[Maillist] DVDs available on Alternative Education
The Morleys
raymondmorl at gmail.com
Mon Jul 20 11:54:54 GMT 2009
Dear Education Revolution E-News Readers:
We recorded 22 keynotes and workshops at this year’s 20th anniversary
AERO conference—more than ever before! With so many recordings, we
will be giving you many options get the ones that interest you. We
will be offering these DVDs at our lowest prices ever, but with the
tough economic times we cannot miscalculate the number of DVDs we have
made. We are sending you a very detailed checklist to review and let
us know which keynote and workshop DVDs you are interested in. This
will help us greatly in predicted the total number to make. If we do
not get enough interest in some, we won’t even produce it. We must
save all we can as a small non-profit in these economic times to
better serve you and the wider public. If there is great interest on
some, we will make the necessary preparations to produce enough so
everyone can purchase a copy that wants to. This year’s presentations
were really extraordinary! We wish we could have captured them all!
That said, we are offering quite an extensive and diverse selection of
what took place! DVD prices may run as low as $7/DVD in some cases!
You find out more about the 22 presentations below or by visiting:
http://www.educationrevolution.org/2009dvds.html
Reply to this newsletter or e-mail us (jerryAERO at aol.com) the numbers
next to each keynote and workshop you are interested in possibly
purchasing. If you might be interested in everything, simply write
“All DVDS.”
Keynote Talks
1. Patch Adams with Kristin Diodonet
2. Deborah Meier
3. Ira Shor
4. Jerry Mintz
5. Khalif Williams
6. Don "Four Arrows" Jacobs
7. Anna Finklestein & Kris Sage
8. Dror Yaron
Workshops
9. A New Look at Early Childhood Education: The Old Way
Presenter: Joan Lawson
10. Cross-Pollinating the Grassroots: Collaborative Art as Popular
Education
Presenter: Beehive Design Collective
11. Better Meeting Skills
Presenter: C.T. Lawrence Butler
12. Education and Democracy in the 1960s: The Continuing Legacy of the
Free School Movement, Parts One & Two (Two Discs)
Presenter: Ron Miller
Guests: Sandy Hurst, Arnie Langberg, Mary Leue, Jerry Mintz, Pat
Montgomery,
13. AERO's Start a School Workshop
Presenter: Jerry Mintz
14. A Look Back at the Founding of Four Alternatives, Parts One & Two
Presenter: Arnie Langberg
15. Educating for Human Greatness – A Higher Vision of Teaching,
Thinking and Learning
Presenter: Lynn Stoddard
16. Raising Self-Esteem vs. Uncovering Self-Esteem
Presenter: Anthony Dallmann-Jones
17. The Self-Organizing Revolution: Building an Educational
Alternatives Movement
Presenter: Ron Miller
18. Teacher Professionalism At Risk
Presenter: Susan Ohanian
19. How Do Children Learn Mathematics?
Presenter: Gilles Laverdure
20. Life of Maria Montessori
Presenter: Susan Kambrich
21. Critical Pedagogy and Social Justice in the 21st Century: From a
High school Student's Perspective
Presenter: Mathew Davis
22. North Star: Start-up, Organizational Development, and Suggestions
for Replication
Presenter: Kenneth Danford
Reply to this newsletter or e-mail us (jerryAERO at aol.com) the numbers
next to each keynote and workshop you are interested in possibly
purchasing. If you might be interested in everything, simply write
“All DVDS.”
Keynote Talks
1. Patch Adams with Kristin Diodonet
Patch Adams, M.D., is a nationally known speaker on wellness,
laughter, and humor as well as on health care and health care systems.
In addition to being a medical doctor and a street clown, Dr. Adams is
also a social activist who has devoted 30 years to changing America’s
health care system. He is the founder of the Gesundheit! Institute in
rural West Virginia, a nonprofit hospital project incorporating humor,
the joy of service, and the integration of varied healing traditions.
In his role as a street clown, Patch explores the relationship between
humor and therapy using his unique blend of knowledge, showmanship and
hands-on teaching techniques. Through his performances, Dr. Adams
demonstrates firsthand his belief that laughter, joy and creativity
are integral parts of the healing process, and indeed may be the most
important health factors in our lives.
