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The Unlocking the World community is the perfect place to ask questions, discuss ideas and exchange information with other teachers and our program consultants.
Wellington College head: 'Schools becoming exam factories'
October 31, 2011
The head of a private school in Berkshire has said the government's education targets are turning schools into "exam factories".
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-15273028
Exceptional teachers for disadvantaged schools
August 11, 2011
Exceptional teachers for disadvantaged schools
Jo Lampert, Bruce Burnett, Curriculum Leadership, 5 August 2011
The Exceptional Teachers for Disadvantaged Schools (ETDS) project is an innovative way to prepare high-quality teachers for employment in low-SES schools. The program, based at Queensland University of Technology (QUT), offers a specialised curriculum, designed to equip high-achieving pre-service teachers for work in the schools that need them most.
Selected pre-service teachers at QUT are invited to take part in the trial course, based on their academic performance over the first two years of their four-year Bachelor of Education degree, and on a demonstrated commitment to social justice. These participants undertake a modified version of QUT's B Ed on-campus curriculum. They have their practicum/field experience at one of a range of disadvantaged schools throughout Queensland which have agreed to partner with QUT in the program.
In the past, teacher education for disadvantaged schools has been described as applying a 'missionary' or deficit model (Larabee, 2010; Comber and Kamler, 2004; Flessa, 2007). The principals of schools participating in the ETDS react strongly against such an approach, and have explicitly asked project staff not to send them anyone who 'thinks they can save the world'. The ETDS project has moved well away from such a model, towards a position that is explicitly centred on notions of academic excellence.
The project is now at the end of its first trial year.
Read more: http://www.curriculum.edu.au/leader/default.asp?id=33544&issueID=12442
Dr Jo Lampert and Dr Bruce Burnett are senior lecturers in the Faculty of Education, Queensland University of Technology.
Committing to the toughest teaching gig in the country
June 23, 2011
And it was the day only one child turned up. While the eager student sat alone in the classroom, the half-dozen teachers at the school sat in the staffroom, chatting and drinking cups of tea. Why didn't at least one of them teach the only student? "We didn't see the point," was the attitude.
So why would that child bother coming to school the following day, or ever again?
The teachers have since left, and an overhaul of the selection process in the past year means fewer teachers with that mindset remain in the system.
Gone are the days when the Territory government tried to entice teachers to remote schools by promising a great lifestyle, an adventure fit for a series of Survivor or a working holiday. One of the first reforms made by Education Department chief executive Gary Barnes when he arrived in Darwin about two years ago was to change the way the department recruits teachers for its 86 very remote communities.