THE NEW YORK TIMES

          HOW RELEASE OF MENTAL PATIENTS BEGAN

By RICHARD D. LYONS

Published: October 30, 1984

THE policy that led to the release of most of the nation’s mentally ill patients from the hospital to the community is now widely regarded as a major failure. Sweeping critiques of the policy, notably the recent report of the American Psychiatric Association, have spread the blame everywhere, faulting politicians, civil libertarian lawyers and psychiatrists.

But who, specifically, played some of the more important roles in the formation of this ill-fated policy? What motivated these influential people and what lessons are to be learned?

A detailed picture has emerged from a series of interviews and a review of public records, research reports and institutional recommendations. The picture is one of cost-conscious policy makers, who were quick to buy optimistic projections that were, in some instances, buttressed by misinformation and by a willingness to suspend skepticism.

Many of the psychiatrists involved as practitioners and policy makers in the 1950’s and 1960’s said in the interviews that heavy responsibility lay on a sometimes neglected aspect of the problem: the overreliance on drugs to do the work of society.

The records show that the politicians were dogged by the image and financial problems posed by the state hospitals and that the scientific and medical establishment sold Congress and the state legislatures a quick fix for a complicated problem that was bought sight unseen.

‘They’ve Gone Far, Too Far’

In California, for example, the number of patients in state mental hospitals reached a peak of 37,500 in 1959 when Edmund G. Brown was Governor, fell to 22,000 when Ronald Reagan attained that office in 1967, and continued to decline under his administration and that of his successor, Edmund G. Brown Jr. The senior Mr. Brown now expresses regret about the way the policy started and ultimately evolved. ”They’ve gone far, too far, in letting people out,” he said in an interview.

Dr. Robert H. Felix, who was then director of the National Institute of Mental Health and a major figure in the shift to community centers, says now on reflection: ”Many of those patients who left the state hospitals never should have done so. We psychiatrists saw too much of the old snake pit, saw too many people who shouldn’t have been there and we overreacted. The result is not what we intended, and perhaps we didn’t ask the questions that should have been asked when developing a new concept, but psychiatrists are human, too, and we tried our damnedest.”

Dr. John A. Talbott, president of the American Psychiatric Association, said, ”The psychiatrists involved in the policy making at that time certainly oversold community treatment, and our credibility today is probably damaged because of it.” He said the policies ”were based partly on wishful thinking, partly on the enormousness of the problem and the lack of a silver bullet to resolve it, then as now.”

The original policy changes were backed by scores of national professional and philanthropic organizations and several hundred people prominent in medicine, academia and politics. The belief then was widespread that the same scientific researchers who had conjured up antibiotics and vaccines during the outburst of medical discovery in the 50’s and 60’s had also developed penicillins to cure psychoses and thus revolutionize the treatment of the mentally ill.

And these leaders were prodded into action by a series of scientific studies in the 1950’s purporting to show that mental illness was far more prevalent than had previously been believed.

Finally, there was a growing economic and political liability faced by state legislators. Enormous amounts of tax revenues were being used to support the state mental hospitals, and the institutions themselves were increasingly thought of as ”snake pits” or facilities that few people wanted.

One of the most influential groups in bringing about the new national policy was the Joint Commission on Mental Illness and Health, an independent body set up by Congress in 1955. One of its two surviving members, Dr. M. Brewster Smith, a University of California psychologist who served as vice president, said the commission took the direction it did because of ”the sort of overselling that happens in almost every interchange between science and government.”

”Extravagant claims were made for the benefits of shifting from state hospitals to community clinics,” Dr. Smith said. ”The professional community made mistakes and was overly optimistic, but the political community wanted to save money.”

‘Tranquilizers Became Panacea’

Charles Schlaifer, a New York advertising executive who served as secretary-treasurer of the group, said he was now disgusted with the advice presented by leading psychiatrists of that day. ”Tranquilizers became the panacea for the mentally ill,” he said. ”The state programs were buying them by the carload, sending the drugged patients back to the community and the psychiatrists never tried to stop this. Local mental health centers were going to be the greatest thing going, but no one wanted to think it through.”

Dr. Bertram S. Brown, a psychiatrist and Federal official who was instrumental in shaping the community center legislation in 1963, agreed that Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy and Johnson were to some extent misled by the mental health community and Government bureaucrats.

”The bureaucrat-psychiatrists realized that there was political and financial overpromise,” he said.

Dr. Brown, then an executive of the National Institute of Mental Health and now president of Hahnemann University in Philadelphia, stated candidly in an interview: ”Yes, the doctors were overpromising for the politicians. The doctors did not believe that community care would cure schizophrenia, and we did allow ourselves to be somewhat misrepresented.”

”They ended up with everything but the kitchen sink without the issue of long-term funding being settled,” he said. ”That was the overpromising.”

Dr. Brown said he and the other architects of the community centers legislation believed that while there was a risk of homelessness, that it would not happen if Federal, state, local and private financial support ”was sufficient” to do the job.

Resources Vanished Quickly

The legislation sought to create a nationwide network of locally based mental health centers which, rather than large state hospitals, would be the main source of treatment. The center concept was aided by Federal funds for four and a half years, after which it was hoped that the states and local governments would assume responsibility.

”We knew that there were not enough resources in the community to do the whole job, so that some people would be in the streets facing society head on and questions would be raised about the necessity to send them back to the state hospitals,” Dr. Brown said.

But, he continued, ”It happened much faster than we foresaw.” The discharge of mental patients was accelerated in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s in some states as a result of a series of court decisions that limited the commitment powers of state and local officials.

Dr. Brown insists, as do others who were involved in the Congressional legislation to establish community mental health centers, that politicians and health experts were carrying out a public mandate to abolish the abominable conditions of insane asylums. He and others note – and their critics do not disagree – that their motives were not venal and that they were acting humanely.

In restrospect it does seem clear that questions were not asked that might have been asked. In the thousands of pages of testimony before Congressional committees in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, little doubt was expressed about the wisdom of deinstitutionalization. And the development of tranquilizing drugs was regarded as an unqualified ”godsend,” as one of the nation’s leading psychiatrists, Dr. Francis J. Braceland, described it when he testified before a Senate subcommittee in 1963.

Dr. Braceland, a former president of the American Psychiatric Association who is a retired professor of psychiatry at Yale University, still maintains, however, that under the circumstances the widespread prescription of drugs for the mentally ill was and is a wise policy.

”We had no alternative to the use of drugs for schizophrenia and depression,” Dr. Braceland said. ”Before the introduction of drugs like Thorazine we never had drugs that worked. These are wonderful drugs and they kept a lot of people out of the hospitals.”

