Dang, sometimes you have to be careful about eating a cup of Ramen noodles while reading edu-blogs to avoid the possibility of passing some noodles out through your nose. But maybe I’m being to narrowly focused on that tedious educational outcome when there are whole worlds of specious edu-crap to be explored.

How about inverted education?

Maybe there’s educational benefit to having kids stand on their head during a lecture? Perhaps more blood going to the brain will improve attentiveness?

Photophilic education?

Since a catchy name seems to be a big part of the attraction in edu-fads I’ll just dress up turning the lights on as an exciting new pedagogical frontier.

With some imagination the possibilities really are practically endless. How about some specious “research” that proves fluorescent lights negatively impact the learning of children of color? In the tradition ed schools, the results of the research would naturally be determined by the most desirable outcome.

Sometimes watching the public education scene is like flipping through old editions of National Geographic.

Looking at all the colorful customs and bizarre rituals it’s easy to forget they actually serve a purpose, or once did, but that the purpose doesn’t make sense outside the context of that quaint, distant culture.

I wish I could say that they succeeded with reading and math and moved on.

I suspect some here still don’t really understand that we are regularly graduation illiterates from our public schools. This needs to change. Many other things need to change, too. But literacy and numeracy come first.

We actually had real science classes with a teacher who liked science. I think the “liked” part makes a big difference.

Of course the fact that both my parents are scientists, and they encouraged me to catch bugs and stuff and try growing a garden and look at weird rocks and things on my own time probably helped as well.