Excellent ASDAN briefing seminars: Wolves Thurs 10 May, London Fri 11 May.

Rebecca Hanson's picture
 105
I'd like to strongly recommend that anyone who wants to be inspired by some of the new, excellent initiatives available to inspire, develop and motivate students attend one of these briefing days if they can. If you're unable to attend please do feel free to ask me questions here.

For those whole don't know ASDAN are a wrap around charity who work to support and formally accredit work students do which isn't recognised through traditional qualifications.

I was at their briefing day in York yesterday which started with the detailed academic research which has been done into the clearly substantial benefits for students doing ASDAN's own qualification - CoPE, the results of which were perfectly in line with my own experience and expectations of working with this qualification.

Then we had a presentation about the legacy 2012 education charity founded by Dr David Hemmery CBE which has developed programs to motivate and inspire students in conjunction with the Olympic games and future major events.
(David Hemmery himself will be doing the presentation himself at the next 2 events).

That was followed by a presentation about the low cost wrap around Modern Baccalaureate qualification which creates a single certificate which shows students' academic qualifications, wider experience and work related skills. Certificates can be printed for 40p and an employer can scan them with their mobile to check their authenticity online. There are substantial online resources to support students and centres participating and awarding bodies are audited by TLM.

That session finished at 1:45 and there there was a presentation which focused in detail on support services available to head teacher to improve their results and more time for networking with the heads, senior teachers and other individuals from inspirational charitable bodies which make a direct different to students lives.

It was an absolute privilege to be there - back in the world of education which actually makes sense to me. It was painfully obvious how unsupported those people are by all three political parties. I was the only person there associated with a political party and I would strongly recommend anyone from any party to go and show your support for the excellent work these people are doing by taking the time to understand what it is.

To attend either event please get in touch with ASDAN asap.
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Comments

Ian Lynch's picture
Thu, 10/05/2012 - 07:50

Leonard, I have taught in 4 LA schools, an independent and a CTC. I inspected many schools both as a Registered Inspector for OFSTED and in a number of other capacities. The best and most effective lessons are not extremely progressive or focussed on specific learning to an exam as you seem to be advocating. OFSTED is hardly the most progressive organisation :-). I suspect that your experience of real classrooms is limited. I hope so as it would explain the reason why you think that requirements to pass exams prevents good teaching. Unfortunately that is a fairly widespread perception but I cited research evidence to the contrary. The real problem is that we have educated the current generations badly and so they are not learning beyond what they were taught. I quite accept that education change is difficult but it is important enough to make some effort despite the constraints.


leonard james's picture
Fri, 11/05/2012 - 06:50

Firstly I am not advocating lessons that are 'focused on specific learning to an exam' I am describing how lessons manifest themselves in the current school system. One can reject 'child centered learning' without advocating the sort of teaching you get in a Dickens novel.

Secondly it takes a certain amount of nerve to complain about educating the 'current generations badly' whilst simultaneously boasting about your work as an Ofsted inspector. Surely you must accept some responsibility for the system you are complaining about?

Ian Lynch's picture
Fri, 11/05/2012 - 07:57

What other type of learning is there than "Child centred"? Its the child doing the learning, no-one else. Re: experience. I stated some facts about this because evidence is important. Reading the Daily Mail or the Guardian would be a poor background for informed comment. Teaching in one school would be better but still anecdotal. We all have responsibility. The difference is now that I have learnt from that experience I'm doing things differently. That is what Lifelong learning is all about ;-)


andy's picture
Fri, 11/05/2012 - 08:59

Absolutely. We have moved on considerably from the days of chalk and talk, stand and deliver and learning by rote. However, and has Janet and others have pointed out the learning process is much more maleable and synthesised than ever before. Enter personalised learning strategies used on a carousel basis to provide a level of engagement with the learning that meets the needs/preferences of the vast majority of learners on a regular basis. Without this the pedagogy becomes narrow and stilted, which leads to disengaged learners who cannot connect with the teachers delivery method.

Lifelong learning has been with us for many years now and the need for it is self-evident. Jobs for life no longer exist. The skills and qualifications required in the workplace are constantly changing. It follows then that those who want to remain in employment and/or gain advancement/promotion must regularly update their skill and qualification sets. Whether this is through formal institutions (e.g. FE, HE) or in-house CPD is irrelevant, it is all about lifelong learning.

Indeed, after the 2007 crash, the Euro crises and its potential impact, the UKs double dip recession, austerity economy and shrinking welfare state, to name but 5 major issues, it is crucial that students are at the centre of their own learning and grasp the mulitfaceted nature of personal learning and thinking skills alongside the need for lifelong learning.

leonard james's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 16:11

'Child centered learning' is a catch all term used by many educationalists to describe the pedagogy associated with people like Piaget.

