Volume 20, No.4

Summer 2006

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  • ¡Sí, se puede!

    From Chicago to Dallas, from Atlanta to Nebraska, from Maine to Los Angeles, and in small towns throughout the land, an outpouring of millions of Latinos and human rights supporters […]

  • Food Resources

    Some Helpful Organizations on Food and the Environment

  • The Scoop on School Lunch

    The Editors of Rethinking Schools

    The federal school lunch program is the oldest and largest of child nutrition programs and began in 1946 with the dual purpose of helping feed the nation’s children and boosting […]

  • Teacher Resistance in the United Kingdom

    By Nick Grant

    The testing regime Melissa Schieble so accurately captures was opposed by teacher unions at its outset — but only in terms of workload, not in terms of pedagogy or the […]

  • Wellness Policy Mandate

    The Local School Wellness Policy, part of the Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act of 2004, requires each school district participating in the National School Lunch Program and/or School Breakfast […]

  • World Trade Organization Activity

    World Trade Organization Summit on Food and Patenting You are delegates to a special summit of the World Trade Organization (WTO). This meeting has been called to debate genetic engineering […]

  • Aliens

    By Geoffrey Nunberg

    Back in 1920, The New Republic reported on an exercise in which the students at a New England college were asked to provide definitions of the word alien. Their answers […]

  • Resources 20.4

    Check out these valuable resources, reviewed by Rethinking Schools editors and Teaching for Change colleagues.

  • Dearest Anthony Soltero

    By Wayne Au

    Dearest Anthony Soltero, Even though we have never met, I cannot let your passing go unmarked. I wish we could have known each other, could have shared stories with each […]

  • Famine Trial Indictments

    British Landlords INDICTMENT: You are charged with the murder of over a million Irish peasants who died in the famine years of 1846 and 1847. These were needless deaths. Even […]

  • ‘Aliens’ Teaching Ideas/Discussion

    Before reading this article with students, repeat the classroom exercise reported in the 1920 issue of The New Republic: Ask students to write definitions of the word “alien.” Have students read […]

  • Sample Language for Wellness Policies

    Curriculum and Media Students in grades pre-K-12 receive nutrition education that is interactive and teaches the skills they need to adopt healthy eating behaviors.  Marketing of low nutrition foods and […]

  • Letter to the Editors 20.4

    Dear Editors, A few months ago I was approached by the Buchanan Associates in Dublin, Ohio, to appear at the International Reading Association Conference (IRA) in Chicago on May 2 […]

  • Feeding the Children

    By the Editors of Rethinking Schools

    As obesity, diabetes, eating disorders and other food-related health problems spiral out of control in the United States, it’s worth taking a look at not only what goes into our students’ mouths, but also what goes into their minds regarding food.

  • Feeding Our Future

    By Michael Ableman

    In the heart of fertile farmland, why does a school serve kids such awful food? Thoughts on the dramatic shift in young people’s relationship to food and the land.

  • Don’t Bite the Hand That Feeds

    Although it needs improvement, the federal school lunch program fills a need

    By Barbara Miner

    Although it needs improvement, the federal school lunch program fills a need.

  • Fossil Food Consuming Our Future

    By Tom Starrs

    Americans use more than three times as much energy to obtain food than they do to fuel their homes, writes Starrs: The implications of agricultural energy use for the environment are disturbing.”

  • There’s No Business Like Food Business

    Students explore the secretive journey from farm to table

    By Michi Thacker

    Students discover that food corporations keep secrets, and ask why?”

  • Home Cooking

    Writing about food can help students feel "at home"

    By Linda Christensen

    Food connects us to our heritage and our homes. Getting students to write about food can make them feel at home

  • Sowing Seeds of Solidarity

    Schools partner with a nonprofit to teach children and communities about the benefits of fresh, local food

    By Leah Penniman

    Schools partner with a nonprofit to teach children and communities about the benefits of fresh, local food.

  • Linking the Land with the Lunchroom

    By Doug Wubben

    A Look at a a program that brings fresh, locally produced foods into schools.

  • Yuck! Worms Are Disgusting!

    Ecological and social lessons from a classroom worm bin

    By Rachel Cloues

    Fourth graders find their classroom worm bin offers ecological and social lessons.

  • Hunger on Trial

    An activity on the Irish Potato Famine and its meaning for today

    By Bill Bigelow

    A role play on the Irish Potato Famine offers meaning for today.

  • Lessons from Ana

    By Jean Hannon

    When a new student arrives from an orphanage in China, a teacher rethinks classroom activities where children play with food.

  • Soda Contracts

    When cash-strapped schools make deals with beverage companies, schools and students lose out

    By Nicola Pinson

    When cash-strapped schools make deals with beverage companies, schools and students lose out.

  • Healthy Bodies Healthy Minds

    By Catherine Steiner-Adair and Lisa Sjostrom

    A program helps young people develop healthy relationships to food and their bodies.

  • Got a Little More Than Milk?

    Students get a glimpse into the corporate-controlled food system by looking at the politics of food

    By Tim Swinehart

    Students get a glimpse into the corporate-controlled food system by looking at the politics of food.

  • Good Stuff 20.4

    By Herbert Kohl

    My grandmother Becky wanted me to be fat, and my mother wanted me to be skinny. Becky escaped from poverty and anti-Semitism in Poland around 1904. For her, being heavy […]

  • Reviews 20.4

    Resources to help teachers and students delve into the economics and politics of food

    By Ryan Zinn

    Resources to help teachers and students delve into the economics and politics of food.

  • Book Review: Grub

    By Ryan Zinn

    Grub: Ideas for an Urban Organic KitchenBy Anna Lappé and Bryan Terry(Tarcher, 2006)256 pp. $12.89 Very rarely does a book as complete and engaging as Grub: Ideas for an Urban Organic […]

  • A Dark Cloud on the U.S. Horizon?

    A teacher's experience in England is a cautionary tale

    By Melissa Schieble

    A teacher’s experience in England is a cautionary tale.

  • The Irish Famine Trial – Instructions

    I reviewed the indictment (included on each “role” sheet) with the class, and counted students off into six groups — five defendant groups and one jury. Each indictment “role” details […]