MaternityYesterday's G2 supplement in the Guardian was dedicated to a survey of how well employers treat parents who are expecting or already have young children. It contained a series of useful articles which also covered topics such as legal issues, case studies, and a glossary of useful terms. All of the …
Revisiting KindergartenMost of my presentations and workshops in the past two years have been dealing with preschool settings and teachers. I have been preparing to talk to kindergarten teachers in Houston this week and it has been fun to revisit much of my kindergarten training materials. I spent a big chunk of my teac…
PlaydayWednesday 1st August is the 20th annual Playday, a celebration of children's right to play. To mark the event, Play England have commissioned no less than four separate pieces of research which can all be accessed in full via this link. Some of the media have picked up on a statistic from one of the…
Something For EveryoneIt looks like the new DCSF has hit the ground running - it's only been in existence for a month but already a steady stream of reports have emerged from the new government department (though in fairness, these would have originally been commissioned by the old DfES).I get a lot of enquiries from stu…
StatisticsLast week saw the release of 2007's Annual Abstract of Statistics. As the title suggests, this is a yearly publication which rounds up a mass of detailed statistics about the UK. The chapters on education, health and social protection should be especially useful to students within the School of Chil…
More Google Tips / PDFsYou may have noticed that most of the links on this blog link to pages which don't look or feel quite like normal web pages; instead, they look like digital versions of a printed document, with individual pages that you can flick through. In fact, most of these documents are known as PDF files, and …
Teenage PregnancyLast Thursday the government launched a new strategy to help young families deal with the demands of parenthood. Teenage Parents Next Steps is a document aimed at Local Authorities and Primary Care Trusts which takes a holistic view of this issue and looks at how support services can be effectively …
Drugs and ChildrenWith cabinet members seemingly falling over themselves to own up to smoking cannabis during their University days, it seems an appropriate time to investigate some of the research that is available with regards to drug use among children and young people.A good introduction is provided by Pathways t…
Tackling Educational EqualitySelf-styled "liberal think tank" CentreForum has just published a report on poorly-performing pupils in the UK. Tackling Educational Inequality suggests that one method of tackling this issue could be to offer generous bonuses to the salaries of teachers who are prepared to work in schools that are …
Child Proofing the YardLast year we purchased a home built in 1919. We gutted the home and worked hard to renovate the entire inside (we did most of the work). This summer it is the yard that needs our attention. The 100+ temperatures, however, have narrowed our working time outside. We are redoing a pond and waterfal…
Poverty & Public AttitudesIs it just me, or has the subject of poverty become the defining issue of recent years? Hardly a week seems to go by without the appearance of a new detailed study of the topic; now the Joseph Rowntree Foundation has simultaneously published two reports which take very different approaches in sheddi…
Summer HolidaysAh, summer holidays... a never-ending golden age of football in the park, hours on the beach, tree-climbing, days out... or so it seemed to me. Yet a story from the BBC states that children in England and Wales are the unluckiest in Europe when it comes to time off from school. What's more, many of …
Turn Off The TV!Once again television is getting bad press over the negative effect that it can have on children. This blog has explored this topic before (see Children & The Media) but now a new report from the National Consumer Council argues that, among other things, too much television watching for 9-13 year ol…
Ofsted Gets Ofsted-edTeachers who live in fear of Ofsted visits may be pleased to hear that the inspections body is itself the subject of criticism. A new report from the House of Commons Education and Skills Committee has questioned whether the new powers that Ofsted adopted in April have had an impact on its ability t…
OnTheWebI've recently received the latest monthly issue of NFER's OnTheWeb (see this previous post for details). This month's edition seems to be a particularly useful one, with a number of links to reports that students and staff alike should find useful. Some of the highlights include information on gifte…
Perpetual MotionI was reminded this past week about how much attention an infant or toddler demands. My California grandchildren were staying with me for a week. My 11 month-old granddaughter is a study in perpetual motion. She doesn't stop unless she is asleep. She has been walking for a month so she is unstoppabl…
Boys vs Girls - Gender Wars; Get Involved!Once again the issue of gender is in the news, following the publication of a new government report entitled Gender and Education: the Evidence on Pupils in England. The media have mainly picked up on the report's observation that recruiting more male teachers will not necessarily result in improved…
PhilosophyThink about seven-year-olds learning at school and what comes to mind? Lessons on literacy or numeracy? Simple ICT skills? How does a discussion about a puzzle devised by the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus grab you?Strange as it sounds, the idea of introducing philosophy for seven-year-olds or…
Think FamilyAs it seems that virtually every government post has either changed hands or been turned into something completely different in the past few days, it's hard to know where this leaves any initiatives or reports that were launched shortly before the change of Prime Minister. Nevertheless, a couple of …
Children's Mental HealthLast week the Times published the results of an investigation into children's mental health issues, with a specific focus on depression. If you're interested in these topics, the articles entitled Young and Desperate and Is my Child Depressed? are still currently available to read in full from the n…