About Me

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hi, I am a mature student studying for a degree in early childhood studies, i start at warwick campus in 2010 if i make it through my second year! All this is new to me, previously worked as a composite engineer, I left school with a couple of qualifications and never imagined that i would be working towards completing a degree! The formalities out the way i am funloving, i like to go out socialising with friends, i like meetin new people too, I can't describe myself in just one word and i think i would run out of characters if i did try! heinze 57 as me dad would say ;-). so yeah you will read good things, bad things, confusing things, informative things all on this here little blog. I must confess now though i am not the greatest at keeping on top of blogs xx peace out guys v

Monday 9 November 2009

alternative schooling

hi all ,
long time no blog Eeek! sorry, haha but i did warn you! anyway just checked out a link i found about TAS the alternative school, i got another link to a bloke called stewart townsend, he has done a video about "bunking off" this was made with the hellp of the guys and girl from TAS this is the link to the video http://vimeo.com/2541500 its worth a watch an i hate to admit it but it made me really sad, having the knowledge that our future generations are experiencing these kind of thoughts on a daily basis. Our so-called education system is supposed to be inclusive - for everyone but watching this brings the harsh reality of it all, it isnt! its not inclusive and unless something drastic is done to change this fact it never will be, i know the argument on the other side is that well there have always been people / children who have been non-conforming or wayward but its our duty as a society to ensure that ALL these children get a good start in life, isnt that why we have the Children Act? Childrens Rights and so on?! it makes me so mad to think of all them children out there who have been cast aside because they dont fit in to the mold that is formed by the governing system of britain! the very people who are supposed to be makin good are at the same time creating bad, i agree with what Brian says, our education system is like a car factory production line any dodgey or faulty parts are pushed to the waste basket never to be touched again unless its to throw them out completely. I know that some ofsted reports are daming to alternative schools , but like what is said by Mr townsend "Schooling, despite the concentration on curriculum and assessment reform in recent years, largely still hasn't tackled the main issue: meaningless (to young people) pedagogy. The government who are supposed to be managing change are not doing so, this links in with the so called independant inspections, ofsted, the more i look into it and find more out about polotics the more i feel this countries government is corrupt and that is just on the education front, never mind taxes and bills!! the same people (government ) who are supposidly making a change for the better for our young children are also kicking aside the children who need help the most by making such tight deadlines that the teachers dont have the time to help the children who are struggling, what kind of education is that? in making the education inclusive with one hand they are at the same time making it exclusive. this does not even take into account private schools or church schools this is our state school system doing this and i damn sure that if my daughter ever struggled at school and was excluded by the system i would not be best pleased! what are the government going to do to help those children who are rejected? they have policy after policy in supposidly solving one problem they create another! to solve that problem they make another policy, such as sure start, if the problem which creates these problems could be delt with @ source surely the money spent on sure start education places could be pumped back into mainstream schools to keep these children in instead of isolating them and moving them away, which in turn creates the "us and them" scenario, which if exposed to constantly (secondary socliasation) will eventually to the extreme create a dehumanized human, why should they bother with society when society wont bother with them..... food for thought right am offski
peace out guys v

Monday 12 October 2009

Make an argument for a primary curriculum model for the 21st century (uk)

Hi all,
just about over my illness now so back in tomora.

ok so the question, Ive not researched this like i should have, but was far too busy trying to get better but i shall have a stab at it an probably come back to it at a later date and revise it but my initial thoughts are as follows :

