Posts by Mark Taylor
195: Sharpen the new platform for smart note taking
Aidan Whytock is the founder of Sharpen, the new platform for smart note taking. A successful actor and entrepreneur, Aidan has drawn on his background to design a tool specifically for the education sector to provide a revolutionary new way to access and apply learning.
Sharpen fills a real gap in the education landscape for more efficient online collaboration between learners, teachers, and peers. By combining real-time communication with lesson notes that can be recalled and revisited instantly, Sharpen facilitates better, more collaborative peer to peer revision in a personalised and interactive way that effectively takes the user back in time.
Drawing on the proven methodology that learners remember more when multiple senses are stimulated, Sharpen replicates this within the platform, empowering learners to create smart notes to remember more and perform better.
Website
Social Media Information
https://www.facebook.com/sharpennotes
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Xientifica SOS, written by Daniel Phelps, is a unique children’s adventure for young people aged 8-12–adult. It’s ‘Where science meets adventure’. It’s not a science book, it is a children’s adventure novel which has science in it.’
Xientifica SOS provides a perfect platform for discussions and encourages children to ask questions, so is not only ideal for lone-reading or as a class book, but perfect for home schooling too.
Xientifica SOS can be bought on Amazon and is available on Kindle or in paperback
Go to Amazon – or to find out more (and listen to extracts from the book) – go to Xientifica.com (with an X)…X I E N T I F I C A
Homepage: https://xientifica.com/
Twitter @xientifica
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The National Association for Primary Education speaks for young children and all who live and work with them. Get a FREE e-copy of their professional journal at nape.org.uk/journal
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194: Montessori Centre International with Maccs Pescatore
Maccs Pescatore is the CEO of Montessori Centre International (MCI), a leading provider of, and facilitator in the provision of Montessori training and education in the UK and around the world. It provides the sector’s marker of quality assurance through its Standards & Training Accreditation Review (STAR) framework. Resources are made available to parents and carers through its online hub, the Montessori Network.
MCI is part of The Montessori Group, a central hub for Montessori philosophy in the UK.
The Montessori Group also includes Montessori St Nicholas, which carries out social impact programmes and initiatives. In 2020, the charity partnered with Leeds Beckett University to create the International Montessori Institute.
Maccs trained as a Chartered Accountant with Coopers & Lybrand before moving into industry. She spent 13 years with Tate & Lyle Plc and ASR Group in the FMCG sector where she held a variety of senior finance positions in divisions in the UK and Europe.
In recent years, working alongside commercial and operational colleagues, she has combined her passion for business with her affinity for working in changing environments, being instrumental in turning around underperforming businesses, repositioning and moving organisation into new markets.
https://www.montessoritraining.org.uk/
Social Media Information
Twitter: @Maccs_Pesc
www.linkedin.com/in/maccspescatore/
£50,000 for the first year of a scholarship supporting Leeds Beckett Montessori degree students
The International Montessori Institute, a centre within the Carnegie School of Education at Leeds Beckett University (LBU), has launched a scholarship programme to support the next generation of Montessori educators. The Institute was established in August 2020 and will provide the UK’s first dedicated undergraduate and postgraduate courses in Montessori education.
Funded by the Montessori Group, the first scholarships of £2,000 each will be awarded to 25 students who are studying on the BA (Hons) Primary Education Accelerated Degree (Montessori) in the 2021/22 academic year. The relationship between the Carnegie School of Education and the Montessori Group means that further scholarships will be awarded in the future years of the partnership.
This scholarship will be first awarded in the next academic year, with applicants to LBU able to apply for the scholarship as part of their application to the university.
Leonor Stjepic, Chief Executive Officer of the Montessori Group said: “We are so pleased that the Montessori St Nicholas charity is able to support new teachers in this way. We hope that this funding will broaden access to higher education study for a significant number of students and in doing so, enhance the experiences of the children who will be guided and supported by the next generation of high-quality teachers. The experiences of trainees as they prepare to work in the education sector can be greatly affected by financial constraints; we want to ensure that students taking the Montessori pathway will have the best possible start to their experience with the International Montessori Institute.”
