Chalkface Blog
The best teaching materials in the most practical format.
Category: Commentary
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So Gordon’s in post at long last, and we are all wondering what he is going to do to for education. So far, his grand contribution is to rename the DFES to DCSF. If everything he does is that inspired, we are in for reasonably quiet time. In fact, as I posted in January, we…
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I can’t say I’m convinced ‘Controlled Assessment’ is really a step forward. Is it really the job of teachers to prevent children from learning when and where they want to? But, ours not to question why. At least with a Yacapaca ePortfolio you can switch student access on and off using the ‘hide’ feature in…
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Danah Boyd is always a worthwhile read, but today’s post is directly relevant to anyone who is involved in anti-bullying. Bullies can be enthusiastic adopters of new technology and will experiment avidly to find the most effective ways of making life unbearable for others. Techniques such as poison email campaigns and character-assassinating MySpace/Bebo profiles can…
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This six-minute video presentation from Karl Fisch (via David Warwick) neatly encapsulates the consequences for education of two trends: the exponential growth in computing power and the maturing of the educational systems of both China and India. Required viewing for any PGCE student! The concepts themselves are familiar themes on this blog; what shocked me…
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Recruiting sergeants down the ages have known that young men come genetically preprogrammed to pledge their loyalty to the first vaguely plausible cause they are presented with, then go out to kill and maim in the name of it. Football clubs know that a stripey scarf is enough to trigger the same behaviour. Now we…
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