Posts Tagged ‘Education’
September 5, 2012
There is a misnomer that children today eat worse today than than ever before. This is not my experience.
For starters, in my day it was unheard of for children to be drinking water of their own volition. It was always juice or soft drink. Water was for post sport hydration only. Children today happily drink water. My students are forever filling up their drink bottles. In my day drink bottles were for fitting on your bicycles for long rides in the summer time.
I only seldomly ate vegetables on their own. My vegies needed to be cooked, flavoured and magically reinvented before I would eat them. The thought of opening my lunch box and finding a container full of celery sticks was not something I wished to contemplate. Children today are only too happy to snack on carrot sticks and apple pieces. If you put a fruit and vegetable tray in front of 10-years-olds, you’d better have another tray in reserve. They would finish the contents in no time.
The key difference between then and know is exercise. I played on the street with my neighbours after school. My parents didn’t need to supervise. In those days kids were allowed to play outside without it being seen as dangerous or an example of poor parenting.
School cafeteria regulations and lunch policies can be extremely inflexible on our children. Sometimes I look at the example of our generation and wonder if we are not a bunch of hypocrites. Whilst teachers and office workers leave the premises to get a fast food option for lunch, children are left to eat food our generation would of refused to eat.
Whilst our kids are making the progress, many of us continue to indulge. Take this silly article for example:
Could you consume a giant burger comprising three beef patties, six bacon rashers, six slices of cheese and pulled pork in just 10 minutes?
This is exactly what one restaurant in London is challenging its diners to do.
At eight inches high, this gigantic burger is a real contender for the title of the UK’s tallest burger.
Weighing in with a gut-busting 3,000 calories – more than an entire daily intake of calories for a man – the burger is being sold as part of an eating challenge at the at the Red Dog Saloon in Hoxton.
To take part in the challenge, contestants in the Devastator Burge Challenge must eat the entire burger, with accompanying fries and milkshake in under ten minutes.
Those who manage to defeat the burger earn their photo on the wall of fame behind the restaurant’s bar area.
Tags:000 calory burger, 3, 5 per cent of people who attempted it have succeeded, ating challenge at the at the Red Dog Saloon in Hoxton, burger, burger three beef patties, Children, Diet, Education, eight inches high burger, Fast Food, food, fries and milkshake in under ten minutes, Fruit, Health, News, Nutrition, Parenting, photo on the wall of fame behind the restaurant's bar area, Red Dog Saloon burger 10 minutes, Red Dog Saloon burger fatty, Red Dog Saloon tall buger, six bacon rashers, six slices of cheese and pork, Ten minutes to eat fatty burger, UK's tallest burger, vegetables, Water
Posted in Nutrition | Leave a Comment »
September 4, 2012
A compilation of behavioural management links by the team at The Guardian:
Positive ways to manage behaviour provides a range of techniques from the training organisation Pivotal Education. These include establishing explicit rules and routines, providing students with clear choices regarding their behaviour and starting each day with a clean sheet.
Further advice on some of the most common behaviour problems is contained in Classroom management strategies. Areas covered include dealing with pupils who are defiant, use abusive language, refuse to work or make silly noises in class. The resource highlights “needs-focused interventions”, such as “chunking” tasks to make them more manageable, taking time over your classroom seating plan and encouraging parental involvement. Strategies to avoid include giving ultimatums or tactically ignoring disruptive pupils.
Coping Strategies for Teachers contains tips on preventing, reducing and managing unacceptable behaviour. Ideas include having a challenge on the board for pupils to complete as they arrive in class, giving responsibility to students for activities such as taking the register, and keeping a behaviour file to record any incidents, meetings or contact with parents.
To encourage positive behaviour in early years and primary, Twinkl has created a range of wall display resources. These include a set of posters about good listening and a Noisometer that you can use to set and monitor noise levels in the classroom. To help celebrate good behaviour, there is a set of star of the day and star of the week posters, and as an alternative to the traditional traffic light behaviour management resource, you can use a set of Behaviour Management Dragons to give warnings for misbehaviour in a calm, non-confrontational way.
For newly-qualified teachers, a list of 10 top tips has been created by assistant headteacher and mentor Eugene Spiers. Advice includes remembering to smile and greet your classes, even the groups you dread, being consistent with praise and sanctions and calling a selection of parents with good news every Friday. There is additional advice in the resource 10 top tips for NQTs.
