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Every stop is a story - Darwin to Adelaide River

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  Every stop is a story - Darwin to Adelaide River The Adelaide River Rupture (image to be uploaded - subscribe to be notified) The storm did not break over the Adelaide River plains; rather, reality tore open along the track. To the left, the familiar Top End landscape clung fiercely to its quiet melancholy. A lone gum tree stood sentinel over the charred scrub and dry earth, its leaves catching the last bruised light of a brooding wet-season sky. In the hollow below, the old fictional homestead crouched beside the rutted dirt road, enduring the heavy stillness that always settles before the atmosphere ruptures. Then came the tear. It began not with thunder, but with an overwhelming, luminous heat that shredded the grey overcast into molten ribbons. You could feel the vortex of raw energy sweeping through radiant ambers, searing cadmium oranges, and blinding celestial whites. The vortex descended like a folded dimension brushing against the earth. Where the atmospheric rift touch...
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Being too Busy to Think

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The BIG Issue: Exhausted Teachers cannot reform For so many reasons most teachers I talk to say that they are busy. Busier year after year.   Burnout Burnout often affects people in helping professions: lawyers, doctors, social workers, managers and teachers, among others. For teachers, working with students means constantly trying to respond to their needs while simultaneously meeting the various demands of the organisation. When teachers feel that there is a mismatch between all these demands and the available resources they have for coping with them, stress is induced. The usual culprits mentioned are: lack of time, ideas, materials, expertise and support. https://goo.gl/k8vzJY This is not unusual Almost half of new teachers leave the profession in their first year because of an excessive workload and 'exhausted and stressed colleagues', a union leader has warned. The number has tripled in six years, according to an analysis of figures by the Association of...
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Reform failure & Classrooms

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Reform Failure & Classroom: The Matrix ‘... it is more difficult to find evidence that classrooms have improved or even fundamentally changed as a result of the many reform initiatives; and indeed the persistent failure of educational change is a common theme in the literature (Sarason 1990, Fullan 1993, Cuban 1998, Spillane 1999) (Wallace 2011). You take the   blue pill , the story ends. You stay the same apathetic you You take the   red pill ,  the story begins. You transform with stimulation Blue pill : 7 Stages of Change Inertia       Red pill : 7 Stages of Change Behaviour I don’t know: Ignorance I don’t want to know: Rejection I can’t: Inability It won’t work: Pessimism It’s too hard: Complication I couldn’t be bothered: Apathy I’ll get them back: Undermine I know I should: Knowledge I want to: Desire I can: Skills It’s worthwhile: Optimism It’s easy:...
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PISA and Education Reform.

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PISA and Education Reform. This ABC Hindsight program discusses why Finland reformed its education system in the 1970s. http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/rearvision/finland-the-real-education-revolution/4228418 Pasi  Sahlburg, a former director of Education in Finland discusses  how Finland has achieved success and the important role of teacher quality and teacher training. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hf65Z_gqH1U This is an excellent discussion, as it covers the purpose of change and the strategic processes employed to gain achievement. The discussion also highlights the need of countries to make reform . PISA is a reflective tool which countries can validate against and use to make reform . Australia is different  to  Finland and as this discussion implicitly identifies – as the world changes nations need to reform their approach to education. It could be that Finland got it right for an era the Industrial era (which the PISA testing m...
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