Students sing, clap, and dance about solids, liquids and gases. They learned the solar system through song. It's just one example of how having clear standards for students drives innovation in a school. 

Arne Duncan, Secretary of Education, talking about his children's school

Arne really doesn't get science, but he's got a pocketful of money, so his words carry some weight. I wiled away a perfectly good morning reviewing science terms for our state's test, time better spent doing science.

I've got no beef with children singing or clapping or dancing. I'd like to encourage more of this, pursuit of happiness and all that. (Jefferson was no dope.) But it's not science.

How clear standards drives this kind of nonsense escapes me--I'm still naive enough to expect a modicum of cogency from our national  leaders.

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Memorizing the planets is not science. Knowing that the planets are lit by the sun is not science. Spouting off that the sun converts hydrogen to helium is not science.

Instead of memorizing planets, follow one for a few weeks, or even a few months--watch how it wanders around against the background of stars. If you "know" that planets revolve around the sun just because someone told you that, you're not fit to be a citizen in this great experiment called America..

Instead of knowing that planets are lit by the sun, take a peek at Venus. Watch its phases for a year or two. Galileo did this over 400 years ago using a crappy telescope. Or look at a ring's shadow cast on Saturn.If you don't have that kind of patience, you're not fit to be a citizen in this great experiment called America.

Instead of claiming you know anything about the composition of the sun, learn about spectroscopy. Helium was discovered on the sun decades before it was found on Earth. I can say this in class, and kids will write it down, and no one challenges me. If you don't have that kind of skepticism, you're not fit to be a citizen in this great experiment called America.

Arne doesn't care if you're a fit citizen. He wants you to better the economy, to go work for one of the many transnational corporations that would cringe at our Constitution if we dared make it matter again.

If all of us who teach remembered why we teach, for whom we work, and why we're "public," Arne would be as potent  as Bumble the Abominable Snowman after Hermey's dental work.

If a child needs a song and dance routine to learn science, it's probably not.

You can listen to a few songs for free if you click on the album cover.
Arne managed to cheapen both science and art in one speech.