The Montessori model of education is unique in encouraging young children to learn through curiosity with an emphasis on individual progress and giving children opportunities to engage with the learning environment.
Centre Director of the International Montessori Institute, James Archer said: “We are delighted that these scholarships will be available to support people as they study the Montessori Method at degree level. Education for opportunity, social inclusion and reconstruction is one of the four key strands of our work and we are therefore thrilled to offer these unique scholarships. The opportunities provided by these scholarships will be truly transformational to people choosing to come and study at the International Montessori Institute, and in turn they will help to transform the lives of the children they work with through their careers.
“The BA (Hons) Education (Accelerated Degree) Montessori, gives students the opportunity to gain a full BA degree focussed on the Montessori philosophy of education. The programme prepares students for a fulfilling career working with children across primary and early years phases drawing on the Montessori method.”
Applications are now open for BA (Hons) Primary Education Accelerated Degree (Montessori) for the 2021/22 academic year. To find more about the programme and to apply please visit: https://www.leedsbeckett.ac.uk/courses/primary-education-accelerated-degree-montessori-ba/
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Xientifica SOS, written by Daniel Phelps, is a unique children’s adventure for young people aged 8-12–adult. It’s ‘Where science meets adventure’. It’s not a science book, it is a children’s adventure novel which has science in it.’
Xientifica SOS provides a perfect platform for discussions and encourages children to ask questions, so is not only ideal for lone-reading or as a class book, but perfect for home schooling too.
Xientifica SOS can be bought on Amazon and is available on Kindle or in paperback
Go to Amazon – or to find out more (and listen to extracts from the book) – go to Xientifica.com (with an X)…X I E N T I F I C A
Homepage: https://xientifica.com/
Twitter @xientifica
Show Sponsor
The National Association for Primary Education speaks for young children and all who live and work with them. Get a FREE e-copy of their professional journal at nape.org.uk/journal
Christian Schiller Lecture 2021 with Dr. Tony Eaude – NAPE 065
Towards a balanced and broadly-based curriculum was the theme of the National Association for Primary Education conference in March 2021. The keynote lecture was given by Dr. Tony Eaude.
He suggested four main arguments for a balanced and broadly-based primary curriculum:
- that the law states that schools must offer this (as it does) and that Ofsted expect this (at least from 7 years old);
- one based on how children create coherent, robust and flexible identities, enhancing their well-being and founded on a sense of agency;
- one based on a conception of democratic citizenship in which children are increasingly enabled to deal with complex ideas right from the start; and
- a social justice one that such a curriculum will open up opportunities from which many children, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds, will otherwise be excluded.
Schiller was an inspector in Liverpool in the 1920s, a role very different from that of inspectors now – more to advise and encourage than to evaluate. Schiller’s concern at the desperate squalor and poverty which he witnessed there – his humanity – and the narrow and inappropriate curriculum on offer comes through very strongly in what he said and wrote (Schiller, 1979).
His main concern was for children’s basic needs to be met, in terms of being properly fed, clothed and cared-for but he also believed passionately that children in the elementary schools he saw should have a broader, richer and more suitable range of experiences – with his emphasis being on physical activity and the arts. While Schiller 2 went on to work in other roles, supporting primary headteachers and teachers, this early experience was formative and remained with him for the next fifty years or so.
In his lecture Tony suggests that the humanities should be seen fluidly as including history, geography, religion, philosophy, literature, languages and culture, more generally; and fulfil a central role in how children construct and weave together their multiple identities into a coherent identity.