I'm also surprised, given your experience, that you think you are doing things differently - the pedagogy you are advocating has been around for decades.

andy's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 19:38

Leonard, given that the Student Centred Learning that I have and still do utilise is essentially the same as that pioneered by Piaget, Dewey, Vygotsky and added to by Roger's, I am a little confused at your apparent opposition to the viewpoints expressed on this thread relating to the wider use of such startegies in the classroom, albeit that in recent times these have been flagged up as student centred learning. If I am missing the point then I apologise but cannot help but feel that there is a large element of either crossed wire or almost purposely arguing the same point at work here. Put plainly, I am a tad confused. I accept that Piaget et al are the founders of teaching strategies that have in essence have been slightly reworked and rebadged as student centred approaches. So what are we really debating?

I do however see that your perception of traditional subjects may not be the same as mine but that is not necessarily the key issue at work here.

Ian Lynch's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 19:40

Piaget has one real claim to fame and that is to start a science of how children learn as a basis for informing teaching. It seems to me that developing a science of learning based on evidence is rather preferable to at best guessing based on atypical personal experience or at worst pedalling snake oil. Masses of research has been done on cognitive development since Piaget yet with every Secretary of State we seem to get another set of personal fads with very little reference to robust objective evidence. A bit like using alternative remedies instead of robust science in the health sector. I don't think everything I'm doing is different but it must have some differences otherwise I would not have been successful in getting about 1 million Euros for 3 transfer of innovation projects in what is pretty stiff competition across Europe.


leonard james's picture
Fri, 11/05/2012 - 06:38

Rebecca

"I’ve don’t understand this idea that if students work together some of the time we have ‘extreme progressivism’."

I'll actually agree with you because the some of the evidence presented here contains ideas that are hardly progressive (even though many of their advocates will claim they are) - perhaps we ought to use the term 'child centered education' from now on.

"The benefits of students doing some groupwork some of the time are taught throughout education because they are so clearly established."

'Doing some groupwork' isn't what is being advocated here though is it. http://bit.ly/KM9hRk

Have you actually taught or do you have any experience whatsover of using interactive online systems to personally track and determine the syllabus progression of students?

You seem to be describing children completing tasks on their own on a computer and I'm not sure why - is this what you think independent learning is?

“children don’t know how to work in groups and need adults to teach them.”
Yes. Teachers teach students how to do groupwork. Could you explain a bit about why you find this idea strange Leonard? Are you advocating for a society where children are unable to collaborate?

Ah that dirty word 'teach'. It just seems bizarre that you'll happily argue for children developing their knowledge in groups yet you are quite happy for an adult to teach the them about teamwork. The best way to learn how to work as a team is to work with a team that does things well, therefore I'm not sure why you think lumping a group of children together then getting someone who works on their own to teach them about teamwork is a good idea.

Janet Downs's picture
Fri, 11/05/2012 - 07:39

Leonard - teaching isn't just one method at the expense of others. It's a range of strategies to be used when necessary. OECD reviewed innovative learning environments and concluded that teachers needed to be “well-versed in the subjects they teach” and needed to be able change their teaching approach when necessary in order to transmit subject content. Teachers needed a “rich repertoire of teaching strategies” to be used and combined when necessary. These strategies include “direct, whole-group teaching, guided discovery, group work, and the facilitation of self-study and individual discovery” together with individual feedback.

Nowhere in the above does it suggest that "teach" is a dirty word.

Schleicher, A. (2012), Ed., Preparing Teachers and Developing School Leaders for the 21st Century: Lessons from around the World,
OECD Publishing.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/9789264xxxxxx-en

Teaching also needed to be “student-centred” – ie the student is at the heart of education. Such child-centred education is derided by some commentators who caricature it as unstructured, unmediated activities. This isn't so. If the child is not at the centre of education, then who is? Is it parents, society, employers, governments? If not the child, then who?

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Fri, 11/05/2012 - 08:38

"You seem to be describing children completing tasks on their own on a computer and I’m not sure why – is this what you think independent learning is?"

Thank you for your question Leonard.

No, that's not what I think independent learning is.

One of the problems of teaching students in applied contexts or using connected tasks or similar activities is that it can become difficult to ensure that each child has robustly covered the agreed curriculum.

Having the kind of online interactive teaching, assessment and tracking systems now available means that you can ensure in a more robust way than has ever been possible under any system that each child is progressing well against the curriculum and that any gaps which have occurred for any reason, be it absence, failure to understand or anything else, can be rapidly filled.

So what I'm saying is that these systems make it much easier for teachers to teach using strategies which create space for independent thought.

I wrote up how I achieved this in practice as a head of department in much more detail in the article 'Outcome-led and Process-led Teaching (as Rebecca Teasdale)
which you can find here: http://www.atm.org.uk/journal/archive/mt210.html

"I’m not sure why you think lumping a group of children together then getting someone who works on their own to teach them about teamwork is a good idea."
Now it's me who doesn't follow. I have always explicitly nurtured students' abilities in collaboration as part of the variety of what I do with them. But it's only a small part of what I do. It's just something teachers do. I have no idea why there is a culture on the internet which seems to spill over into Westminster bubble thinking which seeks to straw man all teachers who do groupwork as being fringe nutters. It seems to go straight from the tabloid headlines into the minds of politicians without ever being tested in the reality of a school, at which point, of course, it would instantly dematerialise.

