Team plan or management diktat?

2019 December 9 Monday 23:23

Unfortunately, reading the vast educational content via different devices, locations, times, etc. can make recollection not easy. There was —somewhere— a commentary about the benefits of teaching as a team within a (subject) department.

Coincidentally, this has also been instigated by/for (delete as appropriate...) yours truly. Whilst it is nice to share ideas, if the "team plan" is uni-directional, is it a plan by consensus, or subordination? Should a manager invite opinion or assume a lack of input as an absence of alternatives? Is planning to learn necessarily equivalent to planning to minimise mis-behaviour? Questions galore...

Periodic table, under-appreciated

2019 December 31 Tuesday 15:40

As the end approaches of the International Year of the Periodic Table (of elements!), an article recently published in New Yorker reminds of this year's attempt to enthuse appreciation to this year's cohort for the modern-day periodic table. It was unsuccessful. Periodic tables in various forms and languages were shown, extended reading tasks set for students to complete, all to no avail. "It's long", the inevitable complaint in modern parlance. Maybe the history of the evolution of the Periodic Table is over-emphasised (i.e. included) in the current gcse specification. In a world of instant gratification, anything that requires sustained concentration (without obligatory "gamification") is instantly derided as boring, thus irrelevant.