Mark Leppard MBE, Headmaster. The British School Al Khubairat.
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By Richard Pearce
Sometimes it is good to look at tomorrow’s facts. Today’s facts are the things that we all believe, the basis for all our present thinking. For Leonardo da Vinci this included the fact that the Earth was flat, for Joshua it was the fact of the sun going round the Earth, and today it includes sets of statements that we know for certain are right, even if some of them would have horrified our grandparents.
The thing is that our certainties change. So who makes our facts? We are aware of the power of news media – and teachers, too – but in many fields it is ‘researchers’ who generate new ideas, and then a succession of filters among academics, administrators, media and social commentators each filtering what are allowed to be accepted as truths. Basil Bernstein (2000) put this more elegantly, but it remains true that academic research is a significant original source and that schools shape it to fit their community’s norms. Let’s look at some of them, and consider what adjustments of our certainties may be on the way.
First, a movement which has been cutting a swathe through the social sciences for the last decade: the replication crisis. There are classic experiments in the social sciences which we all know and quote, that have never been repeated but are the unquestioned basis of practice. Sharif, Zimbardo, Milgram and Asch became household names whose work
has turned out to be of its time and place, but not universally replicable. The theory of Learning Styles had a faithful following but proved to make little or no contribution to better learning; it has ended up among the ‘neuromyths’ mocked by more critical researchers (Kim and Sankey, 2018). And now in the world of Intercultural Psychology a fundamental question is being asked: how far are we assuming that correlation indicates causation? Does Protestant Christianity make countries hardworking, or does that faith appeal to hard workers, or does the Northern European climate and history lead to both of them? An open debate is appearing between revision and tradition (Kunst, 2021; Grigoryev and Berry, 2022).
This is likely to end in the same way as the replication crisis, with academics looking again, and this time critically, at classic ‘knowledge’ (see, for instance, Diener and BiswasDiener, 2022). The final outcome should be a more solidly based picture of how humans work.
Where are international schools in this? What fresh ideas will trickle down to our practice? One theme at the July 2022 conference in Switzerland of the International Academy for Intercultural Research (IAIR) was the development of Global Citizenship. Research at a number of universities in the Netherlands has shown trends there in the focus of Global
Citizenship Education over recent years, in which sustainability has become a dominant theme while cultural understanding has receded. I find this frightening. Not that sustainability deserves anything less than our constant attention, but it is another example of the unhappy dismissal of cultural differences in the face of superficial universalism. Yes, it is much easier to solve the world’s problems if we imagine that everyone thinks in a single way, but international relations remind us that we live in a world of different perspectives. Bennett and Hammer’s Intercultural Development Index (IDI) has shown over many years that most teachers in international schools don’t develop their intercultural sensitivity beyond the halfway mark: the minimisation of cultural difference. At this level we have seen and lived among people of differing cultural ways, and we content ourselves by saying ‘we are pretty much the same’.
‘We are pretty much the same’ is for some people a fact, but as Takeo Fujisawa, co-founder of Honda motors, said long ago: ‘Japanese and American management is 95% the same and differs in all important respects’ (Smith et al, 2006: 172).
A decade ago a group of academics gave a warning against universalism in a paper entitled ‘The weirdest people in the world’: WEIRD meaning Western, Educated, Industrialised, Rich, Democratic (Henrich, Heine and Norenzayan, 2010), but this is slow to trickle down to the classrooms.
In 1989 the fall of the Wall convinced some that capitalism had triumphed, only for the global financial crisis of 2008 to prove that false.
The certainties of the moment have a knack of catching us out. In 1989 the fall of the Wall convinced some that capitalism had triumphed, only for the global financial crisis of 2008 to prove that false. The End of History was taken to be the victory of capitalist liberal democracy over nationalist authoritarianism; look where we are now. Even within Western countries there are divisions that the assumed predominance of liberal values has shown to be an illusion. Popular votes for Trump and Brexit should convince the Western nations that their ‘facts’ may be just local – and temporary –articles of faith.
So what revisions have the academics to offer us? Intersectionality is one flourishing trope. The recognition that a single classification, like male/female or nationality, cannot tell us all we need to know about persons is a reaction against stereotypes and simplistic social analysis.
It has been found particularly useful in showing how one classification can compound another, and especially employed in describing multiple levels of inequity. This revision is a challenge to crude categorisation, but we cannot avoid categorising altogether; words are categories, some generic and some specific, and they are all we have for thought and debate. suggest that the current controversies about sex and gender form one
of these debates about classification, but one in which the categories look different from different angles. The feminist, the biologist, the psychologist, the surgeon, the politician, and above all their lawyers; each slices that particular cake a different way. Schools are just one of the organisations being called upon to take a position at the behest of one pressure group or another.
It is hard to ignore these public pressure groups. But why are we so keen to be more sensitive to different meanings just now? It may be that the conflict is between meanings held on the one hand by the persons involved and on the other by the professionals who are studying them. In the past these could each have been kept within their own communities, each dismissing the other as wrongheaded, but today they are all being expressed in the same, digital, media. Characterisations collide head-on on Twitter.