In my interpretation i have to make an argument FOR a primary curriculum model in the 21st century. Using my knowledge which i have gained over the past year from books and theories that have been published and also proven then i would have to say that most children learn best in the younger years, they are like sponges, they soak in all the information that is provided to them. However there are children with learning difficulties who also need to be catered for, with this in mind the Primary Curriculum model primarily should be accessible, understood and suited to all children. This is an emense task to be delt, but as it is widely know the younger years are THE most important years, foundations are set from which each individual child will build upon throughout their remaining years. With this in mind and also bringing into the equation the basics of primary and secondary socialisation, children nowadays need to gain this skill set before continuing on their learning journey, as in Maslows Heirachy of needs lower levels need to be completed before moving on to the next, and unless the child has their most basic needs met then they will not learn. From reports, surveys and longitudinal studies that have been carried out over the past centuary it can be identifyed that there are growing concerns for the well-being of todays generation of children, increasing numbers of children are not recieving the primary socialisation that would have occured a number of years ago in the home, they are now recieving it at school. This could be due to a number of reasons such as family problems, working mothers, poverty, or a simple lack of inherited knowledge that has been overlooked for passing down, society is changing all the time, at one time it was important to pass down a family recipie for fruit loaf, now it is a necessity to pass down or indeed in some cases pass up information on ICT, with the fast pace the current society is running, there is no time for freshly baked bread or a home cooked pie instead there are micro-wave meals and toastie -pops. These basic skills of life are not being passed down to future generations in the home, therefore they should be covered in the school if our future generations are to survie. Although the current technology is keeping up with the fast paced lives there is always the chance that it could trip and fall, what would our children do then? would they know how to operate an oven instead of a microwave? would they be able to survive in the forest? these are basic skills of life which are no longer being passed down and as a society and a human race we should take the responsibilty to ensure our children are taught these skills to survive. By teaching these in schools we can ensure that children have a basic skill set on which to build. As for acedemics in primary schools this should be basic also, there should be no need for formal teaching of subjects such as mathematics, science, or english as this is part and parcel of learning basic skill sets, learning by doing and acting out should be sufficient for a young child rather than sitting down and being taught. This has been proven to be a good form of educating in countries such as Sweeden, Wales, and New Zealand when a child feels confident in their own abilities the learning process becomes much easier. To overwhelm a child at such a young age with formal subject teaching could i believe be damaging to a child in the long run again as repots have shown children switch off if bombarded with information, this would be an ideal time to postpone the formal subjects as the school leaving age has been increased to 18.

ok guys thats it i will probably read it back n scrap it all!!! lol but not before picking out certain facts, i have left out the formalities such as the acts (children have the right to make their own decisions ect as this would make it far too long) ok nighty night see ya tomora X
PEACE OUT V

Sunday 4 October 2009

PRIMARY REVIEW makes me rattled!

hey guys back again,

the title of this blogg may be a bit misleading, as im not really goin to talk about the review as such more about a debate that was hosted by the institute of education on the 3rd of this month, broadcast on BBC Radio 4. As we were asked to find info on the cambridge primary report by Robin Alexander, and also to look at the Sir Jim rose report of which i have and havent done yet, I am planning on buying the report (robin's, £35.00 from roultage) but in my search i came across this debate. Now during this debate they did cover the 6 areas of core subjects and blah de blah, but what really got my back up was a statement made by Dr. Sheila lawler, her stament was that the current intake of students for BA(hons) in teaching are not up to standard, she said that most students who have been accepted are just not up to the standard, they have maybe two g.c.s.e but no A
levels and that people like this should not be accepted onto a BA(hons) for teaching!!!. My question to her would be WHY have'nt they got these qualifications that are so desperately needed according to her? my answer to this would be to say that it is the govenments fault, they caused this lack of qualifications by the way in which they had teachers teach childrent from that era!. Now I myself as you can probably tell did not finish secondary school with many qualifications, I have been thinking about this more since tuesdays' lesson with Brian, when he asked us to fill in the questionaire about school etc. What do I remember from school, my reply was not a lot, yet if i think hard about it which i have been doing then i can remember my 11 plus, i was scared, sweaty palms, couldnt wait for it to be over, remember my mum saying oh its ok if you dnt pass dnt worry sweetie (as if she had no hope in the first place, my sister was always the tryer, i spent most of my juniors cleaning the toilets at any given chance!) So results in and my parents were asked to go to school, they had recieved a letter from my school with regard to my test results, i didnt have a clue what was going on and to be honest i doubt very much they did to, so I was borderline pass, they and i was told i could go to a grammer school (wirral grammer school for girls) or i could decline the offer and go to "state school" (south wirral high) when i got home i didnt really chat that much about it, all i could think of was how many of my mates where going to be there, my sister wasnt going to be there, and not many of my friends either, pluss it was about 20mins drive from my house where as southy was only a 15min walk, and as my dad said you would rather be at the top of one than the bottom of another, so that was it off to southy with my mates i went. Something recently on facebook of all places got me thinking again about school and "sets" from this there has sprouted a reunion because of the response this status comment produced, the statement was as follows :- F.R.A.C.T.I.O.N.S. Which set where you in? so this fractions was the category for which set you where in- none of us where supposed to know that this was the key word, so i was in R not that i could remember but other girls in my class remembered, which was middle top, obviously s being bottom bottom, so how can a child at the age of 11 going on 12 stay in the top set of mathematics, english, blah blah for 4-5 yrs then fail all her exams? surely if i was no good i would have been dropped a set or two during reviews! but no, so why did i fail my exams? i dnt know to this day i dnt know, but that then sets you up for life, i never went onto sixth form i went straight out and got a job, which i stayed in for the next 13yrs of my life. Making components for aircrafts that will carry hundreds of people or F1 cars that will travel up to 200mph isnt for the thicko brained, i had to read technical engineering drawings, sometimes designing lay-ups and contributing to designs, now surely if i was as thick as my G.C.S.E's have made me out to be there is no way i would have been able to stay on top in a game like that for as many yrs!. My point of this being is that due to the interference of the govenment and the way in which they wanted our national curriculum to be taught led me to fail my exams, and listening to the bradcast makes me extreamly worried, children are an empty slate as the theorist (cant remember name) once proclaimed and this makes me so concerned for children who are now stuck in our so called education system, they are like skinners rats, theorists in the 70's carried out experiments on children, that is no seen as unethical intodays world to take a child and plce them under observation or do tests on them BUT THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT OUR GOVERNMENT IS DOING WITH OUR CHILDREN! but because its them that are doing it makes it ok! i think it was nixon that once said "if its the president thats doing it, it not illegal" I think that this works for our government and a lot of the so called educationalists as well, i know there are good people out there who work well with children and have positive influences on them but there are a lot of peopleout there who dnt know the consequences of their actions. Like Brian put on the board MICRO and MACRO, the macro system controlls our micro world, they make or break people with the decisions they make, so much for free will, when we are constantly controlled by people who do not know what they are doing!! I have a suggestion mr politician lets murder all male children in 2010 because erm there are too many males in this world Mr politician says AH yes MISS JOHNSON i think you are right i shall make a policy for that! bloody farse it is and its our children who are suffering the consequences. Dr Haze from Derby uni said SEAL social, emotional aspects of learning is not a good idea, he thinks this is dangerous, as children are more focused on themselves and how they are feeling rather than others around them, could this lead to self-centredness? what will these children be like when they grow up? would they walk past an old lady in the street who has fallen over because they are upset themselves and dont have the time to stop an help her up? will there be a community? or will people just be concerned about themselves? could this self-centredness lead to a lack of reproduction? I cant deal with myself let alone a child scenario? what will happen then if there is no "next" generation? what will the government do then? is that why they are allowing test tube babies? to "top up" the population for economic gain or sustainability? who knows? only time will tell.
ahhhhhhh and breathe, sorry bout that rant but tha really pissed me off excuse the french! (yep did french failed that an all got a D, top set in that as well!!)
peace out guys v

