Growing up, I’d be riding with someone and as we drove through a parking lot, the person may look at a Cadillac or a car that was not parked correctly and say, “Gotta be a Democrat.” Or, while waiting in line somewhere, a person might say, “Look at that Canadian acting like that.” In each of these cases, the speaker attempted to code their … Read More The Importance of Critically Engaging with Language
+ critical literacy, critical thinking, nora krug, on tyranny twenty lessons for the twentieth century, timothy snyder
In my last post, I wrote about the importance of reading books. As Timothy Snyder and Nora Krug put it in On Tyranny, we read books for a myriad of reasons, and one of the most important is to provide us with the frameworks we need to cut through the noise and soundbites to provide us with the words to explain and explore concepts. Reading, on … Read More We Must Investigate Ourselves
+ critical literacy, critical thinking, lillian e smith, literacy, martin luther king, jr, southern poverty law center
In the last post, I started talking about the importance of critical thinking and literacy skills, especially now. Today, I want to continue that discussion by looking at a few more examples and specifically looking at some ways I teach these skills in the classroom. Again, these examples are not exhaustive, but I believe they highlight the importance of analyzing everything we encounter with … Read More The Need for Critical Thinking and Literacy: Part II
+ critical literacy, critical thinking, donald trump, horror noire, rage against the machine, the binge, tom morello
As I, like millions and millions of others, waited for the election results to trickle in last week, I came across this video of Trump supporters dancing to a song in Philadelphia as they protested for officials to stop counting votes. The video shows a woman in a MAGA hat, a flag shirt, silver pants, and a blue lives matter flag worn as a … Read More The Need for Critical Thinking and Literacy: Part I
Interminable Rambling 