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John Simkin

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  1. You are of course right that the BBC web content is being produced with taxpayers money. However, I think it is very sensible of the government to use organizations such as the BBC to produce free online resources. I would argue that most of the best educational resources come from government funded projects (along with that being produced by the classroom teacher). Take for example the excellent Learning Curve (Public Record Office) website. My concern is over the role that classroom teachers will play in the production of this material. The main reason that the Learning Curve is so good is that Tom O’Leary, the man who runs the website, has recruited a team of excellent teachers to produce the material. My experience of the BBC is that teachers only play a marginal role in the production of its educational materials. The Digital Learning Alliance is understandably concerned about the role that BBC is playing in the production of online materials. While this is happening they will indeed find it difficult to make a profit out of its materials. However, it is not only the BBC that is undermining their efforts to make a profit out of educational resources. Pressure groups and charitable organizations are also willing to provide free materials. So also are a large number of teachers who are so committed to online learning that they are willing to give their time and effort without payment (see for example, the membership list of the Association of Teacher Websites). Thank you for the link to Tom McMullan’s article, Wired to Learn. http://www.adamsmith.org/policy/publicatio...-jan-02-doc.pdf McMullan makes some interesting points and I agree with some of his criticisms of government policy towards online education. The problem for the Adam Smith Institute is that it is supposed to be committed to the free market and is totally opposed to government subsidies. Yet in this article it supports Curriculum Online. However, this is only a government subsidy to bail out large commercial organizations in serious financial trouble. It seems that the Adam Smith Institute is not so keen on the free market when it applies to the production of online resources. I personally believe that the large amount of money being poured into Curriculum Online is a far greater waste of taxpayers money than that being spent on the BBC. The problem for the Adam Smith Institute is that it is impossible to apply capitalist doctrines to online education. Without government subsidies, it will remain impossible for commercial companies to make a profit while organizations and individuals are willing to produce materials free of charge. Until the arrival of the Internet it was impossible for individuals and small organizations to compete with the multinational corporations in the education marketplace. Now, because of low overheads, they have a distinct economic advantage over the big players. This is indeed the real revolutionary significance of the internet. Although they are not aware of it, teachers are on the verge of a grassroots revolution. This forum, and others like it, will play a vanguard role in this revolution.
  2. A survey by the National Union of Teachers found that despite serious reservations, only one out of eight wanted GCSE coursework scrapped. However, 62 per cent of NUT members surveyed said that coursework had added too much to their workloads. According to the survey, one of the major concerns of teachers is that coursework favours middle-class students, who were more likely to get “support” from parents. John Bangs, head of education at the NUT said: “Too often, instead of encouraging pupils to take risks in their work, it is in danger of becoming a bureaucratised part of the examination process. The mixture of good practice templates on the web combined with enormous pressures to enhance schools’ positions in league tables is draining the creative value of coursework.” http://www.teachers.org.uk/index.php
  3. In today’s TES Jonathan Osborne, professor of science education at King’s College, London, claims that the pressure to do well in assessment meant that coursework investigations were now being taught as a set of “receipe-like steps” that have little to do with proper scientific exploration. Osborne argues that assessment of investigation is dominated by just three experiments: measuring the resistance of a wire, the rates of chemical reaction and the rate of osmosis in a potato. Osborne adds: “How can such a limited set of practicals develop or exemplify the wide range of skills and scientific practices that constitute science… It’s a bit like reducing the teaching of performance in music to three standard scales on a recorder.”
  4. I would like to organize a weekly student debate on international issues. At first I think it would be wise to restrict to about two students per school. However, if you are at an international school we could have two students per country. The debate will be in English but it is hoped that those running the different language sections will also offer similar debates. It is a project that lends itself to the very able student. In Britain we have been discussing ways of how we can stimulate the minds of the most able. Debates like this will enable bright students all over the world to stimulate each other. Ideally the debating group would include students from as many countries as possible. The idea is that one of the teachers on the forum would start the debate and pose a question with international relevance for discussion. The students will then contribute to the debate. After a week the debate will be closed. Teachers could then post details of how they would make use of this debate as a teaching resource. Please post details of your school and country if you are interested in joining this project. As soon as we have more than ten schools involved we can begin the first debate.
