Weather has been too good to be wasted with blogs, until today. From a post about the functionally illiterate college student (via 'Poloniusmonk', there are a host of subsequent hyperlinks about modern cheats, crisis of humanities, "dysfunctional technology" (nice!). Enjoy the reads; recommended...
Nothing to add to what has been said, other than confirmation from this classroom observer (not much teaching done this last term, sorry). There is a simple inability at sustained concentration to study, amongst the masses. The intelligent ones, as ever, will simply continue their self-motivated ability to navigate through the mess around them
A review of some blogs has reminded (if honest, with a little bitterness/sadness/wonder; how did this happen, why, for what?) on an uncomfortable personal reality. After x years, never progressed, never promoted, never valued.
As the spring term is about to start, a problem with de-motivation is to emerge. Whilst the favourite meteorological season, the least enjoyable time to teach. Those doing summative assessments are done as far as the year is concerned. Management start to think of unsolicited "initiatives" under the pre-text of "plans" for the subsequent new year, more pupils than usual have "checked-out" from the monotony of the dull extant curriculum; new jobs are sought and so on. Meanwhile, yours truly will just survive at the bottom, whilst those more successful at their relationships move onward and upward; such good traits to possess! :)
UK High Court finally rules correctly that biological sex ≠ sociological gender. To quote a woman from "sex matters":
Yet again, the trans rights activists show us who they are. This is not a peaceful request for the right of a marginalised group to live quietly and with dignity – it’s a violent anti-women mob. They’ve defaced the statue of Millicent Fawcett, who represents women’s suffrage, to make their point that they will not respect women’s boundaries, even when the law requires it. Once again, they prove why women need male-free spaces and services – to keep men like this out.As typical "Labour" government: silence. Where is the debate to define a man?
"Artificial intelligence" deployment within education seems to be done with scant thought. For example, a blog post about formative assessment to save time was of interest, because of similar observation by colleagues about use of AI to generate suitable "dedicated/directed improvement/independent and reflection time" task (e.g. specific questions), under the same guise of "time saving". However, as the aforementioned blog post cites, time saved to do what?
Education is about thought. Having seen with dismay how lazy teachers seek to use technology to "save time", if the time saved is used to go home early, students will not benefit from the possibility of technology, to facilitate access to the teacher as the professional subject specialist and enhancement of comprehension via deep dialogue between teacher and student. AI should not be used to outsource thought by the teacher, about how to improve student comprehension. The SARS-CoV-2 pseudo pandemic reminded that even though many want to replace the teacher, those truly invested in education perceive value in the human relationship between the learner and the learned.
