Alfie Kohn

author and lecturer on topics in #education, #parenting, and human #behavior....
(Personal messages more likely to be read if left on http://alfiekohn.org)

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npub1g5kjuwa699lzk0kk2s86cu3tag6jq522f5ujvrn2qu6xjrd7346s8m0c36

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alfiekohn_at_sciences.social@mostr.pub

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relay.shitforce.one

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Last Notes

2024-11-06 22:50:36

Someone going to start collecting these?
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/113/438/448/337/596/323/original/7c0de3429bdcbe53.png
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/113/438/448/821/388/973/original/a1d4a68373a4869a.png

2024-11-06 17:23:44

https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/113/437/163/584/917/236/original/8d96e290b635123e.png
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/113/437/164/010/828/811/original/54eb2d377132c5a2.png

2024-11-06 13:39:03

1/3
We feared they would try to subvert the election. It's worse: They didn't need to.
We asked how, given his obvious unfitness & fascism, the election could be close. But it wasn't even close.
We deplored the injustice of the electoral college. But he won the popular vote, too.
We can't say the majority didn't understand who he is. He recklessly boasted about dismantling democracy and persecuting his enemies (which is to say, many of us). And 70 million of our neighbors said, "Let's do it."

2024-09-04 20:20:17

A little disconcerted to receive this request from Beacon Press, an independent progressive publisher that I've worked with on a couple of my books. Thoughts?
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/113/081/135/425/543/183/original/d259731972213298.jpeg

2024-08-29 12:02:04

A light-bulb moment for me was realizing that much of the talk about student "motivation" (how to boost it or why a given kid lacks it) is really code for talking about compliance: the extent to which students do whatever they're told without question.

2024-08-27 12:18:58

Having kids read at night is certainly better than assigning worksheets, but I've lost count of the number of parents who have told me,"My child used to love reading until the teacher started requiring the kids to read x minutes every night. Now it's become a chore."

2024-08-26 14:33:19

The #NYTimes has officially become a parody of itself.
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/113/028/810/020/304/942/original/23e7db8294232cea.png

2024-08-19 12:06:11

Call me a dreamer, but when I graduate from college I want to devote my time and talents to making very rich people even richer - and, with a little luck, leave the world just a little bit worse than I found it.
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/112/988/590/367/252/411/original/7c2c9e4601519b29.png

2024-08-17 18:01:00

Today's tip: Complain about getting older only to your peers. Those who are younger than you won't really understand; those who are older will be unsympathetic.

2024-08-07 22:34:31

The #2 on the GOP ticket isn't just weird, creepy, or snide toward childless women. He has endorsed blunt calls to replace democracy with a reign of autocratic terror modeled on Franco & Pinochet. This horrifying, violence-embracing ideology - fueled by religious dogmatism - *is* today's Republican party: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/05/opinion/jd-vance-fascism-unhumans.html?unlocked_article_code=1.BE4.y5tV.KPz4JGUjF4Da&smid=url-share

2024-08-03 12:10:06

Want to predict whether someone has authoritarian or racist tendencies? Research suggests you need only ask what that person values most in children: obedience, respect for elders, and good manners? Or curiosity, independence, and considerateness?
It's tempting to say such characteristics aren't mutually exclusive, but in fact, these two distinct sets of values cluster separately, are negatively correlated, and tend to predict opposed worldviews: https://www.karenstenner.com

2024-07-29 16:08:57

Doesn't much of the dispute on clearing homeless camps (in Calif. & elsewhere) really come down to whether the primary goal is to address the plight of people who don't have a place to live....as opposed to the inconvenience that their public presence poses for people who do?
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/112/870/641/973/409/559/original/37c10129ac35c17f.png

2024-07-27 16:53:58

Interesting new research: Compared with people who just happen not to be religious, those who affirmatively embrace a secular identity are more likely to endorse core democratic values and freedom of expression as well as to reject conspiracy theories: https://www.psypost.org/secularists-revealed-as-a-unique-political-force-in-america-with-an-intriguing-divergence-from-liberals/

2024-07-21 12:05:24

1/2
Red states are
* pro-liberty...unless you're pregnant
* pro-life...with unrestricted access to deadly weapons
* pro-democracy...with a set of policies designed to make it really hard to vote
* pro-parental rights...except for parents who want to protect their LGBTQ kids
* pro-business...until a company supports DEI practices

2024-07-20 14:55:57

Imagine that you read about this happening in, say, Uzbekistan: https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/20/trump-legal-woes-judges-appointed-00169875
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/112/819/395/016/315/110/original/eb59e36418024e82.png

2024-07-14 16:15:26

Holy shit. If this is going on in New York, just imagine how many similar far-right paramilitary groups are being organized in red states. And if it's happening now, imagine what's coming under (an immunized) Trump 2.0: https://tinyurl.com/yc8h6xye