On a lighter note, Five Minutes to a Calmer Classroom provides tips on using meditation in the classroom. It includes details of a simple breathing exercise that can be used to tackle stress and improve concentration.
And for anyone starting the new school year as a supply teacher, there is a list of top tips from primary teacher Colin Cartmell-Browne. Advice includes arriving as early as possible, making a note of the school timetable and discussing with other members of staff whether there are any pupils who will need additional support.
Click on the link to read The Dog Eat Dog Style of Education
Click on the link to read Problem Kids, Suspensions and Revolving Doors
Click on the link to read The Solution to the Disruptive Student Has Arrived: Body Language Classes
Click on the link to read When Something Doesn’t Work – Try Again Until it Does
Tags:Behaviour Management Dragons, Classroom Management, Classroom management strategies, classroom seating plan, Colin Cartmell-Browne, Coping Strategies for Teachers, dealing with pupils who are defiant, dealing with pupils who refuse to work or make silly noises in class, Education, encouraging parental involvement, establishing explicit rules and routines, Eugene Spiers, Five Minutes to a Calmer Classroom, improve concentration through breathing exercises, meditation in the classroom, Noisometer, Pivotal Education, Positive ways to manage behaviour, simple breathing exercise that can be used to tackle stress, traffic light behaviour management resource, Twinkl, use abusive language, Useful Resorces to Assist in Behavioural Management
Posted in Classroom Management | Leave a Comment »
August 31, 2012
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=_oL7B9Manq4
I think it’s highly appropriate for the police to take incidents featuring physical bullying like the one above very seriously:
The argument on a Franklin Township school bus wasn’t particularly unusual. One student had taken a seat that another wanted for himself.
But to Lora Hoagland, what followed was horrifying — a 15-year-old attacking her younger, smaller son for nearly a full minute, the image captured on a cellphone video taken by another student on the bus as it left the parking lot at Franklin Township Middle School East on Wednesday afternoon.
The video, posted to Facebook, was cited by Franklin Township Schools Police in arresting the 15-year-old on preliminary charges of battery with injury and disorderly conduct. It also has left Hoagland with doubts about the safety of her two children, both students in Franklin Township.
She didn’t send either of them to school Friday, likening the scene on the bus to a war zone.
Click on the link to read The Rise of Teacher Approved Bullying (Video)
Click on the link to read Punishments Handed to Children Who Bullied Bus Monitor. Now What?
Click on the link to read The Kids Who Bullied Their School Bus Monitor Shouldn’t be Punished: Nelson
Click on the link to read Video of a Bus Monitor Being Bullied by Middle School Children Goes Viral
Tags:15-year-old arrested for fight on bus, argument on a Franklin Township school bus, Bullying, Bullying on bus, Bullying ranklin Township school bus, cellphone video taken of fight on school bus, Dangers of school bus, Education, Franklin Township Middle School East bus fight, Franklin Township school bus, Lora Hoagland, News, posted to Facebook, School Bullying, School Bus, School Bus Bully, School bus fight video, Video, was cited by Franklin Township Schools Police
Posted in Bullying | Leave a Comment »
August 31, 2012
Trust me, as much as being friends with parents may have its benefits, it is not a good idea:
Jill Schulman-Riemer has taught nursery through third grade, and is currently a private tutor and educational consultant in New York City. She says teachers and parents should keep their distance outside of the classroom, particularly online.
The trouble goes both ways, she warns. “Parents friending teachers and teachers friending parents can be a slippery slope. You put a lot of trust in your children’s teachers. We all need to stay in our professional roles with each other, and Facebook just isn’t a place for that.”
“Talk to them off line,” Schulman-Riemer advises. “Don’t use email or Facebook messenger. Try an actual face-to-face conversation. Explain that, of course, you’re always happy to talk to a parent about their child or anything school-related, but your policy is that you don’t friend parents on Facebook, and you prefer in-person conversations.”