Many of the same issues facing health care—rising costs, poor quality
of care, humorless dehumanization, the neglect of happiness—manifest
themselves in today’s educational systems. Conference attendees will
have an opportunity to explore these similarities in Dr. Adams’
presentations at AERO 2009.
Keynote Topic:
“Education: My Partner & Vehicle for a Revolution in Midwifing
Nonviolence”
Keynote Summary:
A celebration of education and a life of learning and teaching.
Experienced education is a sudective fulfilment to desires for peace
and justice for all people. Education answers answers the questions,
“What can end violence?” and encourages and shows millions of
possibilities how. Hot-damn! And it’s there for you!
Kristin Diodonet
Kristin Diodonet grew up in Dutchess county, southern New York,
surrounded by a very traditional family. Often times she felt
artistically stifled trying to meet the ever changing goals presented
to her.
Kristin went to public school at an early age, going on to be
homeschooled, and later being self schooled. Finally, she enrolled in
Harriet Tubman Free school (HTFS) in 2007. She is in her final year at
HTFS and looks forwards to college where she wishes do art and
cultural studies.
After she leaves school she still wishes to be apart of the
alternative school movement were she hopes she can help improve
students lives, even if she cannot improve their world around them.
Although she is very much up for the challenge. She also wants to be
an artist, travel around the world and study the lives others.
Currently you can find her reading, drawing, and daydreaming. Her
greatest joy is that there is so much to learn. Her only regret being
that there is not enough time.
Keynote Topic:
“The Present State of Our Education and the Future it Can Be”
Keynote Summary:
Based around the ever growing problems of our school system. Mainly
through repression of our youth, extreme inflexibility, and the
violence it now presents to us now. This speech is designated to
recognize the potential of the growing alternative influence in both
our country and the world. Along with pointing out key differences and
similarities between our alternative communities, it is focuses around
the idea that we can join our ideas to harmonize and perhaps change
the course of the a dreary future looms ahead.
2. Deborah Meier
Deborah Meier has spent more than four decades working in public
education as a teacher, principal, director, founder, coalition
builder, writer, board member and public advocate.
Meier began her teaching career as a kindergarten and Head Start
teacher in Chicago, Philadelphia and New York City schools, before
moving on to be the founder and teacher-director of a network of
highly successful public elementary schools in East Harlem. In 1985
she founded Central Park East Secondary School, a New York City public
high school in which more than 90% of the entering students went on to
college. Serving predominantly low-income African-American and Latino
students, the schools Ms. Meier has helped to create are highly
regarded exemplars of educational reform.
Meier is currently on the faculty of New York University’s Steinhardt
School of Education. Her books The Power of Their Ideas: Lessons to
America from a Small School in Harlem (1995), Will Standards Save
Public Education? (2000), In Schools We Trust (2002), Keeping School,
with Ted and Nancy Sizer (2004) and Many Children Left Behind (2004)
are all published by Beacon Press.
Keynote Topic:
At the Heart of Democracy: Why it’s a hard idea to teach, and to learn.
Keynote Summary:
Winston Churchill once claimed democracy was absurd, until one
considered the alternatives. It’s as hard to teach--and as counter-
intuitive--as modern physics. But even more important. And yet we pay
it little heed, even in schools that proclaim themselves
“democracies.” What it might mean if we put the whole K-12 experience
to the test of producing democrats would require a vast change in how
we use those precious years.
3. Ira Shor
Ira Shor is an author and Professor of Rhetoric/Composition at both
the City University of New York’s Graduate Center and the College of
Staten Island/CUNY. His nine published books include a 3-volume set
in honor of the late Paulo Freire, the noted Brazilian educator who
was his friend and mentor: Critical Literacy in Action and Education
is Politics (Volumes 1 & 2).
Shor’s work with Freire began in the early 1980s and lasted until
Freire’s unfortunate passing in 1997. He and Freire co-authored A
Pedagogy for Liberation in 1986, the first “talking” book Freire
published with a collaborator. Shor also authored the widely used
Empowering Education (1992) and When Students Have Power (1996), two
foundational texts in critical teaching. His Critical Teaching and
Everyday Life (1980) was the first book-length treatment of Freire-
based critical methods in the North American context.
