Books Banned in Canada (a partial list)

September 12, 2011

Recently I posted a story about a girl who started a secret library of banned books. The location of her library was a locker at her school.  The article talks about a list of banned books that the girl found and she turned it into her own personal reading list.

That got me thinking about banned books. I did a Google search for “list of banned books”. The search returned over 25 Million results. I found Canada’s Freedom to Read site, which led to the “Challenged books and magazines list” that is released by the Canadian Library Association.

They don’t use the word “banned”, but that’s essentially what they mean. The association maintains a list of books that are prohibited by organizations and community groups. Any organization, group or institution can come up with a list of books they prohibit their members from reading. Whether or not the ban is actually upheld is a different issue entirely.

Because of the number of requests that come forward to ban reading materials, the  produces Canadian Library Association a list of books that are challenged in any given year, if for no other reason than to raise awareness about censorship.

For example, in 2010 in Canada, 74 titles were “officially challenged” by different organizations including:

  • Bateman, Colin. Murphy’s Law.
  • Canfield, Jack, et al. Chicken Soup for the Unsinkable Soul.
  • Lucas, George, Hisao Tamaki and David Land. Star Wars: A New Hope
  • Rowling, J.K. Harry Potter (7 books in series).
  • Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

This is only a sampling of the 74 titles that were officially challenged in 2010.

The site also points out that “Censorship studies usually show that most library challenges go unreported and undocumented.”

It’s hard to say what books have been banned (either officially or unofficially and quietly) by school boards across the country.

But for those of you with that same rebellious reading streak that I have, here’s a little gem I think you’ll like: The University of Pennsylvania maintains a list of banned books that are freely available online. 

Happy reading.

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Update – January 2018 – This blog has had over 1.8 million views thanks to readers like you. If you enjoyed this post, please “like” it or share it on social media. Thanks!

Sarah Elaine Eaton is a faculty member in the Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, Canada.

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Posted by Sarah Elaine Eaton, Ph.D.

Business as a creative force that can make the world better

September 9, 2011

The other day I was having a conversation with a colleague about how universities have made drastic changes in how their operational and leadership models in recent years. The change is especially apparent in the Humanities, where scholars are deeply, viscerally offended by the idea of the numbers of “bums in seats” as being an indicator of a faculty’s success.

My friend remarked, “It’s totally a business model!”

I cringed, as I often do, when I hear remarks like that. I’ve worked in post-secondary institutions, with non-profit organizations, with small businesses and entrepreneurs and yes, even with corporations.

I replied, “That’s not a business model. It’s the worst aberration of business. It’s a business model in its most hideous and grotesquely mutated form.”

Don’t get me wrong. There is no doubt in my mind that some businesses exploit their workers, their customers and anyone else they can. There are some businesses who mistreat and abuse their employees. There are some businesses who misreport their numbers and mismanage their money. There’s no denying that.

But not all businesses are that way. In his book Good to Great, Jim Collins looks at the qualities that differentiate good businesses from truly great ones. He describes the characteristics of both and then goes on to give examples from industry. It’s a book that many business people know well. While he talks about profit as being one key indicator of success in business, it is not the only key factor. In fact, as the author points out, companies that are driven purely by profit often never make the leap from good to great.

Collins wrote a subsequent work that is less well known, though equally brilliant. Good to Great in the Social Sectors looks at what makes an organization — any organization — great. He shows what he means by focussing on schools, non-profits and other social sector organizations, demonstrating how we can define success in ways that have nothing to do with generating profit. In fact, he says that business can learn a lot from non-profit organizations.

Business isn’t always the great evil that those who work in education and non-profit think it is. The problem is that they see the worst mutations of business practices being employed as leadership models. When that is the case, how could they think anything else?

David Cooperrider, known to many as the “father” of Appreciative Inquiry wrote an article worth reading. “Business as an Agent of World Benefit: Awe is What Moves Us Forward” (It’s available as a free download. It’s 7 pages and it is worth reading.) In it he talks about trends in the business world relating to ethical business, green business and corporate social responsibility, ultimately arguing that business has the potential to unleash wildly creative, progressive, helpful and powerfully transformative change in the world.

I sometimes challenge my academic colleagues to talk to their spouses and friends who work in corporations about concepts like corporate social responsibility, ethics, green business practices and how their corporations are finding ways to give back to the community. It’s surprising how many people in the corporate world volunteer for community events and are committed to practices such as recycling, pursuing innovation and being creative in their work.

Educational administrations seem to be adopting the worst aberrations of business management models, becoming more self-absorbed, more self-serving and less caring, while business itself is evolving past those models and becoming more responsible, more ethical and pursuing excellence and creativity more diligently than some educational institutions.

Ironic, no?

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Update – January 2018 – This blog has had over 1.8 million views thanks to readers like you. If you enjoyed this post, please “like” it or share it on social media. Thanks!

