Parents have responsibility for sex education [timesonline.co.uk]
- Published: 25 February 2010
Sir, While I applaud Alice Thomson’s piece on the need for more sex education for our children (Opinion, Feb 24), it includes one telling phrase, where she writes that this education should come from “parents as well as teachers”.
Surely this is the wrong way round? Sex education should take place, first and foremost, at home, where children feel safe to discuss sex and ask questions. Children ask these questions at different stages of their lives; some as young as 5, others waiting longer. In my experience, with four children, the questions came in roughly the easiest and most logical order; “Where do babies come from?” invariably preceding the more awkward “How do they get there?”
Full Story: www.timesonline.co.uk
Science lessons need more explosions and pyrotechnics, report says [timesonline.co.uk]
- Published: 25 February 2010
Science lessons should be more hands-on and exploratory, according to a new report that criticises a dangerous obsession with results that has stripped science teaching of explosions and pyrotechnics.
Despite millions spent in schools on Stem subjects — science, technology, engineering and maths — the Wellcome Trust, Britain’s largest biomedical research charity, said that there were still “significant problems in science and mathematics education in schools and colleges”.
Full Story: www.timesonline.co.uk
Ed Minister’s comments on SNAs insulting [finegael.org]
- Published: 25 February 2010
Fine Gael Seanad Spokesperson on Children & Youth Affairs, Senator Ciaran Cannon, today (Thursday) branded comments made by Education Minister, Batt O’Keeffe, last night in the Seanad as an exercise in shameful spinning and a gross insult to Special Needs Assistants (SNAs), teaching staff and the parents of children with special educational needs who are fighting to secure resources.
“The Education Minister’s comments last night that the presence of SNAs in a child’s life could be detrimental to that child as it might somehow ‘inhibit the child’s development’ are a disgraceful attempt to depict the cutting of 1,200 SNAs as something which is in the child’s best interest. This is a reprehensible act of political spinning which contravenes the experience of every teacher and parent who struggles to meet the requirements of children with special needs on a daily basis.
Full Story: www.finegael.org
75pc of parents think teachers do good job [Independent.ie]
- Published: 24 February 2010
THREE-quarters of parents believe teachers are doing a good job, a new survey reveals.
The boost for the teaching profession is outlined in the study which finds that only 6pc feel they are doing their jobs badly or very badly.
The survey of 1,000 adults, carried out by independent market research company, IReach Market Research, showed that, overall, there were positive attitudes to the teaching profession. The majority of respondents were satisfied with the way teachers do their jobs and had a high level of trust in teachers.
Full Story: www.independent.ie
Union action could close some schools [IrishTimes]
- Published: 24 February 2010
PROBLEMS WITH State examination co-ordination, disciplinary and pastoral care and even school closures are among the possible effects of an escalation of action by second-level teacher unions.
In recent days, the Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland (ASTI) and the Teachers’ Union of Ireland (TUI) have directed teachers not to cover unfilled management posts of teachers who resign or take maternity leave.
This comes ahead of an expected surge in retirements by post-holding teachers in September in order to retain their 2009 pension levels.
Full Story: www.irishtimes.com