Shor’s teaching career began at Staten Island Community College in the
embattled period of Open Admissions, a creative era of cultural
democracy and classroom innovation. During this time, Shor helped
build an open-access writing program recognized then by the NCTE as
one of three such successful efforts in higher education.
Shor also started the new doctorate program in Rhetoric/Composition at
CUNY’s Grad Center in 1993. There he directs dissertations and offers
seminars in literacy and conquest, critical pedagogy, whiteness
studies, composition theory and practice, the rhetorics of space and
place, and working-class culture.
Shor has a son, Paulo, born in 2003, who is doing a reasonably good
job of raising his father.
Keynote Topic:
“Can Critical Teaching Change the World?”
Keynote Summary:
Teaching is not a career leading to fame or riches. While it is
relatively easy to be a bad teacher, it is remarkably hard to be a
good one. Many teachers with high expectations conscientiously infuse
ethical ideals into their lesson plans and class activities. These
teachers see education as a career for doing some good in a very
troubled world. Their high hopes for education as a force to improve
the world mirrors the texts of great educational thinkers, from Dewey
to Freire, from Bruner to Kozol to Kohl to Deborah Meier and Ted Sizer
and Bob Moses. My question for today, then, is this--Can critical
teachers indeed change the world for the better? Can classrooms
inviting students to question the status quo, to consider inequality
and injustice in society, to probe the ethics of power and the civics
of knowledge--transform a cynical, conservative, test-tormented age
into a new progressive era?
4. Jerry Mintz
Jerry Mintz has been a leading voice in the alternative school
movement for over 30 years. In addition to his seventeen years as a
public school teacher and a public and independent alternative school
principal, he has also founded several alternative schools and
organizations and has lectured and consulted around the world.
Jerry was the first executive director of the National Coalition of
Alternative Community Schools (NCACS), and was a founding member of
the International Democratic Education Conference (IDEC).
In 1989, he founded the Alternative Education Resource Organization.
He continues to serve as AERO’s director and as the Managing Editor of
AERO’s networking magazine, Education Revolution.
In addition to several appearances on national radio and TV shows,
Jerry’s essays, commentaries, and reviews have appeared in numerous
newspapers, journals, and magazines including The New York Times,
Newsday, Paths of Learning, Green Money Journal, Communities, Saturday
Review, Holistic Education Review as well as the anthologies The
Directory of Democratic Education (AERO, 2009) and Creating Learning
Communities (Foundation for Educational Renewal, 2000).
Jerry was also Editor-in-Chief for the Handbook of Alternative
Education (Macmillan, 1994), and the Almanac of Education Choices
(Macmillan/Simon & Schuster, 1995). He is the author of No Homework
and Recess All Day: How to Have Freedom and Democracy in Education
(AERO, 2003) and is currently working with Dr. Carlo Ricci on an
anthology tentetively titled, Turning Points: 28 Visionaries in
Education Tell Their Stories (AERO, 2009).
Keynote Topic:
"Turning Points and Two Conflicting Paradigms”
Keynote Summary
Some of the most poignant turning points in his new book will be cited
as examples of the conflicting paradigms of learning centered
curriculum versus traditional curriculum driven approaches.
5. Khalif Williams
Khalif Williams is the Executive Director of the Institute for Humane
Education (IHE). Since 1996 IHE has trained hundreds of humane
educators through its certificate and degree programs, workshops,
presentations, publications and website. By implementing Mr. Williams’
and IHE’s unique cooperative and collaborative ideals, IHE trainees
have touched hundreds of thousands of people worldwide.
In 1994, Khalif began working for racial equity in higher education by
helping establish a minority mentoring/college preparatory program at
Roger Williams University, where he earned his B.A. in Philosophy. He
has also served as a counselor and crisis interventionist at a
residential treatment facility for mentally ill/emotionally disturbed
adolescent boys, and spent several years working for an urban homeless/
runaway shelter for teens.
