Can you explain what skills are and how to develop them? Did you feel confident naming some of the key skills? Maybe you cited the more popular skills cited – literacy, numeracy, or perhaps ‘problem solving’, ‘critical thinking’ or ‘teamwork’. After some naming of skills, could you confidently explain the ‘how’ of developing those skills? […]
What is the Problem with ‘Skills’ in Schools? Read More »
For a long time now I have been reading about vocabulary development. After teaching English Language and English Literature for over a decade and a half (including child language acquisition), I came to the stark realisation that I didn’t know enough about how children not only learnt to read, but went on to read to
Vocabulary Development Reading List Read More »
Illustrated by Ronald Searle, in Life Magazine, 1960. Reading a classic novella like ‘A Christmas Carol’ is tricky for our teenage students. Yes, they have likely heard of Scrooge and seen a film adaptation or three, but when faced with the actual text and the world of the story, with its antiquated social context
Teaching ‘A Christmas Carol’ Read More »
Reading too slowly? The movement towards a ‘slow education‘, encompassing deeper, richer learning experiences, is surely the antidote to our assessment driven, checkpoint laden curriculum. In my previous post I explained that we should slim down our content-filled curriculum to maximise the opportunities for reading. More reading is surely a rallying call every teacher, not
Reading Fast and Slow Read More »