  5. Of course I was not implying that all Jewish people support the persecution of Arabs in the Middle East. In the same way I would not be referring to all Germans when discussing the Holocaust. The point I was making is that most groups have at some time in the past persecuted other groups. In the 1930s it was some Germans persecuting Jews for racial and political reasons. Today it is some Jews persecuting Arabs in Palestine for the same reasons. Those Jews resisting that process today need our gratitude as much as those Germans who bravely stood up to Hitler in the 1930s.
  6. In July 2003 Charles Clarke published the government's e-learning strategy. He asked for teachers to respond to this policy. The deadline is the 30th January, 2004. Apparently, very few have bothered to do this. Maybe members would be interested in commenting on this issue. I will then make sure these views are passed on to the government. http://www.dfes.gov.uk/elearningstrategy/about.stm
  7. There are also many examples of corporate crime that can be used in the history classroom. I have always been interested in the way the wealthy Germans who backed Hitler were treated after the Second World War. The case of Alfried Krupp is particularly interesting. During the Second World War Krupp ensured that a continuous supply of his firm's tanks, munitions and armaments reached the German Army. He was also responsible for moving factories from occupied countries back to Germany where they were rebuilt by the Krupp company. Krupp also built factories in German occupied countries and used the labour of over 100,000 inmates of concentration camps. This included a fuse factory inside Auschwitz. Inmates were also moved to Silesia to build a howitzer factory. It is estimated that around 70,000 of those working for Krupp died as a result of the methods employed by the guards of the camps. In 1943 Adolf Hitler appointed Krupp as Minister of the War Economy. Later that year SS gave him permission to employ 45,000 Russian civilians as forced labour in his steel factories as well as 120,000 prisoners of war in his coalmines. Arrested by the Canadian Army in 1945 Krupp was tried as a war criminal at Nuremberg. He was accused of plundering occupied territories and being responsible for the barbaric treatment of prisoners of war and concentration camp inmates. Krupp was found guilty of being a major war criminal and sentenced to twelve years in prison and had all his wealth and property confiscated. Krupp's American lawyer, Earl J. Carroll, began work on persuading the authorities to free him. In February, 1951, John J. McCloy, the high commissioner in American occupied Germany, ordered Krupp's release from Landsberg Prison. His property, valued at around 45 million, and his numerous companies were also restored to him. When he died in 1967 he was one of the richest men in Germany and was the owner of the 12th largest corporation in the world. McCloy was an interesting character who was later, as a member of the Warren Commission, was able to help cover-up the Kennedy assassination. Richard Bissell and Richard Helms were two other Americans involved in gaining the release of German war criminals. Both went on to become leading figures in the CIA and were the men behind the Executive Action strategy (a plan to remove unfriendly foreign leaders from power). In 1975 the Senate Foreign Relations Committee began investigating the CIA. Senator Stuart Symington asked Helms if the CIA had been involved in the removal of Salvador Allende. Helms replied no. He also insisted that he had not passed money to opponents of Allende. Investigations by the CIA's Inspector General and by Frank Church and his Select Committee on Intelligence Activities showed that Hems had lied to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. They also discovered that Helms had been involved in illegal domestic surveillance and the murders of Patrice Lumumba, General Abd al-Karim Kassem and Ngo Dinh Diem. In 1977 Helms was found guilty of lying to Congress and received a suspended two-year prison sentence. Once again showing how the world has a two-tiered justice system. http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWkruppA.htm http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAmccloyJ.htm http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKbissell.htm http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKhelms.htm
  8. Educational forums like this have great potential for helping gifted and talented students. For example, there is currently a discussion going on at the moment about how you teach about the dark periods of our past. http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=96 What about us creating a thread where students from different countries discuss the topic of history and nationalism. Maybe members could select two or three of their sensible students from their own school with a good use of the English language to discuss these issues. This debate could then be used as a teaching resource. I would be willing to make an opening statement to get the debate going. What do you think? Please post if you are interested in taking part in such a project.
