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"In this Text to Text, we pair Dr. King's pivotal "I Have a Dream" speech with a reflection by the Times literary critic Michiko Kakutani, who explores why this singular speech has such lasting power."

"Language merely reflects our way of trying to make sense of the world. - Frank Smith Frank Smith (1982) says 'writing touches every part of our lives'. One of the first reasons we write is because it is a tool for communication in culture. It gives us the ability the share information over time and space with multiple individuals (explaining, recounting & opinion). It can also be used as a permanent record or as a statement e.g. in history, geography  & science genres. The third cultural aspect for writing is artistry (narrative and poetry). Finally, there is also the personal aspect to writing. Writing allows us all to reflect, express our perceptions of self, to socially dream or to be critical (memoir). By writing, we find out what we know; what we think. Ultimately though, writing is a means for us to express ourselves in the world, make sense of the world or impose ourselves upon it. The question now is why do children write at school? For these purposes? - Not often. There is a massive discrepancy between the writing done in the real-world and that of the classroom. Donald Graves says 'all children want to write'. It is just a case of allowing them to write about the things they are interested in. As Frank Smith says, 'all children can write if they can speak it.' If they can talk about it, they can write it down. The transmission of narrow decontextualized writing skills; that English is just a formal system to be learnt. The insistence on task-orientated writing. The insistence on teacher-chosen writing tasks. The insistence on the use of external stimulus (literature units, film-clips, topic-writing) at the expense of children's knowledge, interests, loves, talents and idiosyncrasies. The formal rather than functional teaching of grammar. These examples embody the 'commonsense' assumptions which claim an authority which is supposedly natural and unshakable. Writing in classrooms at present isn't seen by children as important

"The national myth of happiness pursued and won has always been contested in fiction - and its promise seems almost extinct in some contemporary novels"

Arthur Levine has spent much of his career writing about how tough it is for poor minority kids to get into college. But rarely has this widely respected educator and former president of Teachers College at Columbia University written more urgently than in his latest book, Unequal Fortunes.It was a journey that took him back to his childhood in the South Bronx to figure out why he made it and why most kids living there now don't. "My hope is that this book shows this community is isolated not by choice but by circumstance, and I hope that it shows that the community is a dangerous one to live in. It's hard to blame them for conditions like that," Levine says.Unlike so many of Levine's books, Unequal Fortunes is not just about failed institutions and policies. It's more of a plea for readers to peer into poor children's harrowing lives and become advocates for what Levine calls a Schindler's List kind of change - maybe not to save all children but to rescue as many as possible.

"From the "I have a dream" speech to Steve Jobs' iPhone launch, many great talks have a common structure that helps their message resonate with listeners. In this talk, presentation expert Nancy Duarte shares practical lessons on how to make a powerful call-to-action."

Great approach to any profession...