, I can see why they don't recommend it! I'm not sure why they get lost - seems fairly straightforward to have something addressed to Ms. X in Room X actually get to Ms. X in Room X but ...

In a flyer for subbing in my district : "If you can make it here, you'll make it anywhere!" Um, do you want to advertise that? "Our district is so awful that anything else will seem like a vacation in comparison!" Interesting marketing. I would advise anyone wishing to substitute in this district to run far away as fast as possible, and that makes me very sad because there are incredible kids to be taught.

OK, it's been a little crazy. The electricity went out in the Internet closet (twice) and then when I was connected in DFW (great wireless connection), my gate got changed twice so I spent the whole layover running from Terminal C to Terminal D and back to Terminal C, and then to Terminal D again. Fun. To continue. Roberto ran away from the abusive uncle and ended up helping package drugs and selling pornography on the street . Somehow, Sara (the orphanage director) found out about this 10-year old kid and brought him back to the orphanage. He started first grade at age 10 and, although school has never been easy for him, worked as hard as he could and consistently got excellent grades. He made it through primary and secondary school, graduated from high school (the picture in the pink shirt) and is now attending a technical college. He wanted to work in addition to help pay his way (he's now 22), so got a job as a mechanic's assistant. Within three weeks, his work w...

I am in an Internet cafe (that´s what they call it, but there´s nothing at all resembling a cafe; it´s more like an Internet closet) in Reynosa, Mexico. Before you all get excited and jealous and picture me lying on the beach drinking margaritas, let me tell you that Reynosa, Mexico is a border town, just south of McAllen and Hidalgo, Texas. I looked it up in the Lonely Planet Mexico once and the only thing it had to say about this town of something like two million people was that it is ugly (think petrochemical refineries), and that there is nothing for tourists to do. It went on to mention that the only Americans who usually come to Reynosa are Texans looking for cheap prostitutes or prescription medication without a prescription. I am here to visit my Mexican family, who run an orphanage. We call it an orphanage in English, but that´s a misnomer - it´s more of a group home. The Spanish name is casa-hogar , which literally means "house-home," and there are 40 kids ranging...

I don't think I can go back to teaching. At a ski retreat (I don't ski, but I had fun staying in the warm cabin), I was doing work on my laptop and enjoying myself. As I was about to leave, I realized I had forgotten my computer. I went back in, saying, "Almost forgot my computer," and a friend said, "If you forget it, you'll have to go back to teaching!" That was enough to strike fear into my heart. Everyone else thought it was funny, but I didn't so much.

The Tribune reporter has a blog about what is going on in the district - another strike possible. You can read my comment under the name "Former Oakland Teacher." Also, someone postulated that the reason that teachers in this district quit at the beginning of the year is so they can have no gap in their health insurance ( comment #3 ). I was a little irritated. Sure, a few of them do stupid things like that, but first of all your health care goes through late August anyway, so quitting in late August gives you exactly the same amount of health care as you would have if you had quit in June. People should learn what they're talking about. Second, (I'm comment #4 and 12 on the list) there are AMPLE reasons to quit at the beginning of the year. The district greatly misrepresents things. I'm not at all for quitting any time before the end of the school year, but then (as evidenced by the fact that I spent 8 years in this district) I might be more of a masochist ...

When I was in college, I took a physiology class (1995 maybe? it's so long ago that I gt confused!) Actually, it wasn't that long ago - definitely not earlier than 1995 - but no one I knew had cell phones. The first person I knew who got a cell phone was my friend who moved away from the immediate area when he graduated and got this horrible analog phone... but it was better than what anyone else had, which was nothing. Anyway, I was in this physiology class, and someone's cell phone ring. It was the first time I had ever heard a cell phone ring during class and the professor just pointed toward the door and said, "OUT!" It was a 500+ person class and everyone watched as the disgraced student left. Not even 15 years ago. Last week, as I was subbing in kindergarten, two out of the 15 kids had cell phones. Two kids might not seem like many, but remember, these kids are 5 years old. They don't all know how to write their names yet. They don't know all...