  9. A few years ago our school was visited by a group of German students. They joined my sociology group and we discussed differences between the two school systems. It emerged during the discussion that the German students had been shocked by the fact that British students wore school uniforms. They felt very uncomfortable about this as they associated the idea with the Hitler Youth (they told me that school uniforms are banned in Germany because of what happened in the 1930s). I got the impression from the debate that we had that German students have been far more successful at coming to terms with their history than those in Britain. During the days of the British Empire we were responsible for the deaths of millions of people. In places like Ireland and India our imperialistic policies resulted in large numbers of people dying of starvation. These are issue that are rarely dealt with in British classrooms. (Information from the web suggests that the Irish Famine (1846-50) is taught in some schools in America under the heading “Genocide Studies”. British history teachers are far happier studying the bad behaviour of other nations than tackling the crimes of our own ancestors. Although I think it is vitally important that we study our own dark history, we must make sure we do not encourage our students to feel a sense of guilt about the country’s past. If we do, we are bound to get a negative reaction. My view is that when teaching about subjects like genocide it is important to stress the political and sociological pressures that people were under to behave in this way. At the same time, it is important to look at those examples of people who resisted this pressure to behave in an honourable way. All good teaching involves encouraging the positive rather than punishing the negative. In Germany you have plenty of examples of people who fought against the ideology and actions of the Nazis. These people are excellent role models for your (and my) students. Anyone who has studied history knows that the human race has done some terrible things in the past. However, I remain an optimist. During every one of these black periods, individuals, bravely stood up and said it was wrong. They usually suffered greatly for rejecting the dominant ideology. However, whether they were protesting against racial persecution, slavery, child labour, genocide, military dictatorships, etc., they eventually won (although many were not alive to see it). In the same way that those on the receiving end of Jewish racial prejudice today will eventually win. As Oscar Wilde once said: “Disobedience in the eyes of any one who has read history, is man’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and rebellion.”
  10. Richard Kimber of Keele University has produced a magnificent website for all teachers and students of Politics. He has successfully achieved his ambition of offering a gateway to the most significant resources relevant to political science on the Internet. Kimber has organized his material in several different ways. Area Studies gives access to information on individual countries. You can also find information by looking at the topics section such as constitutions, elections or political parties. http://www.psr.keele.ac.uk/
  11. I would be the first to agree that the anti-war protests showed that a significant number of people still feel very strongly about politics. My concern is that the vast majority of the population does not share this passion about political events. You rightly say that most teachers agree about the merits of SATS and the privatisation of education. The NUT recently asked its members to vote on the following question: "In order to protest against the extra workload and constraints upon professional judgement imposed by directions to teach for National Curriculum tests and tasks at Key Stage 1 and National Curriculum tests at Key Stage 2, are you willing to take action short of strike action by refusing to comply with such directions or undertake work required in consequence of the National Curriculum testing arrangements, including any direction to participate directly in preparation and assessment arrangements for the National Curriculum tests and tasks in your school?" An impressive 86.2% of those who voted said yes. However, only 34.05% of members voted and this meant that industrial action could not be taken. Surely, the number of people who failed to vote, is another indication of the political apathy that exists in the profession. You rightly say that a large percentage of people have a considerable mistrust of politicians. However, the question is: What are people doing about it? Public opinion polls and national and local elections suggests that large numbers are choosing not to vote. In a democracy this means that those who do not vote are handing over power to those who do. This will not only be reflected in election results but in the policies being offered by the political parties. As I said in an earlier posting, this will result in the opinions of young people being ignored by politicians. The recent NUT ballot also sends a message to Tony Blair’s government. That is, teachers are opposed to its policy on SATS, but not enough of them feel strongly enough to do anything about it. In other words, they can continue with this policy and the other proposed policies that they know are unpopular with teachers.
  12. I have had a few emails from people having difficulty making postings. After registering it will take another 15 minutes for you to be able to make postings. If you want to contribute to a discussion that has already started, click “ADD REPLY” (bottom of the page). A box will come up where you can post your message. When you have done that scroll down and click “Add Reply”. If you want to start a new thread. Go to the appropriate section and select the option “NEW TOPIC” (at top on right-hand side). Then it is the same as for replying to the comments of other members.
  13. You might be interested in knowing that David Bradley, who played Billy Casper in Kes, is still a successful actor. He was on television last night in the Mayor of Casterbridge (Councillor Vall). His 19th century face means he is often used in costume dramas: Nicholas Nickleby (Bray), Our Mutual Friend (Rogue Riderhood), Vanity Fair (Sir Pitt Crawley), Martin Chuzzlewitt (David Crimple), etc. He is also Argus Filch in the Harry Potter films.
