You might see an 'essay' going around today about 'the valu…

From the very first sentence, this person attacks Nikole Hannah Jones and the #1619Project in a typically conservative fashion, no doubt to get the conservative heads to go 'hear, hear!!'. He then says she 'claims' her expertise & essentially says to her 'stay in your lane'. 2/x

Ridiculous assertion aside, Considering this author is someone that routinely criticizes his education program for doing things like setting tasks of making 'BLM bracelets', but then heralds it in his bio, one must wonder how he reckons w/his own lack of expertise. 3/x

He then criticizes Gloria Ladson Billings, another Black woman for pointing out something that is literally true (have you not seen curricula that tell teachers to enact the slave trade? Or that propagate the thanksgiving myth?) 4/x

but does nothing to reckon with the the history of this country, the (failure) to teach Black children, the changes that DO need to be made in curriculum to ensure both rigor and windows and mirrors. 5/x

Next, he also criticizes Ibram Kendi, and look I'll be honest I've got some qualms with the ideas myself. However the idea of which knowledge we choose to center, whose knowledge we uphold as the standard stick IS a relevant question & not something to be sidelined 6/x

I wrestle with this question every day of my life as a Black woman and teacher of Black children from whom too many opportunities have been withheld, and reconcile what they need to understand about how the systems of the US works but also what it means to envision freedom 7/x

But, of course, this author teaches in a private school so those issues of 'white supremacy' don't really matter in that context right?

Also- WTAF do you mean about curriculum that is devoid of meaningful content? 8/x

Are you actually implying that a diverse and rigorous curriculum that allows children to both understand how they fit into the larger world AND teaches them about the larger is... wrong? Read Sims Bishop and get back to me. 9/x

Later in this essay he uncritically embraces ED Hirsch. the ideas of knowledge centered curriculum are what I agree with, but if you read 'Why Knowledge Matters' you see that even Hirsch himself said you don't have to use Core Knoweldge™️, but just make your own sequence 10/x

SO IF YOU MAKE YOUR OWN CORE KNOWLEDGE SEQUENCE YOU WILL AUTOMATICALLY Be DECIDING WHICH KNOWLEDGE TO CENTER AND YOU WILL WANT TO MAKE SURE IT IS ACCURATE AND REPRESENTATIVE OF DIVERSE PERSPECTIVES AND OPINIONS. TIME. SPACE. GENDER. RACE. COUNTRY OF ORIGIN 11/x

There are too many people talking and yapping their mouths off with half truths and understandings, ahistorical knowing, and theories that show how little they actually know or have thought or read about these issues that plague our system. 12/x

YALL. DONT. READ. 13/x

Finally, while in no way am I a 'progressive' educator—I've always been on about my issues w/YA lit in the study of English, I'm pro-systematic/explicit phonics etc— but make no mistake: I am not, and refuse to be put, in the same camp with the likes of this absolute shit. 13/end

Post Tweet: the essay is anti-intellectual bullshit that sees nothing except it's own narrow lens, and, despite being quite long, shows a lack of grappling deeply with the issues at hand.

For anyone wondering: 'absolute shit' didn't refer to the author as a person. Just the ideas.

You might see an 'essay' going around today about 'the value of knowledge'. I'm not linking it, but I've taken out a few paragraphs that need to be reckoned with. 1/?

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