I have met a very small number of secondary schools which really don't do much group work at all, usually because they are 'very highly structured schools'. But talking to the staff there is no demonisation of other styles of teaching - there is intelligent discussion about the compromises they have make to stick to that extreme level of structure which brings obvious benefits but also has significant costs to the quality of the learning experience students receive.

Janet Downs's picture
Fri, 11/05/2012 - 16:00

Sorry - link in my post above doesn't work. Here's the correct link.

http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/4/35/49850576.pdf

leonard james's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 16:00

Rebecca I don't see much resemblance between this;

"focus on questioning, collaborative work, problem solving, independent learning and challenge."

and your description of your own methods in which collaborative work is 'only a small part' of what you do and which a considerable amount of time is devoted to testing students knowledge of the curriculum using computers.

You then start praising teachers who don't do group work for not 'demonising other styles of teaching' before demonising teachers who don't do group work by complaining about 'costs to the quality of the learning experience students receive'.

Can you clarify your position please because right now all I'm getting from you is a do as I say not as I do attitude towards pedagogy and criticism of pedagogy.

Paul's picture
Mon, 14/05/2012 - 16:46

"I have no idea why there is a culture on the internet which seems to spill over into Westminster bubble thinking which seeks to straw man all teachers who do groupwork as being fringe nutters"

No, they think you're a fringe nutter.

leonard james's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 15:35

Janet -

Firstly I am not arguing that teachers should use one method at the expense of all others. I am arguing against the sort of pedagogy advocated by some of the organisations put forward in this discussion. Here is what 'let's think' has to say about it's pedagogy:

"draws on the research of Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky and complements many current educational initiatives, including Assessment for Learning and Every Child Matters with its focus on questioning, collaborative work, problem solving, independent learning and challenge."

Secondly 'Child centered education' is a catch all term that is often used by academics to describe the sort of pedagogy associated with Piaget's (and others) theories.

You seem to be constructing your own definition of 'child centered education' and introducing different opinions about pedagogy then acting as if I am arguing against them - please can you stick to the matter at hand.

andy's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 16:08

I agree Leonard. It is often the case that glaring contradictions arise in some participants positions. Good luck with trying to unravel the senario and drive to a straight answer ... :)


Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 17:29

Leonard, my position is that children should learn a robust curriculum and that they should also have the opportunity to work in situations where they will have to work out which elements of what they have been taught to use.

I personally use group work as part of what I do in the classroom because there are obvious benefits for students' learning.

I hope that clarifies my position.


There are a couple of other issues floating round in the background here which I will try to express positions on. If I fail to do so it's not because I'm trying to avoid issues, it's just because there's a lot going on in these discussions and I'm not sure precisely what you want me to be specific on.


Re: robustly structured schools.
There exist some schools which have many very clear rules which are strictly enforce.
I am not opposed to the existence of such schools. They offer structure and security in difficult situations and can bring all the benefits that offers. However the existence of very substantial structures which must be followed by all teachers at all times has some disadvantages for students and staff. In a good school of this type the advantages outweigh the disadvantages and that's why the school is as it is.

I have no idea why you think this position amounts to me demonising teachers.

leonard james's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 22:36

Rebecca,

Re: Clarifications. I'm even less clear now as we have yet another description of your ideal pedagogy, earlier on you were advocating ASDAN and by proxy the sort of pedagogy promoted by the 'lets think' website that Ian linked to earlier. Neither of these things seem to represent what you do in your own classroom so I'm sure why you are advocating them in the first place.

Re: Demonising. You used the term when describing people who criticise group work then said there were 'significant costs to the quality of the learning students receive' when schools do not partake in much group work. Why is this criticism of a teaching method not demonisation?

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 22:49

Leonard there's a lot more information about what I've done in my classroom in my blog.
mathseducationandallthat.blogspot.com

You're taking one sentence out of it's context, which was a reference to the bizarre way in which characters like Tom Burkard, Old Andrew and other very vociferous anonymous characters on the internet tend to create a straw man of a 'progressive' teacher who they denigrate and that they specifically place any teacher who does group work in that group.

The benefits of group work are well documented. I do not intend to demonise or attack teachers who do not use it and I would like to apologise for any comments which have indicated that I wish to demonise anyone at all in any circumstances whatsoever.

I would also like to apologise if I have said that ASDAN and 'let's think' are the same thing. That is certainly not my view and I didn't think I had said it.

leonard james's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 23:13

Andy,

I object to the rhetoric and teaching strategies suggested by ASDAN and the 'lets think' website. Rather than argue about the pedagogy described by organisations they have advocated a few posters have chosen to pursue one or more of the following tactics;

1. Take issue with my use of the term 'child centered education' which is a catch all phrase used in education circles by describing all education as 'child centered'.

