Surge in pupils getting extra time in exams raises fears of cheating
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The exams watchdog is reporting a rapid increase in the number of pupils being given extra time in exam rooms amid fears that teachers are exploiting rules designed to give dyslexic pupils a fair chance.The number of pupils appealing to have allowances made because of a personal crisis or illness at the time of their [...]
More ball games
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If you live in an end-of-terrace house with white goalposts painted on the brickwork, you might not be overjoyed by the government’s call to end the “no ball games” culture. But, with every thud of a football kicked by the kids playing outside, at least you could take comfort from knowing the government is meeting [...]
Centre stage
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It started with a drink. Just a quick one late at night in one of the campus hotels on the edge of Coventry that Warwick University uses to put up visiting academics and staff members who live some distance away. “We love a good gossip about politics after an evening at the keyboard,” David Thomas, [...]
A sense of hope
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Every eye in the room is on Jean Eyedu. Even the large fidgety boy at the back, the three girls squashed into one desk who are half-asleep, and the many who are hungry watch him clowning. He mimics a man walking along without looking, hitting his leg on a rock and falling over. Eyedu topples [...]
The many feats of Mr Incredible
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Andy Bell is the kind of teacher that Gordon Brown would surely approve of. Like the prime minister, Bell is the son of a church minister. He brings his Christian convictions to his work without being overtly religious, and believes that all children can achieve if enough attention is given to their individual needs.That is [...]
Mr Js big questions
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Some teachers tell you that there is no other job they could conceivably wish to do. Some run with this rhapsody a few bars further and declare they can’t remember a time, ever in their lives, when they didn’t want to be a teacher.Ian Jamison, by his own admission, never had such dreams. When he [...]
Colleges soon big enough to go out on their own
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Amid the frenzy of excitement about Labour’s funding arrangements, the latest education bill has slipped virtually unnoticed into the parliamentary lists.The only bit of the education and skills bill that has interested the media so far is the raising of the leaving age. The spotlight has not settled yet on another clause near the end [...]
Dancing their way to fitness
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Video games and couch potatoes. The two used to go hand in hand, but some health experts say that is slowly changing.
For years, video games have been one of the leading culprits blamed for childhood obesity and sedentary lifestyles among young people.
But [...]
Teachers reject unworkable culture plan
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Teachers have rejected as unworkable a ministerial announcement that children should take part in five hours of “high culture” a week, including theatre workshops, creative writing and gallery visits.The %26pound;25m pledge for 10 pilots amounted to just %26pound;15 a pupil to squeeze five extra hours into a curriculum which already includes five hours of sport, [...]
Plea for more flexibility on timing of Sats
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Pupils should be allowed to sit national tests on any day of the year, the head of the government assessment agency has suggested.Allowing teachers to decide when their pupils sit their Sats would give a fairer reflection of their abilities than the current system of mass testing at seven, 11 and 14, David Gee, managing [...]
