I am taken aback at some of the twitter debate surrounding the word “obedience”. I’m a bit shocked that anyone would even consider using it in an educational context in this day and age, and I am shocked that anyone would write it off as “just a word”. What exactly do some people think we… Continue reading On obedience: life is unfair but I’m not going to get over it, that’s why I teach

I think DT Willingham has something to say about education. He has identified, or at least publicised, a real issue for teachers and that is the relationship between skills and knowledge. In particular, how we teach skills and such ephemeral issues as critical thinking, and indeed whether it is possible to teach these things. I… Continue reading On DT Willingham: the difference between “thinking well” and expertise

In the opening lines of the Qur’an, God, in the form of the angel jibreel (Gabriel) exhorts the prophet of Islam to read. Iqra! Bismi Rabbik Al-Ladhi Khalaq, read in the name of your Lord. Situated in a cave in Hira this veritable echo chamber, must have reverberated with the sounds of embryonic Islam, the… Continue reading Core Knowledge: the orphaning of knowledge

I’ve brought together some arguments against the last post from Twitter and BTL and tried to answer them. The argument about when elitism is elitism and when it’s not….! The argument that people who use elitist academic language to argue against Core Knowledge are themselves elitist, is a common one. Of course that only works,… Continue reading Freire, Hirsch and Indoctrination: the arguments against, the arguments against

In the first line of his epic poem, metamorphosis, the Roman poet Ovid sets the scene for the themes that he intends to cover, in nova fert animus mutatas dicere formas corpora, my mind leads me to tell of forms changed into new bodies, or similar, myth and change is Ovid’s concern. Later, much later,… Continue reading On Freire, Hirsch and indoctrination: falling in love with statues is not always a good idea

I think it is important to say what this is and is not. It is not an advocation of progressive techniques neither is it a refutation of traditional techniques. Rather it is  an attempt to look at the polemics of educational discourse or rather educational blogging discourse. Progressive education is receiving a, some might say,… Continue reading Who breaks a butterfly on a wheel: Kirschner, Sweller and Clarke