Sarah Elaine Eaton is a faculty member in the Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, Canada.

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Posted by Sarah Elaine Eaton, Ph.D.

Imagine: A reality TV show for literacy?

September 5, 2011

I don’t watch a lot of TV. Or at least, I didn’t a few years ago. My other half, however, is a television disciple. I have two degrees in literature and I liken his knowledge of television and movies to my knowledge of literature. He knows just about every major television show and movie ever produced, when it was produced, who directed it, who the actors are, and what other shows the actors have appeared in. He also picks up on cameo appearances of the director or the writer. He instantly understands intertextual references between shows (except that he calls them “Easter eggs”) and can point out in a second when a show makes reference to a show or movie before it. He’s really brilliant at this stuff.

I, being a somewhat stereotypical academic I suppose, tend not to watch much TV. But because it’s important to my other half, we sit down and watch TV. He works hard to find shows I like. We have found common ground in some competitive reality TV shows. Top Chef Canada was one of our recent favorites.

Competitors who excel in their field are gathered and given challenges. They compete against the clock and against one another in order to prove their skills. They are judged by experts in the field. Their work is critiqued, praised, applauded and trashed — all in the matter of a few minutes. Every week, a chef is sent home. No competitor escapes criticism and no one is ever perfect. Even the last chef standing has experienced harsh criticism from the judges and has been trashed by their fellow competitors. Despite it all, they continue to focus on producing their best work, every single time.

Imagine if there was a reality TV show for literacy programs. An episode might go something like this:

“Competitors: Your challenge this week is to develop a 3-hour workshop to teach adults how to write a resume. You will have 12 adults in your class, with reading levels between IALSS levels 2 and 3. Your budget is $50. You have 1 hour to prepare your workshop. The winner will receive a $5000 prize to make their workshop a reality. Your time starts… now!”

There would be no whining about a lack of funding. There would be no grumbling about being overworked. There would be no complaining about there not being enough time. There would be energy, hard work, inspiration, creativity, a deep sense of purpose and a heightened awareness of urgency to produce something amazing with severe financial and time restraints.

Imagine if we worked as if we were on a TV reality show… pushing ourselves to produce consistently outstanding results under ridiculously difficult circumstances, working through the fatigue, ignoring the trash talking by others and the lack of resources, time and budget.

There’s never enough time, never enough money and never enough resources. That is, after all, our reality, isn’t it? Passion, creativity and purpose drive what we do. It’s when we expect reality to be something other than what it really is that we lose our sense of urgency and purpose, let frustration take over… and emotionally, mentally or literally, we get voted out.

Accepting the limitations of any given situation can either mean giving in or using those same limitations as a challenge to fuel your own inner drive.

Achieve the impossible because of the circumstances, not despite them.

Be the star of your own reality show.

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Update – January 2018 – This blog has had over 1.8 million views thanks to readers like you. If you enjoyed this post, please “like” it or share it on social media. Thanks!

Sarah Elaine Eaton is a faculty member in the Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, Canada.

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New report says learning styles are bogus.

September 4, 2011

School girl on stairsNPR recently published an article entitled, “Think You’re An Auditory Or Visual Learner? Scientists Say It’s Unlikely”. Journalist Patti Neighmond reported on research being conducted by psychologist Dan Willingham at the University of Virginia who reportedly claims that “it’s a mistake to assume students will respond and remember information better depending on how it’s presented”. He goes a step further to say that “teachers should not tailor instruction to different kinds of learners.”

The article quotes another researcher, Doug Rohrer, from the University of South Florida who dismisses the notion of learning styles completely because he has allegedly “not found evidence from a randomized control trial.”

Rohrer’s words indicate that if studies are not “randomized control trials” that they are worthless. While I agree that such studies have their place in research, particularly in medicine and the hard sciences, I would argue that the human learner is comprised of more than neurology or cognition, and that emotions, perceptions and learning abilities can not simply be measured using randomized control trials. Not to mention cultural differences. Anyone who truly believes that culture does not influence learning styles need to investigate the matter on a deeper level.

The article goes on to say that teachers should “mix things up” in the classroom. Well, that I agree with. (Elementary, my dear Watson.) When we teach, we are teaching groups of students, not individual learners.

But to tell me that I as a language teacher should not “tailor instruction to different kinds of learners”, all I can ask is “Really?!” So, when I have had deaf or hard of hearing students in my class, I should not have increased or emphasized visual aids in my class? Or when I had a blind student, that I should not have repeated the information more than once or twice, so that she could be sure to hear it properly?

Really, I just shake my head at fellow scholars who say such things. Honestly, do these same scientists also support eugenics, to ensure that all humans learn in precisely the same way and that the effectiveness of the methods employed can be empirically proven using only randomized control tests?

The article claims that Rohrer advises against using the notion of learning styles, because there is no proof they they actually mean anything.