Thursday 1 October 2009

FI and Observations

Hi guys back again check wit the record let begin, hehe old song

anyways yep today was our first encounter of the third kind (of lecturer that is) enjoyed it and got a lot of usefull info that i can put to good use once i start my ob's. I originally had a babe in the womb to study but since the split from my bloke that has kind of gone out the window. So have two possible victims in mind one whom is 6/7mths old and the other whom is 13/14mth old. now up until today i didnt know indepth what was being asked of me but now that i have a clearer picture in my head i can decide which child will be more suitable for me to observe, that doesnt mean that i am "choosing" the easiest, or more intersting child but it what it does mean for me is that i now know i have to be objective in my ob's so i will pick the child that i would feel i would be most objective with, if that makes any sense? well it does to me! lol. Ok so yeah did have a couple of worries about fi to be honest, i was told that fi was a cross between brian an lin, arrrrgh nightmare!, no offence guys. With this in mind, although i do keep an open mind when meeting new people regardless of what has been said, i found tht fi was as described as such but not to the extreme i had imagined in my nightmares! lol a good mix of the two i would say, which is sound by me. This evening i have started to read Child Observations and Assessment by Christine hobart an Jill Frankel which fi kindly let me loan, this seems like a good book to start from, as my style it to know the ins an outs of everything before i can get me head round it, an sumtimes i have to do it/read it/ watch it twice b4 the understanding comes or the light goes on! haha bummer, but i know this so its all good. So once i get my forms back from my originally victim i can strt writting in my (free) journal an make plans for my baseline ob's . I am wondering if i should actually start the introduction to the portfolio now rather than later, to keep on top of things, i will keep you posted onthat one. Right thats it for tonight am goosed an its only 7.40pm! i forgot how much brain work is needed i actually feel that my brain needs the rest more than my body!!!
Quick summery of gettin back to it, lovin it, lookin forward to everything this year, a lot more than last year, i dnt know if that is because i have survived the first year an kinda know whats expected of me and know what i need to do, or if its because everything is planned out more this year and that i know what i need to do and when for, not sure on that one, or whether its just that my confidence has upt itself another gear acedemically. It could be aa mixture or everything nature/nurture as they say.
peace out guys v