Through his work with young people and as an advocate for the humane
treatment of animals, Khalif developed and conducted dozens of highly
successful humane education programs for all ages on issues ranging
from the environment to domestic violence, consumerism and the media
to factory farming. These experiences and concerns led Khalif to an
IHE workshop in 2001, where IHE’s philosophies inspired him to make
humane education his life’s work.
Keynote Topic:
“Mending the Broken Mirror: Education for Resiliency and Restoration”
Keynote Summary:
What is education for? Given the escalating ethical, economic,
political, and environmental challenges of our time, young people need
far more than education for jobs. They must be on the forefront of
solving complex, interconnected issues through their careers,
volunteerism, and involvement in system-changing. Their education must
be worthy of their imagination, talents, and intelligence and help
them acquire the knowledge, tools, and motivation to be fully engaged,
hopeful, and fulfilled citizens in the unfolding of a peaceful,
sustainable and humane world for all.
6. Don "Four Arrows" Jacobs
Four Arrows is a professor at Fielding Graduate University and author
of sixteen books, including The Authentic Dissertation: Alternative
Ways of Knowing, Research and Representation (Routledge, 2008) and
Unlearning the Language of Conquest (University of Texas Press, 2006)
in addition to invited chapters for Education as Enforcement: The
Militarization and Corporatization of Schooling and Battleground
Schools. He has doctorates in both health psychology and in Curriculum
and Instruction, with a specialization in Indigenous worldviews.
Keynote Topic:
“Traditional Indigenous Knowledge: The Original “Alternative” Learning
Model”
Keynote Summary:
Indigenous ways of knowing, researching, and education have been
suppressed, ignored or ridiculed for centuries, and our world’s
condition is paying the price. Many alternative education programs
naturally have re-discovered portions of this approach to learning,
but a more complete or more widespread application may be needed if we
are to survive as a species. In this keynote, Four Arrows will offer a
summary of the basic tenants of Indigenous education.
7. Anna Finklestein & Kris Sage
Anna Finklestein
Raised in a suburb of Boston, Mass, 18-year-old Finklestein relocated
to Portland, Oregon, in August of 2008. After attending traditional
schools through ninth grade, Anna chose to abandon the classroom for
her backyard and begin unschooling. Over the next three years, she
founded Stepping Out Theatre Company, a company run by young adults,
which evolved and crystallized her passion and skills for youth
organization and empowerment. She lives with five humans, four
chickens, and three cats in a wonderful Northeast collective and is a
history major at Portland State University. She is particularly
excited about growing food, her guitar, climbing trees, bike
commuting, knitting, and building community.
Kris Sage
Kris Sage is 15 years old, and a full-time student at Mount Hood
Community College. He is an avid reader and prolific writer of works
that someday may be published (perhaps even purchased). He loves
science fiction and fantasy, logic, politics and debate, and to learn
metal rock pieces on his electric guitar. He amazes his friends with
his uncanny ability to fall sleep anywhere. This is his third year
traveling cross-country to attend AERO. Kris spent three years at the
Village Free School, a democratic non-coercive school in Portland,
Oregon. His parents are both social workers who protect and support
youth and families.
Keynote Topic:
“Growing-Up Alternative: Reflections on School, Education, and Life.”
Keynote Summary:
We’re all here for the same reason: to support the growth and
understanding of the alternative education movement. Our intention is
to present honest reflections on our experiences as teenagers on a
quest for a worthy education. In doing so, we hope to answer any
questions you may have about what it is like to be a part of
alternative education as member of the younger generation. In doing
this, we hope to exercise introspection in a way that can be applied
to aid the growth of both individuals and communities. This comes from
the belief that, to grow as a healthy and effective movement, we have
to be critical of ourselves and our experiences. We must continually
question where we’re going and why we’re going there.
8. Dror Yaron
Dror Yaron is the Community Outreach Coordinator for the CREATE Lab at
the Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Institute. He studied at the
International Center of Photography in New York. His own artwork, as
well as community art projects created in collaboration with students
and teachers, has been exhibited in galleries, museums and alternative
venues in the US and Europe. He is excited about some new
technologies, particularly robots, that enable learners to
independently investigate their environment, then share their findings
with others in an interactive online open forum.