2. Begin to introduce other, less extreme, methods of teaching that were not originally part of the discussion.

3. Start to boast about their experiences or achievements in order to provide validity to their own views.

I'd sooner stick to ASDAN and the 'lets think' website which were the subject of my initial complaints.

leonard james's picture
Sat, 12/05/2012 - 23:25

"I don’t think everything I’m doing is different but it must have some differences otherwise I would not have been successful in getting about 1 million Euros for 3 transfer of innovation projects in what is pretty stiff competition across Europe."

Weren't you advocating the 'lets think' website earlier? Is that what your doing or are you, in fact, doing something different? If so why advocate 'lets think' without mentioning your own projects to begin with?

Ian Lynch's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 10:24

Don't think I advocated any web sites. I'm not here to simply promote my own projects and I have no business links with "Let's think". I was promoting evidence based policy more generally. Understanding cognitive development is a better basis for policy formulation than personal preference based on limited, no, or misleading evidence. http://nyti.ms/IRCFFv Research like this has more chance of leading to a step change in performance than simply setting more and harder terminal exams.


leonard james's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 11:11

Firstly I'm not sure anyone is advocating harder and terminal exams as a way of increasing school performance.

Secondly there are other things to consider when forming policy other than cognitive development. I am not disputing the cognitive research behind ASDAN and 'let's think' (at least not yet) I am disputing the practicalities of these policies on the ground. In every school I have worked in the majority of children are simply not motivated to do 'group work' or 'independent learning' or 'challenges' or any of the things described here. Many teachers feel the same yet this 'evidence' is continually ignored by those who having left the classroom (or who were never in it to begin with) seek to tell other people how to do their jobs.

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 12:03

As we've discussed, Leonard, it takes time to train most students to be confident with 'group work' or 'independent learning' or 'challenges'.

It also takes time and commitment to support teachers in becoming confident in creating the environments where this happens.

Having run teachers training courses across both the public and private sector I am fully aware of the pressures some teachers work under. In both the public and the private sector we have some schools where the expectation is that children are sitting quietly doing precisely what they have been instructed to do at all times. I've had teachers in the public sector explaining to me that they have prospective parents in most days at no notice and they can be brought into their classes at any time and that if there is even the remotest air that the teacher is not fully dictating precisely what all the students are doing all the time then they will be fired.

In such circumstances probably the only type of group work which can be justified is a standard 'snowballing' strategy where students are discussing a particular issue or question in preparation for a teacher led plenary, however in reality the classroom is unlikely to be configured for the groups to exist and moving students would be frowned on so the teacher is likely to stick with students discussing things in pairs.

My point earlier was not that such teacher don't exits, it was that they don't tend to attack and straw man teachers who do use groupwork in the way which is aggressively done by key figures with the ear of the government.

When we do try to support teachers who have little experience with group work in becoming confident with with it there are also tensions and strains which can cause them frustrations. Experience shows us that the best way for them to become confident and empowered with using group work as a strategy is for them to firstly view respected teachers who use strategies which the teacher would like to be able to add to their repertoire of teaching strategies and secondly that they need to be confident that they will be supported rather than being negatively judged as they learn these strategies themselves and teach their students to be confident with them.

Each September when I get new classes I know there will be a period when they are not yet learning to their full potential as I teach them to learn in a variety of new ways. This investment of time and energy more than pays back later. But I understand the fear and frustrations teachers experience when they are relentlessly expected to have classroom environments which are easily assessable by Ofsted inspectors who may not have the relevant experience to assess more complex classroom situations. This has suddenly become more toxic as complex situations inspectors did not properly understand were often labelled as being 'satisfactory' because they did not easily tick the boxes of other categories but there was clearly no cause for concern. The redesignation of 'satisfactory' as being 'unsatisfactory' is clearly causing great stress.

I also understand that the pressure on schools to be outcome focused and other issues which I do not fully understand have caused some well conceived initiatives to support teachers in becoming more confident working in applied situations with group work have floundered. A good example of this would be the Bowland initiative for maths:
http://www.bowlandmaths.org.uk/index.htm
where schools were relentlessly and repeatedly advised that teachers should not use the teaching materials until teachers had worked through at least one module of the professional development (you need to select 'Run the Bowland Player Online' from the link above to find both the professional development materials and the teaching materials). I spent quite a bit of time mopping up the damage where teachers were forced to use the teaching materials without accessing any of the training so I do understand the kinds of frustrations you are talking about Leonard. But on the other hand I also listened to those who had taken the professional journey intended talking about their experiences and ways in which their teaching has improved and I wonder if perhaps you have not done so?

eJD8owE1's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 13:16

"As we’ve discussed, Leonard, it takes time to train most students to be confident with ‘group work’ "

Every time my children have done "group work", it's consisted of them --- well behaved, kids who want to learn --- doing the work so that lazy kids who don't want to work can be given the credit. They both absolutely hate it, because they see the manifest unfairness of the situation where they get to do worse work, because of the time wasted dealing with the lazy, while having to hand the lazy the credit. It doesn't encourage "team work" because in a real team situation those unwilling to pull their weight are simply got rid of. It either involves using pupils as unpaid, untrained teaching assistants at the expense of their own learning, or of teaching them that there's no point in working as others will get the credit. "Group work" is profoundly unfair unless the teacher is willing to evaluate the relative contributions of the children in the group; pigs will sooner fly.

