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What every teacher needs to know about… rote learning

As per, here's this month's Teach Secondary column for you delight and edification. These days it is rare indeed for children to be taught much by rote, or, to use a less pejorative term, by heart. Rote remains a much maligned and neglected method of instruction. Certain ways of thinking about education are so ingrained that they become understood increasingly literally and separately from the complexity of ideas that originally gave them meaning. We don’t even consider whether rote learning might sometimes be an effective tool – we know, deep in our hearts that it is an unnatural instrument of evil, born in [...]

2017-02-09T12:45:00+00:00February 24th, 2016|learning|

Why do edtech folk react badly to scepticism? Part 2: Confirmation bias

In Part 1 I explored the concept of vested interest and how it could lead us to make decisions and react in ways which might, to others, appear irrational. This post address another predictable way we make mistakes: the confirmation bias. Confirmation bias, the tendency to over value data which supports an pre-existing belief, is something to which we all routinely fall victim. We see the world as we want it to be, not how it really is. Contrary to some of the accusations levelled at me, I don't hate technology. Far from it. I'm just sceptical about unbridled enthusiasm. Technology might help in [...]

2016-02-23T16:12:00+00:00February 23rd, 2016|Featured, technology|

Just semantics? Subtle but important misunderstandings about learning styles, modalities, and preferences

This is a guest blog from Yana Weinstein, Assistant Professor at University of Massachusetts, Lowell, one of the masterminds behind the wonderful Learning Scientists site. Scientists get quite attached to terms that describe the constructs they are studying. This is because you can’t measure something until you’ve defined what you think it is – and for convenience - labelled it. The naming process itself is fairly arbitrary. A researcher discovers an effect or proposes a process, and if it catches on and further research confirms the construct’s importance, the name might stick. Once a construct is identified and named, hypotheses about it can be formed [...]

2016-02-21T22:54:54+00:00February 21st, 2016|Featured|

Why do edtech folk react badly to scepticism? Part 1: Vested interest

"It's difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it." Upton Sinclair. I'm sceptical about the benefits of 'edtech'. This is, I think, a legitimate position to hold. It doesn't make me a Luddite: I'm enthusiastic about the advantages generally of technology, I'm just not so sure about the ways in which 'edtech' is sold to schools. Since writing this piece on my exasperation with the way iPads are fetishised in education I've been inundated with edtech folk pointing out what an idiot I am. Now obviously enough, I'm not that surprised. When somebody criticises something [...]

2016-03-05T10:05:51+00:00February 20th, 2016|technology|

One more nail in the Learning Styles coffin…

We have scotch'd the snake, not kill'd it: She'll close and be herself, whilst our poor malice Remains in danger of her former tooth. Shakespeare, Macbeth Just when you think you've found a way to put the tortured soul of Learning Styles out of its pitiful misery, it lurches horribly back to life. For a moment I almost believed my last post, The Learning Styles myth debunked on the back of an envelope might have done the trick. Sadly not. If anything, all I succeeded in doing was opening up a new front for misunderstanding. Here was the 4-step debunking: People have preferences for [...]

2016-02-21T10:35:18+00:00February 19th, 2016|myths|

The Learning Styles myth debunked on the back of an envelope

"You don’t have to believe in learning styles theories to appreciate differences among kids, to hold an egalitarian attitude in the midst of such differences, and to try to foster such attitudes in students." Daniel Willingham, Learning Styles FAQ The Learning Styles myth, for those that aren't already clear, is that by aligning teaching to a student's preferred Learning Style, outcomes will improve. Despite lots of research into this claim - the so-called 'meshing theory' - no supporting evidence has turned up. But who needs evidence? In a 2014 survey, 90% of teachers agreed with the claim, "Individuals learn better when they [...]

2016-02-18T21:03:10+00:00February 18th, 2016|myths|

Just give me one good reason to use a tablet in the classroom

I'll start with a confession: I don't really get iPads. This came as something as a surprise to me as, by and large, I'm pathetically geeky about Apple products. I use my iPhone 6plus all the time and have just bought one of the new ultra-slim Macbooks. I fully expected to dig iPads, but my problem is that I just can't really a see a use for them that can't be handled more efficiently or effectively by either my phone or my laptop. Anyway, that's just me; I'm happy to live and let live and if you're an iPad aficionado then more power to you. [...]

2016-02-19T14:12:30+00:00February 18th, 2016|Featured|

When planning fails… what to do when behaviour breaks down

"There is in the act of preparing, the moment you start caring." Winston Churchill Lots of people who don't normally like the stuff I write seemed to approve of the post I wrote on responsibly planning for predictable behaviour to reduce exclusions, and some of those who are usually approving were less pleased. There's two things I might take from this: 1) I've occupied the centre ground and communicated a moderate message that confirmed readers' biases, or 2) I didn't manage to explain myself very well. I think there's a bit of both at work. My point is that we should plan [...]

2016-02-17T15:50:51+00:00February 17th, 2016|behaviour, leadership|

Taking responsibility for predictable problems

"All stable processes we shall predict. All unstable processes we shall control." John Von Neumann Let me preface all this by saying that I think refusing to accept excuses for low standards and poor behaviour is a very good thing. Here's what 'no excuses' means to me: Making an excuse is failing to take responsibility. The students most likely to be excluded from school are the most vulnerable. This may, in some circumstances, be unavoidable. After spending quite a bit of time looking into the work of Virtual Schools (Local Authority bodies with a specific responsibility for the education over children in the Local Authority's care) the [...]

2016-02-18T17:33:18+00:00February 16th, 2016|behaviour, leadership|

Who is dyslexic and why does it matter?

"Man prefers to believe what he prefers to be true." Francis Bacon I've been thinking about dyslexia for a while. Here are a few of the posts I've written over the past couple of years: May 2013 Does dyslexia exist? and Magic glasses and the Meares-Irlen syndrome October 2013 Are all difficulties desirable? February 2014 The dyslexia debate – is the label ‘meaningless’? One thing I've learned is that if you're in any way critical of the label 'dyslexia', you're going to get some grief. This is a highly emotive area and many people feel very strongly that being diagnosed as dyslexic was a positive, life-changing experience. [...]

2016-02-11T22:06:42+00:00February 11th, 2016|myths|

Learning is liminal

I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades For ever and for ever when I move. Tennyson, Ulysses I offered my definition of learning here, but there is, I feel, something more to be said on the subject. Learning is a messy, complicated business. Imagine yourself standing before a dark, ominous doorway. Through it you can glimpse something previously unimagined, but entering and crossing through entails a risk – anything might happen. Not passing through, while safe, means you will never know what’s on the other [...]

2016-02-10T21:51:34+00:00February 10th, 2016|learning|

On bullshit: the value of clarity, precision and economy

"Good writers are those who keep the language efficient. That is to say, keep it accurate, keep it clear." Ezra Pound I've always been of the opinion that saying what you mean clearly, precisely and without undue verbiage is something of a boon to understanding, but it would appear that to some such writerly virtues actually reduce meaning. For instance in this publication from Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain we're told that Today’s ‘clarity- mongers’ are not attacking metaphysics, as did past empiricist/analytical philosophers in the Anglophone tradition. Now, crudely, they don’t like what they can’t understand... philosophers’ ‘clarity’ might not be clear to others... Well-known analytical [...]

2017-04-04T10:20:39+01:00February 8th, 2016|writing|
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