Category Archives: Education
Is a teacher’s knowledge tacit or just uncomfortable?
The following is a response to a post by Carl Hendrick, an educator who writes about education theory and practice. ………………… I enjoyed another thought-provoking and thoughtful post, Carl! In terms of tacit knowledge, however, I don’t believe that most of what we know is tacit. I think, in fact, that much of what we […]
The Politics of Curriculum
Tonight a parent on social media asked if teachers were concerned about the BCTF’s collaboration with the government regarding BC’s new curriculum. Here’s my response: As a secondary teacher, I can tell you that many, many teachers disagree fundamentally with the direction of this new curriculum. We don’t feel there has been much substantive input, […]
The Basic #BCEd Statistics
The debate over public education in British Columbia is often a heated struggle of ideologies and partisan beliefs. Thankfully, Statistics Canada has published some helpful data in a publication called “Summary Elementary and Secondary School Indicators for Canada, the Provinces and Territories, 2006/2007 to 2010/2011”. [Unfortunately, no newer comparative evidence exists, but the publication is due to be updated next […]
Reforming BC’s Scholarship Program?
The BC government recently stopped accepting online submissions to its review of the BC scholarship program, but I had a chance to reply before it closed. The rationale for the review was well stocked with the 21st century jargon that Ministry of Education apparatchiks so adore: British Columbia has one of the best education systems in the world. […]
The Phoniness of BC’s Teacher “Surplus” [Updated]
By 2008, an anticipated shortage of teachers in BC had disappeared. In a National Post article, the change seemed almost inexplicable: “My sense is that there are more teachers than we need in a couple of subject areas,” said Marie Crowther, registrar for the B.C. College of Teachers. “Overall the anticipated shortage hasn’t materialized and from my […]
The False Argument of Equivalence
Mike Smyth’s Sunday editorial [Ed. The link is no longer available.] is a classic example of BC’s mainstream corporate media once again spinning the narrative of equivalence with regard to BC’s education system. We’ve seen it for years from mainstream commentators like Keith Baldrey, Jon Ferry and Tom Fletcher. [Les Leyne of the Times-Colonist is a recent […]
A Review of Tom Bennett’s Teacher Proof
[D]on’t let the fashions crush you. And so many of them are so, so very bad. The thrill of innovation, the desire for simple answers, and the mistaken belief that educational research will shine a guiding light to a smarter, more efficient system, has proven the undoing of us, and will undermine us further if […]
Reflections on a 21st Century School
I recently had the opportunity to spend a day at Thomas Haney Secondary School in Maple Ridge, BC. The school is known for its commitment to flexible, personalized, learn-at-your-own-pace education, and is touted by many as an exemplar of progressive pedagogy. As a teacher curious about the phenomenon of “21st century learning”, but also a little […]
Let’s Hope High School Won’t Be Your “Glory Days”
After another day of classes, and another round of adolescent glowering and truculence, I am reminded of Springsteen’s classic, “Glory Days”. Nobody said it so well: let’s hope your years in high school won’t be your glory days. If they are, then the rest of your life will be a big disappointment! One of the most […]
Presumptuousness in Education
Here’s a comment I made today on Scott McLeod’s progressive education blog, Dangerously Irrelevant. My response is to his question, “When will we view educators that opt out of the use of social media for professional learning as an aberration rather than the norm?” ______ As someone who embraces many social media technologies but who […]