To coach elite child footballers, size – not age – matters

September 2, 2018, 12:00 am

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Young players develop best if coached in bands picked by height, rather than age

For the anguished parent standing on the touchline, it all seems so unfair. Week after week they fret as their 12-year-old, a diminutive but naturally gifted midfield general, is harried off the ball by bigger players.

But change may be on the way. Grouping young footballers according to physical maturity, as opposed to age – a practice called biobanding – improves performance and reduces the chances of injury, according to research that will be examined by coaches in many sports.

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Arms industry spends millions to promote brands in schools

September 1, 2018, 1:00 pm

≫ Next: Let’s keep our feminist critiques of politics for things that really matter | Barbara Ellen

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Defence groups sponsor lessons that promote building and sale of military hardware

Arms manufacturers are spending millions of pounds a year promoting their brands in Britain’s schools, the Observer has learned.

The companies, which between them have sold tens of billions of pounds of weapons to overseas governments, including those with poor human rights records, sponsor a series of school events at which their brands are prominently on display. In addition, they issue teaching materials for use in classrooms that promote the defence sector, sponsor competitions and award prizes.

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Let’s keep our feminist critiques of politics for things that really matter | Barbara Ellen

September 1, 2018, 9:59 pm

≫ Next: From the archive: getting ready for university in 1985

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Reaction to the television drama Bodyguard only serves to confirm our confusion about women at Westminster

If there’s any hope of dealing with the relentless sexism aimed at female politicians, don’t we have to be clear what we mean – and try not to label all criticism, mockery, or even fictional representation, aimed at female politicians as wholly, or even partly, sexist?

Let’s examine, for instance, the much-discussed sex scenes in the new Jed Mercurio television drama Bodyguard, in which Keeley Hawes plays a home secretary having an affair with her bodyguard. To my mind, these scenes weren’t about gratuitously sexualising women in British politics, they were about plot development and characterisation. If you really wanted to be pretentious, you could argue that art shouldn’t allow itself to be constrained by reality. So, just because some real-life women (Theresa May, Amber Rudd, Jacqui Smith) have been home secretaries, it doesn’t follow that Hawes’s character shouldn’t be “allowed” to fornicate with Richard Madden’s bodyguard. (And these were among the most stubbornly clothed sex scenes of all time.)

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From the archive: getting ready for university in 1985

September 1, 2018, 10:00 pm

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Ian McEwan, Rose Tremain and Peter Whalley reveal what they really thought about going to uni and how it prepared them for life

Like a great many young people, Ian McEwan didn’t graft much at university. ‘In my first year I handed in a few of my sixth-form essays with the comments rubbed out,’ he says, indifferently, in the Observer Magazine’s 6 October 1985 issue. ‘And in the second year I did hardly any work.’

McEwan is recalling events in a back-to-school feature about the UK’s new wave of modern universities. He’s one of several notable graduates asked to share their experiences. Responses are candid.

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University bound? Here’s how to pick a bank account and manage your cash

September 2, 2018, 12:00 am

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From overdrafts and mobile apps to cashback sites, there are a range of ways for students to ensure they remain in the black

As thousands of students prepare for university, a host of freedoms lie in front of them. Living away from home, coming back in the early hours and lazy afternoons in front of the TV all await – as does managing money to pay for everyday life. But this last freedom can be fraught with problems: research from comparison site MoneySupermarket reports that students often spend more than their student loan, by almost £150 each term.

So with banks eager to get students’ grant checks and hopefully sign them up as customers for life, what are the best bank accounts and what should they be aware of?

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Confucius MC: ‘I’ve seen illiterate kids learn raps in 10 minutes’

September 2, 2018, 1:30 am

≫ Next: Study of Portuguese and Spanish explodes as China expands role in Latin America

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The south London MC on using beats and rhymes to get children interested in words, and the problem with gentrification in his native Peckham

Confucius MC is a rapper from south London. He has been a close friend of mine since we were teenagers, and has had a huge influence on my life, my character and my rhyme-style. For the past 14 years he has been working at a primary school in Lambeth teaching the art of lyricism to year 5 and 6 children, as well as writing and teaching bespoke curriculum-based rap songs to every year group from nursery upwards. He put out various mixtapes before releasing The Highest Order on Jehst’s label, YNR Productions, in 2014, followed by The Artform in 2017, on We Stay True.

What has the experience of teaching children about lyricism taught you about your own life as a rapper?
Ultimately it’s led me to be more thoughtful. Because children look at things so deeply. As we get older, we forget that in the journey to discovering what it was that held our attention, we gave everything the same scrutiny.