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 13:25

Could you describe the opportunities you've had to observe teachers who have positive experiences with group work in action eJD8owE1?
Why do you feel unable to replicate what they do?

When I have mixed ability groups working in maths I take the time to explain to higher attaining students the benefits of their learning to listen to others students ways of working through problems......
In particular how students have a natural tendency to settle for being able to do things one way and this stops them seeing the variety of possible strategies and so can set up problems for the future when their ability to make rapid progress is likely to depend on them understanding a variety of methods at lower levels.
When I explain this to them they become very aware of how much they are learning as they try to puzzle out how the person next to them is seeing the maths and they are confident that the benefits to them are not just about them becoming better able to teach or the whole class progressing more rapidly.
Have you tried strategies like this?

eJD8owE1's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 13:59

"When I have mixed ability groups working in maths"

I bet the children who are denied the chance to enter Higher Tier GCSE love that.

"Why do you feel unable to replicate what they do?"

Because all I hear, as a parent, is frustrated children who think, accurately, that they are just being asked to do other children's work for them, and don't want to go to school.

"When I explain this to them they become very aware of how much they are learning as they try to puzzle out how the person next to them is seeing the maths"

Mine weren't. They were learning that they're expected to do the work, while the person next to them chats, runs around the classroom and tears things up, but that they'll both get the credit. There is no benefit to that. In any event, what possible purpose is there in learning how other people are failing to perform a task? That might be interesting for professional teachers, but children are not in a maths lesson to learn methods that don't work.

What's the A* and A rate at GCSE in your mixed-ability groups?

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 15:21

eJD8owE1 you're making this gigantic leap from a discussion about students doing group work some of the time to it therefore being a wonderful idea to teach mixed ability GCSE maths. I don't see why you think it's appropriate to lump the two together.

If you read some of the other discussions on this forum you will see that one of my strongest concerns about free schools is that many of them are very small 11-16 schools and this will force the teaching of a wide span of attainment in the same class or full mixed ability teaching which I strongly recommend against.

I'm saying that even in fully mixed ability classes (which I've had to teach due to circumstances beyond my control - not through choice) it's possible to overcome the issues you describe so I'm suggesting that in more normal situations where the span of attainment is not so great and different students are struggling with different topics (so it's not always the same students who are the strongest students) it's fairly easily overcome.

My A & A* rates were in excess of FFTDs by the way but that it's tiny numbers of students and I did things like beg retired teacher friends to come in and work with the students involved. My students' results are simply meaningless as a context for anything in this discussion. I'm not playing them up and you've no need to play them down as I'm the last person you'll find advocating mixed ability teaching at GCSE.

"Mine weren’t. They were learning that they’re expected to do the work, while the person next to them chats, runs around the classroom and tears things up, but that they’ll both get the credit."
Clearly I'd never recommend the kind of group work where some students are clearly not engaged and are disrupting others. That's just bad teaching. It can happen in any classroom and can be associated with any type of teaching.

SJT's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 18:55

"My A & A* rates were in excess of FFTDs by the way but that it’s tiny numbers of students and I did things like beg retired teacher friends to come in and work with the students involved. My students’ results are simply meaningless as a context for anything in this discussion. I’m not playing them up and you’ve no need to play them down as I’m the last person you’ll find advocating mixed ability teaching at GCSE."

eJD80wE1 and I will probably be lumped in with your other detractors but your school's GCSE results do not suggest your group work was at all successful. 14 children attained five A* to C including maths and English from a cohort of 75. Did you even have any colleagues in your Department to lead?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/education/07/school_tables/seconda...

Paul's picture
Mon, 14/05/2012 - 16:49

" My students’ results are simply meaningless as a context for anything in this discussion. "

That bad, eh ?

I seem to remember someone producing before and after results for Maths in your school. Didn't seem to be an difference between them.

Paul's picture
Mon, 14/05/2012 - 16:50

"Clearly I’d never recommend the kind of group work where some students are clearly not engaged and are disrupting others. That’s just bad teaching"

You really think that students not being engaged and disrupting is bad teaching ?

andy's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 14:20

I think the overall direction of this conversation has gone well beyond the top page issue.

Indeed, there are some who confuse the alleged attitude of private schools with public schools and clearly have not one jot of an idea about employment law (e.g. unfair dismissal). They also persistently cite anecdotal evidence without supporting it names of the schools. Some posters also explicitly imply that they are still in the classroom and aren't - and they know it.

