I wonder if you can get moon burn?

Bird Droppings July 10, 2026

I wonder if you can get moon burn?

Last night, after getting home from my grandson’s birthday dinner, I was listening to tree frogs begin their nightly chorus. As I stood outside, I noticed, high in the sky to the west, a smiling moon and knew it was going down and would be gone later in the morning when I got up. But it is nice to end the day with a smile. After a day of storms, the backyard was glowing with a smiling light. I know from my science classes that it is simply reflection from the sun, but it is hard to talk of the moon without attributing to it its own glow. Sort of like a student and a good teacher relationship. We may never see the teacher, only the reflection of the knowledge and wisdom passed on through that student. I find myself wandering lonely in a pedagogical desert at times, thinking back to walking through hallways deserted from the students out for the summer.

“Now nearly all learning space is occupied by an elaborate testing apparatus that measures the student’s progress in ingesting externally imposed curricula and more insidiously provides a sorting device to reproduce the inequalities inherent in the capitalistic market system. …In turn, the teacher becomes the instrument of approved intellectual and moral culture, charged with expunging destructive impulses and refueling the empty mental tank. The student must be permitted no autonomy lest the evil spirits that lurk in everyday life regain lost ground.” Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of freedom, Ethics, Democracy, and civic courage

Many great thinkers and writers attest to democracy and education going hand in hand. John Dewey wrote extensively about this, as did Paulo Freire, John F. Kennedy, whom I borrowed from Thomas Jefferson, and so many more believed democracy and education are intertwined. But as I read Freire’s statement above, I wonder if what we call democracy is truly that. How can a society that manipulates its students into a marketplace, albeit as consumers, truly be a democracy? Watching the billboard ads of current primary candidates saddens me even to think we can call this a democracy. It has only been a few days since a hammer and sickle of the Old Russian Communist Party was on a billboard, comparing or more so implying that, as our current president is claiming, everyone he doesn’t like is a communist, and only people like him, conversely, are true Americans, albeit chances are racist as well.

Many historical writers of education address the incorporation of higher education. I went to get a drink yesterday at the store from a vending machine, and only certain ones were on and available for purchase. So I could only get specific drinks and specific brands.  I recall that when I was teaching high school at our school, it was all Coca-Cola products. I thought it interesting, as we have the Cola Wars even in schools. It has struck education, and yesterday, as you walk through the gym, glancing at the scoreboard and the huge Coke logo. It was free, I have heard. We have a regular Coke man who many kids know by name and is in the building daily when school is in session.

Each week, the school was buying over $10,000 worth of Coke products. Essentially, every day he provides sustenance for nearly 2000 students and faculty. It is interesting as you add and subtract figures: two drinks and one snack per day per student and teacher equates to over one million dollars in sales per school year and three high schools in our county and over a hundred counties in Georgia. No wonder corporations want input in education.

I was noticing that what seemingly doesn’t happen and isn’t supposed to happen does: students tend to group by ability. Several times, I have noticed that lower-functioning students and students who have failed a class, particularly math and science, are grouped together and often with a younger, less experienced teacher in the classroom. This happens all over, not just in schools I have witnessed. Obviously, honors and advanced placement classes are taught by better, more experienced teachers, and in most cases, they have specific certifications or “gifted” qualifications. A simple observation: the best teachers are often in the best classes with the best students and/or in classes of special education/special needs students, sort of a paradox.

I have been watching again the promos for a film coming back on cable, The Ron Clark Story. Ron Clark was the 2000 Disney Teacher of the Year, has been featured on Oprah, and interviewed by Katie Couric. In his teaching style, he provided context for the content, which is a major theme in his teaching, and now, with the advent of The Ron Clark Academy in Atlanta, he is raising his philosophy to a new standard.

“Before going to the bowling alley, Mr. Clark visited himself, measured the lanes, and used the dimensions on worksheets. He also used the bowling pins to teach fractions and took the prizes from the snack shop to use in math class. On every trip, whether it is up the street or across the globe, the Ron Clark Academy will make every moment a learning opportunity because, as Mr. Clark has learned, children must have a connection to something before they will appreciate it. After preparing our students so thoroughly for each trip, they will truly get the most out of the experience and internalize all they have learned.” The Ron Clark Academy, Curriculum, http://www.ronclarkacademy.com

Here is a teacher in our time stepping up and using ideas from almost a hundred years ago. John Dewey proposed such things as early as 1915.  

“Only in education, never in the life of farmer, sailor, merchant, physician, or laboratory experimenter, does knowledge mean a store of information aloof from doing primarily.” John Dewey

However, it requires a teacher to go to the bowling alley, go to a store, do work, and do out-of-school stuff, plus more work in school, doing word walls, and doing stuff, and ….on and on. Much more than getting the teacher’s manual off the shelf and using the packaged transparencies and materials provided by such-and-such publisher, or whatever publisher is approved by state and federal guidelines and conveniently has aligned their text with your state curriculum and/or has had advisors on your state curriculum committee. It is no coincidence that textbooks are expensive and a big business; every school buys textbooks. College texts are notorious for their high prices, but what if they were priced at $50 each and many, especially in elementary reading classes, were disposable? It amounts to millions of dollars a year in each school district. Last year, over $188,000,000.00 was spent in California to purchase books to keep up with curriculum standards. So if you multiply by 50 states and many more countries, we are talking about billions of dollars at stake.

“We naturally associate democracy, to be sure, with freedom of action, but freedom of action without freed capacity of thought behind it is only chaos.” John Dewey

Friere and so many others are fearful of education becoming too integrated and of losing the freedom of thought, which, according to Dewey, is when we lose our democracy. Please keep all in harm’s way on your mind and in your hearts and always give thanks. Namaste.

My family and friends, I do not say this lightly,

Mitakuye Oyasin

(We are all related)

docbird