Ebook: The schools our children deserve: moving beyond traditional classrooms and ''tougher standards''

Forward ... Into the Past -- Tougher Standards Versus Better Education -- Getting Motivation Wrong: The Costs of Overemphasizing Achievement -- Getting Teaching and Learning Wrong: Traditional Education and Its Victims -- Getting Evaluation Wrong: The Case Against Standardized Testing -- Getting School Reform Wrong: The Arrogance of Top-Down Coercion -- Getting Improvement Wrong: Confusing Harder with Better -- For the Love of Learning -- Starting from Scratch -- Education at Its Best -- Getting the 3 R's Right -- The Way Out -- The Hard Evidence -- What to Look For in a Classroom.;Arguing against the tougher standards rhetoric that marks the current education debate, the author of No Contest and Punished by Rewards writes that such tactics squeeze the pleasure out of learning. In this lively, provocative and well researched book, Alfie Kohn builds a powerful argument against the back to basics philosophy of teaching and simplistic demands to raise the bar. Drawing on stories from real classrooms and extensive research, Kohn shows parents, educators, and others interested in the debate how schools can help students explore ideas rather than filling them with forgettable facts and preparing them for standardized tests. Here at last is a book that challenges the two dominant forces in American education: an aggressive nostalgia for traditional teaching: if it was bad enough for me, it's bad enough for my kids and a heavy handed push for tougher standards. Alfie Kohn forces readers to ask what our children are doing in school and what skills they really need to succeed in life. If you are a parent or concerned citizen, this book ought to be on your list.