Testimony to Congress

His point is borne out repeatedly by references in Congressional testimony, such as the following exchange at a House subcommittee hearing between Representative Leo W. O’Brien, Democrat of upstate New York, and Dr. Henry N. Pratt, director of New York Hospital in Manhattan, who appeared on behalf of the American Hospital Association.

Mr. O’Brien: ”Do you know offhand how much New York appropriates annually for its mental hospitals?”

Dr. Pratt: ”It is the vast sum of $400 million to $500 million.”

Mr. O’Brien: ”So you see that, through a real attempt to handle this problem at the community level, the possibility that this dead weight of $400 million to $500 million a year around the necks of the New York State taxpayers might be reduced considerably in the next 15 or 20 years?

Dr. Pratt: ”I do, indeed. Yes, sir.”

He then told the subcommittee that ”striking proof of the advantages of local short-term intensive care of the mentally ill was brought out” in a Missouri study.

Dr. Pratt’s testimony and the Missouri study were repeatedly cited in subsequent Congressional debates on the community centers bill by such politicians as Senator Hubert H. Humphrey of Minnesota and Representative Kenneth A. Roberts of Alabama.

The Missouri study, which compared a group of 412 patients in two intensive treatment centers with patients admitted to five mental hospitals, showed that the average stays for patients in the large hospitals were 237 days longer than for similarly diagnosed patients at the treatment centers.

But Dr. George A. Ulett of St. Louis, the psychiatrist who directed the study as head of Missouri’s Division of Mental Diseases, now says the numbers cited, though correct, were misinterpreted. ”We did have dramatic numbers, but the initial success of the community centers in Missouri hinged on the large numbers of psychiatrists and support personnel who staffed the centers at that time,” Dr. Ulett said.

MORE ARTICLES TO FOLLOW ABOUT HOW THE SOCIETY AT LARGE HAS BEEN PROVEN UNABLE TO CARE FOR OR CONTROL THE MENTALLY ILL.

Christmas – 1965

It was Christmas and cold. Gusty winds blew dry leaves around dusty streets, while grey clouds threatened overhead.  Neighbors had all gotten their Christmas lights up on the edges of roofs. Decorated trees could be seen proudly displayed in front windows.

Ads for every conceivable gift imaginable shouted from television sets, the stores were lit up and decorated. Downtown had the lights up and glitter banners. Everyone was running around madly, getting ready for the Big Day.

In 1965 girls were getting bolder and wearing eye-popping colors on dresses, lipstick and nail polish. Hair styles were Big! with a lot! of hairspray and the woman’s movement was just getting up on wobbly legs.

Seventeen Magazine and the new self-involved women’s magazines were just starting to replace the traditional Woman’s Day and Family Circles that I had been brought up with.

Christmas Eve, my father did the traditional thing which was to get the three of us kids into the car and make a run to the new Mall. We eagerly stuffed our funds into wallets and bags and jumped in the car.

Once at the Mall, my father deposited us and gave us a two-hour window of time. Therefter, we were to meet him at the coffee shop. Released, we ran screaming and yelling through the Mall picking up and discarding junk. The clock was ticking, so decisions had to be made, and things bought. That done, we snuggled our secret purchases close to the chest and hurried back to my dad. We then jumped in the car and went home to furiously wrap.

 

The next morning Christmas dawned, and my brothers and I got up and ran for the tree. After forty minutes of excited ripping and tearing, the floor was covered in brightly colored debris.

We all took a breath and sat back inspecting our stuff.

“Where’s my present?” My mother asked.

Looking wildly around, I started searching in the paper. Panicked, I began to rummage desperately but could find nothing. I looked at my mother, stricken.

“I didn’t get anything?” Her face began to fold into a sob.

My father got up and went to fix himself an early whiskey and soda.

She got up and went back into her bedroom.

“I thought you got her something!” I said viciously to my older brother.

“I thought you did, you idiot!” He hissed back at me.

“Don’t look at me!” the younger one waved his hands in front of himself.

“Aw, shit,” I said to the crumpled paper.

My mother emerged from the back with clothes on. Saying nothing, she went out the front door. Two hours later she returned. She was holding two bottles of new nail polish given to her by a neighbor. One was the new bright pink everyone was crazy about and another in white.

“Someone got me something for Christmas,” she waved the bottles at me and went back to her room again. I was making breakfast and kept my head down. It was a very quiet house that day.

 

The following Christmas season, my mother engaged in very few of her usual, pre-holiday preparations. I’m not sure we even had a tree. Surprisingly, there were no threats, tears, recriminations, nothing, just a sort of deadly purpose.

Instead, she announced two weeks before the event that she would be getting on a plane and going ‘home’ for Christmas. Home was the small Southern where she had been born and raised and where her mother and sisters still lived.

My dad took her to the airport and she was gone. We didn’t hear a word from her until she got back. She was to continue this new ‘tradition’ for about five more years. Our household was remarkably quiet during these times. The tradition only changed when my oldest brother, then in the Air Force, got stationed overseas.  She started a new tradition of visiting him and his family. Seeing her in old photo albums, these looked to be happy trips.

 

Christmas 1985

1985, the Woman’s Movement was in full roar and the sexual revolution had definitely landed. I had a ‘professional’ job, meaning that it had been done by a man previous years. I was flying high with a salary, company car and expense account. Also, yes, can you believe, respect for myself, what I did and respect from others. Alright!

Christmas time, we met at my mother’s new house she had purchased herself. My parents had divorced some years previously. Mother was making her own way in the business world and doing fairly well. The place was a nice ranch in a small town and she had an entire room fixed up for her favorite hobby, sewing.

By this time, Dad was out of the picture except for an occasional dinner, and the two oldest brothers were married and gone. That left me and the youngest brother to do the Christmas thing.

We gathered around the tree and fireplace in the cozy living room and opened presents on Christmas Eve. I had a large box from mom to unwrap. I got the paper off it and pulled the top off to reveal more tissue paper underneath and some darkly glowing fabric. Slowly I pulled out what was a deep, blood red, velvet jacket. It took me a few moments to realize what it was.

“Mom, wasn’t this the jacket you were working on. . .?”

“Yes, yes, it is. You saw it before. But it never fit me right and was too big. So, I made the sleeves into ¾ length and they are so fashionable now. It’s just your size.”

I tried it on once and felt like I was wearing a Hugh Hefner velvet dinner jacket. I could not imagine a single place I could wear such a thing. I folded it back up and plastered a smile on my face.

“Thanks so much, Mom, but it’s really not my style.”