Wednesday 30 September 2009

Ihar and lins introduction to research an lit review

Hi guys back again,
I know i wont be able to keep doin this every day but while its fresh in the mind there is no time like the present, although i have forgotten sum stuff already :-/ . Ok so today we had our first hr with ihar, i enjoyed it as i got to ,know a bit about ihar an you guys, but also as lins said we were NORMING which is part of the theory from TUCKMAN (not sure bout spelling) of group working> see link
http://www.infed.org/thinkers/tuckman.htm  . Also from ihar I got a few questions that i needed to start thinking about such as why, when , how, where, who I know these are pretty simple questions to ask but its remembering the simplist things that i sometimes forget about!  we also got a reminder of the heritage site an the info about all the new ebooks which have been added, great for time saving an leisurely reading, no pressure to return books as they are online! sorted and again the reminder of ATHENS. great recap for us i thought.
During lins session i gained a lot of info not just for her part of the course but for other parts too, links to theorists such as BERNSTEIN FOR THE OBS OF CHILD for fionna .
Other theorists I will list below as i myself find it easier to read a short sentance than to get lost in a paragraph of them!
JOHN DEWEY :- miss-education or education. ie, do you tell a child that all flowers are red or do you tell them that the come in all different colours?
this could also link to PIAGET and his schemas,ie tell a child that juice is in a blue cup constantley, but then child goes to granmas an gets juice in a green cup, the child will insist that there is no juice in the green cup beacuse juice comes in a blue cup, some chldren with maybe attention disorder may refrain from drinking out of that cup because of that dissorder where others would actually try the juice in a green cup after some persuassion.
VYGOTSKY'S  PRODUCTS: Internalize/ externalize, if you dnt externalize then you cant learn. i think this relates to merging technologies  but willhave to ask nxt week.
HOWARD JARCHE :- Context is as important as content (you know me + i know you)
SKINNER:- BEHAVIOURISM------------------------ these two forms of learning when compared with
PIAGET, BRUNER, GAGNE : CONECTIONISM---- itc are outdated so the possible new form is below
STEPHEN DADS + GEORGE SEMANS :- CONNECTIVISM like a spider web, gaining from different sources to learn and different people (NODES). BRONFENBRENNER could also be connected with this form, in his theory of macro ,meso, micro systems.

So they were the theorists i got from todays session some i will have to look up others i wont, I also learnt about TRIANGULATE  which i think is going to be usefull in an exam, three points of call for my research these being

                                                                 MY OWN




                             OBSERVATIONS                           EXPERT IN THE
                              STATISTICS                                      FIELD

To be able to conduct an acedemic research programme ALL three of these must be included, my own primary research (qualitive)  this could be enthrographic (one on one interview with person), teamed with hard facts (quantative)  from an expert in the field  AND these must be contextualised (background evidence/information). Using this triangulative method will give a solid structure to any research project, it will also allow me to be able to poke holes in other (secondary) research/evidence in an academic way allowing me to so my ability to disect an review other lit.

second to last b4 you all fall asleep (eeeek!!) EDUCATION IS DRIVEN BY NEED: this links to MASLOW and his heirachy of needs to reach self actualisation.

And last but not least CONNECTIVISM  has always been around, its just now by using ITC that its a much more faster an easier way of communication between learners, which links to change in society which also leads onto the bigger picture of GLOBALISATION OF TECHNOCAPITALISM.
ok guys thats enough for one night, i am startin to wonder if they are gonna bar me or start chargin me for the amount of space am using on this site? i wonder would they charge for space or characters? hmmm.......
peace out guys v

Tuesday 29 September 2009

back again!

ello, ello, elloooooo,
First day back today, was lookin forward to it! got a bit ambitious though, an took my gym kit with me, but alas i never went, oh well there is always tomora. Had my mate brian today, lookin as dashing as ever an full of wonderful info, got all dates for holidays an readin weeks an exams, oh an also dates for our presentation on an old person and our essay, of which he was shy about the title, jus wait till next week for that i think. On the subject of Bri we were give sum homework durin the summer, six degrees of seperation find the link between corby and recife in six stages. so for those who want to know wha i got am gonna write it below :

ok so i did a mind map first off, i got my basic info from wiki and went from there to other sites on the net, more academic ones that is but my mind map had the following on it
corby-pen green-surestart- welfare reform-white paper excellence in schools-green paper meeting the childcare challenges-poverty christine pascal + tony bertram_early excellence centres- norman glass intergrated service provision- macro economic context-America- headstart programme- nel noddings-c.a bowers- bell hooks- literacy- globalisation- oppression- paulo freire- globalisation of technocapatilism- Recife.
After blurting out on clares comment boxes on facebook of my immediate immpression which was along the lines of history of corby, during the "depression" as such when all the steel works were closed down there i worked from that and got to surestart, then i worked the other way from Recife being in brazil i learned about our mate paulo and what he thought about education and especially educating the poor to give them a voice an help pull themselves out of poverty the i made the obvious link from brazil to America and the headstart programme and my conclusion was as follows Corby- Surestart- Education- Headstart- Paulo Freire-Recife, which i know now to be wrong in fact the missing link was Maggie Wally (not sure of speeling of name) the reason for this is because she went over in the 70/80's and picked up on our mate Paulos' workings and took them across to england , corby, pen green. So that is the real path, the writtings below is what i got :

