SCHOOLS need more male teachers because boys make less effort in women's classes, a new study claims.

Female teachers tend to mark boys lower than they deserve and boys were less likely to work hard in their classes, the researchers found.

Men seemed better at motivating boys but were vastly outnumbered.

Girls also made more effort when graded by male teachers, according to research by the Centre for Economic Performance at the London School of Economics.

Here's a tip.  If you want your career to change paths and get access to more opportunities than ever before, learn MS Access.

Access is like nothing else you have used.  You can't just pick it up and learn it, by yourself.  You really do need training, even if that is just book training.

I've done years and years of training with Access.  It's a two edged sword.  It gives me power to do things that most people could only ever dream of, but then again once people know you know how to use Access, you are never, ever, left alone.

Learn with caution.  And don't skim over the first parts.  Read Part 1 again and again before you touch a computer. 

Don't worry about the 2007 version.  Access and relational database design is always the same.  The only things that change are the nice visual front-ends.

I could write a book on Access.  But basically don't touch the computer until you have done a lot of pencil and paper work and have interviewed and observed the person you are building the database for.  Because once you start Access, you can't just go back and change a little thing from Day 1.  And you have to be really, really strict with the people you make the databases for.  They cannot, just cannot, change their mind about something.  I know we are all those sort of people, who once we see something in its finished form, are struck by a new idea and a small change.  But Access can't do that.  Access is like evolving an idea.  You can't go back and change the start of the evolution process once you have "built on" it and populated it with any information.  You can't go back and change the evolution of man from 40,000 years ago.

Basically my $50,000 bit of advice from years of this is to only replicate with Access the EXACT process people are currently using to do something.  Replicate existing processes.  Don't expect a database to be a 'catalyst' of change to introduce new processes.

And by Access, I mean all relational databases, including student learning management systems and school databases.  If you are designing a database for ALL teachers to use to report on ALL students using the same reporting method, it will NOT WORK unless all teachers are already reporting on all students the same way already.  If that's not happening in your school, don't spend $40,000 on a software developer to design an Access system to do that for you.  

I have seen schools waste unspeakable amounts on this stuff.  Basically Principals are relying on the technology to bring in change, when change management is not at all about technology.    Change practice first, then replicate it on a computer.  I cannot stress that enough.

Microsoft Office Acc..> 13-Jan-2012 20:35   70M

It's this series again.  It's a funny series.  Sometimes good, sometimes hideous.

This is a really interesting idea.  It's about teachers doing professional development for maths, and then reflecting on what they have learned for math teaching, and then relating that to the wider field of teaching and pedagogy.

I used to know a maths education officer, who did this for three years. She would have loved this book.  Maybe it would also be good for math teacher professional associations, widening the application of math based professional development to impact on the wider teacher role.

It's a good idea.  The book pulls it off well, with many teacher conversation extracts.  I asked someone once to write a teacher PD book based on teacher conversation transcripts.  I think this book does it better.  It's an interesting read if you take the time out to get your head around it.  I could see how a deputy principal or a teacher coach could really benefit by browsing this book. 

Learning Through Tea..> 13-Jan-2012 22:49   12M 

After ranting about this topic all week, this happens.

40 years in jail for a relationship with a 14 year old boy.  20 years minimum.  And let's not forget that in a few states in the USA, 14 years old is old enough to get married. 

This "teacher" was in Georgia, which has some of the toughest age of consent laws.  The big deciding factor here is the age difference.  Young kids can do just about anything with each other, but throw an age difference in there and it's a big deal, and why it's jail time of 40/20.

And the other catch is that this person wasn't a teacher.  NOT a teacher.  She was a teacher's aide or a teacher's assistant.  Which sort of makes us think again about the moral codes of professional teachers, but not about age differences in relationships. 

You have to read really, really hard to find out that she wasn't a teacher though.  The media wants teachers' blood.  Not teacher aide's blood.  Teacher Aides don't sell newspapers.  They don't have the same duty of care and legal responsibilities.  It's not good, but it's not as bad as the newspapers say because it simply wasn't a teacher abusing the position. 

I keep thinking about the other teacher I ranted about and his TV interview.  Especially the part where he says "This wouldn't be a problem if I was a plumber."

Well no.  Because a plumber is a tradesperson and a teacher is a professional in a duty of care relationship with their client.  Any professional has the same rules about a relationship with a client.  Doctors, psychiatrists, lawyers, dentists, lecturers, psychologists, employers and employees...  basically it's not just teachers.  Any case of crossing the boundaries where an unevenly powered dynamic exists between two people in a relationship is just wrong.  Plumbers don't have that.   You can't ask to be paid like a professional and act like a tradesperson.  And I'm not a snob.  But there are some fundamentals here.