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Link: Speak up for Scottish Education
I’d be delighted to accept positive examples of your practice (in fact it doesn’t even have to be about your practice – it could be a colleague, your child’s teacher, or someone you know is doing brilliant things) . All you have to do is set up a video camera and speak for up to two minutes on something that you think is making a positive impact. It could be something from your daily practice with a class; something from your school or a larger scale project. You could be a teacher, a parent, a young person, a member of support staff, headteacher, someone who works in further or higher education, or anyone with an involvement in the Scottish education process. It doesn’t have to be new and shiny – just something which is leading to positive outcomes for learners.
If you are fed up only hearing negative stories about Scottish education or Curriculum for Excellence and want to provide some balance then send in your clips and speak up for Scottish education.
If you upload your video to You Tube and send me the URL at dledingham@eastlothian.gov.uk I’ll attempt to categorise your submission so that others can find it easily. The only fear I have is that our natural Scottish reticence will prevent people from speaking up in the belief that what they are doing is nothing special. Believe me what you do is very special. It will only be by sharing this that we can counter some of the wilder assertions about how bad things are in our schools.
Good luck – and don’t be shy!
Don, what an amazing idea, creative and thoughtful and reaching out across the globe about the work we are all doing here. I’m going to be really excited to hear the videos, hopefully you can get some people from HE/FE too. Can I ask what was the stimulus for you to create this?
Don, good for you! Once again your thoughtful insights into Scottish Education challenge us all to think about what we are about. I agree with your assertion that there is too much negativity out there. Look forward to hearing and seeing celebrations of the positives.
Great idea Don – really looking forward to watching the monthly video interviews.
Do you have a twitter account? It was through twitter I heard of your video (& other comments / thoughts of yours!) I find twitter a fantastic way to ask questions / hear peoples thoughts / comments and also hear what’s going on in the wider world – on top of being one of the best CPD opportunities too.
Looking forward to seeing you on Friday & also to continuing to follow your blogposts / video posts – keep ’em coming (& continue to be an “inconvenient thinker!!)
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Go for it, Don! 🙂
John
Sally
The main reason I don’t have a twitter account is that we don’t get mobile phone reception where I live. That can be both a negative and a positive I suppose.
Don
Don. A sensationally simple but powerful idea. It may get teachers to share their practice as well which I think is critical for professional learning. We need other voices supporting the narrative not just the media mafia
Great to see Greg picking up on this simple but marvelous idea from Don – the messages that ought to come out of this will, of course, be important to each country, but the overall message internationally could be very powerful indeed.
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Excellent idea Don. There is a huge amount of very good work and people in education. Talking down all that is good helps no-one and plays into the hands of those who say that CfE is taking us in the wrong direction. We need to celebrate the fact that our staff, children and young people are so enthusiastic and energetic.
Keep up the good work.
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Don, this is magic. Great idea. We’re onto it!
I have set up a Twitter account (http://twitter.com/sufse) to help promote this fab idea virally. Looking forward to all of the contributions
Will do what I can to spread this around to parents. They too want to hear the positives, and when they do, they come on board to do what they can to contribute. Too often they are hearing only stories that get them worried.
Thanks for the follow on Twitter which led me to your blog and project. I’m sure it will be a success…and I look forward to seeing outdoor learning on your list of categories on the RHS in due course!
Hi Don,
I’ve take the liberty of setting up a Youtube channel for your ‘Speak Up’ venture – see:
http://www.youtube.com/user/speakupforeducation
I’ve ‘favourited’ all the videos submitted so far (click ‘see all’ on the right hand side to see them all).
Happy to hand over the reins of it to you to do with it what you will – the look and feel and the logo are all customizable, of course.
I left the title non-country-specific in ase you ever want to extend the notion to allow other countries to submit videos too – we could then set up separate ‘playlists’ within the channel – one for Scottish Education, one for Australian education (given Greg W’s interest), and so on.
What do you think?
John
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Don, I agree totally with you that there is an enormous amount of good practice going on in Scottish Education. In my authority, North Lanarkshire, Co-operative Learning has made a huge difference I feel, to the quality of teaching and learning. I hope you get a big response to your campaign.
A superb idea, Don, and I’d love to take part at some point. In the week that you’ve kicked this off I’ve been at the sharp end of what you’re talking about: a 20 minute interview with a journalist failed to give him the negative story he wanted, so he instead decided to quote blog comments from a year ago, out of context, and ignore what I told him the previous day. It’s nuts, and seems to confirm the old press adage: “if it bleeds, it leads”.