For over a year I went to classes with two groups of I5-year-old girls, wagged with them, had lunch with them and generally hung around with them at school. I recorded interviews and conversations, wrote down what I saw happening in the classroom, and got them to write to me.

In a day and age when the credibility of schools and the teachers in them are being questioned, it seems important to analyse carefully some of the factors which seem to promote effective schooling. Our study involved an examination of eight schools in the Southern Auckland region, matched in pairs ...

Infant Teachers try to ensure that all young people in their classrooms have access to the necessary tools of trade. In some classrooms books, pencils, rubbers, rulers, sharpeners, etc. are kept in the students' desks. In other classrooms they are kept on, or near, the teacher's desk, or at some ...

The ancient Greeks urged the student: 'Know thyself At the beginning of this century, John Dewey talked of 'reflective self-awareness'; today, we invoke metacognition. All refer to a concept that has been known by good teachers for centuries, and that has very powerful implications for education. What is it ...

Sex education in schools has been a topic of considerable controversy for many decades. Some groups see it as the preserve of the family; others believe that the high number of sex-related casualties in our society indicates a need for an alternative source of information for our young, i.e., the ...

In a child's eyes starting school is a rite of passage, associated with increased status. Children even link physical growth with this enhanced status - one boy said, 'I bet I grow a couple of inches.' Starting school is a period of transition and adjustment - a moving from the ...

These days it is common to hear teachers speak about their concern over a lack of discipline shown by many students. Whether the issue of concern is disruptive behaviour, the defiance of authority, violent behaviour or stealing, is not important. What is important is that many teachers believe that students ...

This investigation - in 75 maths classes, for 10-year olds, up to 10 visits in each - came to the puzzling conclusion that no matter how much the pupils were encouraged to contribute, or discouraged from contributing, there was no link between that and their marks. Teach with lots of ...

Just kids, aged nine to twelve, so you wouldn't expect any great insights from them about the world, would you? I asked them how they thought houses would be different when they grew up. Most thought they'd be bigger and better. One thought they would be smaller because people would ...

It is profoundly disturbing to learn that 70% of Australian 15-year-olds' expect the future to be ended by nuclear war. The research which revealed this was not elaborate. It was called 'Images of the Future'; Australian secondary students at Years 9 and 10 (approximately 15-16 years old) were asked what ...