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 15:26

My apologies for referring to myself as being a teacher Andy. When teaching classes of 40 students for 3 hours at a time A-level to degree standard maths using best practice in the classroom or teaching teachers and tutoring it's sometimes easy to forget that you are, of course, not a teacher. Do you go round all the mums who are working less while they're on career breaks insisting that they understand that they are 'not teachers now'? Or is that just a charm strategy you save for me?


andy's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 16:01

Rebecca, we've had this discussion before. Your persona on LSN is not the same as the one you portray on Linkedin. You repeatedly pass yourself off as a full-time teacher and yet you are not employed at a school in that role (e.g. "Each September when I get new classes"). You also explicitly imply that you are a Head of Maths but the truth is that you were and are not now. Holding the post is one thing but after one has left it the title doesn't continue. I was a deputy headteacher but am not now, so I don't confer upon myself that title.

It would be much better if you were up front and didn't attempt to mislead other participants. Yes, you, like may other qualified but not in post teachers are entitled to draw on and use their personal experiences. Just don't try to pass them off as anything else.

While we are on the theme of accuracy, would you care to elaborate on which "public" school it is that you refer to when you say that being caught teaching any other style that 'didactic' to pupils in serried ranks would get that sacked instantly? " I’ve had teachers in the public sector explaining to me that they have prospective parents in most days at no notice and they can be brought into their classes at any time and that if there is even the remotest air that the teacher is not fully dictating precisely what all the students are doing all the time then they will be fired." Does this school have a name and when you say "public" do you really mean 'private'?

As a freelance educationalist might I enquire as to where you deliver these 3 hour lessons to A-Level to degree standard maths students, oh, and how often? Are all 40 students A level or are some of them degree students as you imply? And where may I ask do you fit in the new classes of KS3 and 4 students you also imply that you teacher?

PS. Gender has nothing to do with the issue of inaccurately portraying oneself.

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 16:09

I would like to explictly apologise for misleading people regarding my current employment status. I am not currently a Head of Maths or working full time. I have made that explicitly clear during many discussions on this forum. My use of tenses has not been designed to mislead it has been used to describe what I do in particular situations and circumstances.

I do not publicise where I currently work due to the organised campaigns of lies which have been sent to employers and bodies I work with to discredit me.

eJD8owE1's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 18:25

"I do not publicise where I currently work due to the organised campaigns of lies which have been sent to employers and bodies I work with to discredit me."

Organised campaigns against you, along with instant firings of people who offend visiting parents? Wow. Who knew maths teaching was so exciting? Either that, or you're paranoid.

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 19:39

"instant firings of people who offend visiting parents"
I've no idea what you mean by that.

I suppose you think this kind of think is a laugh eJD8owE1?
"Perhaps I should send my “best of Weebecka” archive to the trainees you are teaching ?"
http://www.localschoolsnetwork.org.uk/2012/04/what-are-we-paying-for-edu...

You wouldn't if you'd had people taking aspects of comments you've said, saying they mean completely the opposite of what they actually mean and sending them to your employers and your professional associations.

But then perhaps you think it's an entirely appropriate way to treat someone who suggests that doing group work some of the time can be a good thing or that doing mixed ability teaching for part of the time in Key Stage 3 can bring some real benefits for students if the teachers are properly trained for it and it's done well? You don't come across that way - you seem to be someone who's just interested to chat to people with different perspectives and wants to see how your experience fits alongside that of others - as I am.

I'm not paranoid eJD8owE1. The harassment is real and its horrible. I'm writing about it openly because I want those involved in it to be aware that their victims are genuine people who care about education and that they should be ashamed of what they've done, in the hope they won't do it to so many people in the future.

Paul's picture
Mon, 14/05/2012 - 16:53

That's nothing. She thinks her computer was targeted by Mossad because of her multiple perspective reality views.


Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 19:41

“instant firings of people who offend visiting parents”
I’ve no idea what you mean by that.

Sorry - as soon as I posted I worked that out. It's was just something someone said. I don't know to what extent it was true or not true. But it was clear they were very afraid of doing group work because they were convinced it would be totally unacceptable to their head and they would suffer negative consequences if they did.

Paul's picture
Mon, 14/05/2012 - 17:01

“Perhaps I should send my “best of Weebecka” archive to the trainees you are teaching"

Just for the record, this is me. Becka landed on the TES and managed to nearly trash it, being one of only two people to be permanently irrevocably banned and as far as I know the only one to be ever threatened with legal action (a mixture of driving the moderators nuts, wierd personal messages to people and libel issues I suspect).

I started archiving her posts because she started threatening people (and libelling other people by name). I know this makes me sound a bit paranoid but I felt it necessary ; I've been on forums (and moderating some) for 15 years and never felt the need before.

I would admit it is quite entertaining because her story changes continually and it is fun quoting her own posts back at her.

