Here is another collection of links to the latest education news stories:

• SATs for 11 year olds have too high a margin of error to be used to compare schools in league tables, according to the NUT and ATL, who have urged the government to scrap the tests for Year 6 pupils. The leader of the NUT has given hints that there could be another boycott of the SATs next year, although more notice would be given this time around.
• Trade Unions were outraged by the £200,000 pay package of a primary headteacher in south London. Michael Gove has written to the School Teachers’ Review Body to say that he wanted no headteacher to earn more than the prime minister. The TES have published a related article which explains that rocketing headteacher salaries are justified by the ‘mammoth pay packets of singers and footballing megastars’.

Image – Decus Et Tutamen

• Michael Gove has also published the Department for Education’s key policy commitments and invited the public to hold them to account on delivery.
• The chairman of Ofsted has explained that it is not ‘an absolute disaster’ if schools contain bad teachers.
• The scrapping of school building plans has cost education authorities at least £160m, according to the Local Government Association.
• Empty shops could be converted into schools, saving a third of the cost of starting a new building. Meanwhile, a report from the Auditor General for Wales has said that that school buildings in Wales are in a poor state and there is a long way to go before all of them will be ‘fit for purpose’.
• Reforms that will allow every school to become an academy will be rushed through at a pace usually reserved for emergencies such as anti-terror legislation. However, the Director of Education at Civitas has explained that academies are failing to teach traditional subjects in favour of less challenging qualifications in an effort to drive up results.
• Students will have to pay more for university, possibly through a graduate tax, according to the Business Secretary Vince Cable. University students will also be able to take low-cost two-year degree courses in order to save time and money before entering the world of work.
• Thousands of people could miss out on a university place in the UK this year after 660,953 people applied to start full-time undergraduate courses. The Lecturers Union fears that up to 170,000 people could be disappointed.

Image – Graduation Cake Guy

• The debate about school lunches continues as the chairman of the School Food Trust has criticised parents for filling children’s packed lunches with junk food.
• A Scottish government pledge that all school children receive two hours of physical education a week is not being met, according to new figures.
• A group of primary school children have been honoured by the Royal Society of Chemistry for disproving the theory that spiders are afraid of conkers.
• Do you want to get your children more interested in Maths? Why not find out more about the maths buskers who want to communicate the wonder of maths to people in the street!

Here’s a round-up of this week’s education-related news stories:

• Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Education, prepared a written ministerial statement on education spending. In his budget statement, George Osbourne, warned that education spending in England could be cut by as much as 25% over the next four years.
• The chair of Ofsted has resigned, fuelling speculation that ministers plan significant changes at the organisation.
• An announcement is expected next week about the future of the Building Schools for the Future scheme.
• The number of primary aged children is expected to rise by 13.5% by 2018, putting pressure on schools and education budgets. The proportion of 16 to 18 year olds at school, college or in training reached its highest ever level last year.

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• Parents want more advice about how to prepare healthier lunch boxes, rather than having schools tell them what they can and cannot put in them.
• A coalition of senior doctors and nurses have written to Michael Gove, expressing ‘deep concern’ at his decision to axe plans for free school meals for half a million primary school children from low income families.
• A leading headteacher says that more effort should be boosting results among the most able pupils, rather than concentrating on the drive to raise standards to a minimum threshold.
• The National Governors Association is telling its members to be cautious about becoming an academy. The government has also released a list of schools that have asked about becoming an academy.
• A study has shown that the free schools model in Sweden has not significantly improved pupils’ academic achievement.
• Students and staff at 100 UK colleges and universities are protesting against funding cuts in further, higher and adult education.
• An experienced headteacher has been suspended after allegedly making comments about a pupil.
• A report from the Telegraph finds out about schools who are taking part in a range of ‘eco’ activities, including recycling, reducing waste and growing vegetables.

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• Sir Tom Stoppard believes that books are being left behind as an increasing amount of young people’s time is spent focusing on ‘the moving image’.
• It was also claimed that access to PCs and high-speed broadband can lead to a decline in test scores among young people.
• Atmosphir has left their ‘beta’ stage and offers free games based learning opportunities for schools. Thanks to Kevin McLaughlin for spotting this and sharing it on Twitter. Find out more about Atmosphir in the video below:

Nominations for the next set of Teaching Awards are now open and any teacher or pupil who makes a nomination will be entered into a prize draw.

www.teachingawards.com/matilda

Teachers can win a class trip to see the Royal Shakespeare Company’s production of ‘Roald Dahl’s Matilda, A Musical’, plus an RSC Education workshop. Pupils who make a nomination could win one of 25 Roald Dahl goody bags. Is there someone at your school who you could reward by making a nomination?

Research by Samaritans shows that the pressure to achieve high marks is one of the biggest worries for nearly a third (30%) of young people aged 18-24. Exams can bring a whirlwind of emotions from panic and fear of failure to anxiety about the future, and students need to know they are not alone.

They may require a wealth of assistance but may not always feel they can approach members of staff at school. It’s therefore important that they know all school staff are there if needed.  The personal experience of education staff can be of great encouragement and comfort to those who are struggling.

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If you are worried about any of your students or they come to you for advice then youth mental health expert, Dr Mike Shooter has some useful points to remember: helping your students to prepare well in advance is key. Plan a session where you work through a revision plan together, making sure it is broken into manageable chunks; and encourage them to keep things in perspective. While we should remember the importance of exams, failure is not the end of the world and they are not their only chances at success in life.

Teachers and other education staff who want to join in a discussion on how they can support their students, can log onto a live webTV show where Dr Mike Shooter and student Edel Buggy (who did her A-levels last year) will be offering their advice and support.