Sure, friending your kid’s teacher may sound like a nice way to have a more personal connection with someone who’s an important part of your family’s daily life. But information on people’s Facebook pages can easily be misread or blown out of proportion. And while teachers recognize that they’re being judged on student performance and how they present themselves in the classroom, they shouldn’t be held accountable for old college pictures, or late-night comments posted on their timeline after someone’s bachelorette party.
If you go out and friend a teacher on Facebook, or accept their friend request, you do so at your own risk, says Carrie Mize, who’s been on both sides of the fence, as a parent of three young children, and a teacher of pre-school and elementary grades in Michigan, Virginia, and Connecticut.
“If you choose to open up the personal side of things, you have to understand that it’s their personal life and you may see things you don’t like,” She says. “A teacher’s Facebook page doesn’t have anything to do with your child. The teacher doesn’t have their teacher hat on, and if you see something inappropriate, you just have to let it go.”
Click on the link to read Don’t Even Try to Huminise James Holmes
Click on the link to read Teachers Who Rely on Free Speech Shouldn’t be Teachers
Click on the link to read Facebook’s Age Restictions are a Joke
Click on the link to read Facebook and Child Exploitation
Tags:Education, facebook, Facebook friend with parents, Facebook friend with students, Facebook friends with teachers, friend a teacher on Facebook, Jill Schulman-Riemer, Parents and Teachers Should Not Be Facebook Friends, Parents friending teachers and teachers friending parents, social media, teachers and parents should keep their distance outside of the classroom
Posted in Social Media | Leave a Comment »
August 31, 2012
When a teacher decides to be circus ringmaster to a bullying free for all, one wonders how the authorities can do anything less than ban him from the classroom indefinitely.
Instead, they point out his record. This is his first blemish.
I would argue that this is not a blemish – it’s a gaping scar.
Click here to watch video.
The parents of a Washington state teen want their son’s teacher fired after learning that the student was terrorized in a bullying attack by peers — and at some points, by the teacher.
The incidents occurred in February at Gig Harbor Middle School, but cell phone video of the attacks surfaced just this week. Footage shows more than a dozen students dragging the then-eighth-grade boy around the classroom, carrying him by his arms and legs, burying him under chairs, writing on his feet and stuffing his socks in his mouth. The antics last about 15 minutes while teacher John Rosi watches, and later joins in.
Rosi pokes the teen in the stomach and pretends to sit on him, chiding, “I’m feeling kind of gassy.” The class Rosi was supposed to be teaching is a half-hour course for reading and math preparation, The News Tribune reports.
After district officials learned of the incident in February, Rosi was suspended for 10 days without pay, given new classroom management training and moved to a different middle school.
But that’s not enough for the boy’s parents, Randall and Karla Kinney, who have requested a criminal investigation and are calling for Rosi’s termination. Joan Mell is representing the victim, who was 13 at the time of the incident.
“It was a teacher-led bullying incident of epic proportions,” Mell told KIRO 7.
Acting Superintendent Chuck Cuzzetto said he was horrified by what he saw in the video, but contends that while Rosi displayed “inappropriate classroom management,” it was an isolated incident in an 18-year career, and the district acted appropriately in disciplining Rosi.
“We took what we think is pretty significant disciplinary action against the teacher,” Cuzzetto told the station.
Click on the link to read Explaining the Colorado Movie Theater Shooting to Children
Click on the link to read Don’t Even Try to Huminise James Holmes
Click on the link to read How Can Facebook Allow James Holmes Tribute Pages?
Click on the link to read The Need to Blame Anything and Everything for the Colorado Shootings
Tags:Bullying, bullying captured on cell phone, Chuck Cuzzetto, Education, Gig Harbor Middle School bullying, Joan Mell, John Rosi bullying, John Rosi Video, Karla Kinney, moved to a different middle school., professional conduct, Randall Kinney, Rosi was suspended for 10 days without pay, student was terrorized in a bullying attack by peers, Washington state teen
Posted in Bullying, Professional Conduct | 4 Comments »
August 30, 2012
This could be the first word “arbitrary” has been used in an act of vandalism:
Victims of graffiti commonly find themselves painting over misspelled profanities or scrubbing out obscene drawings.
But when the residents of Northumberland Gardens woke to find their luxury cars had been vandalised, the tone was rather more – polite.
Words including ‘very silly’, ‘really wrong’ and ‘arbitrary’ had been scratched into the paintwork with a screwdriver.
