Constructive criticism

What is the difference between you are not good enough and there are certain elements that need improving.

Words and deeds

This week has seen things said and done that have a dramatic impact on people without the person that has said the things realising that the meaning may have been misunderstood. Positive praise of people young and old has such an impact. The old saying sticks and stones doesn't take into account the emotive side of meaning or how it can be taken.
At the beginning of Last week I demoralised a group of students with my words and my intention was to try and get pupils to realise and attempt their potential. This week I lost all confidence in a peer that totally demoralised me.
The peer is well experienced and should have chosen better words. We are all learners and at times we forget!

Is Maths really necessary?

The International Baccalaureate has three different levels of Mathematics that form part of the course. Mathematical studies, Mathematics standard level and Mathematics Higher Level. So why do we spend 12 years of our lives being forced to learn about areas of mathematics that we will never use in our day to day lives?
A large number of Degree courses require a student to have an A'level in mathematics that will probably have no bearing on the course that they actually end up studying or the career that they end up per suing. Why does a student that will end up running their own beauty business need to know how to transform a shape with vectors or indeed that Pythagoras theorem works only for right angled triangles? Why doesn't Maths follow a similar idea to the IB and have a different levels that take into account the fact that some people will not need to use complicated mathematics in their every day life rather than create an ever growing number of people who will for evermore say that they were rubbish at maths and believe that there is no real need for the subject in their everyday lives or that of their children.
"Maths for life" rather than giving people a grade that isn't a "C" or above and make them feel as though they have failed in a subject that's content is too vast.

First blog

The first Friday blog written on a Saturday. Well at least it is being written. It has been a strange transition. Looking after a group of really bright people that are amazingly keen to learn and absorb information like a sponge. Then looking after a group that don't want to learn. They are keen to learn about life without looking at some of the important things that they need to do. People are not sure about learning about being a child before being a grown up. Social networking has a lot to answer for.