Join them live online at www.studiotalk.tv on Thursday 27^th May at 7pm to discuss exam stress.

The Health and Safety Executive is running a new campaign to reduce slips, trips and falls in the workplace. Throughout 2008-2009, across the Education sector in the UK, there were 948 major injuries and a further 1865 that resulted in workers having to take more than three days off work as a result of slips, trips and falls – resulting in costs in excess of £60million.

In response, the HSE has launched a new phase of its Shattered Lives campaign. As part of this, people can visit the Shattered Lives website for practical advice and guidance.

www.hse.gov.uk/shatteredlives

On the website, people can find out information on how they can easily reduce the risk of slips, trips and falls in the classroom and see what other organisations have done.  Advice ranges from how to deal with spills and other slip risks, to the importance of using ladders correctly to reduce the risk of falling from height.

I have recently been sent an email about a petition to reduce excessive paperwork in schools…

“We are a Primary School in Cambridgeshire whose Head teacher outreaches to many other schools in the locality and beyond. For many years he has been involved in a mentoring/coaching role with other heads and has been appalled at the amount of teachers/head teachers who are going through emotional trauma due to the amount of paperwork and bureaucracy involved in education today. Having previously spoken to Tony Blair about the state of the education system, he has recently visited Westminster once again to voice these issues on behalf of educators everywhere.

Image – Closing

He is very concerned about the effect that this bureaucracy is having on people’s professional and personal lives, having been told by many excellent heads that it is their reason for leaving education!

The time taken away from teachers being able to teach our children and costs involved in these excesses of bureaucracy are staggering and therefore we feel it is relevant for parents to also be involved in our protest.

We have recently produced a petition REPAIR (reduce excessive paperwork and irrelevant regulations) (in schools) which has been signed in various ways over 700 times in just a few weeks – as you can see, the comments made echo our Head teachers concerns.”

If you would like to sign the petition online, visit:
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/kbconcepts/signatures

Following on from yesterday’s post about The Little Book of Goodness, here’s another resource linked to food and healthy eating…

National School Meals Week is the biggest national healthy eating awareness week about school meals in Britain. It takes place from 9th to 13th November 2009 with the support of the School Food Trust and ASSIST FM. It encourages everyone to “Get Involved” in promoting healthy school dinners in Primary and Secondary Schools.

The NSMW site offers lots of ideas, resources and activities for schools to use during the week, and throughout the rest of the year too!

How do you feel about having a code of conduct for teachers? The General Teaching Council says that teachers must “maintain reasonable standards in their own behaviour that enable them to uphold public trust and confidence in the profession”.

You can read the Code of Conduct here (PDF).

However, the NASUWT union has started a petition against this, because they feel that it intrudes into teachers’ private lives. Find out more in this article from the Guardian.

What do you think? Is the code of conduct a step too far, or is it something that teachers don’t need to worry about?

Teachers’ TV are offering CPD training workshops to support schools in making the most of Teachers TV as a resource for CPD. Tailored to the needs of different practitioners, the sessions are free and provide an interactive and informative learning environment.

Download this PDF leaflet to discover more or visit the Teachers TV site to find out how to book a session.

By Alistair Owens http://www.keen2learn.co.uk

An essential element of our teaching resources in schools has to focus on renewable energy to achieve the goals we need to survive. As the technology advances we are seeing developments in efficiencies of equipment but also some strident considerations. It seems our quest for wind energy could be misplaced. The real salvation lies with giant mirrors. 

Professor Jack Steinberger, a Director of the CERN particle Physics Laboratory in Geneva and Noble prize winner, advised that wind energy represented an illusionary technology that will prove uneconomic and an ultimate waste of resources. “Wind is not the future” he told fellow Nobel laureates at the Royal Society.

Urging the promotion of solar thermal energy Professor Steinberger stated the world resources of fossil fuels would be depleted in 60 years. Yet 80 per cent of Europe’s energy needs could be generated in the Sahara desert. Using giant parabolic mirrors to focus heat energy to generate steam to drive conventional turbines, the power is virtually pollution free and an exhaustible supply.

Continuing to build wind farms especially offshore will be hugely expensive and need conventional back up to produce energy on windless days. But whilst wind energy is politically free the thought of energy being supplied across many country borders posses a ransom threat. Our gas supplies are becoming more reliant on the supply from Russia. The pipeline crosses other countries and we have already seen supply interruptions due to political arguments upstream. The concentration of our energy in sunnier climes could see a battle royal between the oil rich countries seeking alternatives as their current source of income dries up.

The situation is fascinating, and as the action will take place in  the next 20 – 50 years, it will be our children that will ultimately become the power masters. Strategically we need to ensure their education contains the correct focus. The solutions will be a combination of science, engineering, maths, economics and politics. The developments are highly dynamic and public opinion has yet to be fully swayed.

Professor Sir Harold Kroto a Nobel prize winner in 1996 said a new era of science education is needed.

“There’s is no point in looking for the four horsemen of the Apocalypse in the future. They’re already here, and climate change is only one of them”

Professor Kroto believes the solution to renewable energy is a combination of education to attract good teachers and enthral children, and to change people’s behaviour. He has also been amassing free educational science teaching resources on his website www.geoset.info

As we plan for the future perhaps we can influence  children to take a commercial interest in science. The long run of top flight graduates being lured from vocational aspirations to move into finance could be at a cross roads. The banking crisis has reduced the potential for personal wealth at any odds. The new wealth could move to renewable energy. Now that could attract a whole new tranche of scientists to develop new ways to save the world and maybe become an energy baron.