SLATE Members Are Asked to Send a Letter Protesting the Punitive Testing Measures in NCLB and the President’s Proposal to Extend NCLB Mandated Tests to High School. Send a letter to your governor (before February 25) and to your representatives and senators. For a sample letter, click here. 

February 2005

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SLATE Newsletters are offered as resources for dealing with current issues affecting the teaching of English language arts. Reproduce these materials and use them to help promote better understanding of the goals of English teaching.

In this issue:

• From the Editor 
• Censorship and School, 2004
• The Education of an Anti-Censor
• Breaking Down the Educational Dichotomy Between Those Who Work with Their Hands and Those Who Work with Their Minds
• Where Have All The Children Gone?
• Candidates for the 2005 SLATE Elections
• Applications for Intellectual Freedom Awards (DUE MAY 1)
• New NCTE Resolutions
• SLATE Steering Committee 2004 
• SLATE News from Convention 2004
• SLATE Session at 2005 Annual Convention
• Call for SLATE Newsletter Articles
• Call for Personal Opinion Papers

The SLATE Newsletter editor introduces this issue. See http://www.ncte.org/about/issues/slate/119417.htm

Censorship and Schools, 2004
by Robert E. Crafton
Slippery Rock University
Member, NCTE Standing Committee Against Censorship

Bodily functions, human sexuality, homosexuality, profanity and/or racist speech, evolution, Satanism, witchcraft and the occult, unpopular political positions, and bad taste -- all the usual suspects -- have received their fair share of attention in schools and libraries in 2004. Books, t-shirts, and campaign posters along with student newspapers and radio shows have all been targeted for expressing positions, exploring subjects, or using forms of language that some members of the community have found distasteful. Read the entire article at http://www.ncte.org/about/issues/slate/119418.htm

The Education of an Anti-Censor
by Nicholas Karolides
University of Wisconsin-Falls River

When I first met censorship, I was a teacher of seventh-grade English and Social Studies in a so-called core curriculum in New York State. I was an innocent, so innocent that I did not recognize what I was being introduced to. The first example was a parent who objected to a comment that I had made in class that was perceived as being critical of one of the presidents of the United States, and identified by her as being inappropriately un-American for seventh graders. The second, a couple of years later, involved FBI agents contacting the school’s principal about letters sent to the Soviet Union Embassy by several of my students, seeking information for a Social Studies report. Read the entire article at http://www.ncte.org/about/issues/slate/119420.htm

Breaking Down the Educational Dichotomy Between Those Who Work with Their Hands and Those Who Work with Their Minds
by Jacqueline Darvin
Queens College-City University of New York

Like all teachers, I am confronted with political issues in my classroom on a daily basis. I cannot come to work in the morning without being challenged by one political issue or another. Read the entire article at http://www.ncte.org/about/issues/slate/119419.htm

Where Have All The Children Gone?
by Fred Barton
Editor, SLATE Newsletter, and Region 4 Representative to the NCTE/SLATE Steering Committee

In Frederick, Maryland, recently third- and fourth-grade students were asked to sound out pairs of words with similar vowels, such as "castle" and "manner." Seems typical enough until you learn that these were students at the Maryland School for the Deaf. Read the entire article at http://www.ncte.org/about/issues/slate/119421.htm

Candidates for the 2005 SLATE Elections
Ballots will be mailed to SLATE contributors in April. Completed ballots must be returned to NCTE by June 1. See http://www.ncte.org/about/gov/elec/news/119452.htm

Nominate for the NCTE/SLATE Intellectual Freedom Awards
As an NCTE member, nominate for the National Award. See http://www.ncte.org/about/issues/censorship/awards/107130.htm 
As an NCTE affiliate member, encourage your affiliate to name a winner for this award. See http://www.ncte.org/groups/affiliates/awards/109291.htm 

NCTE Members Approve Statements on Education Issues at Annual Convention
The importance of journalism courses and programs in English curricula, labor equity, and students' right of expression were the topics of resolutions passed by members attending a business meeting during the NCTE Annual Convention in Indianapolis. See http://www.ncte.org/announce/118780.htm

Meet the 2004 SLATE Steering Committee 
See http://www.ncte.org/about/gov/stcommit/106928.htm for committee members and http://www.ncte.org/groups/affiliates/resources/110877.htm for the regional map.

SLATE News from Convention 2004
Maryann Manning reports that the SLATE session "No Child Left Behind's Assault on Learning to Read" was standing room only. In fact, they had trouble getting the audience to vacate the room so the next session could start. "There is so much interest in the mess that NCLB has created. We have been asked to repeat the session at WLU in San Diego this summer. The audience was filled with anger over the situation and the presentations by Ken Goodman, Daniel DeYoung, and myself fueled feelings." Aurelia Davila de Silva served as session chair. 

Read the SLATE Committee meeting minutes from Annual Convention 2004. See http://www.ncte.org/about/issues/slate/119517.htm

SLATE Session at 2005 Annual Convention
Don't miss the SLATE session planned for the 2005 NCTE Annual Convention in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, November 17-22! "Who is NCLB Failing? Students, Teachers, Schools, and Colleges of  Education" will feature several well-known scholars. SLATE Chair Pat Cordeiro will moderate two back-to-back sessions featuring Ken Goodman discussing the harm that NCLB has inflicted on the reading achievement of children. Also speaking will be Aurelia Davila de Silva, an experienced reading teacher, who will discuss what's happening to students as a result of NCLB; Reba Wadsworth, an elementary school principal, who will talk about how her school has been negatively affected by NCLB; Daniel DeYoung, classroom teacher, who will illustrate the effect on him as a teacher since NCLB was put into effect; and Maryann Manning, professor of education at the University of Alabama, who will share what is being mandated of professors of reading education in different states.

Call for SLATE Newsletter Articles
SLATE Newsletter is looking for short articles of 250-500 words on issues related to the teaching of the English language arts. Send your contribution to Fred Barton, Editor, SLATE Newsletter, in care of NCTE at slate@ncte.org.

Call for Personal Opinion Papers
You are invited to submit a Personal Opinion Paper (POP) for publication in the SLATE Newsletter. POPs can be on any sociopolitical issue that affects the teaching and learning of English language arts. Recent topics have included student testing and grading. Send a POP of no more than 500 words in length to Fred Barton, Editor, SLATE Newsletter, in care of NCTE at slate@ncte.org.

Copyright 2005
National Council of Teachers of English
http://www.ncte.org/

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