Perhaps the most dramatic new idea from the crosscultural conference – and the hardest for international schools to accept – is co-acculturation. This is the notion that where newcomers are entering a social community, both the incomers and the community should adjust. It is making headway in the socially liberal Nordic countries, which have accepted many immigrants in recent years after being beyond previous social irruptions, and have found their liberalism tested. The more southerly parts of
Europe may be more hardened to migrants from across the Mediterranean and could have developed attitudes that make them unsuitable ground for a compromise with immigrants. Could international schools develop ways of modifying their own operation to accommodate specific incomers, or will market forces compel them to remain dedicated to offering a Western environment which will prepare students for work in the Western economy? can’t see this idea getting through the filter into general practice in international schools. Those schools that are truly ‘international’ – standing between nations – will welcome it and already practise it; but I suspect that for the great majority it will reveal that the ‘international’ in their name simply means ‘foreign’; a school with an educational philosophy brought from a foreign country, an Anglophone cultural colony in which non-English languages are seen as alien. One test of the professed ‘internationalism’ is this, applied by Danau Tanu in her remarkable book ‘Growing up in transit’ (Tanu, 2018): does a school recognise someone as a Good International Student if they haven’t merged with the majority of English speakers? A multilingual child in the ESOL class may have already learned to mix with other national and language communities, but have not yet acculturated to the ideal model as the teachers of that school see it. Frequently they are rated as ‘international’ only when they join in the softball team, attend the Model UN, and choose burgers over a bento box. No, I think international schools will for the most part hold their Western-centric course.
Can we expect any of these new truths to become second nature to us in the near future? There is a natural reluctance among senior professionals to abandon the fundamentals on which their careers are based, and likewise an enthusiasm among the young to take up any innovative position in which no-one has more
experience than they have. But whichever make it to the status of ‘fact’, we can be sure that there are certainties around the corner which some will embrace, some items of faith that will become facts, just as the previous facts are demoted to myths. We need certainties and so we create them. In the words of the old Soviet Russian joke: ‘The future is certain; it’s only the past which is unpredictable.’ ◆
Richard Pearce has worked in international schools for many years. He now writes and is a consultant on issues relating to international education. ✉ rldpearce@gmail.com
• Bernstein B (2000) Pedagogy and Symbolic Control: Theory, research, critique (2nd edition). Lanham, MC: Rowman and Littlefield.
• Diener E & Biswas-Diener R (2022) The replication crisis in psychology. In R Biswas-Diener & E Diener (Eds). Noba textbook series: Psychology. Champaign, IL: DEF publishers. Retrieved from http://noba.to/q4cvydeh, 23/10/2022
• Grigoryev D and Berry W (2022) ‘Causality crisis’ in intercultural research a false alarm? A commentary on Kunst (2021)
International Journal of Intercultural Relations. 86: 158-162.
• Henrich J, Heine S & Norenzayan A (2010) The weirdest people in the world? Behavioral and Brain Sciences. 33(2-3): 61-83.
• Kim M K and Sankey D (2018) Philosophy, neuroscience and preservice teachers’ beliefs in neuromyths: A call for remedial action. Neuroscience and Education. 50(13): 1214-1227
• Kunst R (2021) Are we facing a ‘causality crisis’ in acculturation research? The need for a methodological (r)evolution. International Journal of Intercultural Relations. 85: A4-A8.
• Smith P, Bond M H and Kagitcibasi C (2006) Understanding social psychology across cultures: living and working in a changing world.
Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf.
• Tanu D (2018) Growing up in Transit: the politics of belonging at an international school. New York, NY: Berghahn.
As a child living in northern England, long before the days of household television in that part of the country, firmly believed in the Santa Claus story. In fact, knowing nothing about confirmation bias at the time, I glimpsed the edge of his cloak one winter as he left the living room where I was dozing on the settee, recovering from measles and still running a fever.
Throughout the year, between Santa`s Christmas visits, his story was often invoked by my family to guide my behaviour. Through the narrative I was taught certain values, such as gratitude, and that my actions, if good, would lead to corresponding consequences, such as gifts. I have since wondered why was not angry when found out that Santa was imaginary and that I had been deliberately deceived. I can only rationalise that it was because I
experienced the rewarding satisfaction of discovering a new world view or paradigm into which I felt initiated with a fresh identity of growing-upness.
Anyway, paradigms are shifty things.
Their close gestalt cousins show us a witch which can become a princess within the same contours (see figure). While neither one of those visions may be inherently right or wrong, each generates in us a very different set of stereotypical assumptions and ensuing actions. A witch is haggard, wicked, feared and best avoided; a princess is young, beautiful, and to be courted by a prince.
Kuhn is the philosopher well-known for bringing attention to the notion of paradigms and their shifts, in his publication The Structure of Scientific Revolutions A famous major paradigm shift in science is the Copernican Revolution. This moved understandings about the cosmos from an earth-centred view of the universe (the Ptolemaic view) to a Sun-centred (heliocentric) view, with the Sun at the centre of the Solar System.
Wittgenstein, another philosopher and a peer of Kuhn, was fascinated by the
role that language plays in establishing paradigms. Actually, Kuhn too later became fascinated with language, especially in its power to organise and classify the world and our position in it through scientific theories. As an illustration of how the language of scientific theory does this, consider how, in English at least, we still talk of the Sun rising and setting. This description retains Earth at the centre of the solar system, so that we still experience the Sun moving around us although we know theoretically that this is not the case.
Wittgenstein famously declared that ‘the limits of my language are the limits of my world’. Educators who work in International Baccalaureate (IB) schools are familiar with this idea. In all four programmes of the K-12 IB continuum students must learn at least one second language. A major reason for this requirement is to introduce students to a world view other than their own. As an outcome, it is hoped students will be better able to critically examine their own world view, including biases and assumptions that they discover hidden in the language that serves to create it, and for which there may be alternative options.