  14. A collection of articles on the world's leading photographers. This includes Ansel Adams, Berenice Abbott, Alvin L. Coburn, Imogen Cunningham, Walker Evans, Arthur Fellig, Lewis Hine, Dorothea Lange, Jacob Riis, W. Eugene Smith, Edward Steichen, Alfred Stieglitz, Paul Strand, Timothy O'Sullivan, Edward Weston and Clarence White. http://masters-of-photography.com/
  15. Seven years ago the publishers of the Daily Mail spent more than £10 million for the film library of British Pathe. The 3,500 hours of material covers news, sport, social history and entertainment from 1896 to 1970. The entire archive, including its pictures of the Coronation of Tsar Nicholas II, the explosion of the Hindenberg airship and the declaration of war in 1939, has been digitised, with the help of £1 million from the National Lottery's New Opportunities Fund. This material can now be searched online and downloaded from the Pathe News website. http://www.britishpathe.com/
  16. Jack Hughes: Biography Jack Hughes was born in Clapton, London on 11th March, 1920. The eldest son of Thomas Griffiths Hughes, a haberdasher's assistant from Aberystwyth, and Elizabeth Ellen Hughes a lady's maid from Bethnal Green. The couple also had two other children, Muriel Hughes and Stella Hughes. He went to school in Clapton and Stoke Newington before leaving at the age of fourteen to work as a warehouseman and trainee salesman in London. In 1940 he was called up to join the British Army for military training. The following year he was sent to Egypt to take part in the Desert War. He was at Tobruk but got pushed back to El Alamein where he was wounded in the arm and was hospitalized in Alexandria. He returned to duty and took part in Operation Lightfoot and Operation Supercharge. He was also involved in the capture of Tunisia in on 11th May, 1943 and the war in Italy in 1944. He remained on duty until arriving back in Liverpool in August 1945. After the war his brother-in-law, John Simkin, introduced him to my future wife, Eileen Kane, who he married on 28th June, 1947. They lived in Loughton before moving to Rayleigh in 1960. He worked as a commercial traveller until his retirement in 1985. Jack Hughes was interviewed in June, 2001 I was called up in 1940 to join the army for military training. I was told to report on the 13th June to Winchester Barracks as a rifleman. In March 1941 I was drafted to Egypt. I arrived six months later at a place called Port Taufiq. It was very hot (108 degrees). We were there a couple of weeks then we joined the Kings Royal Rifle Corps B Company. From there we moved into the desert proper. I was at Tobruk but we got pushed back to El Alamein where I was hit by shrapnel and ended up in hospital at Alexandria. When I came out a month later I rejoined the battalion to get ready for the big push on 23rd October, 1942 at El Alamein. We got detailed to clear the way of mines by bayonet proding. We then started the push in our carriers to Tunis that took about six months. We had a visit by Montgomery and I had my photograph taken with him. The next lot of action was Italy 1944. That took to the end of the war. We got the ship to Liverpool from Naples. It was not until August, 1945, that I got home. For photographs of Jack Hughes see: http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/Msimkin4.htm
  17. Stella Hume: Biography Stella Hughes was born in London on 5th June, 1926. She is the daughter of Thomas Griffiths Hughes, a haberdasher's assistant from Aberystwyth, and Elizabeth Ellen Kershaw, a lady's maid from Bethnal Green. Stella attended Wellington Avenue School for Girls in Chingford and was thirteen years old when the Second World War broke out. During the Blitz Stella, like other children in London, only "attended school on Monday mornings in order to collect books and homework and this was returned to the school on Friday mornings (air raids permitting)". In 1940, Stella, aged fourteen, began work as a machinist at Rego in Edmonton, making soldiers uniforms. She worked a 48 hour week as a three pence three farthings an hour. Stella also joined the Voluntary Nursing Service and nursed at Whipps Cross Hospital in the evenings and at weekends. After the Rego factory was hit by a V2 Rocket Stella fund work at the Luxrum the light bulb factory. When the Rego factory reopened Stella returned to making officer's uniforms. In 1943 Stella met George Hume, a Bombardier in the Royal Artillery S/L Regiment. He took part in the D-Day landings and the liberation of Paris. He also reached Germany and helped free those in Concentration Camps. After arriving back in England they married in 1947. After the war Stella worked at Standard Telephones before joining George Hume in his business in Harlow. Stella Hughes retired in 1984. Stella Hughes was interviewed in June, 2001. My father, Thomas Griffith Hughes was born in Aberystwyth, Wales in 1880 he was a well educated man and started his school at the early age of two years old. He prided himself on the fact that he never missed a day from school during the whole period of his education, for this he won many prizes for which he was equally proud. Being Welsh, he was very keen on singing and despite his age developed a fine tenor voice. At the age of fourteen he sang Jerusalem for and in front of Queen Victoria and for this he was awarded the honour of kissing the Queens hand. This was another occasion