Not that the choice of vocabulary will be much consolation. The late-night wrecking spree caused £20,000 damage to the 24 cars targeted in the affluent suburb of Jesmond, Newcastle.
Hours later, Professor Stephen Graham, 47, was arrested and questioned by police. An academic at Newcastle University, he lives in the next street from Northumberland Gardens, where most of the attacks were carried out.
Professor Graham, a graduate of Southampton University, is based at Newcastle University’s school of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, and specialises in the study of cities and society.
The author, editor or co-author of seven books, he also looks at the sociology of technology, researching urban aspects of surveillance.
Tags:arrested after a resident saw him crouched beside a car Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2195486/Stephen-Graham-University-professor-vandalised-cars-affluent-Newcastle-street.html#ix, attack may have been motivated by a planning row restricting cars parking in nearby streets Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2195486/Stephen-Graham-University-professor-vandalised-ca, ‘really wrong’ and ‘arbitrary’ car graffiti, ‘very silly’, car Graffiti, car vandalism, Education, Grammar, Northumberland Gardens vanadlised cars, Prof Graham, Professor Stephen Graham academic at Newcastle University, Professor Stephen Graham grafitti vandalism, Spelling, university professor and the street of cars scratched with a better class of graffiti Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2195486/Stephen-Graham-University-professor-vandalised-cars-aff, University professor Stephen Graham vandalised 24 cars, Vandalism with a screwdriver cars, Vocabulary
Posted in Professional Conduct | 1 Comment »
August 30, 2012
Maths teacher Shayla Smith is accused of providing the worst excuse for allegedly giving her students the answers on their state exams – they were “dumb as hell.”
Atlanta math teacher Shayla Smith is accused of giving students answers to state exams because they were “dumb as hell.”
A tribunal hired to investigate a widespread cheating scandal among Atlanta Public School teachers and administrators is recommending that the school board fire Smith by not renewing her contract. She was a fifth-grade teacher at Dobbs Elementary School, and is one of about 180 Atlanta educators accused of various improprieties related to the administration of state exams — including erasing wrong answers on students’ multiple choice exams and replacing them with correct ones.
Dobbs fourth grade teacher Schajuan Jones taught in a classroom across from Smith, the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports. Jones testified during the hearing that she had overheard Smith speaking with a teacher in the hallway about administering a test for her students.
“The words were, ‘I had to give your kids, or your students, the answers because they’re dumb as hell,'” Jones said.
Click on the link to read Standardized Tests for Teachers!
Click on the link to read Oops, We Seem to Have Lost Your Exams
Click on the link to read I’m Just Gonna Say It: Standardised Tests Suck!
Click on the link to read Too Many Tests, Not Enough Teaching
Tags:Atlanta Cheating Scandal, Atlanta Journal Constitution, Atlanta math teacher Shayla Smith, Cheating Teachers, Dobbs Elementary School, Dobbs Elementary School cheating, Education, heating scandal among Atlanta Public School, I had to give your kids, or your students, recommending that the school board fire cheating teacher, Schajuan Jones, Shayla Smith accused of giving students answers to state exams, Shayla Smith dumb as hell, Standardized Testing, Superintendent Erroll Davis, Teacher excuse for cheating, Teacher Fired, the answers because they're dumb as hell
Posted in Professional Conduct, Standardised Testing | 1 Comment »
August 30, 2012
Courtesy of funny.com:
1. They’re always ringing the bell before I get there.
2. I saw a sign that read “School Ahead. Go Slow.”, so I did.
3. My watch was set to Tokyo time.4. I had to feed my pet piranha.
5. My alarm clock kept going off while I was asleep.
6. Sorry–usually my punctuation skills are excellent.
7. I was dreaming about a basketball ball game, and it went into overtime.
8. I’m on time–everyone else is early.
9. I told you if I wasn’t here, you should go ahead and start without me.
10. What? I thought this place was open until three thirty!
Click on the link to read Who Said Grammar Isn’t Important?