The role of language in creating paradigms is a focus in the IB Diploma Programme (DP) Theory of Knowledge (TOK) course. As part of this course, students analyse the language or discourse of the different academic disciplines and consider how they create different kinds of knowledge, as well as express different relationships between that of the knower and that of knowledge. As an example of this, consider the human heart as described by a biology text – the heart is full of blood, with that of the human heart described by a poet – the heart is full of love.
But it is not only through academic discourses that we express our relationship to knowledge. Fairly recently, somewhere in the USA, a rare
biological event took place. For the first time in seventeen years a particular kind of cicada, the periodical cicada, emerged from beneath the soil. It came in its millions, to enjoy a few weeks of maturity, breeding in the sunshine before dying; each female leaving behind hundreds of eggs which, when hatched, will dig back into the soil to start the seventeen-year journey to synchronous maturity again, measured kairologically.
drum-like membranes on their bellies to serenade and woo females.
The language we use matters, because it creates paradigmatic knowledge such as the story of Santa Claus, and thus positions us in relationships, such as to the Sun, the heart, and the cicadas. Language is integral to the stories we inhabit, influencing how we think, how we form and then reinforce values, and ultimately how we consequently behave.
Arran Stibbe is a professor of Ecolinguistics at the University of Gloucestershire in the UK, who studies in detail how language reflects how we value and therefore treat the natural environment. He investigates our use of metaphor and the stories-we-live-by as we talk about the environment, and he also notes importantly what is erased and thus not included in those stories.
Japanese haiku and native American texts for instance, illustrate a very different attitude towards nature than that expressed in the global language of English, where the environmental view is
An announcement of this awesome event, on a World News network, described it as an invasion! Descriptions from people who were in the vicinity, and who were interviewed for the news channel, included accounts of how many of the newly emerged cicadas they had successfully squashed; others expressed disgust and revulsion on seeing them, while others complained of the noise. Sir David Attenborough, on the other hand, expressed delight and amazement at the creatures singing in their adult costumes.
Their sound is, in fact, a kind of music produced by males vibrating
. A major reason for this requirement is to introduce students to a world view other than their own.
predominantly one of seeing resources for a consumer society. And attitudes lead to corresponding outcomes.
Mount Kangchenjunga, in what was previously the independent country of Sikkim and is now the border region between Nepal and Sikkim state of India, is the third highest peak in the world and part of the Himalayas. But no one has been allowed to climb it, as to the local people it is their protective deity. Reciprocally, this view also protects the mountain.
The Journey of the Universe authored by two Yale University professors, Brian Thomas Swimme and Mary Evelyn Tucker, tells the story from when time began until now, and places us in it as characters with agency to take the
journey forward as we wish. It is inspired by the work of Thomas Berry, who was clear that in our present predicament of a climate crisis, species extinction and near systemic ecological collapse, there is a need for a new story as a paradigm that repositions us, by changing our values and therefore our actions. This need is increasingly recognised by other educational organisations.
The OECD 2030 Learning Compass calls for new values and competencies in agency to restore global wellbeing.
UNESCO has recently published a 2030
roadmap that calls for an education of transformation to develop a compassionate mindset as the basis of global citizenship. The new IB Programme Standards and Practices ask schools to envision themselves as self-organising ecosystems. Social, Emotional, Ethical (SEE) Learning is a freely available evidence-based programme from Emory University in Atlanta, USA, that provides practices for developing a compassionate mindset along with changes in values and behaviours to bring about wellbeing for individuals, society, and environmental ecosystems.
The understandings and educational resources needed for shifting our paradigm from one of moribund consumption to one of sustainable wellbeing are here. It is time for all of us in the field of education to be grownups, and act as agents in authoring the new story that future generations of students will be able to inhabit. ◆
The Oxford School Panama uses Discovery Education Espresso as its daily learning platform.
Executive Principal Farhana Patel explains how Espresso helps teachers to create engaging learning experiences while giving students the confidence to thrive.
One of my first priorities as the new Head teacher at The Oxford School was to secure high-quality digital resources. I was drawn to Espresso because it has relevant, purposeful, and engaging learning resources across the curriculum, from Early Years to Key Stage 2. Today we use it as our daily learning platform in all five of The Oxford Schools. We like the fact that it is aligned to the National Curriculum, has everything in one place and saves teachers time.
One of the best things about Espresso is that it supports independent and guided learning. We can deliver lessons online or in-person and students can access Espresso in the classroom and at home. It’s a versatile platform that can flex to support teaching and learning wherever it is taking place. We’ve had lots of positive feedback from parents, who can see that the resources are of a high quality and help students to go further.
Children need a safe space to learn online, and this is the beauty of Espresso. It allows students to explore different topics and to follow their curiosity. The sheer number of resources is impressive, and the videos are short, engaging and include visual prompts. Espresso helps us to stretch and support our students and this is where it excels.
Espresso helps teachers to deliver the British National Curriculum with confidence. The videos and built-in guides make it very accessible for international educators. Teachers can be sure that the pitch of lessons is in accordance with curriculum requirements and that they are covering the skills required for each subject.
Our students love everything about Espresso, especially the interactive games. These are great for consolidating learning and we often set them for homework. Meeting individual student needs is also easy, thanks to an interactive tool called Studio, which allows teachers to assign content directly and share lesson plans and ideas with colleagues.