for which he was very proud. Shortly after this my father's mother unfortunately died and this resulted in his father bringing the whole family of six sons and one daughter to London to settle in Stoke Newington in North London. All his family was old enough to work and my father went into the Drapery trade working for a company called Rouse in Old Bethnal Green Road East London. My mother, Elizabeth Ellen Kershaw, was thirteen years younger than my father being born in Bethnal Green in 1893 she attended school in Bethnal Green, East London with her twelve sisters and brothers. Two of these children died in their infancy with seven girls and four boys surviving. Her mother was an extremely strict person and all her children revered her. At the age of thirteen my mother was sent out to work by her mother. My mother and father met when my father visited the Vicarage for tea with the vicar with whom he had business; the Vicarage was opposite where he worked. My mother was working there as a parlour maid. She was pleased with her job and rose eventually to the position of lady's maid to an actress Sybil Thorndyke who latterly became Dame Sybil Thorndyke. My mother and father married when my Mother was nineteen and my father was thirty-two. Shortly after this the First World War broke out and my father enlisted into the Royal Medical Corps. I was the third child of my parents born in 1926, which was the year of the General Strike! At the age of thirteen the Second World War broke out, although I was aware of the presence of the war initially, it had little effect on me. I attended Wellington Avenue School for Girls in Chingford, North London at the time and I remember the school being some two or so miles from our home and I walked to and from school daily. When the Germans started their air raids, they progressively got worse and therefore we only attended school on Monday mornings in order to collect books and homework and this was returned to the school on Friday mornings (air raids permitting). This lack of attendance to school did not effect my education to badly as my father, who was a stickler for good education would help me and my friends with our lessons and I do recall he certainly made sure we worked hard. I left school at the age of fourteen to start work and my mother escorted me to get suitable work and I recall leaving school on a Thursday and starting work on the Friday. This was literally "being thrown in at the deep end" as I had no time to adjust to this change to my life. I worked forty-eight hours a week as a machinist at an hourly rate of three pence three farthings, (which is less than one and halfpenny nowadays). All was not gloom and doom at this time especially as a young girl who perhaps was sheltered to a certain extent, not realising the full extent of what was happening. When the air raids got extremely bad we had to go to the air raid shelters, that's where I learned to dance and do the Jitterbug to the sounds of the bombs falling around us. We all made a point of enjoying our lives to the full because we were all aware that each day could be our last. It was really strange on reflection as facing the reality of death at any time no one seemed to moan or complain too much unlike nowadays when such problems are a thing of the past for us in this society. I had a dog, a Sealyham named Bob, and I walked him daily and I do recall on one particular day when there was a bad air raid shrapnel was falling all around us. An Air Raid Warden shouted at me to take cover but they would not let me take my dog in the shelter and I was not prepared to abandon him so I ran all the way home, we were very lucky to get home safely. Quite often the German Bombers would off load their deadly cargo over Chingford if they could not penetrate the Barrage protecting London. One evening my father, mother and myself were just opening the back door to go to the air raid shelter in the garden when there was a terrible explosion and an enormous whooshing sound! The next thing I recall was that we were all blown back through the house to the hall and landed in a heap. We soon learnt that the Bombers had dropped their bombs into the fields at the back of our house it was a miracle that no damage was sustained. I joined the Voluntary Nursing Service working from the Chingford post most evenings and at weekends in order to do my bit, so to speak, in the war. Five days a week I made soldiers uniforms working for Rego in Edmonton North London and then nursed at Whipps Cross Hospital in East London travelling there by bus. Along with my "indoor and outdoor" uniforms, which I was given I was issued a tin hat (which I had to pay for) but all this made me feel great. I recall on one occasion our factory where I worked was hit by a V2 rocket and my nursing training came in handy. When I got home I was filthy and dishevelled and I remember my Mother saying to me "why are you home early?" no mention of the state I was in. Due to this rocket attack I was out of work until such time as a temporary factory was opened so I looked for other work. I found a job at Luxrum the light bulb factory and I stayed there a year until the Rego opened again when I returned to tailoring officer's uniforms. When I was seventeen I met my husband George he was a Bombardier in the Royal Artillery S/L Regiment and what a fine soldier he was. George was twelve years older than I was; he was born in 1914 and was brought up by his two elder sisters in Hackney, East London as his Mother died when he was very young. He joined the army immediately after war broke out and he saw a lot of action in Europe. He went to France shortly after the D-day landings via the Omaha beaches and went through Europe to the Russian borders. His battalion joined forces with the Americans to liberate Paris. During the campaign, he was involved in the freeing of the poor people held in Nazi concentration camps. He witnessed some terrible sights but would not talk about them at all. He was demobbed from the army after serving six and a half years in 1946 and we were married in 1947. For a photograph of Stella Hume see: http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/Msimkin2.htm