to link Corby to Recife in six stages is a big ask. On the face of it you could simply say that Corby was one of the first 11 early excellence centres to open in the UK in 1998, this was a result of the white paper "Excellence in schools" 1997 and a direct creation from the 1998 green paper "meeting the childcare challenge".
The then government initialised these projects as the intervention for the prevention of family poverty. Initialising this programe the government would bring together child services, agencys, parents an so on to create  Multi-agency working force. this idea of multi -agency working has been drawn from ideas originating from Americas Headstart programme.
The headstart programme as with the surestart programme provides comprehensive education, health, nutrition and parental involvement services to low income children and their families.
So how do we link corby, surestart and headstart to Paulo Freire and Recife? Education is the link. Keeping it simple the power under which paulo was oppressed made him come to realise that the feelings of hunger which in turn stemmed from family poverty which again in turn reduced the self-esteem of him an others like him was caused through lack of education. The educated rich remained rich the uneducated poor remained poor. Now as developers of a town , city, county, country such as corby and Reicife the only way to sustain these places are through the inhabitants whom occupy the place, the only way to gain sustainability would be through ensuring the inhabitants had the knowledge and education to do so. To be able to acheive this they (inhabitants) had and have to be educated, but along with eduction comes power and independence in turn leading to higher self esteem, therfore enabling people to break free of the poverty threshold resulting in sustainability which in turn in the macro economic context allows the country to progress and develop further. But in doing so can lead and had led to certain countries globalization domination forcing other countries further into poverty leading to whats become the known as the globalisation of technocapitalism. will this new process be responsible for the new wave of poverty and oppression resulting from unsustainable development?

Ok so thats it went on a bit dint i hahhahaha an its a bit deep but he told me to write down wha i had written down so i have, i will be brutally honest an say that i only wrote this up yesterday an didnt give it that much thought, in fact i only found the piece of paper Bri gave to us on friday last week so if its pants then  am sure Brian will tell me to remove or ammend my mistakes. so dnt forget the missing link was maggie wally not education i made all the middle bit up from what i picked up on and made my own link viable although the ideas were obtained from legit sources. ne way guys i gotta go pick my rug rat up from school see ya tomora,
oh an tija dnt forget ya gym stuff!!!!!
peace out guys v

Friday 25 September 2009

f f f f f ffffrrrrriiiidaaaaaaay

Yepo i know, two blogs in two days! well best get into a routine of doin this, thought i would share the books i got yesterday at the library, ok i read the chapter which was suggested by fionna, ch 19, ref only book from our library, was basically what Ihar told us in first year about how to conduct research, using wildcards, ect good to get a refresher course. I got Paulo Freire pedagogy of the oppressed, links with surestart i believe, started to read that already, seems like a good book an i was pleased to have shocked myself by being kind of right (although maybe a little too deep) on brians find the missing words from Corby to Reicife in 6 stages. just needs to write it up. I also got Childhood second ed, by chris jenkins, which gives an understanding of into private attitudes and public policy in relation to children. Key concepts in childhood studies by allison james and adrian james which includes concise summeries of key ideas an introductions to some complex issues (sounds good) Research with children perspectives and practices sec ed, by pia christensen and allison james, includes both new an old research within the social studies of childhood, an demonstrates the links between theory an practice.Contempory issues in the early years by good old gillian pugh about multi-agency working or lack of it.children in society contempory theory,policy and practice by Pam foley, jeremy roche an stan tucker and the contents is in the title really. The family by liz steel an warren kid couldnt find the one on the list so this will have to do till i get over to warwick, this is about the sociology of the family. And last but not least i got my hands on a MIA KELMER PRINGLE book, yes about time, i know! the needs of children. so thats my reading list so far, hoping to have whized through them all by half term of crimbo at the latest, so i can get me some more. i also need to get a copy of mr haralambos as i think that will come in handy for me. Cant go to warwick today so looks like its gonna be a qucik call to see whats goin on with my email, will use the number brian gave me yesterday, double booked today, I NEED to get a diary! or a calender an i also need to find me some glasses- sick of squinting! peace out guys v