One of the aspects that our teachers like best about Espresso is the fact that it is continually updated. New content is added all of the time and we see these changes constantly. It is reassuring to know that so much thought goes into the resources. It feels like a lot of love, care and time has been put into the platform!
We’re very happy with Espresso and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to other international schools. It’s a holistic platform with everything in one place and gives us high-quality resources to help teachers and engage students. It’s perfectly suited to the way we teach today and the attention to detail is outstanding. Education is always evolving and so is Espresso. It’s continually updated to meet educators’ changing needs.
The OECD 2030 Learning Compass calls for new values and competencies in agency to restore global wellbeing.
By Nicholas Forde
When international schools around the world
commence another academic year, attention inevitably turns to planning and finalising the perennial ‘back to school’ activities and communications.
A school awakening from the long summer holiday can be likened to an aeroplane taking off, with the same intensity and acceleration from a standing start. It is an opportunity to set the tone for the year – but the parental view of a school’s effectiveness is often influenced by ineffective and incomplete communication. As schools and organisations emerge from the pandemic, it is interesting to engage in a counterfactual, asking what changes schools would have made to their communication systems had they known ahead of time the impact the pandemic would have on schools. Sporting and performing arts events, coffee mornings and fundraisers are ways in which the school mission and values become visible and communicated to parents. The pandemic curtailed many of these traditional ways in which parents would normally be immersed in school life.
As a result of this, simple, clear and consistent
messaging has great potential for communicating the overall strategic vision and effectiveness of the school. What follows are 5 principles of communication that are relevant for ‘back to school’ and subsequent messaging during a busy school year.
Communication with parents as ‘your classroom’
Monitoring the kinds of inquiries from parents received by office staff via email and telephone on any given day is a useful starting point for spotting gaps or miscommunications of key messages. However, these often come from the most engaged parents.
If we take the analogy of our parents as a classroom, what about those who never raise their hands? Parents engage with the school based on their level of
confidence and prior experience – both good and bad!
If parents know that the school is there to support them, and care for their child, they are more likely to engage with the school over the course of the year. This includes asking for help or clarification.
The pandemic called for a health check on all forms of communication. Schools adapted their communications because government or health authority advice was changing weekly or sometimes daily. At the ISF Academy in Hong Kong, although parents found written updates useful, we paired these with regular livestreams using YouTube or Microsoft Teams. These replaced the usual face-to-face coffee mornings and allowed us to focus on specific points that needed clarification. They also put a human face to the decisions being made. Parents do not always agree with the changes made, but by being transparent and explaining the rationale it is possible to bring parents along with the school during a difficult period.
Even during the best of times, stakeholders will distance themselves from decisions with which they disagree, or which they do not understand. For a school leader, hearing a parent use the depersonalising phrase ‘the school …’ is a sign that the message hasn’t got through or been explained properly. There is a clear need to narrate any strategy and personalise the steps taken by leadership and for whom they are made. School vision and mission statements often include the importance of home-school partnership. School communications are an opportunity to model this, and show that ‘the school’ is made up of staff, students and parents working together as part of the same team. Communication in schools should always be about ‘us’, rather than ‘them and us’.
Alastair Campbell, former communications director for the British Prime Minister Tony Blair, has written extensively about the importance of communications being fully embedded into strategy. He argues it is important to distinguish between the overall strategy and the tactics used to achieve the main goal. During the early stages of COVID 19, it was important not only to share what we knew, but also to distinguish this from what was still unknown. A good example from 2020 was the feverish speculation related to the possible cancellation of International Baccalaureate Diploma
examinations. We set out for parents and students what the main possibilities were, but focused attention on continuing with high quality examination preparation until any official announcement was made. Later on, implementing a hybrid learning model for students unable to return to campus was a short term tactical approach to meet our strategic goal of making learning as inclusive and as accessible as possible for all students.
The pandemic provided us with a perspective on the fitness for purpose of communications, but we also tasked different team members with communicating with different stakeholders. As Principal, took on the role of communication with parents, while a Deputy Principal focused on staff, and our Directors of Curriculum focused on the messages to students. The messages were strategically similar, but adjusted for the audience. This consistency of approach has endured. Larger schools that have dedicated communications and human resources teams need to think carefully about how whole-school messages are coordinated and communicated. Choosing when to send a message from the Head of School to provide reassurance or emphasis is important in balancing the operational and the strategic. Smaller schools often rely upon one or two senior staff for all communication, so it is important to be aware that ‘the messenger’ will often be perceived differently by stakeholders, and negatively if the message is incomplete or incorrect.
In conclusion, while the pandemic has brought about greater awareness, communication has always been a key part of strategy. Every communication conveys key information, but it is also an opportunity to make vision and mission visible. ‘Why are we doing this?’, ‘how does this link back to our goals?’ and ‘what is being communicated?’ are questions to be asked by all of those responsible for communications in schools. ◆
Nicholas
✉ nforde@isf.edu.hk
• Campbell A (2022) Covid: ten lessons to draw from the whole wretched experience Available from: https://alastaircampbell. org/2022/05/covid-ten-lessons-to-draw-from-the-experience/ (Accessed 6/6/2022)
Forde is Principal of Secondary at The ISF Academy, Hong Kong.The pandemic curtailed many of the traditional ways in which parents would normally be immersed in school life.
Every communication conveys key information, but it is also an opportunity to make vision and mission visible.
