Phonics, Collaboration and Professional Practice.

I shall assume that your silence gives consent.  – Plato. Yesterday’s post highlighted the teaching of phonics and the three teaching unions that are protesting about the new phonics tests. Leaders of three teachers’ unions have written to MPs urging … Continue reading →

The Great Phonics Debate and Methodical Madness.

On and on rage the arguments about “synthetic phonics” and their use in learning to read. Consider this delightful sentence I came across in Pedant’s Corner in the Guardian recently: “These are tools that everyone should have in her/his armamentarium … Continue reading →

Digital Literacy and a Revolution in the Classroom – Part Two

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Eric Schmidt, the executive chairman of Google, is surely a man who ought to know about the digital world. This Sunday he wrote the following article for the Observer, by way of responding to the Observer’s campaign to bring ‘coding’ … Continue reading →

Any Questions?

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So it’s been another week of big headlines about education and literacy, with all manner of uninformed and over-opinionated people wading into the debate. Also, thank goodness, plenty of very sensible and thoughtful folk. On Radio 4′s ‘Any Questions?’ programme … Continue reading →

Standards in Literacy and Reading – the Chief Inspector Speaks

You have to hand it to the new head of Ofsted – he’s certainly making plenty of waves. “Playing fast and loose with international data”, according to some. Ofsted: Literacy progress has stalled, chief inspector says http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-17368311 England is being … Continue reading →

Enabling and Empowering; The Work of Teachers

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Thought For Today “That’s the job of a teacher – to enable and empower.” So said Patsy Rodenburg, voice coach, speaking on Desert Island Discs this week. The question teachers really need to ask themselves is, to what extent does … Continue reading →