28 Jun

Posted at 09:29h in Uncategorized

My name is Esther Russo and I work as a Vocational and Education Training teacher in the CIFP (El Centro Integrado de Formación Profesional) of Lorca in Murcia, Spain. In recent years my interest on new approaches to learning has grown, especially seeing the results that we have in our classrooms: lack of motivation, problems with managing time and goals, stress, abandonment of the courses, lack of social skills. I can see those even among my students, who are over 16 years old and many times over 18 or 20, are supposed to be really engaged, as they have chosen...

25 May

Posted at 09:33h in Uncategorized

It was common in my school, and I believe still is, for teachers to chide pupils who were not working. Working meant working at a prescribed task from the teacher. Also in modern parlance, there is reference to having pupils ‘on task’. If you are not working at a prescribed problem or task, then it is assumed that you were not learning. Recently a parent asked me what we would do if a student is not working. I indicated that we may do nothing since it’s not apparent that it’s a problem. Often when I was criticised in school for not...

20 Dec

Posted at 09:32h in Uncategorized

At the end of November I attended the International Democratic Education Conference in Bangalore India. As part of the presentation that I made I explored the notion of empowerment. I used the model shown below which summarises the way in which we think about empowerment in Self Managed Learning College. It uses the idea of traffic lights to highlight the difference between non-negotiable, negotiable and empowered activity. Like any organisation we have some non-negotiable elements. These include that we start the day with our community meeting. However what people say in the community meetings is up to the individual. They are...

28 Nov

Posted at 09:10h in Uncategorized

There is currently a debate in educational circles about whether it is more important for children to learn facts or to learn skills. This either/or thinking – where it has to be one or the other – does not make sense to me. So it will be worth considering what is important to learn in education. The first issue, then, is – is education aimed at learning about things (facts) or learning how to do things (skills). It is linked to ideas about the difference between education and training. A simple distinction is exemplified by the following; You are a parent and...

17 May

Posted at 09:36h in Uncategorized

200 people gathered at the Freedom to Learn conference at Summerhill School on 6th, 7th and 8th of May. I ran a workshop on different ways of learning particularly focused on learning without using classrooms. I generally find when talking with many people about learning that they have a bit of a blank in thinking of alternative ways of learning which don’t require the classroom. Somehow an approach which doesn’t need any classrooms can seem aberrant. The reality is that the classroom is a rather odd alternative that has been relatively recently created in human history. For most of the time...

28 Apr

Posted at 09:49h in Uncategorized

Self Managed Learning College is part of a global movement bringing traditional 19th century education into the 21st century by paying attention to solid evidence of better ways of educating young people. The case I will make here is that the role of adults and of schools should be to support young people in taking charge of their own lives and, centrally, of their own learning. I will mention a few examples of solid evidence about learning before indicating how to respond to this evidence. Evidence All young people are different. Specifically all the research shows that people (young and old) learn in...