Click on the link to read Why Spelling is Important
Click on the link to read 2 Kids Outsmart 3 Robbers
Click on the link to read the 100 Skills Parents Should Teach Their Children
Tags:Comedy, Education, Funny, Funny Excuses, Funny Excuses for being late, Funny Excuses for Lateness, Humor
Posted in Education Matters | Leave a Comment »
August 29, 2012
I love the idea of cartwheel and somersault friendly schools. I want to do something similar at my school:
ONE Victorian school is defying the national trend to ban activities like cartwheels in the schoolyard saying concerns over safety are “overkill”.
Belmont Primary School in Geelong has declared itself a cartwheel and handstand friendly zone, according to The Geelong Advertiser.
Principal Mark Arkinstall described the recent ban on cartwheels at one Sydney primary school, which can only be performed under the direct supervision of a trained gymnastics teacher, as “ridiculous”. He said concerns about the safety of children was just “overkill”.
“It seems to be a bit silly, you’d never get out of bed in the morning if you took that attitude,” Mr Arkinstall said.
“We’ve never even thought of it (a ban). All kids need to be developed, not just academically but socially, emotionally and physically,” he said.
Mr Arkinstall’s comments come on the back of a series of bans on cartwheels, tiggy, high fives and hugging which top the list of activities outlawed by overzealous Australian schools during the past few years.
Let’s revisit some school bans from the last 12 months:
Click on the link to read Banning Home-Made Lunches is a Dreadful Policy
Tags:Armadale Primar, Belgian Gardens State School, Belmont Primary School in Geelong, cartwheel and handstand friendly zone, cartwheel and somersault friendly schools, cartwheels in the schoolyard, Drummoyne Public School, Education, Gail Charlier, Largs Bay Primary School, New Farm State School, Principal Mark Arkinstall, recent ban on cartwheels at one Sydney primary school, school bans, Special Education, William Duncan State School
Posted in School Rules | Leave a Comment »
August 29, 2012
I have argued, and will continue to argue that teachers who have sexual relations with their students should be sent to prison. It is a terrible breach of trust and must be stamped out.
But our courts don’t seem to want to deter teachers from committing this crime. Time and time again they give out nothing more than a slap on the wrist,
Take the case of a PE teacher who was unrepentant when found to have been involved with his 15-year old student. Did he get a prison sentence?
Nope.
What about the maximum suspension of 5 years?
Nope.
Why not?
The court ruled that he was provided with an “insufficient ethical training.“
A HIGH school physical education teacher who had an intense sexual relationship with a female student has received a softer punishment because of insufficient ethical training.
Queensland’s Civil and Administrative Tribunal has resisted imposing a full five-year suspension on Daniel Kyei, 25, despite the teacher expressing little remorse for the 19-month affair, which began with kissing and sexually charged text messages when the girl was only 15.
Mr Kyei admitted arranging sexual encounters with the girl around her 16th birthday in December 2010, which took place at the teacher’s home, at school during school hours, by webcam on the internet and at a park near Mr Kyei’s Brisbane home.
The Queensland College of Teachers lobbied the tribunal to impose a five-year suspension on the man, but the tribunal argued there were “mitigating factors” and suspended him for three years only.
“These include Mr Kyei’s youth and inexperience as a teacher combined with an apparent lack of practical support and ethical training provided to him, and his co-operation with . . . this disciplinary action,” the tribunal said on Monday.
“He has not expressed in his submissions to QCAT any remorse for the impact that his conduct may have had on (the student) or any regret over his conduct. However, in the course of interviews during the investigation . . . he acknowledged that his actions are ‘inexcusable’.”
Mr Kyei taught the girl in Year 9 in 2009 and Year 10 in 2010 at a Christian-affiliated school in suburban Brisbane.
This story makes me so angry!
Click on the link to read Child Commits Suicide Due to Alleged Systematic Bullying and Inept Teachers
Click on the link to read The Cure for Suicide Isn’t Another Educational Program
Click on the link to read Sick Teachers Need to be Arrested not Fired!
Tags:Daniel Kyei, Education, HIGH school physical education teacher who had an intense sexual relationship with a female student, insufficient ethical training, Lenient Punishments for Teachers Who Have Sex With Under-Aged Students, PE teacher sex with student, QCAT, Queensland's Civil and Administrative Tribunal, teacher arranging sexual encounters with the girl, The Queensland College of Teachers, ttle remorse for the 19-month affair
Posted in Professional Conduct | Leave a Comment »
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