Leave the learning to the kids!

Education is too important for adults to take so seriously - such seriousness kills the creative spirit that is every child's evolutionary inheritance. Schools , like doctors should at least do no harm! Progress depends on first imagining possibilities. As Einstein said,'Imagination is more important than knowledge for knowledge is limited whereas imagination embraces the entire world stimulating progress giving birth to evolution'.He also said it was a miracle that children's' sense of wonder was not crushed by modern schooling.School are increasingly looking like organisations dedicated to the standardisation of children.Teachers have been infected over the past decades with a range of pseudo scientific management processes to ensure all...

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Posted in: Big Picture,Creative Schools,national standards,Personalized Learning,Rants and Raves,teaching and learning

Are you listening Mrs Tolley?

Thank you Iain Taylor for this guest blog. The below are Iain's notes for his thank you speech to the Minister after her presentation to the Auckland Principals Association. Iain is well known for his point of view and is currently principal of Manurewa Intermediate School.Thank you Minister for having the courage and tenacity to address the APPA… as you can see from the numbers here today what you had to say was keenly awaited…and thank you also for ‘putting to rest’, we hope, our fears of national league tables.You will already have heard around the country I am sure that it is not national standards we fear at all - we already use a wide range of assessments which are standardized. We already know where a child’s performance sits compared...

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Posted in: Big Picture,Educationalists,Ministry NZCurric,national standards,Rants and Raves

Game bird study - Duckshooting season.

I am sick and tired of visiting schools and hearing principals tell me it is all about: assessment, success criteria, teachers' intentions, WALTS, best practice ( really fixed practice) feedback, feed forward, next steps teaching and now National Standards. All part of the same failing scientific management ideology of control and conformity. Worse still, all but a few creative schools have been sucked into all this 20th Century thinking. It seems to be repeated as some state imposed mantra of success, an educational rain dance, when the real problem is motivation or engagement - keeping the desire to learn alive. This is what teachers' should be keeping to the forefront of their minds. Duck shooting is on us - what is it all about? Why shoot...

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Posted in: Action Plans and Lessons,Creative teaching,inquiry learning,Integrated Learning,Rants and Raves,teaching and learning

A take on the current politically inspired changes

Measurement mad technocrats, ivory tower academics, and limited vision politicians have far too much influence in education - time we all woke up! A satirical view from my friend Mac from Auckland.A Bunch of Nasty StatisticsA small tear in the time space continuum had seen the beginning of a new era in the land of Edu Ka Shun. Patrician Anatoly had been replaced and in schools all around the land there had been great anticipation as to the direction that the incoming Patrician would take.The first action taken by the new patrician had been the calling together of all the Bureau Rats with an explanation demanded of them about the state of education and the expectations of student outcomes on a national basis. The new Patrician had caused much...

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Inquiring into Anzac Day

After exploring, students 'prior ideas' and questions about ANZAC Day, class discussions, and researching articles and pictures, students drafted out, and wrote up, their own thoughts. The challenge included appropriately illustrating the topic. A range of skills ( 'literacies') need to be in place to complete such a task.Alert teachers ( we need more of them) are always on the lookout for inspirational ideas to introduce to their class - ANZAC Day is one such opportunity.ANZAC Day is an ideal way to develop inquiry skills to your children while at the same time developing some important ideas about what it is to be New Zealander.Such a study could be introduced before ANZAC Day and concluded after Anzac Day is over.The 'new' New Zealand Curriculum...

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Autumn - a chance to develop inquiry skills

Many schools seem to have got into the habit of collaboratively planning one major ( often school wide) study a term. While this may have some advantages it often means that the idea of introducing small seasonal studies, or current events like volcano eruptions, are overlooked.Autumn is too good not to take advantage of.All too often the results of Autumn studies seen in many classes ( usually Junior rooms) are superficial, to say the least, but this need not be the case.If there are deciduous trees in, or near, the school grounds what a brilliant opportunity to develop a small integrated study.The study could be prefaced with the provocation, 'Why do some trees lose their leaves?' Such questions introduce an inquiry approach to the students.A...

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Posted in: Action Plans and Lessons,Creative teaching,inquiry learning,Integrated Learning,teaching and learning