Keynote Topic:
“How I Get to Have All the Fun”
Keynote Summary:
At the beginning of this year I transitioned from the role of the
Photography Studio Coordinator at the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild to
Community Outreach Coordinator of the CREATE Lab at the Carnegie
Mellon University Robotics Institute. In response to the e-mail
announcement I sent my contacts about this change, a colleague wrote:
“You have all the fun!”
I guess he was right.
In this presentation I will share some of the magic moments I spent
working with the artists at the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild. Making
art, we delivered a meaningful - and luxurious - alternative education
experience, free of charge to Pittsburgh Public Schools’ students and
teachers. It was during one of these learning adventures that I fell
in love with a robot. This is how I came to preside over a friendly
army of robots and sensors, ready to be deployed into the community
for social good. Together we hope to establish an interactive learning
environment - based on choice and rich with knowledge - driven by a
multi-age global community, including among others: school students
(public, democratic, free, home-schooled), educators, artists,
prisoners, journalists and MacArthur Geniuses in Science. Seriously.
Workshops
Below are the workshops. There is more detailed information at
http://www.educationrevolution.org/workshops.html
9. A New Look at Early Childhood Education: The Old Way
Presenter: Joan Lawson
The workshop with review current trends in early childhood education
within the context of developmentally appropriate practices. Put
another (more realistic!) way: we will discuss how the current “push
down” curriculum imposed upon many young children in too many early
childhood settings conflicts with sound developmentally appropriate
practices as defined by respected theorists and practitioners. We will
also discuss how to resolve the conflicting demands that correspond
with these trends as such are faced by early childhood educators in
the field and ways to integrate developmentally appropriate practices
within play based programs.
10. Cross-Pollinating the Grassroots: Collaborative Art as Popular
Education
Presenter: Beehive Design Collective
Using gigantic portable murals teeming with intricate images of plants
and animals, the Bees will facilitate story-sharing about the impacts
of globalization & climate change on communities and ecosystems
throughout the Americas. As artists and educators who engage with
thousands of learners each year, the Bees use illustrations, stories,
and an inspiring, interactive, and memorable narrative to promote
discussion of pressing issues that affect both people and the
environment. Bees will model some techniques for sharing graphics &
stories and will encourage lots of participation, questions, feedback,
and strategy suggestions from attendees.
11. Better Meeting Skills
Better Meeting Skills
Presenter: C.T. Lawrence Butler
Why is it that, although meetings are necessary, they are often
difficult, time-consuming and even painful experiences? Perhaps one of
the reasons is that few of us take the time to learn better meeting
skills. In this class, participants will learn skills and techniques
designed to improve their experience in meetings. Exercises will be
used to encourage creative conflict resolution, self-empowerment,
respect for diversity, and appreciation of different perspectives and
opinions. These skill-building exercises will provide experiential
learning in areas of agenda planning, facilitation techniques, small
group discussion and evaluation. The beginner as well as the
experienced facilitator will find this class stimulating and valuable.
12. Education and Democracy in the 1960s: The Continuing Legacy of the
Free School Movement, Parts One and Two (Two Discs)
Presenter: Ron Miller
Guests:, Sandy Hurst, Arnie Langberg, Mary Leue, Jerry Mintz, and Pat
Montgomery
This symposium brings together several education activists from the
'60s generation to talk about their efforts, challenges, and lessons
learned. The free school movement was part of a larger cultural
awakening that opened new possibilities for social change. The spread
of educational alternatives, including homeschooling, in the last few
decades is a direct result of their pioneering work. Here is an
opportunity to encounter and learn from a vital piece of our history.
13. AERO's Start a School Workshop
Presenter: Jerry Mintz
This is the space for all school starters at the conference to
network, discuss, and learn about options and resources.
14. A Look Back at the Founding of Four Alternatives, Parts One and Two
Presenter: Arnie Langberg
I will present the four alternatives that i have helped to start,
beginning with the Iota Society in Lynbrook, NY, in 1957, then the
Village School in Great Neck, NY, in 1970, Mountain Open High School
in Evergreen, CO, in 1975, and High School Redirection in Denver, CO,
in 1988. I hope that the audience will ask questions, make comments,
and help me to look for patterns that we can discuss further in a
workshop session.