That made me ask, “Is it really possible that there is no proof that learning styles work?” In less than 30, I found ten studies — just focussed on language learning — that counter Rohrer’s position. While I did not find the “randomized control tests” that he demands as the only acceptable evidence, I did find numerous other studies (including a few control studies, though they were randomized).

If I can find ten studies in less than 30 minutes, relating specifically to language learning, how many studies have been conducted across the disciplines, over the past several decades? Can we really say that learning styles are bogus? What are your thoughts?

Control studies

Eme, E., Lacroix, A., & Almecija, Y. (2010). Oral Narrative Skills in French Adults Who Are Functionally Illiterate: Linguistic Features and Discourse Organization. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 53(5), 1349-1371.

Tanyeli, N. (2008). The Efficiency of Online English Language Instruction on Students’ Reading Skills. Paper presented at the International Technology, Education and Development Conference (INTED). Retrieved from http://www.eric.ed.gov/contentdelivery/servlet/ERICServlet?accno=ED504676

Research studies (non-control)

Erton, I. (2010). Relations between Personality Traits, Language Learning Styles and Success in Foreign Language Achievement. Hacettepe University Journal of Education, 38, 115-126.

Kucuk, M. G.-K., E. ; Tasci, D. (2010). Support Services and Learning Styles Influencing Interaction in Asynchronous Online Discussions. Educational Media International, 47(1), 39-56.

Lincoln, F., & Rademacher, B. (2006). Learning Styles of ESL Students in Community Colleges. Community College Journal of Research & Practice, 30(5-6), 485-500.

Psaltou-Joycey, A. (2008). Cross-Cultural Differences in the Use of Learning Strategies by Students of Greek as a Second Language. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 29(4), 310-324.

Psaltou-Joycey, A., & Kantaridou, Z. (2009). Plurilingualism, Language Learning Strategy Use and Learning Style Preferences. International Journal of Multilingualism, 6(4), 460-474.

Turner, M. (2010). Using Student Co-Regulation to Address L2 Students’ Language and Pedagogical Needs in University Support Classes. Language and Education, 24(3), 251-266.

Wang, L. (2007). Variation in Learning Styles in a Group of Chinese English as a Foreign Language Learners. International Education Journal, 8(2), 408-417. Retrieved from ERIC: http://www.eric.ed.gov/contentdelivery/servlet/ERICServlet?accno=EJ834277

Wong, J. K.-K. (2004). Are the Learning Styles of Asian International Students Culturally or Contextually Based? International Education Journal, 4(4), 154-166. Retrieved from ERIC: http://www.eric.ed.gov/contentdelivery/servlet/ERICServlet?accno=EJ903817

Zhang, L.-F. (2007). Intellectual Styles and Academic Achievement among Senior Secondary School Students in Rural China. Educational Psychology, 27(5), 675-692.

Scholarly studies (Conceptual and theoretical)

Abraham, R. (1978). The Nature of Cognitive Style and Its Importance to the Foreign Language Teacher.

Jones, S. (1993). Cognitive Learning Styles: Does Awareness Help? A Review of Selected Writings. Language Awareness, 2(4), 195-207.

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Update – January 2018 – This blog has had over 1.8 million views thanks to readers like you. If you enjoyed this post, please “like” it or share it on social media. Thanks!

Sarah Elaine Eaton is a faculty member in the Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, Canada.

5 Comments | education, languages, learning strategies, research, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Sarah Elaine Eaton, Ph.D.

Marketing tip: Ask your students where they heard about you

August 20, 2011

This is a simple way of determining which method of marketing works for your language or literacy program: Ask your students how they heard about you. Do most of your students find out about you through the Internet? …word of mouth? …your brochure? … trade fairs? Once you figure out what has proven most successful, you will know where to focus more of your marketing dollars.

I suggest getting this valuable information in writing. Whether it is through an evaluation form or an exit interview where the results are recorded, get the information in concrete written form. Compare it from year to year. See if your most successful marketing strategy changes over time.

Of course, we know that word of mouth is the most powerful way to market your program. If the majority of your students come to you through word of mouth, then you are very lucky. Most language schools need to combine word of mouth with other marketing efforts.

But what other marketing efforts are successful for you? You may be surprised. You may be pouring thousands of dollars into a fancy brochure and find out that 85% of your students used the Internet to find you. If that is the case, you would want to drive more of your marketing dollars into the Internet (maybe pay for a higher ranking on a search engine or get a banner ad onto other people’s sites). Once you know what has proven successful, you can use that information to generate even more interest and registrations.
Marketing materials: tools and tips to do the job better

This post is adapted from “Idea #18” in 101 Ways to Market Your Language Program

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Update – January 2018 – This blog has had over 1.8 million views thanks to readers like you. If you enjoyed this post, please “like” it or share it on social media. Thanks!

Sarah Elaine Eaton is a faculty member in the Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, Canada.

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