  18. Second World War Oral History Project The main objective of this European project is to encourage school students to carry out interviews with people who experienced the Second World War. If possible contributions should include biographical details of the person being interviewed. It is hoped that we will be able to produce a substantial resource for the study of the Second World War. It will be possible to search the database of contributions. Initially the material will be in English but in time we hope to have interviews in different languages. I have posted a couple of interviews to show how it is hoped the project will work. It is hoped that others will also add their teacher/student interviews. http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=88
  19. Muriel Simkin: Biography Muriel Hughes was born in London on 29 July 1914. She was the eldest daughter of Thomas Griffiths Hughes, a haberdasher's assistant from Aberystwyth, and Elizabeth Ellen Hughes a domestic servant from Bethnal Green. They also had two other children, Jack Hughes and Stella Hughes. Muriel was educated at Rams Episcopal Primary School and Hackney Parochial School and left school in 1928 at the age of fourteen. Her first job was working at Barlow's Metal Box Company for 5s 6d a week. She also worked as an examiner and finisher for Horne Brothers Tailoring in Hackney before marrying John Simkin, a porter at Billingsgate Fish Market, on 26 August 1939 at West Hackney Church, Stoke Newington. While on their honeymoon Neville Chamberlain announced that Britain was at war with Germany. When they returned John Simkin joined the Royal Artillery and she was conscripted to work at the Briggs munitions factory in Dagenham. Muriel Simkin left work in 1942 when she gave birth to their first child Patricia. After the death of her husband in 1956, Muriel Simkin found work in a factory in Barking. Later she worked at the Electric Windings factory in Romford. She continued working until breaking her leg at the age of 70. Muriel Simkin now lives in retirement in Basildon, Essex. The Interview The Second World War was declared when Muriel Simkin and her husband, John Simkin, were on their honeymoon. We were on our honeymoon when war was declared. We had planned to have a fortnight's holiday but we had to come home after a week. It was not a very good start to our married life. I went with my parents to London to see off my husband and brother. They had both been called up by the army. After we left them at the railway station we got caught in an air-raid. We had to get off the bus after it caught fire. We ran for shelter. While wee were running I looked at my dad and he appeared to be on fire. I said: "Dad, you're alight." He nearly had a heart attack and I was not very popular when he discovered that I was mistaken and that it was only the torch in his pocket that had been accidentally turned on while he was running. Muriel Simkin worked in a munitions factory in Dagenham during the Second World War. We had to wait until the second alarm before we were allowed to go to the shelter. The first bell was a warning they were coming. The second was when they were overhead. They did not want any time wasted. The planes might have gone straight past and the factory would have stopped for nothing. Sometimes the Germans would drop their bombs before the second bell went. On one occasion a bomb hit the factory before we were given permission to go to the shelter. The paint department went up. I saw several people flying through the air and I just ran home. I was suffering from shock. I was suspended for six weeks without pay. They would have been saved if they had been allowed to go after the first alarm. It was a terrible job but we had no option. We all had to do war work. We were risking our lives in the same way as the soldiers were. While her husband was away in the army Muriel Simkin was forced to live on her own. We had an Anderson shelter in the garden. You were supposed to go into the shelter every night. I used to take my knitting. I used to knit all night. I was too frightened to go to sleep. You got into the habit of not sleeping. I've never slept properly since. It was just a bunk bed. I did not bother to get undressed. It was cold and damp in the shelter. I was all on my own because my husband was in the army. You would go nights and nights and nothing happened. On one occasion when my husband was on leave, I think it was a weekend, we decided we would spend the night in bed instead of in the shelter. I heard the noise and woke up and I would see the sky. They had dropped a