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Study of Portuguese and Spanish explodes as China expands role in Latin America

September 2, 2018, 6:37 am

≫ Next: Cathy Newman says she was sexually harassed at elite school

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Thousands more Chinese students are taking up Latin American languages with an eye to improved employability

When Zhang Fangming started learning Portuguese, it was with an eye to becoming a top Chinese diplomat in Brazil.

For Sun Jianglin, a Portuguese degree was about landing a job, but also a deeper knowledge of Brazilian music. “Bossa nova!” the 19-year-old undergraduate cooed. “I really like this kind-of-close-to-jazz music!”

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Cathy Newman says she was sexually harassed at elite school

September 2, 2018, 6:58 am

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Broadcaster tells of experience at Charterhouse to encourage girls to report incidents

The broadcaster Cathy Newman has said she was sexually harassed and humiliated by teenage boys while attending an elite private school on a scholarship.

The Channel 4 News presenter told how the experience had an impact on her confidence at a young age and said she was speaking out as school terms start in an attempt to encourage girls to report harassment and bullying.

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Use of isolation booths in schools criticised as 'barbaric' punishment

September 2, 2018, 7:36 am

≫ Next: The Guardian view on education: some things money should not buy | Editorial

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Parents attack ‘consequence rooms’ where pupils are made to sit alone in silence for hours

Parents have criticised the use of isolation booths at secondary schools across the country, after concerns were raised about the “zero-tolerance” behaviour policies run by some academy trusts.

Guardian analysis found this week that 45 schools in England excluded at least 20% of their pupils in the last academic year. The Outwood Grange Academies Trust – which runs 30 schools across Yorkshire, the Humber and the east Midlands – ran nine out of the 45.

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The Guardian view on education: some things money should not buy | Editorial

September 2, 2018, 10:32 am

≫ Next: Quarter of UK student nurses drop out before graduation, study finds

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Markets ought not be judged by what they produce for winners, but on their outcomes for the losers

Competition makes losers as well as winners. This fact makes a simple rule for judging when it is useful to society and when it is dangerous. Can we afford to look after the losers? They are not going to vanish. From about 1979 to 2008, policymakers across the western world were agreed that there were hardly any problems that could not be solved by organising some kind of market, from which the magic of competition would produce much better results than planned cooperation ever could. The last 10 years has been a time for unlearning all those lessons and there are few places where this is more obvious than in education.

The introduction of the academy system was among other things an attempt to make central planning impossible. The market, and the self-interest of parents, would ensure that good schools flourished and bad ones – well, they would disappear, perhaps by osmosis. Yet local authorities still have a statutory duty to ensure that every child has a school place – and the political imperative to avoid discontent among parents who vote – even while the means to do so have largely vanished now that two thirds of secondary schools are academies which they do not control. One result is last week’s report that the country is facing a shortfall of more than 100,000 secondary school places over the next five years, as a demographic bulge pushes upwards through the school system.

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Quarter of UK student nurses drop out before graduation, study finds

September 2, 2018, 4:01 pm

≫ Next: Outcry as boy, 13, dies after beating from teacher in Tanzania

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Proportion of nurses qualifying has not improved since 2006 investigation

Nearly a quarter of student nurses are dropping out of their degree courses before graduation, according to figures that bode ill for the staffing crisis in the NHS.

Of 16,544 UK nursing students at 55 universities who began three-year degrees that were due to finish last year, 4,027 left their courses early or suspended their studies.

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Outcry as boy, 13, dies after beating from teacher in Tanzania

September 3, 2018, 8:08 am

≫ Next: Bring back work visas for overseas graduates, say UK universities

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Death of Sperius Eradius has led to demands for review of corporal punishment in schools, where violence is widespread

Campaigners have urged the Tanzanian government to review corporal punishment in schools after a 13-year-old boy died following a beating by his teacher.

Sperius Eradius, from the northern Kagera province, died on 27 August, a few days after the punishment. Sperius had been accused of stealing from another teacher.

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Bring back work visas for overseas graduates, say UK universities

September 3, 2018, 10:00 pm

≫ Next: The stories of 100 teachers, coming to a theatre near you

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International student numbers in UK ‘flatlining’ as it fails to compete against likes of US

British universities have called on the government to reintroduce a visa that would allow overseas students to stay in the country to work for up to two years after graduation.

They say it would give the UK a competitive edge over rival countries and help it maintain the 450,000 international students, 134,835 of them EU-born, who come to study in Britain every year.