I
n early September 2022, a headline of the New York Times said ‘A Summer of Climate Disasters: Climate change has made extreme weather increasingly normal.’ If you were like me, you might have been left fretting about this new reality. Concurrently, it’s noticeable in the media that the push for taking action has intensified – especially with our world’s youth. It is vital that educators worldwide join together with our students and school communities to insert Climate Action Education into daily practice to help make a significant impact on our collective futures. As educators we have the power to make transformation happen!
Through its Climate Change Education for Sustainable Development programme,
UNESCO aims to ‘help people understand the impact of global warming today and increase ‘climate literacy’ among young people.’ (UNESCO, 2022a) Many will be more familiar with the term ‘climate literacy’ than the newer term ‘climate action education’ (NOAA, 2008).
Back in 2008, it was deemed that ‘Climate literacy is an understanding of the
climate’s influence on you and society and your influence on climate.’ (NOAA, 2008) ‘Climate action education’ takes ‘climate literacy’ and adds elements of advocacy, civic engagement and experiential learning – and it certainly helps to develop global competencies!
Climate change is a wide-reaching and complex issue that touches all humankind; ergo, it’s something that all international schools face globally. If this year of climate disasters occurring worldwide weren’t proof enough of the need to take urgent action, there are a number of recent policy and scientific documents to support an amplified focus on this area in education. The UK Department for Education, in April 2022, published the policy paper Sustainability and Climate Change a children’s strategy for the education and children’s service
systems, which encourages climate action and promises to ‘level-up the strategies with determination rather than despair’ (Department for Education, 2022). It addresses one of the key findings as of late, that despite a multitude of resources, teachers do not feel adequately prepared to teach about climate. The paper states that ‘Through our engagement with the teachers and representative bodies, we have heard that more support in teaching about climate change and in navigating the many different resources available is also needed’ (Department for Education, 2022). In a recent Canadian study, there were similar findings when
teachers were surveyed; less than half felt they had the knowledge and skills to teach about climate change. The barriers noted were lack of resources and lack of professional knowledge, and that teachers need enhanced curriculum policy to be provided (EdCan, 2022).
As of late, the language associated with climate change has become increasingly alarming, such as climate ‘emergency’, or climate ‘crisis’, and new levels of climate anxiety amongst our students are emerging. This complex topic has to be approached with some sensitivity as it touches upon values and must be discussed in ways that cultivate respectful discourse and, moreover, develops our students’ capacities to take action. The emotional dimension of teaching climate action education and health and wellbeing is an area that also needs to be carefully addressed. Discussions about climate disasters can lead to fear and anxiety, and we must therefore pay attention to the potential psychological dangers, and balance the approach with one of hope and determination by creating environments of trust where we can support our students.
Many international schools have led sustainability and environmental education using the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that work towards solutions to 17 global issues
aiming for 2030, one of which is climate.
Fieldwork Education’s international curricula – International Early Years Curriculum (IEYC), International Primary Curriculum (IPC) and International Middle Years Curriculum (IMYC) – have added special units focused on the SDGs as well as highlighting possible connections throughout their curricula (Fieldwork Education, 2022). To enhance this, they recently partnered with an innovative organization called Take Action Global (TAG) which was founded by two award-winning educators, Dr Jennifer Williams from the USA and Koen Timmers from Belgium. Six years ago, the pair developed the ‘Climate Action Project’ which is a free six-week curriculum translated into numerous languages which has grown rapidly around the world. They have now launched a full-year school membership program called ‘Climate Action Schools’. TAG has received a high level of support from worldwide dignitaries including Dr Jane Goodall, HRH Prince of Wales, Sir David Attenborough, Ministers of Education and the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP), and benefits from educational support from organisations such as LEGO, NASA and the WWF. It has already engaged almost 3.5 million students in 146 countries worldwide and growing! The Head of the International
As educators we have the power to make transformation happen!
Curriculum Association (ICA), Sarah Blackmore, states (Blackmore, 2022): ‘Bringing together the International Curriculum Association (ICA), part of Fieldwork Education, and Take Action Global (TAG) for the ICA’s International Curriculum Conference in October 2022 was only the beginning of a partnership that we see as unlocking potential in our global community of schools. Recent comprehensive reviews of the IEYC, IPC and IMYC have embedded, as a foundation, global competency, learner agency and the push to take action. With learning goals across subject disciplines, international learning and personal values, we have a strong platform to support schools in helping students to “understand and address the impacts of the climate crisis, empowering them with the knowledge, skills, values and attitudes needed to act as agents of change” (UNESCO, 2022b).’
The TAG programs offer a plethora of resources for students and teachers focused on climate action education. Moreover, the Climate Action Schools program provides an edtech platform for collaboration and connections between schools and students. The program also provides teachers and school faculty with certified professional development, thus addressing the issue of preparedness for teachers to support climate action education. (TAG, 2022) In communication with Dr Jennifer Williams, her reply when I asked her to expand on climate action education was as follows (Williams, 2022): ‘As we consider the necessary actions to protect our planet, we can look to classrooms to lead the way. Our partnership with the International
Curriculum Association (ICA) brings focus to not only the importance of collaboration between global organizations for social good, but also the critical and urgent need to empower educators and young people to develop creative solutions to the problems we face due to climate change. Now is a time for building climate resilience across the planet with all people; we are excited to team up with ICA and their school network in a shared commitment of climate education for all.’
