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March 29, 2013
Martin Scorsese: Using movies to explore the American character

On Monday, April 1, Academy Award-winning director Martin Scorsese will present the 42nd Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities at the John F. Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. The annual Jefferson Lecture, sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities, is—according to the NEH— “the most prestigious honor the federal government bestows for distinguished intellectual achievement in the humanities.” Past lectures have been given by Wendell Berry, John … Read more »
March 28, 2013
Common Core meets the reform agenda

Earlier this week, the American Enterprise Institute hosted an all-day conference examining how the Common Core State Standards fit into the larger reform movement in education. Panelists came together to discuss whether the Common Core initiative complements or conflicts with the school reform agenda that many states are already pursuing, and new research was presented by education leaders such as Deven Carlson (University of Oklahoma), Ashley … Read more »
March 27, 2013
Read charitably

Writing at the Daily Princetonian, Princeton University’s independent student newspaper, Toni Alimi, a religion major from Katy, Texas, urges his fellow students to read texts charitably. In reading critically, he writes, “we’re asked to do more than just absorb information; we must engage arguments and their implications seriously.” However, he continues, “the instruction to read critically is often taken as a license to read uncharitably. Rather than attempting to understand … Read more »
March 26, 2013
Library of Congress extends “Civil War in America” exhibition

Good news for students and teachers taking a trip to the nation’s capital this summer: the Library of Congress has just extended its “Civil War in America” exhibition from June 1, its original closing date, to January 4, 2014. The Library has also decided to display the John Hay copy of the Gettysburg Address for six weeks as part of the exhibit; it will be on display from … Read more »
March 25, 2013
Happy birthday, Flannery O’Connor!

On March 25, 1925, Flannery O’Connor was born in Savannah, Georgia. She graduated from the George State College for Women in 1945 and the following year entered the Iowa Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa, where she first studied journalism but later became known for her fiction. Diagnosed in 1951 with lupus, she returned home to her family’s farm in Milledgeville, Georgia, where she raised birds—peafowl, ducks, ostrich, chickens—and … Read more »
March 22, 2013
The listening deficit

Writing at Joanne Jacobs’ blog, Diana Senechal, an English teacher in New York City, describes the importance of listening. Senechal is concerned that today’s students do not know how to listen well—“many lack the practice,” she writes, partly because “entire school systems emphasize group work and rapid activity over anything contemplative or sustained. Before they have a chance to think, or even take something in, students must turn and … Read more »
March 21, 2013
Today in history: March from Selma to Montgomery

On March 21, 1965, 3,000 civil rights protesters joined Martin Luther King Jr. to begin the 54-mile-march from Selma, Alabama to the state capitol building in Montgomery. The first attempt at the march—which was organized to protest against racial injustice and, particularly, the death of Jimmie Lee Jackson, an African American protester who was killed by an Alabama state trooper the previous month—occurred on Sunday, March 7. … Read more »