The Humanities 20:20 manifesto (www.humanities2020.org.uk) summarizes why the humanities matter, arguing that they enable children to:
1. consider questions about the meaning and purpose of their lives;
2. explore their own identities, values and beliefs and concepts such as time, space and faith;
3. develop skills and habits associated with critical and creative thinking;
4. extend their cultural and imaginative horizons;
5. learn to empathise with people who are different, as well as those who are similar, thereby celebrating diversity and challenging stereotypes;
6. learn about democracy, global citizenship and sustainability;
7. strengthen a sense of care for themselves, each other and the planet in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
To find out more please visit Dr. Tony Eaude’s website https://edperspectives.org.uk/
More information about NAPE is available at https://nape.org.uk/
Other interviews between Dr. Tony Eaude and Mark Taylor can be found at:
https://www.educationonfire.com/education-on-fire/066-re-humanising-primary-education-dr-tony-eaude/
https://www.educationonfire.com/national-association-for-primary-education/nape033/
193: Organization for Social Media Safety
After a long career in business, Ed Peisner founded the Organization for Social Media Safety in 2016 after his teenage son Jordan was viciously assaulted in West Hills, CA.
The attack was filmed and uploaded to social media by an associate of the attacker. The video went viral, viewed by millions, and Jordan was left with serious and life-long injuries from the assault. Ed decided to dedicate himself to the goal of ensuring that no other family had to endure such a terrible ordeal.
Now, Ed travels the country as the National Education Director for the Organization for Social Media Safety teaching thousands of students, parents, and educators how to stay safe on social media.
Marc Berkman serves as the CEO of the Organization for Social Media Safety (OFSMS) where he has grown OFSMS into a prominent national consumer protection organization that has taught social media safety skills to thousands of students, parents, and educators across the country and developed essential social media safety legislation like Jordan’s Law, the nation’s first law to deter social media-motivated violence.
Previously, Marc served for over a decade as a senior advisor to members of Congress and the California State Assembly. During his time as a legislative aide, he developed and helped pass into law numerous legislative initiatives to protect vulnerable children and families.
Marc received his JD from Columbia Law School and his BA from UC Berkeley.
He lives with his wife and two children in Los Angeles, CA.
Website
Social Media Information
https://www.facebook.com/ofsms
https://www.instagram.com/org4socialmediasafety/
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Xientifica SOS, written by Daniel Phelps, is a unique children’s adventure for young people aged 8-12–adult. It’s ‘Where science meets adventure’. It’s not a science book, it is a children’s adventure novel which has science in it.’
Xientifica SOS provides a perfect platform for discussions and encourages children to ask questions, so is not only ideal for lone-reading or as a class book, but perfect for home schooling too.
Xientifica SOS can be bought on Amazon and is available on Kindle or in paperback
Go to Amazon – or to find out more (and listen to extracts from the book) – go to Xientifica.com (with an X)…X I E N T I F I C A
Homepage: https://xientifica.com/
Twitter @xientifica
Show Sponsor
The National Association for Primary Education speaks for young children and all who live and work with them. Get a FREE e-copy of their professional journal at nape.org.uk/journal
The climate emergency and ecological crisis with Teach the Future – NAPE 064
Teach the Future is an inclusive, well organised and persistent campaign by secondary and tertiary education students to greatly improve education on the climate emergency and ecological crisis in the UK.
In this episode Robson Augusta chats to Mark Taylor about how it is never too early to start learning about how the climate emergency can be positively affected by our primary aged children.
Teach the Future are campaigning for change across the whole of the UK, but education in the UK is a devolved matter, meaning there are different education ministers and education laws in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. A lot of our work is relevant across the UK, but we also have specific campaign branches in Scotland, Wales and England:A student lead organisation who believe our education system needs to be reformed to reflect the urgency of the climate crisis.
https://www.teachthefuture.uk/
Twitter @_TeachtheFuture
National Association for Primary Education publish their professional journal ‘Primary First’ 3 times a year.
If you would like read a past issue of the Primary First journal you can receive a FREE e-copy by visiting nape.org.uk/journal