These days, few education secretaries of state are content with doing a good job, deeming it more important to leave on the system their indelible mark. To this lamppost tendency Nicky Morgan appears to be no exception. Her wheeze, and it’s a biggish one, is to make Britain ‘a global leader in teaching character and resilience. Robin Alexander analyses the new look drive of character education. Read more
Katherine Long can’t remember the actual moment when her wonder in her son’s ability and love of learning turned into a worry. Or when she started losing confidence in herself and her parenting, and faced every school meeting trying to hold it together. Have we forgotten about the wider problem of bullying in the DfE mission against homophobic bullying? Read more
It is probably true that: When we describe and aim for a preferred future, understand what matters, and when we are fanatically disciplined and deliberate in delivering the few things that really matter…we bring new light to what life might be. … and achieve unusually well. A thoughtful analysis of strategic leadership. Read more
A new school curriculum ordered by the Education Secretary Nicky Morgan after the Trojan Horse scandal could lead to a plunge in the numbers of pupils taking Religious Studies. Fiona Boulton, head of Guildford High School in Surrey, said there was increasing distress among teachers about the new GCSE course which could dramatically reduce the opportunity for pupils to engage in moral and ethical debates. Read more
Children should not be wrapped in cotton wool and must be allowed to play, fall over and hurt themselves, the head of the Health and Safety Executive has insisted. Despite the organisation’s reputation for promoting a risk-averse society, the chairman of the HSE, Judith Hackett, said it was not good for society to overprotect young people as they would become risk naive later in life. Read more
For too long, Ofsted along with other government agencies and an endless queue of educational journalists, academics, do-gooders and social engineers seem to be hell-bent on informing children about issues that they are neither intellectually, physically or emotionally equipped to handle. While we can’t shelter children from the ugly excesses of the world, we should make sure that the knowledge they are given is age appropriate, otherwise we are destroying childhood innocence. Read more
Is the British values agenda a sledgehammer to crack the Muslim fundamentalism issue or a timely reminded to consider what you teach? Here’s what some ethnically diverse independent schools think about teaching British values. Read more
Rowan Williams, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, is leading a drive to have humanism included in the new RE curriculum alongside major religions. He is among almost 30 clerics and academics from four faiths who have written to the schools minister Nick Gibb pressing for humanist ideas to be offered as an option in new GCSE and A-level courses. Read more