basket of incendiary bombs and we had got the lot. Luckily not one went off. Next morning the bombs were standing up in the garden as if they had grown in the night. Rosie, my mum's sister, had to go to hospital to have a baby. Her mother-in-law looked after her three-year-old son. There was a bombing raid and Rosie's son and mother-in-law rushed to Bethnal Green underground station. Going down the stairs somebody fell. People panicked and Rosie's son was trampled to death. Muriel Simkin admits that she enjoyed some aspects of the Second World War. People on the whole were more friendly during the war than they are today - happier even. People helped you out. You had to have a sense of humour. You couldn't get through it without that. The worst part was having you husband and brothers away from you. We never heard from Jack, my brother, for five months. He couldn't communicate at all because he was involved in important battles in North Africa. It was very worrying. We knew a lot of his regiment had been killed. Then we saw his picture in the Daily Express newspaper. He was being inspected by General Montgomery. It was not until then that we knew he was alive. For photographs of Muriel Simkin see: http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/Msimkin.htm
  20. Second World War Oral History Project The main objective of this project is to encourage school students to carry out interviews with people who experienced the Second World War. If possible contributions should include biographical details of the person being interviewed. It is hoped that we will be able to produce a substantial resource for the study of the Second World War. It will be possible to search the database of contributions. Initially the material will be in English but in time we hope to have interviews in different languages. I have posted a couple of interviews to show how it is hoped the project will work. It is hoped that others will also add their teacher/student interviews. Article on Oral History: Voices From the Past http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/2WWprojectarticle.htm
  21. I thought A Walker said you were interested in giving political 'nounce' this rather more looks like anti-Blairite attacks on the policies! Top up fees etc have nothing to do with the original thread. If people are apathetic to the political system - it is their choice. Politics should not be rammed down people's throats. What is next, enforced citizenship in a hard-line Stalinist regime? (jbooth) Top up fees had everything to do with the original thread. To quote myself: “Only one in five under 30 could name him whereas two-thirds over 50 successfully knew his name. This is very surprising as Charles Clarke has received a great deal of publicity over the last few weeks as he has been seeking support for highly controversial policies concerning the funding of higher education.” Your strategy of linking citizen education it to the idea of a “hard-line Stalinist regime” is disingenuous. There is no evidence that when Stalin was in power he attempted to introduce citizenship education into the Soviet curriculum. Like all dictators, Stalin did not like the idea of your people being taught about political rights. To survive, dictators depend on the population being politically illiterate. The imagery of politics being “rammed down people’s throats” is an interesting one. If this is true of teaching politics in schools, is it not also true of other, less controversial subjects? If not, what evidence do you have that politics/citizenship is taught differently from any other subject? I am a History Teacher and I value good history teaching - all this mumbo jumbo about citizenship smacks to me of nannying the people, telling them what to do, when to do it and what to say in the event of having a thought. (jbooth) All education has an element of telling people what to do. Is citizenship education any different from this? You appear to be suggesting that history teaching is value free whereas citizenship teaching is politically biased. The idea of introducing citizenship into the curriculum was politically motivated. The idea originally came from Bernard Crick who was working as an adviser to David Blunkett, when he was Education Secretary. Crick was a member of the Labour Party but had got the idea from what had been going on in the United States. The policy, favoured by members of the Democratic Party, was to encourage young people to become actively involved in the community. (I should at this stage admit that Francine Britton, the person who pioneered the scheme in the United States and was brought over to Britain to advise the government, is a personal friend, and this could be influencing my views on the subject.) You could argue that Bernard Crick and Francine Britton were politically motivated in the sense they wanted to increase participation in the political process. It is indeed a liberal idea that I would be willing to defend. In fact, without this active participation in the running of society, democracy is a sham. Lord knows what it will be like in a 'pan European community'. Why else do you think Blair is looking at lowering the voting age to 16! Next it will be only those with GCSE in Citizenship to vote - what is next, political education in the classroom, political educators deciding the electorate in the classroom! why don't we all start waving