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I was told the story of a teacher in Ontario who reluctantly participated in a project to improve her students’ learning. After several months she found that “her students performed better than she had even expected herself.” When she told her story, she wept. Read more
The week when I was due to meet Michael Gove, The week when I was due to meet Michael Gove, England’s controversial Secretary of State for Education, New Zealand’s own Minister of Education, Hekia Parata, released a damning review of the New Zealand Teachers Council (NZTC) alongside a proposal to reform it into a more professional body. This was timely. Read more
At first glance, the glowing reports about Finnish education make it sound like a magical fairyland. Some of the myths surrounding the legend of Finland’s education system are that teachers’ work is easy and there are no high-stakes tests. Read more
Germany found in 2001 that their 15-year-olds ranked well below the OECD average in maths and reading in the Programme for International Student Achievement (PISA) study. They also had one of the largest gaps between high and low performing students in the world. Read more
Not all teachers in Singapore desire to rise through the ranks to head of department (HoD) or beyond. Many are content to stay in the classroom, branding themselves as HOT – happy, ordinary teachers. Read more
Some Australian politicians believe sacking the bottom 5% of teachers is the answer to improving student achievement. Last week in Melbourne, I interviewed academics at a number of universities, researchers at the Australian Council of Education Research (ACER), media commentators, and think tank researchers. Read more
How do the world’s best performing education systems attract and develop great teachers? To find out, I am about to embark on a journey overseas. Read more
Last Saturday, the primary teachers’ union NZEI rallied more than 10,000 supporters all over the country to ‘fight the GERM’ and inoculate against a disease taking the world by storm. GERM stands for the Global Education Reform Movement, a term coined by Pasi Sahlberg, the renowned Finnish expert in international education reform. Read more
In The New Zealand Initiative's Better Education Project, I am looking at how policy levers interact and affect the quality of teaching in schools. Teacher training and qualifications, or Initial Teacher Education (ITE), is one policy area of promise. Read more
While not wishing to perpetuate cultural stereotypes, proverbs can say a lot about how our cultural values can influence student achievement. In Japan there is a famous saying: “The nail that sticks out gets hammered down.” And the Japanese classroom is the best place to observe young students being hammered down to size. Read more