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The stories of 100 teachers, coming to a theatre near you

September 3, 2018, 11:00 pm

≫ Next: Let teachers sack heads … and other ideas for a National Education Service

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Her poem Dear Mr Gove got 300k views on YouTube. Now Jess Green has written a play

Kat is a bushy tailed newly qualified teacher raring to start imbuing the pupils of Hurstville Community College – the comprehensive on the estate to which the Teach First programme has assigned her – with her passion for English.

But she can’t even get the youngsters to sit down in class, let alone enthuse them, and after only a week is thinking of packing it in. The head announces a new marking policy via Tannoy, a member of staff has gone missing and her middle-class mother has told friends her daughter is travelling rather than admit she is teaching in a comprehensive.

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Let teachers sack heads … and other ideas for a National Education Service

September 3, 2018, 11:15 pm

≫ Next: Life Lessons by Melissa Benn book review – clarion call to hearten the weariest teacher | Peter Wilby

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Labour has promised an NHS-type system for education. What should its priorities be? We asked Michael Wilshaw, Danny Dorling, Frank Cottrell-Boyce and others

Book review: A Clarion Call, by Melissa Benn

Labour has published its plans for a “cradle to grave” National Education Service and will unveil further details of its policy at its annual conference in Liverpool this month. It wants the NES to transform education into a right instead of a privilege, so everyone expects the same standard, as with healthcare in the National Health Service. But what would any incoming government need to do to create a truly national service? We ask people involved in education what their priorities would be.

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Life Lessons by Melissa Benn book review – clarion call to hearten the weariest teacher | Peter Wilby

September 3, 2018, 11:15 pm

≫ Next: Detroit public schools' drinking water shut down amid lead fears

≪ Previous: Let teachers sack heads … and other ideas for a National Education Service

The campaigner’s 15-point plan for a National Education Service would tackle inequality – and ease the pressures on teachers

Melissa Benn has a rallying cry. “It is time for boldness,” she writes, “for the setting out of agendas that will bring real change.” She wants a new education act and offers a 15-point outline, in the form of an extract from a Queen’s Speech drafted by a future government, presumably Labour. It would form the basis of a National Education Service which, she hopes, would take the same place in public affections as the NHS.

One can hear weary sighs in the staffrooms. Since 1979, we’ve had 21 education acts introducing changes that significantly affected schools, or universities, or both.

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Detroit public schools' drinking water shut down amid lead fears

September 4, 2018, 2:00 am

≫ Next: KS2 results show widening gulf between strongest and weakest primary schools

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Students will be offered bottled water and coolers after testing raised concern at dozens of schools

The 50,000 students returning to public school classrooms in Detroit on Tuesday following the summer break will find the drinking fountains dry, after elevated levels of lead and copper forced the district to shut off the water supply.

After test results evaluating all water sources, from sinks to fountains, for 16 schools showed higher than acceptable levels of the chemicals last month, the Detroit public schools community district announced it was turning off the water at all its schools.

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KS2 results show widening gulf between strongest and weakest primary schools

September 4, 2018, 10:37 am

≫ Next: Special needs funding at crisis point, say school leaders

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Performance improved overall but substantial variations remain between local authorities

The gulf between the strongest- and weakest-performing primary schools in England widened this year, according to national results from key stage 2 tests of literacy and maths taken by 11-year-olds in spring.

The widening gap was driven by improved performance among local authorities such as Richmond-upon-Thames, where 80% of pupils met the expected standards in reading, writing and maths, compared with the national average of 65% of pupils in mainstream schools.

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Special needs funding at crisis point, say school leaders

September 4, 2018, 4:01 pm

≫ Next: The job Americans won't take: Arizona looks to Philippines to fill teacher shortage

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Headteachers say lack of funds means code of practice is an empty promise

A teaching union has accused the government of making “empty promises” to the families of one million children diagnosed with special educational needs whose schools have failed to receive additional funding.

The National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) said funding for schools supporting pupils with special needs and disabilities was at crisis point, citing a survey of members that found 94% said it was harder to support such pupils now than two years ago.

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The job Americans won't take: Arizona looks to Philippines to fill teacher shortage

September 4, 2018, 11:00 pm

≫ Next: How I survive: American teachers and their second jobs – a photo essay

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College-educated Americans are increasingly uninterested in teaching jobs – so Arizona has begun to recruit from abroad

On a recent sweltering morning in a public high school in a dusty town in the central Arizona desert, students in an advanced physics class hovered over beakers and flame-testing dishes.

With each experiment, Melvin Inojosa, 29, dressed in teacherly khakis and a bright blue collared golf shirt, bounded between lab tables, sinks, a whiteboard and his desk, exclaiming “Optics!” “Quantum mechanics!” “Thermodynamics!”.

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