She started prattling on and on about how expensive the fabric was, etc. etc.          I wouldn’t back down, no way I was taking that thing home and then pretend to wear it.

“Maybe you could sell it.”

More babbling on and on. I went and got myself a coke and soon after, found some excuse to leave the festivities early.

That early winter, I waited to see if my mother, sensing my extremely displeasure with the gift, would get me something else. She never did. Apparently, she felt that she had done her duty and Christmas was over.

In the years following, I began to tell my mother and my brother, in broad hints, what I would like to get for Christmas. In looking through old pictures recently, I saw myself with a new vacuum cleaner and a happy face. It was exactly what I wanted.

Mom and Dad are both gone now, and that brother has disappeared from the face of polite company. I am still in touch with my other two brothers, but they have large families and those families come first, especially at Christmas.

 

 Christmas – 2015

On Christmas Day I got a voice mail message from my daughter.

“Mom,” she said in her usual breathless fashion, “I’m at Dad’s and my phone has run out of power. I’m calling on his phone. I’ll try to call you when I get home.”

Later, I called my daughter. She answered. “Yeah, hi. Um, I’m just going out. Talk to you later. Love ya!”

I sat in my living room and stared at my little artificial tree. Decorated with pretty glass bobbles, red and gold snowflakes, there was a beige tea towel tucked around the base to somewhat resemble snow. Yellow snow I thought with a laugh.

Under the tree there was not one single gift. Not even a little one. This marked the first Christmas when I didn’t get a single gift from anyone. Not one.

“Funny,” I remarked to the cat, “how much things change and then stay the same.

His response was to start licking his paw. I sighed and went to get boxes to take down the tree.

 

 

 

 

Cew 2/18

 

 

Whole Language describes a literacy philosophy which emphasizes that children should focus on meaning and strategy instruction. It is often contrasted with phonics-based methods of teaching reading and writing which emphasize instruction for decoding and spelling.

After its introduction by Kenneth Goodman (1963), the Whole Language approach to reading rose in popularity dramatically. It became a major educational paradigm until the late 1980s and the 1990s. Despite its popularity during this period, educators were highly skeptical of whole language claims. What followed were the “Reading Wars” of the 1980s and 1990s between advocates of phonics and those of Whole Language methodology. Congress commissioned reading expert Marilyn Jager Adams (1994) to write a definitive book on the topic. She determined that phonics was important but suggested that some elements of the whole language approach were helpful.

However, once we get past all the press releases to understand Ken Goodman and the significance of his approach, it is essential to understand where he started, career wise and where his ideas originated from. As a young teacher, Goodman was in a large inner-city school district dealing with poor, low-income students with significantly poor academic skills. His first research had to do with student mis-cues when they were reading and how many mistakes students made per passage, (Goodman, 1967).

Chomsky and Goodman

The whole language approach to phonics grew out of Noam Chomsky’s ideas about language acquisition. In 1967, Ken Goodman had an idea about reading, which he considered similar to Chomsky’s, and he wrote a widely cited article calling reading a “psycholinguistic guessing game”, (Goodman, 1967).

Goodman thought that there are four “cueing systems” for reading, four things that readers have to guess what word comes next:

1. graphophonemic: the shapes of the letters, and the sounds that they evoke.
2. semantic: what word one would expect to occur based on the meaning of the sentence so far.
3. syntactic: what part of speech or word would make sense based on the grammar of the language.
4. pragmatic: what is the function of the text.

Graphophonemic cues are related to the sounds we hear, the alphabet, and the conventions of spelling, punctuation and print. Students who are emerging readers often use these cues. Proficient readers and writers draw on their prior experiences with text and the other cueing systems. Ken Goodman writes that, “The cue systems are used simultaneously and interdependently. …an initial consonant may be all that is needed to identify an element and make possible the prediction of an ensuing sequence or the confirmation of prior predictions,” (Goodman, 1982). He continues with, “Reading requires not so much skills as strategies that make it possible to select the most productive cues.”

The semantic cuing system is the one in which meaning is constructed. “So focused is reading on making sense that the visual input, the perceptions we form, and the syntactic patterns we assign are all directed by our meaning construction,” (Goodman, 1996). The key component of the semantic system is context. A reader must be able to attach meaning to words and have some prior knowledge to use as a context for understanding the word. They must be able to relate the newly learned word to prior knowledge through personal associations with text and the structure of text.(Goodman, K. 1982).

The syntactic system, according to Goodman and Watson, (Goodman, Y. 2005). includes the interrelation of words and sentences within connected text.

The pragmatic system is also involved in the construction of meaning while reading. This brings into play the socio-cultural knowledge of the reader. Yetta Goodman and Dorothy Watson state that, “Language has different meaning depending on the reason for use, the circumstances in which the language is used, and the ideas writers and readers have about the contextual relations with the language users. Language cannot exist outside a sociocultural context, which includes the prior knowledge of the language user,” (Goodman, Y. 2005).

 

Eventually, Goodman formulated a theory that students could learn to read, with comprehension, even with miscues, if they were able to rely on the context of the passage, in whole, to help them understand the meaning of what they were reading. In other words, a reader could link or frog-jump over words he did not know, and by referring to the context of the total passage, would be able to ‘understand’ the meaning of the unknown word. In the end, the reader could understand and comprehend the entire passage.

His Whole Language theory caught fire in the 60’s and 70’s and whole generations of school age children were taught to read with this theoretical approach. It was in the late ‘70’s (about) and early ‘80s and the 90’s that parents and educators became aware of the fact that students were graduating from high school, still unable to read.

What was happening? Back to the drawing board and back to conventional forms of instruction. Further research into the nature of reading and of learning has shown us clearly that young readers have to learn to decode words and language. And, today, teaching colleges are training teachers that the pre-K to 3^rd grade years are all about decoding and decoding skills. Students have to be able to break words apart, put them back together again, construct sentences and ultimately, construct meaning from what they read. Education appears to be back on track.

Alas, poor Ken. Hard times. However, all is not lost and there is light coming from that tunnel. The students Goodman originally worked with were poor readers from poor academic backgrounds. It is highly likely these students were never taught good decoding skills. Here is the important point. Instead of attempting to reverse the clock and go backwards to the 2^nd grade and reteach those skills, he simply skipped over all that decoding stuff and taught students’ techniques to read with their existing skills.

Other teachers at the same time were working with inner-city school kids and learning that if students were simply interested in what they were reading, they would read without being forced to do so, (Fader, 1955), (Krashen, 2012).

