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2 September 2015
Our August newsletter is now available.
1 August 2015
Many children - and some adults - find it difficult to understand why dividing by 1/2 is the same as multiplying by 2.
Part of the problem maybe with how division is defined. If it is defined as 'sharing', it is straightforward to understand that sharing 6 cakes among 3 people means that each person gets 2 cakes - but how do you share 6 cakes amongst half a person?
Another way of looking at division is ask - for example - how many 3s are there in 6? Following this approach, give the pupils a copy of the following handout and let them follow the logic for themselves.
- When we divide 6 by 3, we are working out how many 3s there are in 6 (2)
- When we divide 6 by 2, we are working out how many 2s there are in 6 (3)
- When we divide 6 by 1, we are working out how many 1s there are in 6 (6)
- When we divide 6 by 1/2, we are working out how many 1/2s there are in 6 (12) which is the same as multiplying 6 by 2
- When we divide 6 by 1/3, we are working out how many 1/3s there are in 6 (18) which is the same as multiplying 6 by 3
- When we divide 6 by 1/4, we are working out how many 1/4s there are in 6 (24) which is the same as multiplying 6 by 4 and so on...
24 July 2015
A BBC team with the help of Newcastle University recruited 30 volunteers, randomly divided them into three groups and asked them to do a particular activity for three hours a week for the next eight weeks.
One group was asked to walk briskly. The second was asked to do puzzles, such as crosswords or Sudoku, and the third group was asked to take part in an art class.
Out of the three, the people attending the art group showed the greatest improvement.
Part of the benefit came from learning a new skill - including psychomotor skills and the group was socially interactive which helps keep the brain sharp.
Source
14 July 2015
Things are remembered together when they are similar, contrast or appear together contiguous. - Aristotle (384??322 B.C.)
10 July 2015
The ways in which university watchdogs protect standards in England, Wales and Northern Ireland face a major overhaul in plans expected this week.
It could mean the end of a regular cycle of university inspections.
There are believed to be proposals for a more 'risk-based' approach, with higher levels of scrutiny for less established institutions. There have also been questions about the future of the current watchdog, the Quality Assurance Agency. The plans for discussion, which will be published this week, will set out major changes in how standards are assessed and monitored in universities.
The plans aim to create a way of ensuring quality at a time of increasing consumer pressure from students and doubts about standards in some new private providers.
An annual survey published this month by the Higher Education Policy Institute showed that less than half of students believed they had had good or very good value for money from their courses. The shake-up is expected to propose different levels of supervision for different parts of the higher education sector. Universities are said to be resistant to a 'one-size-fits-all" monitoring system'.
This could mean that established, mainstream universities would no longer face a cycle of inspections of the kind carried out by the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA). Newer entrants offering higher education courses would face a tougher level of scrutiny. For established universities, there would be a stronger emphasis on student "outcomes" - such as data on the employment record of graduates and information from the National Student Survey.
There would also be a strengthening of the 'external examiner' system, in which experts from other universities are used to check on the quality of degrees being awarded.If there were particular concerns about an institution, there would be a formal, hands-on inspection. It is expected that university governing bodies would have a bigger role in being accountable for quality.
And the plans are expected to 'embed' the idea of a way of measuring the quality of teaching in universities. The Conservatives' election manifesto promised a way of comparing university teaching standards as well as research. The intention is to move towards a regulatory system with a stronger focus on what courses mean for students and employers, rather than monitoring the internal processes of universities.
1 July 2015
Ministers are planning to revive national tests for seven-year-olds in England, according to the Times Educational Supplement.
Currently, Year 2 pupils sit tests in reading, writing, maths and science which are marked by teachers and moderated by local councils. The results of any new tests would be used to hold schools to account on pupils' progress. Teaching unions have already threatened to boycott any new national tests.
Schools Minister Nick Gibb is reported to be considering the proposals as his department gets to grips with how pupil progress is to be measured and recorded now the system of National Curriculum levels has been scrapped. This was the system of checking pupils' year-by-year progress against a set of national expectations.
Pupils are expected to reach two levels of progress between the end of infant school - or Key Stage 1 (KS1) - and the end of primary school, or Key Stage 2 (KS2). Schools are held to account on this through the league tables.
It has been reported that Nick Gibb is looking at the idea of scrapping teacher assessment in KS1 tests entirely in favour of having reported tests because there is a difficulty with using teacher assessment for progress, plus they want to reduce teachers' workload. It has been suggested that progress can't be measured accurately with teacher assessment, and that there are incentives for schools to depress pupils' scores to show progress is being made.
The KS1 national tests for seven-year-olds were scrapped more than a decade ago after complaints that seven, or six in some cases, was too early an age to put children through the stress of external testing.
Any move to bring in national tests for infant pupils would be controversial, as teaching unions have long argued that they skew learning and can set children up to fail in the early years, when youngsters develop at different speeds. The proposal is supported by Ofsted but not by the National Association of Head Teachers and the Association of Teachers and Lecturers.
1 July 2015
Our July newsletter has just been published.
1 July 2015
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