Web icon set to be discontinued

Web icon set to be discontinued: "The browser that helped kick-start the commercial web is to cease development because of lack of users.

Netscape Navigator, now owned by AOL, will no longer be supported after 1 February 2008, the company has said.

In the mid-1990s the browser was used by more than 90% of the web population, but numbers have slipped to just 0.6%."

Not really that sorry to say goodbye to something which kind of got its legs tangled in the web of the late 1990s and never quite moved on... but it was the first browser I used and was my first experience of the web. I definitely don't use the web in the same way I did back when Navigator effectively was the web for many people (I no longer have to go make a cuppa cha and pile my way through other work while a 1 meg file downloads for a start!) and it's interesting to think how rapidly and how far it's come. And how relatively easily a hu-u-u-u-uge name can become a blast from the past. And no-one even really notices it's gone.

The web's a strange old place, isn't it?

'Medical myths' exposed as untrue

BBC NEWS | Health | 'Medical myths' exposed as untrue: "Dr David Tovey, editor of Clinical Evidence journal, said: 'The difficulty is it is often hard to disprove a theory.

'On the flip-side, absence of evidence does not necessarily mean absence of effect.

'Where reliable evidence becomes really important is in helping people make serious decisions about harms and risks."

Although this article isn't on first look that relevant to E891, it does contain a useful little quote which is worth bearing in mind when thinking about evidence-based education. "absence of evidence does not necessarily mean absence of effect" - and it got me thinking, if you base your practice on evidence-alone then aren't you missing things which are significant in terms of the effect they're having but that don't provide evidence? Dangerous to imagine that evidence-based practice is the only way forward when there's so much we don't know about human behaviour and social / learning interactions. There's an inherent arrogance in evidence-based practice which seems to say we know the problem, we now know the solution... ta daaaa! But who's to say what's really the problem and what are the desirable outcomes we should be working towards? And what happens when the evidence is revised in years to come and it turns out that the right way was the wrong way?!

Absence of evidence does not necessarily mean absence of effect - definitely worth bearing in mind when considering evidence-based practice in education.

League tables only do harm

League tables only do harm | Schools special reports | EducationGuardian.co.uk: "And therein lies the problem. As long as league tables exist, in a risk-averse society people dare not ignore them. Primary schools at the top of the league (which tend to be in the wealthiest areas) have a reputation to maintain; those at the bottom have to try to claw higher. The status of all teachers, governors and parents depends on how their year sixes perform in national tests."

Calling into question whether or not 'evidence' of the type that league tables provide is of any use at all since the qualitative knock on effects don't seem to feed positively into the system... or something along those lines... maybe?!

Still just good or bad...

End league tables, say governors: "End league tables, say governors Tests Children sit tests at 11 and 14 which form the basis of league tables School governors are calling for an end to the current system of league tables and national tests in England. The National Governors' Association (NGA) said the tables held information that was too narrow and misrepresented what happened in schools.

Instead it wants schools to be given a grade based on comparisons with others in similar circumstances, and tests that check individual pupils' progress."

An interesting one which relates to the ideas of 'effectiveness' discussed by Ball (1995) - here you can see one measure of success is being replaced as it misrepresents what is 'good' about schools. It's replacement? Another form of grading system. Schools are still cast in the roles of good or bad. They might have changed their approach, but there's an underlying assumption of what the problem is and how to measure / fix it.

Reference:

Ball, S. J. (1995) ‘Intellectuals or technicians? The urgent role of theory in educational studies’, British Journal of Educational studies, Vol. 43, No.3, 1995, pp.255-71, Blackwell

Big word bingo

Am just reading Stephen Ball's 'Intellectuals or technicians?' article and am having a wading through treacle moment, so to lighten the mood... I'm noting down all the big / complex words from his article and play 'big word bingo' with all the other course texts in the hopes of finding something more difficult to read!

So... mark your cards with...

nosologies
parsimonious
adumbrated
panopticon
polyvalent
concomitant
ameliorative
hegemonic
imbricated
proselytising
ontological
epistemological
dispositif
semiotic

Mind you... having trawled through the whole thing, it is quite an interesting, thought-provoking article.  I just wish he hadn't tripped over and swallowed a dictionary on his way to typing it up... 

Useful resource on post-modernism

post-modernism @ the informal education homepage: "post-modernism and post-modernity Page upon page of print has been devoted to the post-modernism. But what actually is it, and what implications does it have for informal educators? Barry Burke investigates."

Have to say... I've read the description of postmodernism in the Study Guide... and I'm really not any the wiser! The above page is a good introduction to the concept in an educational context... and the whole site generally is a great resource for all things educational thinker / theory!

E891 on Facebook

For anyone who's got a Facebook account or would like a reason to get one if you're involved with E891... there's now a Facebook group for course-wide discussion of issues, concepts, ideas... anything related to the course really! 

There is no OU-hosted forum where anyone studying E891 can meet... so this little space on the interweb should provide a neat little home for all things E891 which can't be met by the tutor group system which is currently in place.  Or that's the theory at least!