The Goodman approach can be resurrected and used today with older students when it is not possible to duplicate the K-3 learning experience. I am speaking of ESL and ELL learners, many of whom don’t come to this country until they are nearly adults.

As high school or especially as college students, ESL’s are required to read substantial amounts of material. This is a struggle for them. Time and time again, while working with ESL students, I have seen them glued to their dictionaries and carefully translating their English texts word by word or phrase by phrase. The length of time this translation process takes is, to putting it mildly, extensive.

So, what can we do to keep the ESL/ELL student even with their peers? Students can be taught the Kenneth Goodman approach to reading, wherein, they construct meaning from the text not by translating word by word but rather by understanding the piece they are reading in context with the whole text.

Currently, I teach my ESL students to keep a word journal and to write down words that they don’t know. However, they are not to stop and look words up in a dictionary unless they feel strongly they cannot understand the passage without help. Then, later, they can go back, look up the word, even write down a definition. Students can leaf through their notebook for a refresher or put the words on 3×5 cards and practice them.

ESL students, need to learn to live with some ambiguity. (This and this can also apply to older native speakers who are struggling with reading.) In their reading, they will not understand every word. They need to learn to read and comprehend to the best of their ability and, well enough to get the class assignment done. As most teachers will tell you, they would rather have a completed student assignment that is somewhat less than an A, than to have no assignment at all.

Unfortunately, students all too often give up and either quit coming to class as they feel too overwhelmed. Reading requirements are a big part of that overwhelm.

In conclusion: ESL students are overly dependent on dictionaries and translation devices to get them through their reading and assignments. The Kenneth Goodman Whole Language approach to reading can be utilized for these students, as well as low-achieving older native speakers. The Whole Language approach can help them get through their reading with sufficient understanding of the material to complete class work. Students can be trained to create word journals and to make a habit of recording words they don’t know, learn the words and thereby, expand their vocabularies.

Constant reading in English and expanding vocabularies combined with listening to spoken English with help these students to eventually become good readers, proficient writers and good communicators.

 

                References

 

Adams, M.M. (1994). Beginning to read: Thinking and learning about print. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. ISBN 0-262-51076-6.

Fader, D. (5/5/1955). Hooked on Books. Mass Market Paperbacks.

Goodman, K. (1963). A Communicative Theory of the Reading Curriculum. Elementary English, Vol 40:30, Mar. 1963, pp 290-298.

Goodman, K.S, (1967). Reading: A Psycholinguistic Guessing Game, Journal of The Reading Specialist, 6 (4), 126-135.

Goodman, Y. (2005). Reading Miscue Inventory. Katonah, NY: Robert C. Owen Publishers, Inc.

Goodman, K. (1982). Language and Literacy. Boston, MA: Routledge & Kegan. ISBN 0-7100-0875-9.

Goodman, K. (1996). On Reading. NH: Heinemann. IBSN 0-435-07200-5.

Krashen, S. (5/5/2012). The Power of Reading, The University of Georgia College of Education, The COE Lecture Series. Retrieved from www.youtube.com. Retrieved: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSW7gmvDLag&t=1236s

Whole Language, Wikipedia. Retrieved: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whole_language

2/2018 cew – copyright

 

 

 

Friday, I got the last of my 1099 wages statements from my employers for 2017.  I was able to add up all the money I had made in the year.

Halleluiah! I finally earned exactly the same amount I earned in 1992, twenty-six years ago. In 2008, I made the big plunge, left the corporate world forever and went back to school to become a teacher. It has been a bumpy road from time to time, but I will say I do enjoy what I do now much more than then.

So much for the vision of self-fulfillment. I am currently in the same size apartment I was in that year; two bed-room, one bath, car-port, pool-jacuzzi, pets okay. The only difference is that the amount of the rent has gone up 33% in the same period of time. I live in a moderate sized town in Central California; not Manhattan or San Francisco.

I estimate food prices are double what used to be since I am paying $600 to 900 per month for one person while I was paying $400 to $600 for two people.

In the same time period, electricity has increased from $6.57 per kilowatt hours in 1990 to $10.28 kilo hr. in 2016. The increase is 36%. Retrieved from https://www.statista.com/statistics/183700/us-average-retail-electricity-price-since-1990/.

The price of gasoline has gone up and come down; $1.30 per gallon in 1990 to $2.42 per gallon in 2016. Retrieved fromhttps://www.statista.com/statistics/204740/retail-price-of-gasoline-in-the-united-states-since-1990/.

Prices for Water And Sewerage Maintenance, 1990-2017 ($20)

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, prices for water and sewerage maintenance were 254.46% higher in 2017 versus 1990.

http://www.in2013dollars.com/Water-and-sewerage-maintenance/price-inflation/1990.

Top of Form

Bottom of Form

Prices for Food, 2000-2017 ($20)

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, prices for food were 48.95% higher in 2017 versus 2000. Retrieved from http://www.in2013dollars.com/Food/price-inflation.

 

Wow! You really have to look at the numbers to believe it. I keep wandering around saying “Why am I so broke? Why do I never have any money?” And, I am broke, and I do never have any money. The only break I get from the economy is since I have Medicare for medicals; the program reduces the amount of the bills and how much they pay. As a result, the doctors and hospitals reduce their fees. That’s it. Maybe some reduction in the costs of parks and museums. But, the big-ticket items: food, shelter and transportation – I’m in there with the rest of the rabble. I frequently ask myself, how do people live who have kids and make less money than I do? Basically, they do without is how.

Last thought; because I am in the senior group (sigh) I can easily remember a pack of cigarettes that cost 25 cents, gasoline that was 25 cents a gallon and going to the market and for $20, bringing back 5 bags of groceries. Easily enough to last a week. Today I can spend $20 and come out with two things, literally.

Bottom of Form

U.S. Inflation Rate, 1990-2017 ($100)

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics consumer price index, the dollar experienced an average inflation rate of 2.35% per year. Prices in 2017 are 87.3% higher than prices in 1990.

Years with the largest changes in pricing: 1917 (28.65%), 1921 (-24.20%), and 1947 (21.43%). Okay, so maybe it is. But, an increase of 28.65% in inflation in one year. What the heck is going on? Two of the years listed above were war years.

Okay, I’m simple, I don’t get it. I just feel like saying, bring back the old days. Ah, me.

cew

 

 

 

 

FRONTLINE

TWO AMERICAN FAMILIES

The State of America’s Middle Class in Eight Chart

JULY 9, 2013

by JASON M. BRESLOW Digital Editor •

EVAN WEXLER

In 1992, both Tony and Claude had recently lost their manufacturing jobs. For the next 20 years, our cameras followed them and their families as they struggled to avoid poverty. When they could find work, it was often for longer hours, less pay and no benefits. Bills piled up, tensions rose and relationships became strained.

