A brief analysis of Sam Smith’s ‘Too Good at Goodbyes’ for students, teachers, those who like pop music, and those who, like me, want to like it.
Learning from Schumann’s op.82, no. 5
This brief and deliberately limited analysis focuses on the use of long appoggiaturas as a key theme of this piece. I’m sure there’s much more to be said about it; your comments are encouraged!
Pointless Preparation (‘for the 21st century’) Prevents Progress
Why I maintain that it’s utterly idiotic to be ‘preparing students for the 21st century’.
An ‘aspirational’ society is still a divided one
An argument that to promote ‘social mobility’ is to endorse inequality.
What’s worse than educational buzzwords?
A suggestion that teachers might get along better with one another if we were less passionate about such obscure things.
Don’t plan, flow.
An idea for balancing good preparation with the flexibility to be responsive.
I can’t recall when memory wasn’t forgotten
“Look at all those idiots on university challenge. All they can do is recall facts in response to closed questions. Completely unemployable failures of the education system, the lot of them.”
On the rotten fallacy of subject hierarchy
“What an unusual combination”, say the majority on finding out what I teach. Though sometimes I ask, never do they justify their surprise – I suspect because it’s a bit rude to say “but music’s so easy, and maths is for clever people”.
Melody: they who codify, complicate (at key stage 4)
An argument for musicality to precede theory, but not against either.
In the face of disappointment
Thoughts, prompted by Oxbridge admissions processes, on preparing students to fail.
