Monthly Archives: November 2007

“In a statement the company said: “This is not about money, this is about doing the right thing for the people of Hull, which is why Yorkshire Water will not be paying out compensation.” BBC

Children learn to read too early Children are too young to learn to read when they first start school in the UK, an academic claims. Pushing reception pupils too hard could put them off for life, especially boys, says Professor … Continue reading →

Cult show Survivors to be remade I seem to recall that you didn’t like the idea one little bit!

Beware, this is a long post. It may even turn into a series of posts. Or should that be rants? David Cameron is really enamoured of those swedish schools. They’re in his green paper: Fifteen years ago, the Swedish government … Continue reading →

Swedish model of ‘free schools’ “the Lundquists decided on a route currently not available to most British parents – they actually set up a brand new state school themselves with other local parents and helped run it just how they … Continue reading →

Have a great day today, celebrating the feast day of England’s patron saint, St Edmund The Martyr  

Small wants a new nickname. Tim has been trying to persuade him that we could call him Yoda (he does have this habit of saying things like “Strange is it” you see) while when I went up to kiss him … Continue reading →

Or is it just in the way it’s being presented by the timesonline? Right at the moment if you go to their education section you will find that headline no 1 is Tories want reading tests for 6-year-olds while headline … Continue reading →

Small *likes* digital comics. He was waiting for me to come down today as the bit of paper with his name and password on had been mysteriously cleared away from beside the puter so he couldn’t sign in without me. … Continue reading →

…. Batman! In a move of unusual intelligence, the BBC has started airing the original 1960s series of Batman. In a move of unusual stupidity, they have put it on in the middle of the night on BBC3. So we … Continue reading →

Yes it’s that time of year, again, already. Noobs may want to find out what I am on about by reading this informative collection of posts from RC2006 Once again we are offering runners up prizes of special “Buy Anything … Continue reading →

Tim and I both snoozed til 11, then he got up and left me to snooze some more. Don’t know why we both needed so much sleep, I don’t think we were particularly late to bed after CSI watching last … Continue reading →

“Look at Britain today and you see a blighted land, its atomised culture diluted by outside influences, its people resentful and divided. But who would blame a whipped dog for howling? The fact is, these islands are suffering from a … Continue reading →

From Times Comment Central “We’ve had coming on to 2,000 motto idea submitted since we first called for entries. This is a symbol, I feel, of the national enthusiasm for Gordon Brown’s brilliant idea that we urgently need a national … Continue reading →

The eventual aim is to feed GM-enhanced oils to animals such as chickens and cattle, to produce omega 3 enriched meat, milk and eggs. This would provide a sustainable source of fish oil amid concern over dwindling fish stocks. “The … Continue reading →

in the guardian: Ten years of bold education boasts now look sadly hollow Even more fascinating comment thread. So, home educators, are there any ways that schools could be changed in such a way that you would consider using them … Continue reading →

Go and read it, you won’t believe me if I tell you about it. What can I say, West Yorkshire police appear to be even more dangerously incompetent than the Met.

77% Geek ps if you take this quiz, you might want to remove the advert before you post the code to your blog. (pps ought to get an extra couple % for noticing that, didn’t I?) HT Andrea

this morning, Small very much wanted to tell me about seeing spiderman shrink to the size of Holly. I upset him as I was trying to chivvy him out of the house into the car at the time, and he … Continue reading →

‘Super-size’ secondary schools should be broken up into smaller units, says a report from a charity that fast-tracks graduates into teaching. bbc Hurrah! A sensible suggestion about ridiculously large schools. Tried to bypass the nasty bit of the M1 this … Continue reading →