Of course, their story is far from unique. Over the last several decades, the middle class has struggled to keep pace with smaller paychecks, mounting debt and shrinking opportunities for steady work. The following eight charts offer a brief snapshot:

#1: Wages are down

Middle class incomes have shrunk 8.5 percent since 2000, after enjoying mostly steady growth during the previous decade. In 2011, the average income for the middle 60 percent of households stood at $53,042, down from $58,009 at the start of the millennium.

#2: Less income for the middle class

Partly as a result of lower pay, the middle class’s share of the nation’s total income has been falling. In 1980, the middle 60 percent of households accounted for 51.7 of the country’s income. By 2011, they were less than half. Meanwhile, the top fifth of households saw their slice of the national income grow 16 percent, to 51.1 percent from 44.1 percent.

#3: Union positions are shrinking

One factor behind the decline in income has been a drop-off in the number of workers earning union salaries. In 2012, the median salary for a unionized worker stood at roughly $49,000. The median pay for their non-union counterparts was just shy of $39,000. Since 1983, however, the share of the population belonging to a labor union has gone from one-in-five workers to just over one-in-ten.

#4: More workers stuck in part-time jobs

A second factor weighing down pay is the rise in the number of Americans stuck in part-time jobs. In 2012, more than 2.5 million Americans worked part-time jobs because they could not find a full-time position, the most since 1993.

#5: Fewer jobs from U.S.-based multinationals

Part of the challenge for job seekers is that U.S. multinational corporations having been hiring less at home. These large, brand-name firms employ roughly a fifth of American workers, but from 1999 to 2008 they shed 2.1 million jobs in the U.S. while adding more than 2.2 million positions abroad.

#6: Rising debt

Predictably, the economic pressures facing the middle class have left families deeper in debt. . In 1992, the median level of debt for the middle third of families stood at $32,200. By 2010, that figure had swelled to $84,000, an increase of 161 percent.

#7: Families are saving less

The rise in debt has meant fewer families have the ability to put away money for things like retirement or a child’s tuition bills. In 2001, more than two-thirds of middle class families said they were able to save money in the preceding year. By 2010, that figure was below 55 percent.

#8: Net worth has plunged

The impact on family net worth — the amount by which assets exceed liabilities — has been painful. In 2007, median net worth peaked at $120, 600. Then came the financial crisis, which pushed millions of Americans into joblessness and home foreclosure. By 2010, net worth had plummeted 36 percent, to $77,300.

• WORLD

Trump Gives Generals More Freedom on ISIS Fight

Pentagon brass take lead on decisions that were made by White House under Obama; ‘I authorize my military,’ Trump says

By

Dion Nissenbaum in Washington and

Maria Abi-Habib in Beirut

Updated April 14, 2017 10:29 p.m. ET

U.S. military commanders are stepping up their fight against Islamist extremism as President Donald Trump’s administration urges them to make more battlefield decisions on their own.

As the White House works on a broad strategy, America’s top military commanders are implementing the vision articulated by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis: Decimate Islamic State’s Middle East strongholds and ensure that the militants don’t establish new beachheads in places such as Afghanistan.

“There’s nothing formal, but it is beginning to take shape,” a senior U.S. defense official said Friday. “There is a sense among these commanders that they are able to do a bit more—and so they are.”

While military commanders complained about White House micromanagement under former President Barack Obama, they are now being told they have more freedom to make decisions without consulting Mr. Trump. Military commanders around the world are being encouraged to stretch the limits of their existing authorities when needed, but to think seriously about the consequences of their decisions.

The more muscular military approach is expanding as the Trump administration debates a comprehensive new strategy to defeat Islamic State. Mr. Mattis has sketched out such a global plan, but the administration has yet to agree on it. While the political debate continues, the military is being encouraged to take more aggressive steps against Islamic extremists around the world.

The firmer military stance has fueled growing concerns among State Department officials working on Middle East policy that the Trump administration is giving short shrift to the diplomatic tools the Obama administration favored. Removing the carrot from the traditional carrot-and-stick approach, some State Department officials warn, could hamper the pursuit of long-term strategies needed to prevent volatile conflicts from reigniting once the shooting stops.

The new approach was on display this week in Afghanistan, where Gen. John Nicholson, head of the U.S.-led coalition there, decided to use one of the military’s biggest nonnuclear bombs—a Massive Ordnance Air Blast bomb, or MOAB—to hit a remote Islamic State underground network of tunnels and caves.

Gen. Nicholson said Friday it was too early to say how many militants had been killed in the previous day’s bombing. The Afghan Defense Ministry retracted an earlier statement that the strike had killed 36 militants, saying it was unable to provide precise figures yet.

A military official for the coalition who viewed footage of the bombing said it was difficult to make out details of its effects beyond a “mushroom cloud” of smoke rising into the sky. He added that a second MOAB was available for use in the country, but no decision had been made on whether it should be deployed.

Islamic State’s Amaq news agency posted a statement on Friday saying none of its fighters were killed or wounded in the strike, which took place in Nangarhar province, along the country’s mountainous border with Pakistan.

Gen. Nicholson indicated that he—not the White House—decided to drop the bomb. “The ammunition we used last night is designed to destroy caves and tunnels. This was the right weapon against the right target,” he told reporters Friday. “I am fortunate that my chain of command allows me the latitude to make assessments on the ground.”

A senior administration official said Mr. Trump didn’t know about the weapon’s use until it had been dropped.

Mr. Mattis “is telling them, ‘It’s not the same as it was, you don’t have to ask us before you drop a MOAB,’” the senior defense official said. “Technically there’s no piece of paper that says you have to ask the president to drop a MOAB. But last year this time, the way [things were] meant, ‘I’m going to drop a MOAB, better let the White House know.’”

Indeed, on Thursday Mr. Trump himself emphasized the free rein he gives the Pentagon. “I authorize my military,” Mr. Trump said. “We have given them total authorization.”

On Friday, the U.S. military said it has sent dozens of soldiers to Somalia, where Mr. Trump recently gave the head of the U.S. Africa Command more leeway to carry out counterterrorism operations against al-Shabaab, the al Qaeda affiliate in the area.

The more aggressive military approach comes as the long slog against Islamic State is bearing fruit. The group is on the back foot in its Iraqi stronghold, Mosul, and is facing a hard battle to defend its de facto Syrian capital, Raqqa.

