05.15.09
Posted in Psychology at 10:23 am by sharkey
Chris Parry was the former Head of the Independent Schools Council and a former rear admiral. He got into trouble for talking about indiscipline in state schools (see below).
It is disappointing that your article reporting my thoughts on state schools did not reflect fully and clearly the views I expressed during the interview (Private school chief: some state school pupils are unteachable, May 31). I have said repeatedly that I have unconditional praise and admiration for the achievements of teachers and pupils in the maintained sector, despite the fact that, in some cases, they have to work in extremely challenging circumstances.
For me, his comments on downloading info directly into the brain are more interesting. Justifiably he then spoke about the teachers role as assisting the students in applying the information (info becomes knowledge given context). What was so wrong with this?
Remembrance of things past (to coin a phrase) depends on encoding. Understanding depends on social interaction, the two overlap and are not independent. Info downloaded will be as inaccessible as those friday morning lectures that allowed you to sleep off your hangover at University. Long term memory is active in encoding, long term memory – with all its emotional tagging, is developed through social interaction, our own narratives do not come into existence so that we can tell ourselves a story. It is surpprising that somebody in a senior position in education does not first check his views against research in cognitive psychology .
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Posted in Politics at 9:24 am by sharkey
In 1858 the Thames was horrendously polluted with human waste
……There was no escape for the newly built House of Commons. Sheets soaked in chloride of lime were hung from windows to try to blot out the smell, and plans were made to move the House out of London.
I remember Tommy Sheridan commenting on this one year and using it as an analogy, he said the sheets should be put back on to stop the smell coming out. With the current exposee of fiddling this comment is apt again. The days of there being a Worker s MP on a Worker’s Wage seems very long ago. RIP Terry Fields.
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Posted in Uncategorized at 8:48 am by sharkey
The 25th of May is International Missing Children’s Day
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6691503.stm
I hope that the coverage goes beyond the individual case and looks at the type of children who are vunerable, those in the care system who can dissapear with very little media attention.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8036070.stm
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Posted in Uncategorized at 7:02 am by sharkey
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