At least one person has been the recipient of an external complaint by her (i.e. she rang the school up and accused the person of bullying or abusing her). You can see the anger rising in here. Virtually every forum discussion she ends in ends up as a fight. Oddly the moment she left the chaos and deletions stopped.

It is also worth pointing out that saying things like "(named OFSTED inspector) is evil and responsible for all the bad things that happened at my school" is rather difficult to take out of context.

I haven't set it to anyone, incidentally. I'm not a nasty little piece of work. Even though I think you are a pretty sad person I don't approve of taking forum discussions into the real world.

andy's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 20:01

Rebbeca, you're going back over old ground and making matters worse. Time to remember the old saying, about being in a hole and knowing when to stop digging. Both on LSN and Linkedin you have made the allegations about people harrassing you and telling lies - including having you computer hacked by Mossad. But then others have come along and alleged that it was you who was harrassing others and you who contacted the senior leadership of others to compalin about alleged comments on forums. However,it is also you who admits to having received legal letters from the TES (TSL) about your postings and comments about others, which you deny being responsible for - stating that the TES were wrong and you can't understand why they picked on you.

I have no idea where the truth and reality is but I do know what impression you are creating of yourself on these forums. Not others, Rebecca, but the impression you are giving and creating. Hence my advice is to stop digging your own hole.

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 20:08

"I have no idea where the truth and reality is"

Andy I've been involved in various discussion on different forums where I'm chatting to people and you arrive to declare that the conversation is over and to express your strongly negative opinion about my personality.

As you yourself point out you have no insight these issues at all and you don't know me so why you are so obsessed with joining in with them I have no idea. The conversations would be a lot more straight forward if you simply did not take part in them.

andy's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 20:22

Yet more misquoting and twisting. This is getting to be a habit of yours Rebecca. On both forums yo which you allude I had already been involved in the discussion. Equally, my suggestion was that "for me" the discussion had strayed so far from the point of origin that it was time for me to call it a day. Other participants made similar comments and/or agreed but each time you persisted and everyone else stopped contributing. On this particular thread I neither named you nor told people to stop contributing. What I said was, "I think the overall direction of this conversation has gone well beyond the top page issue." So please do not try to say otherwise. Your own inconsistencies are your own undoing.


Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 20:31

"including having you computer hacked by Mossad"

I have never alleged that. When you have previously stated that I had alleged it I have explicitly denied that I have ever even though it.

I don't know why you seem to be so obssessed with saying such things Andy. Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong - time will tell. You can't and you shouldn't be trying to.

andy's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 21:52

Permit me to quote directly from your own website: http://cyberrhetoricbyrebeccahanson.blogspot.co.uk

Thursday, 22 December 2011

"The first, most shocking attack [from Israelie intelligence] came when I had been contributing to the discussion for about a week and one of our home computers from which I had been posting suddenly ceased to operate. When my husband managed to get it going (with the aid of a laptop which used the same Anti-virus software and a cable) his diagnostics told him that the machine had not been attacked by a virus. Instead it showed a deep root drive error. Asking around, a friend with relevant expertise suggested that this was not a normal problem and that it in fact indicated remote cyberwarfare – someone deliberately romotely accessing and trying to destroy this computer. That friend suggested that I contact any other participants who were trying to defend a multi-perspective agenda and ask if they had also been targeted. I contacted the other participant who was interested in multiple perspectives being heard and found that his computer had also failed at the same time and that it had cost him a substantial sum of money to get it fixed."

This allegation of yours has been repeated on LSN and Linkedin.

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Sun, 13/05/2012 - 22:24

I suppose if you add the words 'from Israeli intelligence' as you have Andy then it seems I did suggest that Mossad had attacked my computer. The fact that you have added those words makes it look to me rather like you are simply obsessed with making me look like I'm paranoid.
http://cyberrhetoricbyrebeccahanson.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/how-to-manage...

I would also be very grateful if you would not try to discredit me by copying and pasting my blog with extra words added to make it look like I've said thing which you have accused me of saying.

If you leave the blog as it is then you will see I'm just trying to describe what happened so that others can be aware that there may have been a problem and a bigger picture can emerge or not emerge over time. As I've said before it seems that if cyberwarfare was involved in the attack on my computer and I do not know whether it was or not then giving the literature on this topic it would have been very unlikely to be Mossad. I've told you this before Andy.

I don't know why you so frequently criticise me for taking conversations off topic when you feel it's fine for you to suddenly misquote me about Israel.

eJD8owE1's picture
Mon, 14/05/2012 - 08:00

I'm a security researcher who has extensive experience in defensive computer work, including in high-threat environments. I've done forensic work, and I've done some work on StuxNet which (we conjecture) is about the only honest-to-goodness state actor piece of work we know of. Other advanced persistent threats have been seen in the wild (for example, the attack on RSA which compromised some of their SecureID two-factor authentication tokens) but have proven extremely difficult to analyse or to assign responsibility for.