The U.S. has sent more forces into Iraq and Syria, stepped up support for Saudi Arabia’s fight against Houthi militants in Yemen, and dispatched an aircraft carrier to the Korean Peninsula amid growing evidence that North Korea is preparing for a new nuclear test.

Loren DeJonge Schulman, who served as senior adviser to Mr. Obama’s national security adviser, said a more assertive military campaign is destined to fail unless it is part of a broader strategy against Islamic State, also known by the acronyms ISIS and ISIL.

“It’s crazy that the Trump administration thinks that ‘taking the gloves off’ is either a winning strategy against ISIL or a useful narrative for the White House or the military,” said Ms. Schulman, now a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security.

Derek Chollet, a former assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs in the Obama administration, said giving the Pentagon more freedom is one of the most significant things Mr. Trump has done.

“It’s not clear to me that he’s making any tough decisions,” said Mr. Chollet, now executive vice president at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. “All that he’s essentially done is ceded decision authority down to protect himself from making tough calls.”

The flip side of the Trump administration’s emphasis on a more-free-wheeling military approach to Islamic State is an apparent reduction of the use of soft-power tools—economic development, diplomacy and democracy-building—favored by the Obama White House.

Some State Department officials describe being cut out from the White House’s counterterrorism strategy in the Mideast, with efforts to nurture democratic governments and push for more secular education systems carrying less weight in the White House’s evolving approach.

“State is being systematically sidelined,” said a State Department official who has worked on counterterrorism issues in Washington and abroad.

The official said the White House strategy of prioritizing military might over diplomacy makes it hard to persuade Mideast allies to relax their grip on power. Many of Washington’s closest Arab allies are autocratic regimes guilty of human-rights abuses that critics say fuel terrorism.

“The problem there is that in many of the places where you need carrots, those carrots are often seen as threats to local governments,” the official said, referring to democracy and society-building programs the State Department funds across the Mideast.

Egypt offers a prime example of the Trump administration’s leanings. When Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi, a military strongman, visited the White House earlier this month, Mr. Trump gave him a warm welcome. Mr. Obama had refused to meet him because of his regime’s alleged human-rights abuses.

U.S. officials in the Mideast say a counterterror approach that focuses solely on military might without programs to fight the causes that feed extremism could backfire, leading groups like Islamic State to go underground and wait for future opportunities to re-emerge. They are particularly concerned about Raqqa, where a U.S.-led military coalition is closing in around the city but post-liberation stabilization plans aren’t finalized as State Department officials wait for White House guidance.

—Jessica Donati and Habib Khan Totakhil in Kabul and Carol E. Lee in Washington contributed to this article.

Write to Dion Nissenbaum at dion.nissenbaum@wsj.com and Maria Abi-Habib at maria.habib@wsj.com

Appeared in the April 15, 2017, print edition as ‘Military Takes Lead on ISIS.’

• Erika Rawes,
•  The Cheat Sheet
• In its discussion of historical middle class societies, The Economist reports, “Their members are neither rich nor poor but somewhere in-between…’Middle-class’ describes an income category but also a set of attitudes…An essential characteristic is the possession of a reasonable amount of discretionary income. Middle-class people do not live from hand to mouth, job to job, season to season, as the poor do.”

Some argue that the most sensible income amount to attach to the middle class would be the median household income, of around $54,000.

Perhaps, anyone who earns between the 25th percentile and 75th percentile is a member of the middle class.

Diana Farrell, once Deputy Director of America’s National Economic Council, told The Economist she thinks a middle class income begins at the point where a person (or family) has one-third of their income left over for discretionary purposes after they’ve provided themselves with food and shelter. In other words, someone who earns $3,000 per month would have $1,000 left after they’ve paid their mortgage or rent, utilities, and grocery bills.

Though there is some debate over the exact income a middle class household brings in, we do have an idea of who the middle class are — most working class people. Today’s bourgeoisie is composed of laborers and skilled workers, white collar and blue collar workers, many of whom face financial challenges. Bill Maher reminded us a few months back that 50 years ago, the largest employer was General Motors, where workers earned an equivalent of $50 per hour (in today’s money). Today, the largest employer — Walmart — pays around $8 per hour.

The middle class has certainly changed. We’ve ranked a list of things the middle class can no longer really afford. We’re not talking about lavish luxuries, like private jets and yachts. The items on this list are a bit more basic, and some of them are even necessities. The ranking of this list is based on affordability and necessity. Therefore, items that are necessity ranked higher, as did items that a larger percentage of people have trouble paying for.

Vacations

A vacation is an extra expense that many middle-earners cannot afford without sacrificing something else. A Statista survey found that this year 54% of people gave up purchasing big ticket items like TVs or electronics so they can go on a vacation. Others made sacrifices like reducing or eliminating their trips to the movies (47%), reducing or eliminating trips out to restaurants (43%), or avoiding purchasing small ticket items like new clothing (43%).

New vehicles

Very few people who earn the median income can afford to buy a new car or truck. Interest.com recently analyzed the prices of new cars and trucks, as well as the median incomes across more than two dozen major cities, and found that new cars and trucks were simply not affordable to most middle-earners.

“Median-income families in only one major city [Washington DC] can afford the average price Americans are paying for new cars and trucks nowadays.” As of 2013, new cars are priced at $32,086, according to the study. Mike Sante, Interest.com’s managing editor reminds us, “just because you can manage the monthly payment doesn’t mean you should let a $30,000 or $40,000 ride gobble up all such a huge share of your paycheck.”

To pay off debt

These debt statistics come from Debt.org:

• “More than 160 million Americans have credit cards.”
• “The average credit card holder has at least three cards.”
• “On average, each household with a credit card carries more than $15,000 in credit card debt.”

Not only do we have large amounts of credit card debt, we also have student loans, mortgages, cars, and medical debts. Our debt is growing faster than our income, and many middle class workers have trouble staying afloat. >Money-Zine evaluated debt growth and income growth over the past few decades and found that “back in 1980, the consumer credit per person was $1,540, which was 7.3% of the average household income of $21,100. In 2013, consumer debt was $9,800 per person, which was 13.4% of the average household income of $72,600. This means debt increased 70% faster than income from 1980 through 2013.”

Emergency savings

To provide ourselves with a degree of financial security, we are supposed to have emergency savings to protect ourselves in the event of job loss, illness, or some other catastrophe. Most members of the middle class don’t have at least six months of emergency savings, however, and some working people have no such savings.

A Bankrate survey found that only around one out of four households have six months of emergency money saved, and many of them are in the higher income groups. Another one-fourth have no emergency savings at all, and the remaining household have a small to moderate amount of savings, but not enough to cover six months of expenses.

