Lava Lamps and Scholarships
In the third week of the school year, Chris and Gena explored the new year as a fresh start, including Chris' newly 'upgraded' classroom (complete with LEDs and a lava lamp). The conversation shifted to celebrating Gena's outstanding achievement of three English...
AI has no place in a boys' English classroom
We may be in the minority, but Bags and Chris are in full accord on this one: AI is going to do untold damage to boys' learning in English. Only this week, articles in the Christchurch Press Number of illiterate uni students ‘at crisis level’ and the Otago Daily Times...
Good Chat
Bags explores how she creates rich discussion in her English classroom.
Push Through the Tears
Bags relays an experience she had recently with a student who was struggling to speak in front of the class and then Chris grabs the microphone and talks for too long in order to attempt to explain how Grammar for Writing actually works in the context of a Year 9...
Patterns and Cognitive Overload
Bags and Chris come out of their respective closets for Pride week and we discuss how setting up patterns in the classroom accelerates boys' learning.
The Conference
So we succeeded at putting on a conference that focussed our attention on Teaching Boys English, and by all accounts it was a real success. Gena and Chris chat about the messages of the event - including a few reasonably contentious points of view - until we were...
Research in Action: Presentation to ResearchEd 2013
Agency through Authenticity
Presentation to the #i2ipartnership teachmeet, held on 24 October 2013
What I do when the Government isn't watching.
An intrepid group of educators are headed off to Brighton to run a teachmeet on the fringes of the Labour Party conference, here is part of my contribution to the event - I'll upload the full speech after the event. The presentations in full will all be available on...