SALON August 16, 2015 The “Mindset” Mindset What We Miss By Focusing on Kids’ Attitudes The emphasis on effort in Dweck’s “growth mindset” is most notable for the larger questions it discourages us from asking. By Alfie Kohn One of the most popular ideas in education these days can be summarized in a single sentence — a fact that may ... Read More
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EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP September 2015 Who’s Asking? By Alfie Kohn It seems only fitting to explore the role of questions in education by asking questions about the process of doing so. I propose that we start with the customary way of framing this topic and then proceed to questions that are deeper and potentially more subversive of traditional schooling. 1. ... Read More
SALON September 4, 2015 “Helicopter Parenting” Hysteria The Epidemic That Actually Isn’t By Alfie Kohn Parents who are overly involved in the lives of their college-age children are the folks we love to scorn. A steady stream of articles and blog posts bristle with indignation over dads who phone the dean about a trivial problem or moms who know more ... Read More
EDUCATION WEEK September 30, 2015 Do This and You’ll Get That A Bad Way to Defend Good Programs By Alfie Kohn When we’re not sure people will support our cause, it’s tempting to link it to something more popular. Because x may be controversial (or may simply lack broad support), we hitch a ride on y, an outcome that reflects ... Read More
Foreword to The Teacher You Want to Be 2015 To Change What We Do, Consider What We Believe By Alfie Kohn [This essay is adapted from the Foreword to The Teacher You Want to Be, edited by Matt Glover and Ellin Oliver Keene (Heinemann, 2015)] Creativity — in education and in general — might be defined as the capacity to ... Read More
BOSTON GLOBE January 10, 2016 Clicking for Love The Curious, Odious, Hilarious World of Online Dating By Alfie Kohn [NOTE: This is the complete version of an essay that was greatly abridged for publication in the Boston Globe‘s Sunday Magazine.] It was when the first woman I’d exchanged messages with invited me to give her a call that I suddenly ... Read More
SALON March 28, 2016 Trumped What You-Know-Who’s Success Says About Our Country’s Addiction to Competition By Alfie Kohn There is one overriding story this election season, and it concerns how Donald Trump has confounded pundits who assumed he was the kind of joke people would laugh at rather than vote for. It’s the story of how the media cover him ... Read More
BOSTON GLOBE April 17, 2016 Men Are Still Paying for Women on Dates? By Alfie Kohn [NOTE: This is the complete version of an essay that was abridged for publication in the Boston Globe‘s Sunday Magazine.] Imagine that a committed feminist woke up last week from a decades-long coma. She looks around and finds that considerable consciousness-raising has taken place ... Read More
EDUCATION WEEK September 07, 2016 On Punishment for Bullying — and Punishment as Bullying By Alfie Kohn Bullying at school has attracted an enormous amount of attention, spurring academic studies and popular books, regulations and training sessions for educators. By now its status as a serious problem is widely acknowledged, as it should be. We can never go back ... Read More
SALON August 27, 2017 Raising an UnTrump By Alfie Kohn When the words “Trump” and “children” appear in the same sentence, it’s often because the writer is trying to figure out how to protect the latter from the former. How do we shield our offspring not only from what this man does (particularly if the youngsters in question are at ... Read More