by Unlike most media outlets, The Huffington Post actually pretends to take an interest in education. However, I continue to believe that their Education section was created to be an advertising platform for the truly awful film, “Waiting for Superman,” remembered as the Howard the Duck of education documentaries by the three other schmucks and I who paid to see it.
Regardless of their motives, The Huffington Post, is a frequent mouthpiece for the charter school movement and unofficial stenographer for corporations trying to make a quick buck off the misery of teachers and students.
The Huffington Post recently featured an article, “The Most Popular Books For Students Right Now,” authored by their Education Editor Rebecca Klein. I clicked on the headline with interest, because I’m a fan of books and reading (I know a truly radical view for an educator). What I found was quite disappointing.
Aside from the fact that six books were the favorite across twelve grade levels, the books fell into two obvious camps; books kids like and books they were required to read by a teacher.
Nonetheless, data is data and Web users like lists.
What I do not like is when basic tenets of journalism, like “follow the money,” are ignored in order to mislead readers. The source for the “independent reading habits of nearly 10 million readers“ is Renaissance Learning, described by The Huffington Post as “an educational software company that helps teachers track the independent reading practices of nearly 10 million students.”
That’s like saying ISIS is a magazine publisher Donald Trump, owner of an ice cream parlor. While factually true, this is what Sarah Palin might call putting lipstick on a pig.
Renaissance Learning is a wildly profitable company that sells Accelerated Reader, a major prophylactic device for children who might otherwise enjoy reading. The product is purchased by dystopian bean counters who view small children as cogs in a Dickensian system of education where nothing matters more than data or achievement.
Their product creates online multiple-choice tests that schools pay for in order to quantify each child’s “independent” reading. If the school doesn’t own the test for a particular book a kid reads, they receive no credit. Kids routinely dumb down their reading in order to score better on the quizzes. Accelerated Reader rewards compliance and speed by turning reading into a blood sport in which winners will be rewarded and their classroom combatants, punished.
Ironically, I wrote about Accelerated Reader in The Huffington Post back in 2012. (Read Mission Accomplished)
When you look at the “favorite” book list featured in The Huffington Post, please consider that kids read The Giver and The Crucible because they are standard parts of the curriculum. This tells us nothing about what kids at grades 7, 8, or 11 actually like to read. Seeing Green Eggs and Ham as the first grade winner should make you sad. Can you imagine taking a comprehension test on this classic??? How vulgar!
The Grade 2 favorite is also likely assigned by teachers, Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type. The mind reels when I try to imagine the test measuring comprehension of the comic book/graphic novel, named favorite book by 3rd, 4th, 5th, AND 6th graders, “Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul. First of all, we should be alarmed that this simple book tops the charts for four years, but don’t forget that kids will be tested by a computer on their comprehension of this delightful comic book.
“Nothing forced can ever be beautiful.” – Xenophone
Caveat emptor!
Veteran educator Gary Stager, Ph.D. is the author of Twenty Things to Do with a Computer – Forward 50, co-author of Invent To Learn — Making, Tinkering, and Engineering in the Classroom, publisher at Constructing Modern Knowledge Press, and the founder of the Constructing Modern Knowledge summer institute. He led professional development in the world’s first 1:1 laptop schools thirty years ago and designed one of the oldest online graduate school programs. Gary is also the curator of The Seymour Papert archives at DailyPapert.com. Learn more about Gary here.