The idea that your husband, with a commercial anti-virus and a cable, and talking to a friend, can somehow distinguish between the wide range of botnet malware on the Internet and a targeted, advanced persistent attack by a state actor or an organisation with similar resources is absurd. Leaving aside the nonsense of a "deep root error" (Google shows two references, both to blog spam for "Moncler Jackets", so you're just making up spurious technical-sounding phrases) let us consider some facts.

Serious attacks only work once. You launch the attack against your opponent, and the act of doing so shows the defender your attack. The defender can then analyse the wreckage and build a defence, which they normally will be (or at least, as attacker, you can't prevent them from) sharing with other potential victims. They're in essence one-shot deals. So Stuxnet was used to take out (again, we conjecture) Iran's uranium centrifuges, but is now in the wild, known to security researchers and blocked by every AV package. The RSA attack was more multi-faceted, but there is an extensive literature describing how it worked, so it can't work again. Moreover, as the routes the attacks used were easy to determine post hoc, certainly easier than the nature of the attacks themselves, even had AV packages not been updated to detected it, we have a good idea of what information assurance work needs to be done to prevent it happening again.

But you're asking us to believe that, having built a serious cyberwarfare capability, a well-resourced attacker used it, used their one chance to use it, to take out the home PC of a part-time maths teacher. Not the machine that hosted their blog, note, but their home PC. An attack so dangerous and so effectively targeted at silencing you, that all you needed to do was use your husband's laptop and shazam, you're back on the air. But, if what you were saying were true, your home PC would now have all the forensic evidence of the attack which, once analysed, would mean that attack could never be used again.

In the academic security community we'd love to speak to your friend and your husband, because _we_ don't know how to distinguish state-actor attacks from generic malware, mostly because Stuxnet was built out of the same parts as generic malware, but with rather more targeted purpose. Any security researcher, in academia or in industry or in Cheltenham, would love to see your PC, because diagnosing and characterising a state-actor or similar piece of cyber munitions would be the sort of thing you could build a career on.

So, we have two options. Either a well-funded state or state-influenced actor used a highly sophisticated, one-use-only, cyber weapon to take out the home PC of a part-time maths teacher in order to fail to silence a tiny readership blog, leaving on the one hand no evidence that has been analysed but on the other hand doing so so ham-fistedly that a couple of blokes can diagnose it just like that, or you're a paranoid loon. I wonder which one it is?

Paul's picture
Mon, 14/05/2012 - 17:03

"I would also be very grateful if you would not try to discredit me by copying and pasting my blog with extra words added to make it look like I’ve said thing which you have accused me of saying."

Actually fair comment.

However the post is insane, complete nonsense (try googling for "deep root drive error"), paranoid and disturbing.

If you want to discredit Rebecca I have pages and pages of stuff.

andy's picture
Mon, 14/05/2012 - 18:12

"I decided to participate in this discussion with the aim of using the skills described in my first blog as cyberrhetoric to try to ensure that the discussion explored multiple perspectives on the Israel Palestine debate. It is well known that Israel is expert in cyberwarfare and expends substantial resource in trying to manage its online profile."

In this quote from the original blog from your website it is crystal clear that you did not refer to any specific or general Israel company, you unequivocally cited "Israel" that is to say the nation state and from that along with your own references to Israeli intelligence/Mossad on LSN (previous discussions) and Linkedin conversations makes clear what you are alleging.

I stand by the legitimacy of my use of the standard/accepted literary device of square brackets [ ] to indicate to the reader that the content of the brackets is not that of the original author.

By the way, whereas I am aware that you have raised the 'hacking' issue before - see opening para of this comment - we have never engaged in any form of discussion about it. The first time I read it, it spoke volumes to me and hence other than noting iit, I gave it a wide berth. I seem to recall that in an earlier LSN discussion either Riccky Tar or Tim took issue with you about the 'hacking' allegation.

Rebecca Hanson's picture
Mon, 14/05/2012 - 08:28

It could be that I'm describing what happened and am interested in wider comments eJD8owE1.

My question in this conversation was why there appears to exist a group of posters on the internet who seems to spill over into government policy through the likes of Tom Burkard who seem to be determined to systematically discredit people who post that some group work can be beneficial to students?

eJD8owE1's picture
Mon, 14/05/2012 - 09:03

"It could be that I’m describing what happened and am interested in wider comments"

Nonsense. Something happened to your computer. You immediately, on the basls of no evidence beyond your husband and a mate's intuition, jumped to the conclusion that you were the target of cyberwarfare, because that bigs up your sense of being politically radical. For extra echo-chamber confirmation, rather than asking people who know what they were doing to look at the evidence (any AV company, or university CS department, would have the capability to do this) you instead asked around other paranoiacs. You know the answer, and all you're doing is looking for other people to agree with you. It's pure Citizen Smith.

Alternatively, you could present some evidence. As I say: security researchers would give their right arms for a PC which presents clear-cut evidence of an advanced persistent threat, and I could put you in touch with any number of them. You kept a forensic image of your computer, right?

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