19 Feb

Posted at 09:43h in Uncategorized

Some years ago I was working in a school running a Self Managed Learning project. In the group with which I was working there was a talented 13-year-old girl musician. She said that she would like to have a career as an orchestra musician. We looked at the life of an orchestra musician and also looked at some research on job satisfaction. The results of the research showed that orchestra musicians had a level of job satisfaction on a par with that of a prison warder. The reasons for orchestra musicians possibly lacking satisfaction with their work appeared to be related...

17 Nov

Posted at 09:44h in Uncategorized

Once upon a time there was a boy in Bolton with no interest in his schoolwork. He tended to spend time with his mates or watched comedy VHS tapes that he had recorded. He gained one GCSE then after school did a series of seemingly dead-end jobs such as in the bingo hall and at the local cinema. Because he enjoyed cracking jokes and fooling around he started to do some stand-up comedy gigs in local pubs. Eventually he developed a comedy stand-up act. He was officially entered in the Guinness World Records book for the planet's biggest-selling stand-up tour. His...

14 Nov

Posted at 09:45h in Uncategorized

Sonia Sodha in her article “Is the state sometimes wiser than parents?” (6 Nov 2016) goes too far. She proposes banning home education and suggests; “Some may be getting an adequate education – we just don’t know”. The reality is we do know because there has been plenty of research showing that such education is largely very effective. Her stance is mirrored by that of the state in wishing to ignore inconvenient evidence. Let’s take another example. The Government’s own research has shown that every year at least 10,000 children get worse results at GCSE just because they are summer born....

28 Jul

Posted at 09:48h in Uncategorized

SIZE MATTERS The transition from a small primary school into secondary education is an issue for many parents. There are serious choices to be made for children at this age. We know that many children feel nervous about going into a large, more impersonal school where they do not feel known by teachers. In a typical secondary school a teacher might see over 250 children in a week and cannot get to know all of them really well. In addition the national data show that schools are getting larger year by year. This issue of size is serious. The research shows that...

28 Mar

Posted at 09:50h in Uncategorized

Some people have suggested that the only change from Victorian schools to those of today is from black to white – blackboards have changed to whiteboards. We still have classrooms that are not much different from the 19th century with curricula that have progressed little since then and with lessons of standardised times delivered in (increasingly) large institutions. Indeed there is an argument to suggest that the school is possibly the only institution that would be recognisable to a Victorian who might be transported to the current time. Factories now have robots and offices don’t have clerks working in serried ranks....

17 Mar

Posted at 09:46h in Uncategorized

Much has been written about how important parents are to a child’s education, but often the advice is not all that helpful. Here are a few thoughts on the what, how, when, where and why of education that parents might consider. WHAT.The press and the education establishment go on about GCSEs, grades, exams and so on as the most important areas for parents to assist their children. A recent research report suggested that children doing Saturday jobs could get lower grades at GCSE. What the report did not mention is that if school students want to learn about dealing with real...