An Irish perspective on education for all who value teaching
Episodes
Wednesday Jan 31, 2018
Wednesday Jan 31, 2018
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
On this week's programme I bring you the second part of my interview with Páiríc Clerkin, the Chief Executive Officer of the Irish Primary Principals' Network (IPPN). In this part of the interview our conversation covers topics such as:
- What the IPPN does
- How he finds the role of CEO of the IPPN
- What teachers should think about before applying for roles as principal or deputy principal
- How will job of principal be different in ten years’ time to what it is today
- What inspires him
- What he likes to read/listen to
- Changes he’d make in the IPPN
- The five minute bench break
- How his own education influences his work as an educator
Wednesday Jan 24, 2018
Wednesday Jan 24, 2018
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
On this week's programme I look ahead to the 2018 annual conference of the Irish Primary Principals' Network with the Chief Executive Officer of the Network, Páiric Clerkin. Among the topics we discuss are:
- Priorities for principals at this time
- School funding
- Droichead
- What to expect at the IPPN Conference
Wednesday Jan 17, 2018
Wednesday Jan 17, 2018
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
On this week's programme I bring you the second part of my interview with Dr. Gerry O'Connell from the Marino Institute of Education where we talk about religious education and much more.
Among the topics discussed this week are the following:
- Prayer and religious education and how mindfulness was introduced to Catholic schools over two decades ago
- The power of prayer and mindfulness
- How do you define a practising Catholic if not by their attendance at church?
- The problem with large class sizes
- How to develop one’s religious imagination
- Integrating religious education with other subjects
- Accommodating children who don’t take religious education in a religious school
- How do prospective teachers learn to teach religion? Dr. Gerry O’Connel outlines seven elements that are key to his approach:
- Waiting and wondering
- The threshold experience
- Asking the question
- Gathering around the subject
- Journalling ( What did I learn? What does it say to where I am? What am I going to do about it?)
- Pushing back the horizon
- Concluding ritual
Wednesday Jan 10, 2018
Wednesday Jan 10, 2018
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
On this week's programme I speak to my colleague in the Marino Institute of Education, Dr. Gerry O'Connell about religious education. Gerry is a primary teacher and a teacher educator with vast experience and his ideas are grounded in this experience and in his scholarly work in the field. Among the topics discussed this week are the following:
- The difference between teaching religion and religious education
- The importance of starting with the students’ experiences
- The challenges of working with diverse student experiences
- The teaching methodology “Godly Play”
- Social media as a force of oppression
- Why contemplative space, depth of conversation or wonder and symbol or story are central to religious education
- Whether sacraments should be taught in school or in parishes
- What makes a teacher?
- Teaching as a vocation
- A perceived secularist agenda in some media organisations
Wednesday Dec 20, 2017
Wednesday Dec 20, 2017
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney.
On this week's programme I am joined once again by philosopher and retired primary school teacher, John Doyle. In the interview, John reflects on the role of questions in teaching.
Wednesday Dec 13, 2017
Wednesday Dec 13, 2017
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
On this week's programme I bring you the third and final part of my interview with David Didau, author of What if Everything You Knew about Education Was Wrong? Among the people and websites referred to in this part of our discussion are the following:
The Neuroscience of Intelligence by Richard J Haier
How to Teach by Phil Beadle
My second guest this week is Jane Shimizu who is a primary teacher in a DEIS school in county Galway. For many years she kept a busy classroom blog and current updates are on the school website. As part of her discussion on science week, she mentioned the website www.rokit.com.
Wednesday Dec 06, 2017
Wednesday Dec 06, 2017
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney.
On this week's programme I welcome back a guest who was on the programme before, Brendan Culligan. Brendan was a keynote speaker at the 2017 annual conference of the Literacy Association of Ireland. His presentation was titled “More than one hundred and twenty five years of Crushing ‘Garlic’!" - in which he honours the memory of an educator who had insightful ideas about teaching spelling.
Wednesday Nov 29, 2017
Wednesday Nov 29, 2017
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
This week I bring you the second part of my interview with writer, blogger, speaker, trainer and former English teacher David Didau. We focus particularly on his book, What if everything you knew about education was wrong? Among the topics discussed are the following:
- How teachers can use research
- Why less feedback is more
- Carol Dweck’s research on mindsets
- The difficulties in telling if what children learn is retained or transferable
- Why a sat-nav is the perfect “assessment for learning machine”
- The illusion of knowledge
- Assessment for learning
- Why testing should be rebranded as quizzing
- Why differentiation is a “dark art”
Wednesday Nov 22, 2017
Wednesday Nov 22, 2017
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney.
On this week's programme I speak to David Didau, who is also known as "The Learning Spy." I wanted to find out more about his book, What if everything you knew about education was wrong? Among the topics discussed on the programme with David are the following:
- Opportunity costs in teaching
- Choices teachers make
- Criticism of the teacher education he received
- Who he trusts on questions about education
- How teachers are acquiring incorrect information about education
- The lack of evidence behind learning styles and educational outcome
On next week's programme I'll bring you the second part of my interview with David.
Wednesday Nov 15, 2017
Wednesday Nov 15, 2017
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney.
On this week's programme I spoke to three people who presented workshops at the 2017 Annual Conference of the Literacy Association of Ireland. They were Claire Dunne from the Marino Institute of Education, Damien Quinn from seomraranga.com and Anne Burke from Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada. Among the websites mentioned on the programme were:
Children's Literature Association of Ireland
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13586750-bully