There is no doubt that climate will remain one of the most pressing issues of this century. It’s clear that climate action education now has a critical urgency, and we have an opportunity to catalyze the movement within international school communities, globally. Simultaneously, schools need to provide teachers with climate action education
professional development. Climate action education should be embedded into school curricula, across subjects in a transdisciplinary approach that includes systems perspectives as well as local and global perspectives, worldwide. It is my hope, and that of TAG and Fieldwork Education, that through climate action education, our students will develop the knowledge, skills and understanding to be able to thrive and prosper in their and our collective future. ◆
Catherine Copeland is founding Director of Global EDGEucation consultancy and an Impact Partner for Take Action Global.
She previously served as Head of Primary at Keystone Academy China, Sotogrande International School Spain, and United World College Maastricht, The Netherlands.
✉ ccopeland@globalEDGEucation.com
• Blackmore S (2022) Sarah Blackmore, Head of International Curriculum Association, Fieldwork Education: personal communication 30 September 2022 https://fieldworkeducation.com/accreditation
• Department for Education (2022) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sustainability-and-climatechange-strategy/sustainability-and-climate-change-a-strategy-for-the-education-and-childrens-servicessystems#action-area-1-climate-education
• EdCan (2022) https://www.edcan.ca/articles/climate-change-education-canada/?gclid=CjwKCAjw-LZBhB4EiwA76YzOUHE8-ccA3-3DM8CQ3ucEZveISNPv5umyjWehyJbCETtKrUgIA4z7BoC7ZMQA vD_BwE
• Fieldwork Education (2022) https://fieldworkeducation.com/news/2019/sustainable-development-goals-fullmapping-documents
• New York Times (2022) https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/07/briefing/climate-change-heat-waves-useurope.html
• NOAA (2008) Climate Literacy: Essential Principles and Fundamental Concepts
• Take Action Global (2022) www.takeactionglobal.org
• UNESCO (2022a) https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/climate-solutions/education-key-addressingclimate-change
• UNESCO (2022b) https://www.unesco.org/en/education/sustainable-development/climate-change
• Williams J (2022) Dr Jennifer Williams, Executive Co-Director, Take Action Global: personal communication 30 September 2022
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Schools that are seeking to offer international education to Chinese students, particularly in China, will often have discussions about what this means. Part of the discussion can include the idea that the two cultures meet in the middle. There is something comfortable and almost inevitable about this conclusion. After all, the school is for Chinese students and the school is seeking to expose the students to western education through the curriculum of their choice. Once this position is declared, there is an assumed agreement as to what this means. It sounds like the two cultures are meeting in some metaphorical middle space and in doing so, they will achieve their aims.
This whole idea is significantly flawed. To accept the conclusion is to work on the premise that the educational experience for the students will be some sort of mathematical mid-point: 50% Chinese and 50% western. This is not stated as such, but there will be individuals who will act in ways that assume this is the expectation. There has to be a stepping back from this type of dialogue. Yes, a school that is offering international curriculum to Chinese students is bringing two cultures together. The students are products of the Chinese education system and intimate members of Chinese culture. They will always be so, and the question therefore is: what are schools doing when they offer an international curriculum to the students and parents and teachers?
The international curriculum with its content, pedagogy, assessment practices, assumptions and values is designed by and for western culture students. This is a powerful Trojan Horse that is brought into the lives of the community members. The assumption is that the international education experience will provide advantages for the students and their families. Whatever these advantages are, the articulation of those advantages has to be in line with the host country culture. What is perceived as an advantage by western educators may not be a desirable or recognisable advantage to a non-western person. All of the advantages have to be
identified and all have to be presented to the parents, teachers, students and Education Ministry officials in ways that are recognisable and acceptable to all the audiences.
On the surface, this does not sound like a difficult task. But experience shows that the advantages that are espoused for the various international curricula (overtly and presented in the course outlines) do not always translate in the way that they do in the west.
Some words and phrases that are valued highly in international education are counter-cultural and bordering upon being cultural threats.
For example, in western education, we see that students need to be ‘critical thinkers’. For a Chinese person, this term is potentially very stressful. The reader sees the word ‘critical’ and becomes anxious about the intention to criticise. This is not the intent of the phrase but translation is not the same as interpretation. The words and phrases that
are built into international curricula and programmes are full of jargon that sit easily in western culture. It cannot be assumed that they translate well, let alone are interpreted as intended. Even if the translation and interpretation are recognised, there is no guarantee that these expectations match the values and benefits of education that the host culture nurtures and expects of education. This is a minefield that has to be recognised and traversed safely.
The key here is to recognise that any teaching and learning experience for a Chinese student has to fit in with Chinese culture. The culture of China has a long and complex history and is a dominant factor in the lives of Chinese people. It guides them, supports them and protects them. Bringing in an education experience that is western in character and implementation is a threat by its very presence. This is because it is so different. The exposure of Chinese children to an international curriculum has benefits and should not be dismissed as being totally inappropriate in the context of Chinese culture. Rather, the view to be taken is that under all circumstances Chinese culture has to be safeguarded as the students learn new ways of learning and experience new ways of being taught.
The identification of the advantages that Chinese students can and should gain from international education has to be done only by Chinese people. It is their culture; these are their children. Once the decisions are made about what these advantages are, the manifestation of the advantages has to be shaped by and be compatible with Chinese culture. This is not a 50:50 proposition.
