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Standardized testing has swelled and mutated, like a creature in one of those old horror movies, to the point that it now threatens to swallow our schools whole.

Alfie Kohn

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Alfie Kohn
Age: 67
Born: 1957
Born: October 15
Author
Teacher
Writer
Miami Beach
Florida
School
Swallow
Whole
Testing
Like
Creature
Schools
Horror
Mutated
Creatures
Swelled
Movies
Standardized
Point
Threatens

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People will typically be more enthusiastic where they feel a sense of belonging and see themselves as part of a community than they will in a workplace in which each person is left to his own devices
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If rewards do not work, what does? I recommend that employers pay workers well and fairly and then do everything possible to help them forget about money. A preoccupation with money distracts everyone - employers and employees - from the issues that really matter.
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The Legacy of Behaviorism: Do this and you'll get that.
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When was the last time you spent the entire day with only 42 year olds?
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If I offered you a thousand dollars to take off your shoes, you'd very likely accept--and then I could triumphantly announce that 'rewards work.' But as with punishments, they can never help someone develop a *commitment* to a task or action, a reason to keep doing it when there's no longer a payoff.
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Learning is something students do, NOT something done to students.
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Students should not only be trained to live in a democracy when they grow up they should have the chance to live in one today.
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John Dewey reminded us that the value of what students do 'resides in its connection with a stimulation of greater thoughtfulness, not in the greater strain it imposes.
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The value of a book about dealing with children is inversely proportional to the number of times it contains the word behavior.
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Educational success should be measured by how strong your desire is to keep learning.
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Children learn how to make good decisions by making decisions, not by following directions.
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What can we surmise about the likelihood of someone's being caring and generous, loving and helpful, just from knowing that they are a believer? Virtually nothing, say psychologists, sociologists, and others who have studied that question for decade
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Someone who thinks well of himself is said to have a healthy self-concept and is envied. Someone who thinks well of his country is called a patriot and is applauded. But someone who thinks well of his species is regarded as hopelessly naïve and is dismissed.
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We can't value only what is easy to measure measurable outcomes may be the least important results of learning.
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If children feel safe, they can take risks, ask questions, make mistakes, learn to trust, share their feelings, and grow.
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If a child is off-task...mayb e the problem is not the child...maybe it's the task.
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Unconditional parenting: Moving from Rewards and Punishments to Love and Reason.
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Assessments should compare the performance of students to a set of expectations, never to the performance of other students.
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Most of us would protest that of course we love our children without any strings attached. But what counts is how things look from the perspective of the children
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When test scores go up, we should worry, because of how poor a measure they are of what matters, and what you typically sacrifice in a desperate effort to raise scores.
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