Classical Composition

 "What if you could teach your child using the same writing program that produced such masters of the language as John Milton, William Shakespeare, Benjamin Franklin? What if you could have the same basic composition curriculum used by Quintilian, the greatest teacher of ancient rhetoric, and Cicero, the greatest persuasive teacher of all time?"

"The method of Memoria Press' Classical Composition writing program is called progymnasmata, which was an ancient course in pre-rhetoric writing drills.  This method was developed in the 4th century A.D., and was used as early as 100 B.C, and possibly even earlier, in the Golden Age of Greece. It was used for centuries in western civilization."

Jim Selby has blown the dust off of the writing curriculum that was used in schools for over 1,500 years......

memoriapress

"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." - Aristotle

The Problem of Discipline; The School Journal, July 1900

"But to put yourself in his place, sympathetically, scientifically, habitually, is the simplest, hardest, and most important lesson the professional school has to teach, or an intending teacher to learn, and I know of no better means to this end than the training in dramatic art, and the study of childhood and youth."

By Gertrude Edmund, Lowell, Mass.
The best discipline is that which produces the natural development of the ideal within the nature of the child. Such development depends primarily on the personality of the teacher, and the influence she exerts thru the power of suggestion. Natural aptitude to control and govern; personal magnetism to rivet with links of steel; the power to express the beautiful impulses and noble emotions of a strong, steadfast character — these are fundamental factors. Pedagogy has been defined as the power of translating yourself into your pupil's exact environment, so that you may be able to think with his mind, to experience the thousand and one embarrassments under which his struggling brain labors and to view your own intuitional approaches to him thru his eyes. But to put yourself in his place, sympathetically, scientifically, habitually, is the simplest, hardest, and most important lesson the professional school has to teach, or an intending teacher to learn, and I know of no better means to this end than the training in dramatic art, and the study of childhood and youth.
Our best schools of acting claim that personal magnet ism is developed thru practice in reading and reciting such literary productions as require strong emotions for their portrayal. Dramatic art teaches pupils to become keen students of life, and their imaginations are trained to be in sympathy with the joy and pathos, heights and depths of that humanity they are to interpret. Pupils are trained, not only to observe the slightest detail of expression, but to reproduce such expression thru voice, face, and gesture. 0, the power of the human voice ! The living agent of the soul, the agent of the imagination and feeling, as well as of thought. To the student of vocal expression every note in nature is alive with suggestions. In every wind that blows, in every thunder peal that rolls, in every laughing, dancing brook, in every storm-tossed wave, there are instructive lessons. But of far more value than the voice, in the discipline of the school, is the power of facial expression. It is with the countenance we supplicate, we threaten, we soothe, we rouse, we rejoice, we mourn, we triumph, we express submission. Thru the eyes are expressed, with the utmost power, joy, grief, anger, love, hatred, affection, pity, contempt, — all the passions — all the emotions of the human heart. The time is coming when every professional school for the training of teachers, will follow in the footsteps of Col. Parker, and organize a department of dramatic art; when the systematic study of children will constitute a regular part of the normal course of study ; when the child's physical and moral well-being will be considered of as much importance as his intellectual progress in passing from grade to grade, and each temperament will be dealt with according to its nature ; when the practice departments of our professional schools will be so organized that the teacher will have her own pupils in her own room to manage in her own way without unnecessary interference.
For if you take away the opportunity for testing the teacher's ability to govern a school, she can get no growth in this direction and you have failed to train the teacher in that which is most essential to her success and usefulness, and without knowing it you may turn out upon the public an incompetent teacher.
•Abstract of Address before the N. E. A.

The_School_Journal

The General Education Board founded in 1902

 The Board was created by John D. Rockefeller and Frederick T. Gates in 1902. Rockefeller gave it $180 million. Its head Frederick Gates envisioned "The Country School of To-Morrow," wherein "young and old will be taught in practicable ways how to make rural life beautiful, intelligent, fruitful, recreative, healthful, and joyous."

