Books to read

The future of foreign language education in the United States (2002)

Language Planning and social change (1997)
Teaching and Learning Chinese in Global Contexts （2010)

Left back, Diane Ravitch
Americans have argued about their public schools, some claiming that they are not as good as they used to be, others that they are not a good as they ought to be. Some think the schools should go "back to basics"; other insist that the schools should break free of the basics. Some want higher standards; others want schools where students pursue their own interests without any external pressures. Some think that the schools must liberate themselves from the dead hand of tradition, others that the schools are plagued by too many faddish reforms.

American schools were once again at the center of acrimonious debates about their quality, their methods, and even their purpose.

Criticism of the academic curriculum came mainly from two sources: business leaders, who wanted economy and efficiency in the schools, and progressive educators in the nation's new colleges of education, who wanted the school curriculum to be more closely aligned to the needs of society int he industrial age.

The progressive movement in education emerged in the 1890s, at the same time as the larger Progressive movement in politics.,,,improve the living conditions of the urban poor, introduce equitable taxation...

....insisted that nothing learned in one situation could be applied to any other, so that all training must be specific to the task at hand.

Language Planning in Local Contexts
http://books.google.com/books?id=9os7UwdIYp8C&pg=PA3&lpg=PA3&dq=Language+Planning+in+Local+Contexts&source=bl&ots=cEf-wNcvuz&sig=O3wph99b2OxgIsxQVpQ51sQpZEc&hl=en&ei=0OJXTtWZDMfX0QGeqImxBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CB8Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false