The issue of teaching character, which until now has mainly been debated within the ivory towers of academia, is suddenly all the rage in policy circles in the UK, in the wake of the report by the All-Party…
Stick to the textbook.
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For more than a decade, Singapore, along with South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Finland, has been at or near the top of international leagues tables that measure children’s ability in…
We’re after eight As.
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In 2016 the Department for Education (DfE) will radically overhaul their school league tables and replace their five A* to Cs grades measure with a new approach measuring results across pupils’ best eight…
How many A*s does one family need?
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There is a common misconception that genes are deterministic and that human potential is fixed at birth. This could not be further from the truth. We, as behavioural geneticists, see no evidence whatsoever…
More maths anyone?
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Teaching assistants can help children improve literacy and numeracy skills if they work in small groups with specific pupils known to have low attainment levels, new reports indicate. The findings appear…
Too many two-year-olds.
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Proposals to allow schools to start looking after two-year-olds go to the heart of a long-standing tension in education policy: is early childhood provision about childcare for working parents or is it…
Tale of the two Michaels.
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It is not very often that an education story is the lead item on the BBC’s Today programme, but the apparent sacking of Baroness Sally Morgan as chair of schools inspectorate Ofsted and comments by its…
Computing is an important subject, but it is only one of many that schools have to teach, and few would argue that it is more important than English, maths, or science. But as a high-profile debate continues…
Under pressure over Ofsted.
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As the old saying goes, there is only one thing more useful in politics than having the right friends. That’s having the right enemies. The education secretary, Michael Gove, has been highly skilled in…
When Jamie’s School Dinners first aired in early 2005, it launched Britain’s secondary schools as a key battle ground for politicians, professionals and campaigners keen to improve young people’s diet…
Education is well financed in Australia but a number of inefficiencies need to be addressed.
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SECURING AUSTRALIA’S FUTURE: As the Commission of Audit reviews government activity and spending, The Conversation’s experts take a closer look at key policy areas tied to this funding – what’s working…
Once you done that there’s plenty more to be getting on with.
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The triennial jamboree that is the publication of the OECD PISA tests kicked off with the usual round of blaming and name calling among politicians. Both sides of the political debate naturally found ammunition…
Can language nests revive endangered Indigenous languages?
AAP/Tara Ravens
More than 90% of Australia’s Indigenous languages are critically endangered and two-thirds of those languages spoken a hundred years ago are now dormant. The seeds of the current situation were sown long…
The government is reviewing significant early learning initiatives introduced under Labor.
AAP/Dave Hunt
Early childhood education reforms, started under Labor, are looking increasingly shaky under a Coalition government. Despite a series of recent reports and mounting evidence that support the Labor reforms…
Al-Madinah school in Derby: making news for all the wrong reasons.
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Each new administration tends to try to improve compulsory education by introducing a new and purportedly better type of school. The current government has at least three, and is pushing vocational schools…
Australia aims to be ranked among the top five countries in the world by 2025 for student performance in reading, science and maths literacy.
AAP Image/Dan Peled
Sunanda Creagh, The Conversation e Hannah Valmadre, The Conversation
Governments should invest in postgraduate school teacher education and primary-level specialist teachers in maths and science, according to a new green paper released today by the Melbourne Graduate School…
There’s renewed debate around whether universities need to specialise in research or teaching.
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“We must give universities more freedom to focus on what they are good at… If that means that some universities want to focus significantly more on teaching, then they should confidently do so… Government…
Prime Minister Julia Gillard wants Australia to improve its international standing in education performance, setting a goal to be in the top 5 by 2025.
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Two new education performance reports released by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) have painted a bleak picture of Australia’s student literacy and science and mathematics achievement…
Education academics and teachers should be able to share ideas.
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Apparently, teachers and principals have no need to hear about research on international education policy and are too sensitive to deal with “controversial” ideas. Last week, the University of Melbourne’s…
For better or worse, the university experience has changed considerably over the past forty years.
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Before the second world war, a very small minority of the population in Western societies went to universities. Most were men, most were from the social elite. From the late 1950s that changed. With a…