In real terms, it has to be closer to 100% Chinese. The education has to allow the students to be successful beyond study in China and, as such, the students must learn skills and processes that will ensure that success. However, the foreign teachers and administrators have to recognise that they are providing a service that serves the needs of the students within their cultural context exclusively.
The foreign teachers and administrators have to let go of many of the priorities, assumptions and values that they would normally deliver and promote to western students. They need to focus not only upon what has to be taught but also upon how the host culture interacts with what is being taught and learned. All the foreigners have to work with the teachers, parents and administrators to ensure that the version of education being developed and implemented contributes positively and constructively to the lives of the students. This is a shift in mindset that is essential. The cultures are meeting, but on the terms and conditions dictated by the host culture. Certainly, not in the middle. ◆
the school is seeking to expose the students to western education
any teaching and learning experience for a Chinese student has to fit in with Chinese cultureRichard Mast trains Chinese and foreign teachers and administrators in China and Australia.
Our understanding and visualisation of our solar system and the universe beyond has been much enhanced in recent years by images produced by the Hubble Space Telescope. That instrument has now been replaced by the new James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), designed primarily to conduct infrared astronomy. The largest optical telescope in space, its high resolution and sensitivity in the infrared region of the spectrum allow
(ESA and CSA). Several thousand scientists, engineers and technicians spanning 15 countries have contributed to the build, testing and integration of the JWST. NASA partners such as Australia have been involved in the telescope’s post-launch operation. Study of a broad range of investigations is envisaged for the instrument, including observation of the formation of the fi rst stars and galaxies, and detailed atmospheric
Several thousand scientists, engineers and technicians spanning 15 countries have contributed to the build, testing and integration of the JWST.
it to view objects too distant, faint or further back in time to have been studied by the Hubble telescope. The development of the telescope is a prime example of international cooperation between agencies, with NASA collaborating on the project with the European and Canadian Space Agencies
characterisation of potentially habitable exoplanets. The novel design involving an elaborate mirror structure, built using gold-plated beryllium, posed construction and deployment issues, and created intense interest amongst scientists and engineers as well as in the general media.
Launched on 25 December 2021, the telescope has already produced spectacular results of impressive and unprecedented detail in connection with various aspects of its intended studies. Images of a spiral galaxy (IC 5332) located some 29 million light years from Earth have recently been released. This galaxy stretches about 66,000 light years in width (about one third the size of the Milky Way), is seen face-on to the Earth and the spiral arms can be seen clearly, free of the dust that usually obscures them.
Such images highlight the telescope’s capabilities to reveal previously unseen aspects of the cosmos, including star birth shrouded in dust. However, the JWST’s stable and precise image quality has also been used to illuminate our
own solar system, and so far has taken images of Mars, Jupiter and Neptune. The key feature of all the images from the JWST is the detail and clarity produced. As regards the studies of Neptune, the observatory’s infrared instruments highlight features not seen in such detail since the Voyager 2 probe fl ew past the planet in 1989. These include the rings and dust bands that encircle the ice giant. Scientists are also intrigued by the different cloud structures, which should tell them something novel about the workings of Neptune’s atmosphere.
The whole project built around the JWST seems destined to produce fascinating and insightful information regarding the nature of ‘our world’, and may also stimulate and support concern regarding the challenging issues that face our home planet. ◆
Opposite:
✉ rickharwood@btinternet.com
In 2014, the international school community was rocked when it emerged that a serial paedophile had worked in multiple international schools over a 40 year period, illuminating previously unsurfaced challenges of child safeguarding in this sector. Not long after this case hit the international headlines, I was reading a Guardian Secret Teacher article.
The Secret Teacher writing in June 2014 had moved to the Middle East and was heading back to the UK just a year later because, they said, ‘I miss the challenge and privilege of helping disadvantaged young people … children who really need to be taught. And by “need” I mean children... who aren't
from the easiest of backgrounds.’
The indignation I felt at reading this prompted one of my first ever tweets, which marks the beginning of my advocacy for safeguarding children in international schools.
Having taught in Saudi Arabia, it resonated with me when the Secret Teacher said ‘Students' parents are educated, successful, international business people and, generally speaking, the pupils are polite, pleasant and placid.’ Certainly, that was my experience too. But, in my time as Head of Year and then Acting Deputy Head in Jeddah, I had also supported a student who was
experiencing domestic violence in the family home, and had managed two serious cases of child-on-child abuse (one of which resulted in a student leaving the school, and another of which was unsatisfactorily resolved due to the status of the student’s family), as well as countless other less notable but still significant concerns related to mental health, divorce, racial abuse and radicalisation.
As I reflect back on my time there over a decade ago, with experience and a feeling of guilt, I also recognise issues which should have had more action or exploration. A student in their mid-teens living without their parents for long periods with only a cook and
I knew that safeguarding and child protection was the business of international schools.
driver at home. A 16 year old boy driving a supercar. A teacher who drank a glass of wine in celebration when we landed outside of Saudi on a school trip – at 7:30am.
Back in 2014, knew that safeguarding and child protection was the business of international schools, but it was only in 2017 that began to explicitly focus my career in this area. I was commissioned to audit safeguarding practices and develop a safeguarding handbook for an international school in Europe. This gave me the opportunity to dive more deeply into areas of safeguarding I was less familiar with: safer recruitment practices, the legal considerations around safeguarding, and the process of managing allegations.
