OTHER STORIES

• UFT-backed Council candidates in virtual sweep

  Of 49 City Council hopefuls endorsed by the union, 47 were elected to four-year terms on Nov. 3. The union’s choices for city comptroller and public advocate — Councilmen John Liu and Bill de Blasio, respectively — romped to victory.

• ‘Frankenstein,’ and other interesting topics

  Professional development took many forms on Nov. 3, from a UFT safety training to a session at the New York Public Library on how to teach Frankenstein, and strategies for reaching struggling writers in the Rockaways.

• A banana tree grows in Queens

  Tomatoes, celery, potatoes, parsley, sunflower seeds and other earthly delights, picked right out of the garden by kids at PS 205 in Queens, are part of the “Garden to City Harvest” project, which feeds the hungry in New York City.

• Learning that’s for the birds

  Are you interested in protecting the environment? A novel way you and your students can pitch in is by participating in a citizen-scientist project. One teacher tells how he did that by creating a bird-watching club at his school.

• More than teaching

  Teaching is so much more than test results. Regardless of the critics’ demands, we can’t teach and children can’t learn when they are feeling sick or hungry or worried about adult-size problems.

• What works? Curriculum mostly

  Where should we spend precious education dollars, especially now that we don’t have so many? A new paper suggests there’s a much bigger bang for the buck when you invest in curriculum, rather than expensive “solutions,” like charter schools or merit pay.