Daily Wisdom: November 21, 2012

It’s Only History

Argument Starter

Since we spent a fair amount of time discussing articles and a film critical of teachers unions, this response from Amy Dean certainly merits conversation and discussion:

Teachers unions have played a critical role in advocating for public education, but you’d never know it from mainstream media coverage. Therefore, there is a great need to lift up this tradition and highlight the efforts of teachers to collectively push for top-notch public schools.

Fascinating Factoid

The Dunning-Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which those who lack skills or knowledge believe they are superior to those who actually, are, rating their abilities as much higher than they are. In fact, according to professors Dunning and Kruger, those with the poorest performance are least aware of their own incompetence.  As Chris Lee notes, this becomes quite complex:

The results of research performed by Dunning, Kruger, Ames, and Kammrath tell us something that every one of us has expressed at some time or another. The incompetent are readily able to escape detection by those who count. At its most cynical—though it is also a logically inescapable conclusion—this is best expressed by the Peter Principle: people are inevitably promoted to a position that is just beyond their level of competence.

Word of the Day

OLIGARCHY (ol-i-gahr-kee): rule by the few.
Example: “Back in my country I have many family members, but only my grandparents can make decisions. It’s kind of an oligarchy, but my grandma makes the best pies so it is worth it,” stated Francesco.

[pextestim name=”Quote of the Day” img=”https://quixoticpedagogue.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/chopin_pic.jpg”]”As if a magician’s wand had touched him, the garland of roses transformed him into a vision of Oriental beauty.” Kate Chopin,  The Awakening [/pextestim]

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