Part 2 will be practical skills for starting a school, building on the
results of the presentation.
15. Educating for Human Greatness – A Higher Vision of Teaching,
Thinking and Learning
Presenter: Lynn Stoddard
Workshop will invite participants to adopt the attitudes and abilities
of extraordinary teachers and parents. Reading, writing, math and
other disciplines are taught as tolls, not as goals, to help students
grow in Seven Dimensions of Human Greatness and become valuable
contributors to society.
16. Raising Self-Esteem vs. Uncovering Self-Esteem
Presenter: Anthony Dallmann-Jones
Self-Esteem is one of the most important, yet misunderstood, facets of
education. Learn exactly what self-esteem is and is not and how it
impacts learning, AND how to intervene upon the downward spiral of
"low self-esteem" guaranteeing better academic achievement and
healthier self-concepts.
17. The Self-Organizing Revolution: Building an Educational
Alternatives Movement
Presenter: Ron Miller
An conversation explaining strategies for supporters of educational
alternatives to join forces and bring our ideas to the public. I can
discuss the principles of the “Self-Organizing Revolution” that I
describe in my book, and talk about my 20 years of experience in this
movement, but it will not be a presentation.
18. Teacher Professionalism At Risk
Presenter: Susan Ohanian
Description:
Teacher professionalism is at risk, under bombardment by Democratic
and Republican corporate-politicos. When a teacher becomes a
technician whose existence is dependent on directives from the State,
then the very term 'teacher professionalism' becomes an oxymoron. This
jeopardizes alternative schools as well as public schools. We are all
At Risk.
19. How Do Children Learn Mathematics?
Presenter: Gilles Laverdure
Description:
Two components of math learning will be discussed: 1. How to focus
learning on the understanding of important math concepts and 2. How to
develop competencies in problem solving. There will be a brief
presentation on how the brain makes sense of new learning and a
thorough interactive presentation of how mathematical concepts and
techniques have evolved over the last 20 000 years. Most importantly,
a parallel will be drawn between this long history of inventiveness
and the cognitive and creative development of a child. A case will be
made for constructivist learning and participants will learn how to
avoid common traps in teaching math which can be harmful to the
child’s understanding and success.
20. Life of Maria Montessori
Presenter: Susan Kambrich
Description:
Join us to learn about the extraordinary life of Maria Montessori,
renowned educator and scientist. We will explore the discoveries that
formed the Montessori Method, a way of teaching children that
revolutionized education.
This workshop will outline the life of Maria Montessori, Italy's first
female medical doctor. Dr. Montessori's work with children led her to
many discoveries of how learning takes place. As a woman, she had many
challenges, from her work initially as a medical student to her work
later as an educator and scientist. Montessori worked with children of
all abilities. Her work led her to develop the Montessori Method,
known throughout the world. This workshop will include a powerpoint
presentation about her life, her method, and other significant
educational theory and political thought during her life.
21. Critical Pedagogy and Social Justice in the 21st Century: From a
High School Student's Perspective
Presenter: Mathew Davis
Description:
This is an informational workshop/discussion followed by Q&A led by
artist, public intellectual, and recent public high school graduate
Mathew Davis. The workshop will cover a myriad of topics including:
*Performance
*Potential of public schools as apparatus for social justice
*Critical pedagogy
*Authentic artist expression
*Issues and challenges that face youth in 21st century and how they
effect survival in the future
*How youth can confront and change them
*Organizing and building a movement
*Performance
*New society and an era of social and economic justice
22. North Star: Start-up, Organizational Development, and Suggestions
for Replication
Presenter: Kenneth Danford
Description:
North Star Is the first organization of its sort in the world: a
community center supporting teens to leave school and use
homeschooling as a means to design and pursue their own learning. One
of our long-term goals is to use our success as a model to encourage
others to create similar programs in their own communities. We do not
wish that every teen homeschool, but we do wish that every community
might have a center such as North Star.
This workshop will focus on the organizational development of North
Star: from two disillusioned teachers with a dream through its
creation in 1996 to its current status.
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2009 AERO Conference DVDs
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