“In our dream we have limitless resources, and the people yield themselves with perfect docility to our molding hand. The present educational conventions fade from our minds; and, unhampered by tradition, we work our own good will upon a grateful and responsive rural folk. We shall not try to make these people or any of their children into philosophers or men of learning or of science. We are not to raise up among them authors, orators, poets, or men of letters. We shall not search for embryo great artists, painters, musicians. Nor will we cherish even the humbler ambition to raise up from among them lawyers, doctors, preachers, statesmen, of whom we now have ample supply."​

- Rev. Frederick T. Gates, Business Adviser to John D. Rockefeller Sr., 1913 [1]

The Country School of Tomorrow

The current American school system took root around the turn of the century. In 1903, John D. Rockefeller founded the General Education Board, which provided major funding for schools across the country and was especially active in promoting the State-controlled public school movement. The General Education Board was not interested in encouraging critical thinking. Rather, its focus was on organizing children and creating reliable, predictable, obedient citizens. As award-winning former teacher John Gatto puts it, “school was looked upon from the first part of the 20th Century as a branch of industry and a tool of governance.” The Rockefellers, along with other financial elite and their philanthropic organizations (such as the Gates, Carnegies, and Vanderbilts) have been able to mold society by funding and pushing compulsory state schooling for the masses.  

“I am here. Anything more than that is rumor and slander.”

 ― Mahmoud Darwish, A River Dies of Thirst: journals

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State Laws on Dental “Screening” for School-Aged Children

How are schools obtaining dental information for the CEDS data base?

"According to the Council of State Governments, in 2007 state lawmakers adopted nearly 70 bills on the topic of oral health.iii Included among these measures are state laws that require parents to provide certification of an oral health assessment as a condition of school entry (California) and require evidence of a dental screening prior to elementary school and high school (Iowa). A third state (New York) approved a requirement in 2007 that schools request a dental health certificate upon a student’s entrance into school or upon entry into K, 2nd, 4th, 7th, and 10th grades. In April 2008, Kentucky’s Governor signed legislation to require student dental health certificates. These new laws add to the group of laws adopted by states as far back as 1915 (Kansas) and 1945 (Pennsylvania). More recent laws adopted over the last two decades include those in Georgia, Illinois, Nebraska, Oregon, Rhode Island, and the District of Columbia. Overall, about a quarter of the states (12) now [as of 2008] have some requirement for a dental certificate for school-aged children."

ASTDD

CEDS 

Forum Guide to the Teacher-Student Data Link: A Technical Implementation Resource

"This document is intended to serve as a practical guide for implementing a teacher-student data link (TSDL) that supports a range of uses at the local, regional, and state levels. The guide addresses the considerations for linking teacher and student data from multiple perspectives, including governance, policies, data components, business rules, system requirements, and practices. It provides references to promising practices for high quality data linkages, including TSDL-specific processes such as roster verification and the establishment of the 
Teacher of Record."

• Teacher of Record (TOR)
– TOR is defined as the educator who is accountable for a student’s or group of students’ learning outcomes. However, defining a TOR for an organization such as an SEA or LEA is a policy decision. Many SEAs and LEAs maintain jurisdiction-specific definitions for TOR in order to support policies related to the responsibility and accountability of educators for student outcomes. Different policy questions and operational uses of the TSDL call for the differentiation of teachers with primary accountability for student learning, those teachers partially responsible for student learning, and education professionals that are linked to students for operational purposes. TOR is discussed further in Appendix B.

NECS Forum Guide

Common Education Data Standards (CEDS) Version 5 Data Model Guide

The question is, "Did the implementation of "Standardized Testing" provide the data base necessary for CEDS?

 

"...CEDS focuses on data elements and modeling in the Early Learning, K12, Post Secondary, Career and Technical Education (CTE), Adult Education, and Workforce sectors, and it has data domains for Assessments, Learning Standards, Learning Resources, and Authentication and Authorization. CEDS includes domains, entities, elements, option sets, and related uses."

Naming Conventions and Key Terms

Entity Terms
Entity terms provide the context for an element. For example, in the following data element names, the terms Person, Accountability Report, Dental Insurance Coverage, and Advance Placement are entity terms.
•Person Middle Name
•Accountability Report Title
•Dental Insurance Coverage Type
•Advance Placement Credits Award
 See pg.8

 See also pg. 37, NDS Entity Relationship Diagrams

CEDS

Common Education Data Standards (CEDS)

The Common Education Data Standards (CEDS) is a specified set of the most commonly used education data elements to support the effective exchange of data within and across states, as students transition between educational sectors and levels, and for federal reporting. This common vocabulary will enable more consistent and comparable data to be used throughout all education levels and sectors necessary to support improved student achievement. The standards are being developed by NCES with the assistance of a CEDS Stakeholder Group that includes representatives from states, districts, institutions of higher education, state higher education agencies, early childhood organizations, federal program offices, interoperability standards organizations, and key education associations and non-profit organizations. CEDS is a voluntary effort and will increase data interoperability, portability, and comparability across states, districts, and higher education organizations.

NCES