Retirement savings

If you reach the retirement age with little or no money saved, Social Security is probably not going to be enough to cover your basic needs. Even if you want to work for your entire life, you have no way of knowing whether or not you will be physically capable of doing so.

Although having a lack of a retirement savings is a risky move, so many people bet on double zero, just hoping that things will work out in their favor. While some members of the middle class neglect this aspect of financial planning because they are procrastinating, there are also some workers who cannot afford to set this money aside. Nearly half of those who don’t save for retirement say it’s because they simply don’t have the money.

As of late, around 20% of people near 65 have not saved anything for retirement at all, and the majority of people — 59% — worry that they don’t have enough money saved for retirement, according to a Gallup Poll.

Medical care

Medical care is a basic necessity and something we’d think would be affordable for someone earning a middle income. A Forbes article published data indicating that workers in large companies — many of whom are members of the middle class — “face nearly $5,000 in premiums, co-payments, deductibles and other forms of co-insurance.”

During the past few years, these costs have had a large impact on working Americans. A report by Feeding America found that a shocking 66% of households say they’ve had to choose between paying for food and paying for medical care — 31% say they have to make that choice each and every month.

Dental work

According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, “the U.S. spends about $64 billion each year on oral health care — just 4 percent is paid by Government programs.” About 108 million people in the U.S. have no dental coverage and even those who are covered may have trouble getting the care they need, the department reports.

Oftentimes, people will purchase medical coverage and forgo dental because it’s so expensive. Plus, dental insurance may cover only 50% of the more expensive procedures, like crowns and bridges. This leaves those who have insurance with large co-payments.

In many cases, middle-earners will delay or even forego some of these procedures in efforts to save on costs. According to the CDC, nearly one in four adults between the ages of 20 and 64 have untreated dental caries (like cavities or infections).

 

A new report suggests much of the country has yet to actually witness a full economic recovery.

By Andrew Soergel, Economy Reporter |July 13, 2017, at 1:06 p.m.

Study: 3 in 10 Americans Haven’t Recovered From Great Recession

A new report suggests 30 percent of Americans have yet to recover from the financial crisis.

The U.S. is now nearly 10 years removed from the onset of the worst financial crisis the economy has weathered since the Great Depression back in the 1930s. But a new study suggests 3 in 10 Americans still feel as though their personal finances haven’t fully recovered or never will.

And nearly half believe the U.S. economy has yet to fully recover from the crisis and the Great Recession.

A survey published Thursday by Country Financial polled 1,000 adults across the country. It found that 26 percent of respondents are still in recovery mode while another 4 percent believe they will never recover. And 42 percent said they think the broader economy has not “fully recovered financially since the 2007/2008 financial crisis.”

These feelings have led many to adjust or delay their planned retirement years, as only 39 percent of respondents said they’ll be able to retire as anticipated in the aftermath of the crisis. More than 1 in 5 said they’ll have to delay retirement at least five years if they’ll be able to retire at all.

Government data, however, shows various branches of the economy have indeed returned to their pre-recessionary levels of health. The unemployment rate ticked up slightly in June to 4.4 percent but is still comparable to where it was at the end of 2006. Home prices have hit new highs, as have major stock indexes on Wall Street. And consumer and business confidence metrics have risen to their highest levels in years.

But the Country Financial survey suggests not all Americans have enjoyed those gains and still aren’t completely confident in the trajectory of the U.S. economy. Doyle Williams, an executive vice president and chief marketing officer at Country Financial, says this is, in part, a story of geography.

“Ten years ago, during the housing crisis, people were locked into geographies, they couldn’t follow jobs or job opportunities because of where they were located,” Williams says. “People are now more mobile, but you still see people that may not have the skill sets and may not be in the right location. … Some of the rural areas being left behind.”

The Country Financial poll is hardly the first to highlight a growing disparity between economic success in the nation’s major metropolitan areas and the erosion of opportunity in smaller rural communities across the country. A study published earlier this year by the National Association of Counties found that slightly more than a quarter of America’s counties had fully recovered from the recession in terms of unemployment, job availability, economic output and median home price.

A separate wage report from the Pew Charitable Trusts found a deeply uneven landscape in terms of personal income growth since the recovery. Resource-rich states like North Dakota, Texas and Alaska saw average annual income growth of 4.7 percent, 3 percent and 2.3 percent, respectively, between the end of 2007 and the middle of last year.

Nevada, Illinois and Alabama, meanwhile, saw gains of just 0.5 percent, 0.8 percent and 0.9 percent, respectively.

Still, Williams points out that Americans do seem to feel fairly comfortable with their own financial situations, even if many believe they haven’t fully recovered from the recession. Three in 5 respondents said they feel their overall level of financial security is “excellent” or “good,” while 85 percent expect their current conditions to get better or stay the same over the course of the next six months.

And 84 percent of those surveyed said they’re “very” or “somewhat” confident they’ll be able to pay off their existing debts.

“The positive piece is this sense of personal responsibility. People feel like they’re in control, for the most part. And I think we should all feel good about that,” Williams says.

But the more concerning piece of the puzzle is the percentage of respondents who said they wouldn’t be able to make ends meet if they found themselves unemployed. More than 30 percent of those surveyed said they would be able to go one month at most without any income and still be able to pay bills on time. Only 28 percent said they’d be able to go more than five months and still be in the clear.

“This really is a national issue, that people aren’t prepared,” Williams said. “The vast majority of people have saved nothing. And this point on people not being able to go by a month [without income] speaks to that. It is a real concern.”

 

By Geoffrey James   contributing editor Inc., com.

By the laws of mathematics, most bosses are more or less average when it comes to management talent. However, bosses who are really awful tend to share these 10 easily-identifiable characteristics. — Geoffrey James

1. They’re indecisive.

Horrible bosses analyze problems to death and make tentative decisions, which they frequently revisit. By contrast, great bosses make decisions quickly and hold firm to them because they know that failure to decide is failure by default.

2. They’re impatient.

Horrible bosses have a short fuse and are quick to vent frustration on employees. By contrast, great bosses keep their tempers in check lest browbeaten employees make more and worse mistakes.

3. They’re overly dramatic.

Horrible bosses inflate every setback into a disaster, every competitor into a nemesis, and every workday into a series of conflicts. By contrast, great bosses turn setbacks into stepping stones, competitors into allies, and each workday into a good day.

4. They’re controlling.

Horrible bosses believe there are only two ways to do something: “My way or the highway.” By contrast, great bosses use their employees’ individual traits to align personal goals with business goals.