2024-06-28 15:50:50

In case you were worried that the Court's destruction of reproductive rights, affirmative action, and the separation of church & state had distracted it from the task of protecting corporations (from regulations to safeguard workers, the environment, or consumers), you can relax.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/supreme-court-chevron-overrule-agency
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/112/695/191/364/266/830/original/bf40bd88946393e2.png

2024-06-25 16:58:44

Can we stop calling these people "pro-life" now?
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/112/678/317/152/733/681/original/76f9a1d2330ee371.png

2024-06-24 11:59:31

1/2
Early anthropologists debunked the myth that it's "just human nature" to compete, especially in times of scarcity. Some cultures with limited resources are indeed competitive, but others are cooperative, the assumption apparently being that they can't *afford* to compete and must work together. Similarly, some cultures that enjoy abundance are cooperative while others are competitive.

2024-06-17 12:00:20

Fascinating study: Lower social-class university students (& other adults) do worse than their higher-class counterparts on a reasoning task only when they've been led to focus on outperforming others. Competition, in other words, exacerbates social inequality: https://psycnet.apa.org/buy/2019-10560-001

2024-06-14 11:53:09

The evidence fails to support the claim that homework is academically beneficial for students in any meaningful sense, as I showed in this chapter from my book The Homework Myth: www.alfiekohn.org/homework-improve-learning/.
Many HW defenders quickly pivot to claiming that it promotes self-discipline, responsibility, time management & study skills, etc. Yet over the last 20 years I've been unable to find a single study that supports this folk wisdom about HW's supposed nonacademic advantages.

2024-06-13 15:04:16

In 2020, people took to the streets to protest police brutality....and were met with police brutality.
Just the other day, a Florida school board banned a book about book banning: https://www.tallahassee.com/story/news/politics/2024/06/11/florida-school-board-bans-book-about-book-bans/73970418007/
They can destroy our democracy, but by god they can't take away our rueful appreciation of irony.
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/112/609/909/876/923/242/original/ca150dfe36937baf.png

2024-06-08 11:58:49

Given how many positive things can be flicked away just by calling them "woke," it shouldn't be surprising that educational conservatives also rely on derogatory labels like ”fuzzy math” to dismiss more sophisticated teaching that emphasizes meaning over rote recall.
It's the flip side of the "Science of..." campaign to prop up traditionalist pedagogy - a diabolically effective framing that promotes a reactionary educational agenda while simultaneously denigrating progressive alternatives.

2024-05-26 14:42:40

I love my neighborhood
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/112/507/915/433/132/427/original/7e49299b256fd379.jpg

2024-05-19 12:10:10

A horrifying dispatch from Israel that may be among the documents future historians will cite to establish collective guilt: Polls show that the vast majority of ordinary Israelis actively support the slaughter in Gaza and oppose food & medical aid for civilians; a bumper sticker says "Finish them"; a popular song calls for Gaza to be "erased."
Even before Oct. 7, most Israelis were, at best, conveniently indifferent to Palestinian suffering caused by their government: https://tinyurl.com/3bf6ek3v

2024-05-14 12:09:25

Research finds that putting children in competitive activities tends to reduce their generosity and empathy. (This makes perfect sense when you think about the mindset required to try to beat other people.) Someone nicely summarized this by saying that caring tends to atrophy when the point is to win a trophy.

2024-05-11 12:02:52

Jerome Bruner reminded us that we want students to "experience success and failure not as reward and punishment but as information." This insight is so essential that I call it Bruner's Law.
Its immediate implication is that grades must be eliminated (not merely tweaked) since they're inevitably experienced by students as rewards and punishments.
Beyond that, we should use Bruner's Law as the standard by which to weigh all other assessment practices and whether they make sense.

2024-05-07 16:07:14

Historian RIck Perlstein just called this the best essay on Israel he's ever seen, although it's not a quick or easy read. It's a hard-hitting account of how Israel & its supporters have shamelessly exploited the Holocaust (and antisemitism more generally) to justify its crimes against Palestinians -- the current massacre being the apotheosis of a decades-long process -- and how a number of Jewish scholars and literary figures over the years have spoken out about this: https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n06/pankaj-mishra/the-shoah-after-gaza

2023-09-28 16:19:30

In terms of what it reveals about her psychiatric status, Ms. Wolf might as well have announced, "My toaster is secretly recording my thoughts." But antivax falsehoods are fed by political fervor, so such pronouncements are eagerly seized on. And ultimately contribute to countless deaths.
https://cdn.masto.host/sciencessocial/media_attachments/files/111/143/667/036/569/642/original/869e94f15876ec32.png