the red flag and calling the Cold War a draw. (jbooth) This statement is an attempt to mix together all the things you apparently dislike: Europeanism, Citizenship Education, Tony Blair and Socialism. Although I am not convinced that they are natural bedfellows. I am not aware that Blair favours the idea of lowering the voting age to 16. In fact, I very much doubt it. Nor am I convinced that Blair is very keen on Citizenship Education (nor was David Blunkett when he discovered what it really entailed – although by that stage he had gone too far to retreat from the policy). Once again you attempt this smear tactic of suggesting that Citizenship Education has something to do with Communism (State Capitalism would be a better description of it). Citizenship Education has nothing to do with dictatorships. In fact, the subject is only common in the more advanced democracies. Surely by not voting in elections and being detached from the mainstream political process young people are simply setting up their own alternative forum for political action. (James Becket) I suspect this is rarely the case. While it is true that people who attend political protest marches against “Global Capitalism” might well not vote in elections. The vast majority do not vote in elections because of political apathy rather than political commitment to a particular cause. The whole concept of Citizenship education is surely just a sop from the privileged classes who control the western "democratic" system to give a pretence of valuing political participation. (James Becket) That may be true but that should not stop those people who are fully committed to the democratic process to use the system against itself. In fact, I would argue that is how political progress has been made over the last 200 years. Citizenship teachers should be helping their students to go on anti-war protests or to organise petitions against the tyranny of Westminster politics if that is what the students want to do. (James Becket) I am very uneasy about this statement. While it is true that citizenship education might lead to students going on demonstrations or signing petitions, I think it is undesirable for teachers to be seen as organizing these activities. There would then be some truth in the statement that citizenship education was in fact really political indoctrination. Teachers cannot do Citizenship without being political. Maybe putting it on the curriculum will be the long term undoing of the present political system. (James Becket) I agree that teaching citizenship is a highly political act. So also, is the teaching of history. In its original form citizenship education did have the potential to threaten our flawed democratic system. However, the government has watered down the original proposals of Bernard Crick and Francine Britton. This is especially true of the elements where the students becoming involved in the political life of the community. By the time they have finished, it will be a totally classroom based course with a compulsory GCSE exam at the end of it.
  22. Several people have asked how they can put their photograph (avatar) on the website. What you need to do is the following: (1) Go to Education Forum (2) Select My Controls (top, right of the screen). (3) On the left-hand side click ‘Edit Avatar Settings’ (under Personal Profile). (4) Go to the bottom of the page where it says ‘Upload a new image from your computer’. Click ‘Browse’. (5) A box will appear at the top that will show what is on your computer. You now have to find your photograph (best to leave it on your Desktop – if not, find the folder where you have stored it). (6) Click the image and then click ‘Open’. (7) Now click ‘Update Avatar’. You picture should now appear on the screen. It will now appear every time you make a posting.
  23. Kes, the best film ever made about education, is on tonight (Channel 4 11.05). Well worth taping to show to your students. Written by a teacher (Barry Hines) it contains several scenes that illustrate what it was like to be in a secondary modern school after the war. Although made in 1969 it still raises all the important issues about schooling that are still relevant today. http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0064541/
  24. Number and algebra lessons to support the intervention strategy and the Year 7 Key Stage 3 strategy for mathematics are now available. The first set of lessons available including nine Number and Algebra units, six Shape, Space and Measure and Handling data units, and twelve Consolidation lessons. Each lesson supports about 40 minutes of direct teaching, and refers to a selection of pupil activities including some drawn from Springboard 7 to complete the remaining time and to provide homework. Downloadable files containing all the lessons are available from the Primary National Strategy website. http://www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/keystage3...&strand=generic
  25. Music and Humanities specialisms have been added to the existing list of eight specialisms. These will be available to schools which apply for specialist status from October 2003 onwards. Full guidance for the specialism is available in the current edition of the Specialist Schools Application Guidance see the Specialist Schools Trust website. http://www.specialistschoolstrust.org.uk/
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