5. They’re not self-aware.

Horrible bosses ride the roller coaster of their own emotions, dragging employees along with them. By contrast, great bosses cultivate the emotional awareness to understand their own processes and harness them to everyone’s… more

6. They play favorites.

Horrible bosses hand out plum assignments, perks, and raises to employees whom they like the best. By contrast, great bosses give each employee the opportunity to excel in his or her own way.

7. They’re overly vain.

Horrible bosses hog the limelight and take the credit for the successes of their team. By contrast, great bosses always realize that without actual workers doing actual jobs, there would be no such things as a “job creator.”

8. They’re inflexible.

Horrible bosses are forever trying to replicate past successes, even if they’re ancient history. By contrast, great bosses treat past successes warily because “what got you to where you are now won’t get you to where you want to go.”

9. They blame others.

Horrible bosses finger-point and scapegoat when things go wrong. By contrast, great bosses know that the failure of a team is always a failure of its leadership and rarely of the team itself.

10. They’re never grateful.

Horrible bosses characterize themselves as “self-made” because they’ve worked so hard. Great bosses are always conscious that they’re successful because they’re standing on the shoulders of giants. Loosely adapted from the… more

Internet 2017  —– I want to add micro-managing, but then again, that probably falls under Controlling! CW

 

I was recently in a small taco shop getting a quick dinner. I went in to sit down wanting a few minutes to read the latest on my Kindle reader. As I sat there, my attention was attracted to a group of gabbling young mothers, all eating and talking a mile a minute. Next to them at a different table sat three little girls all about three, four and five years old. The girls were supposed to be eating but each one of them sat glued to a small Gameboy/cell phone that was playing games. The little girls were not talking to each other, to the adults or even eating much. I was shocked.

I mean, yes, I have my Kindle but, then again, I’m not five with a group of other kids. Where is the playing, talking and interaction these kids need to grow up? One little girl had not even touched her food and the mother was so busy talking, she didn’t even notice. Yea Gods! What is our society coming to? I am afraid to think.

THE BLOG 

11/10/2015 11:06 am ET Updated Nov 10, 2016

Education vs. Edutainment

By Bobby George

Somewhere along the way, our culture adopted the idea that learning wasn’t fun – that to inspire children, we needed to entertain them. We needed to stimulate their interests and reward them for their efforts. It didn’t matter if they accomplished the task, or were even inspired by the activity, just so long as they were happily entertained.

What this path misunderstands, which is a key observation that the Italian educator Maria Montessori offered, is that children are born naturally inquisitive. You don’t have to force them to learn – and, most importantly, you don’t have to sugar coat their successes, any more than their failures. Children inherently, one could say biologically, see the world as an opportunity to discover their interests.

Theories abound about how this shift toward what is loosely called “edutainment” happened, and how it has been fully incorporated into our cultural consciousness.

First, with the advent of television, and other forms of mass media, some claim we witnessed an unprecedented rise in consumerism. Children, once but a Wall Street oversight, were quickly understood to be the fastest way into the family pockets.

Marshal McCluhan, for his part, highlighted the fact that it wasn’t even so much the content, or even the consumption, that mattered with mass media. Instead, it was how children were transfixed by the medium itself. With movement and light, new medias projected upon childhood an array of perceptions by which to view the kaleidoscope of life. Shiny and bright, something was a foot.

Second, others conjectured, perhaps more alarmingly, which is not to say more seriously, that the excessive infant mortality rates at the turn of the twentieth-century directly contributed to us, as adults, lavishing our children with unabated gifts and praise. . ..

In J.G. Ballard’s autobiography, Miracles of Life, he tellingly writes:

“My parents had been born in the first decade of the 20th century, long before antibiotics and public health concerns for vitamin-enriched foods, clean air and water. Childhood, for families of any income, was a gamble with disease and early death. …”

What this insight reveals, as a snapshot in a time that remains all-too-present for some, is that there was a sense in which the greatest accomplishment of childhood was simply – or not so simply – making it out of childhood.

Now, there’s an alternative path, a third way, which may be directly related to the industrialization of education and provide an adequate solution to our inquiry. Which is to say, it may very well hold the secret to why “edutainment”, or the idea that children need to be entertained to learn, became the prevailing mode of engagement with children – not only from parents, but also from our institutions.

What are our expectations of childhood?

Here, we take a lesson from the French philosopher Roland Barthes. In Mythologies, a collection of articles written to express our tendency as a society to create modern myths based on our social values, Barthes laments, “All the toys one commonly sees are essentially a microcosm of the adult world”.

His point is rather profound.

When toys are created by adults, they often betray the novelties of childhood. When toys are manufactured, with overly specific outcomes in mind, they actually limit that sense of discovery that exploration affords.

What we lost was the ability to pursue your own interests, and what we gained was the idea that we needed to entertain children to make them want to learn.

What makes Maria Montessori so relevant to this conversation, both historically and as a contemporary. . . It placed an emphasis, not on adulthood, but on the experiences of childhood. On following the interests of children, instead of trying to fabricate them through overstimulation.

If we are to take children seriously, and not just apply the model of edutainment to education, it will be with a realignment of the ways in which we think about learning itself.  Maybe we can start by listening to our children.

Follow Bobby George on Twitter: www.twitter.com/bobbyjgeorge

Bobby George

CEO at Montessorium

____________________________________________________________________________________

Good article by Bobby George on the ‘need’ to entertain children. The idea of edutainment has clearly spilled over into the school system where more and more teachers and administrators are killing themselves finding new ways to keep their students entertained.

A couple of major points missed in this article and obvious to our society is the advent, across the nation and the world, of more effective birth control. In my life time, the number of children in an average family has dropped from eight, to four, to two and then to singles. Many families today have one or two children only and four is considered ‘large’. Obviously, with much, much smaller families, the emphasis on the remaining children becomes more intense. Each child now is more important than ever before because there are fewer of them per family. Think of China with the One Child only rule that was in place for years and years.

Clearly, the remaining children are treated like the little Prince or Princess their family feels them to be. Therefore, the happiness of each child becomes more critical to his or her parent and a domino effect is created all the way down the line.

Additionally, due to the rising cost of living, more and more families have two parents working as opposed to one parent working as was common before the 70’s. The working mother syndrome involves a lot of guilt for not being there at home with the kids. This results in guilt buying of more stuff to compensate. So it goes, round and round.

There is no clear evidence that kids get anything more out of life by being showered with stuff. There is a lot of evidence to suggest otherwise. Since it certainly doesn’t look like the cost of living is going to go down anytime soon, with two working parents; it is time parents and school personnel re-evaluate the entire concept of edutainment with our children and students.