At St. Michael’s…

We engage each in their own learning by…

• encouraging growth through creative and critical reflection with others
• creating a school environment in which teaching and learning is purposeful, relevant, innovative and collaborative…

We empower with a sense of hope for the future by:

• equipping each child with the skills required to work towards their full potential…
• nurturing resilient learners, who can negotiate change…

St. Michael’s Vision and Mission Statement

If we believe this, then we should not only agree with, but fully embrace what this video (which I found here at The Fischbowl blog) promotes:

The Conference Board, in 2006, produced Are They Really Ready for Work? Employers’ Perspectives on the Basic Knowledge and Applied Skills of New Entrants to the 21st Century U.S. Workforce.  You can still download the report.

I just want to share with you today one part of the 64-page report:

To determine future skill needs, employer respondents were asked to indicate how the importance of the basic knowledge and applied skill areas would change over the next five years…

1. Critical thinking/Problem solving
2. Information Technology application
3. Teamwork/Collaboration
4. Creativity/Innovation
5. Diversity
6. Leadership
7. Oral communications
8. Professionalism/Work ethic
9. Ethics/Social responsibility
10. Written communications

(pp. 48, 49)

How well do you think our classrooms meet this need?

Well, that’s a very strong statement, and probably not 100% true, but when I do start to hate it is when there is more around than what is really necessary.  When you consider how much paper goes through my pigeon hole in the staff room, the notes that leave the office, and the sheets that come across my desk, it’s a lot of paper.  If I don’t need to have it printed on paper, I’d rather have it some other way.  So there’s my problem.

Then I know there’s a problem many of us have at school.  The photocopier.  It’s a frustrating mechnical animal.  Especially the older machine that seems to have been deliberately engineered to cause trouble after the service contract has expired, what with all its jams and misfeeds.

There’s a simple solution to our problems.  Stop photocopying.

There may be some times when it’s useful or even necessary, but are there ways that are more efficient in terms of cost, time, eco-friendliness and learning benefit?

Holy Family at Luddenham is obviously asking a similar question, so when I saw that somewhere there was thinking what I was secretly thinking here (ok, the office staff would say my thinking was not so secret to them), I thought it might be good to blog about it to get it out of my system.

Just don’t expect me to produce and photocopy a survey for people to complete about the topic.  Yes, I can see the irony.  I might email you if I feel so inclined…

Photo credit: Day in the Life by zebble

Some people may remember that Dale Spender was a presenter at the 2003 Diocesan Focus on Learning Conference.  Last week she contributed her thoughts on federal political education policies and their relevance to the 21st Century world our schools need to prepare children for.  I was alerted to this Sydney Morning Herald article by the Diocesan Library blog, Edlib.

As we approach a federal election this year, the party leaders are talking about “vision” and “the future”.  We as educators need to pay attention to and critique the education policies to see how visionary they really are.

As learned professionals we need to make informed and objective choices.  ABC’s Stateline on Saturday reported on the NSW State Government’s disagreement with recently announced Federal Government policy.  While the Iemma Government is opposed to performance pay for teachers, it also sought to criticise levels of Federal funding for government schools vs. non-government schools (always a touchy subject for those in Catholic Education, but not one for discussing in this forum – I’ll use a personal space to express my personal opinion), presenting the data in a way supportive of their own perspective.  “There are three types of lies – lies, damn lies, and…”

For those people interested in learning more about the education policies in the lead-up to the federal election, below are links to the policies of the two major parties:

• Australian Labor Party
• The Liberal Party of Australia doesn’t have a dedicated policies page yet for the current election, but read the news on the home page and in the archive for the latest policy announcements