Norman Edmund’s Educational Blog

Note: Hurricane Wilma knocked out our power on October 24. We’re finally back.
Congress is to be congratulated for specifying in about 100 places in the No Child Left Behind Act that educators must do and use “scientifically based research.”
What Is Scientifically Based Research?
All three words indicate that it is research using the scientific method.
First - […]

The National Assessment of Educational Progess reported on reading and math exams given to hundreds of thousands of students.
Now proponents of the No Child Left Behind Act are claiming that it is working; opponents are claiming that it isn’t.
Since the NCLB Act was put into effect in 2002, a large amount of opposition to […]

A few researchers have pointed out that if you can properly motivate students, you can increase educational efficiency on the order of 50%.
Our top educational leaders pay little attention to student motivation when they design educational reform programs, with one exception. They motivate by putting pressure on students to pass tests. There is nothing wrong […]

There are many references today to the need to teach critical thinking. This term has grown in popularity in the last 20 years, and for good reasons. The main one is that our educators have failed to teach the scientific method, which is the main tool of thinking. In this complex era, the ability to […]

The dispute about the existence and use of the scientific method has been kept a deep, dark secret by those perpetuating the erroneous claim that it doesn’t exist. Correcting the blunder has these benefits to the public:
Less waste of billions of taxpayer dollars
Better schools and education for children
Better performance by public officials and lawmakers
Better public […]

Education is America’s biggest industry, with an estimated $1 trillion spent per year. Yet we have the strange situation that no one person or organization is qualified at the present time to present the big picture to the public or to educators.
The reason is simple - education is so complex that no one person can […]

An article by William J. Broad in the October 13, 2005 issue of the New York Times reports on a panel of experts convened by the National Academies. The panel called for an urgent and wide-ranging effort to strengthen scientific competitiveness.
Teaching and using the scientific method - the method that has most changed the world […]

In a 2003 survey Stand By Me, Public Agenda reports that 76% of teachers think they are often made the scapegoats for all the problems facing education. As an educational researcher, specializing in the scientific method for more than 15 years, I believe the teachers are correct.
The basic problem has been that educational researchers and […]

I submitted an ad for my book to the Monitor on Psychology, published by the American Psychological Association. It was rejected. A similar ad was submitted to Psychology Today and was accepted.
I claim that, although it is classified as one of the social sciences, psychology is not really a science because its practitioners are not […]

Your help is needed to improve education. You may remember me as the founder and head of Edmund Scientific Co. After my retirement, I spent a few years boating and fishing. Then I began to do some specialized research into the scientific method, our education system, and related areas. I have now spent more than […]