Through attending the Council of International Schools (CIS) Child Protection Foundation Workshop in 2018, I learnt about the impact of the 2014 case and how it had spurred the creation of the International Task Force on Child Protection (ITFCP). also heard from forensic psychologist Dr Joe Sullivan about the motivations, thoughts and behaviours of child sex offenders,
a presentation which I have now heard several times through my work with CIS but which is no less disturbing each time.
In early 2020, these experiences were coming together as an emerging idea for a doctorate. was talking with a school leader admire and explained to her that I was interested in exploring the challenges of safeguarding in international schools but I didn’t feel was enough of an expert. I will always remember how she looked me straight in the eye and said ‘But how do you think you become an expert?’ So, I sent off a research proposal and, by October 2020, I was beginning my doctorate with the University of Bath.
In early 2023 I will undertake visits to international schools around the world to explore their child safeguarding practices through interviews with Board members, school leaders, safeguarding leads and students, all with a view to identifying challenges and sharing successful practices. ◆
The topics touched on in this piece are also themes emerging in my preliminary research interviews with safeguarding leads: transience, recruitment, affluence, neglect, teacher conduct. But am also asking new questions as a result of my conversations to date, such as:
• Who should be a safeguarding lead in an international school? Is a senior teacher, clinical psychologist, social worker or counselor best suited to the role?
• What is the connection between diversity, equity and inclusion and child protection?
• What is the effect of safeguarding legislation if the country’s agencies are ill-equipped to deal with reports?
• What impact does accreditation have on safeguarding practices?
• How do safeguarding leads look after their own wellbeing? look forward to sharing the results of my findings with the international school community in due course!
Throughout my professional life, as an educator in UK, Europe, Southeast Asia and Japan, working with young children growing up bilingual, I had been part of different types of educational provision, but always felt that each did not recognise and support the holistic, unconscious self-language-learning skills of young bilingual children. It was not until the 1970s, when I discovered Children’s Home Bunko in Tokyo, that I found a programme for young children that I felt, with slight adaptation, could match their needs during the special period, often described as the ‘Absorbent Period’, when they ‘pick-up’ spoken language absorbing, without discretion, all they saw, heard and self-discovered.
Human brains are social, and young children, like adults, need to interact and share with others for wellbeing and to successfully learn. Very young children are remarkable communicators from birth. If they ‘feel safe’ and ‘feel good’ (comfortable), they quickly discover how to socialise and start face-to-face communication, gradually building their self-learning skills. Sharing faceto-face chats with caring adults or older children about activities is important, as this creates opportunities for
young children to hear and, without effort, unconsciously absorb chunks and patterns of language intertwined with culture. Harvard Education Research refers to this sharing as ‘back and forth’ exchanges. Into these exchanges experienced adults often scaffold new language confirming recently discovered concepts. Learning from social partners is important for young children, and they often act as role models remembered for life. After about three years of adult guidance, young children’s ability to communicate bilingually with words or short phrases shows they have worked out which language to use with which adult. All this can occur before young children even enter a classroom, when the teacher may introduce more formal language learning methods.
Solid foundations of bilingualism appear easier to build during children’s Absorbent Period when young children observe and unconsciously mirror and absorb, slowly refining what they absorb to match the models they see and hear. However, by the age of 8, most children’s minds have changed, making them conscious learners responding to a more academic, research-based approach to learning using their newly developed cognitive skills of critical and lateral thinking. Parents of 8-year-old bilingual children report that their children’s use of spoken English (learned at school) has changed from child-like chatter to more ‘grown up’ conversation.
Although physical development milestones are well documented across cultures for parents, details of language development tend only to record the big milestones in the first years, with little reference to young children growing-up bilingual. Families may celebrate Baby’s ‘first word’, without realising how Baby self-learned to talk and the important role they, as carers, had played in this achievement. Most information is written for teachers by academics; little guidance is available for parents.
In many societies, insufficient recognition is given to the important role played by mothers, who daily shepherd their growing babies from birth, caringly adapting their speech to develop their necessary lifelong language-learning skills. Voice is an undervalued educator. The different form of spoken language used by mothers (motherese) is present in different cultures; it is thought to develop due to the hormonal change during pregnancy to prepare for motherhood.
In 1971, soon after arrival in Japan with my late husband, I was invited, as a picture book author, to visit a Japanese Children’s Home Bunko (bun – ‘literature’, ko – ‘storehouse’), a voluntary programme designed for Japanese children to enjoy and talk about picture books. I was impressed that a Japanese mother in her front room could run a neighbourhood Home-Bunko independently, outside school hours, as a mini picture book borrowing library, with freedom to create her own programme to interest young Japanese monolingual children. realised that I could adapt this Japanese method of Bunko to create an immersion English community, similar to the ones in which young returning Japanese children had socialised and picked-up English while living overseas. I felt, with my experience, and as a first language English speaker, that I could be the motivating main native speaker, and bilingual children’s English-speaking Japanese mothers could support me and also manage the administration.
In 1977, together with two Japanese mothers, we opened the first International Children’s Bunko in Tokyo in English with five bilingual Japanese children. Dan Dan International Children’s Bunko was not a school; it was an English language self-help, picture book-borrowing immersion community supporting and developing spoken English, the weaker of these young bilingual
Japanese children’s two languages, for which there was little provision in Tokyo. (The name ‘Dan Dan’ was chosen by the Japanese mothers as a play on my family name and as it is an expression in Japanese to convey a ‘slowly, slowly’ approach.)
planned the Dan Dan Bunko model as a simple programme that could be adapted to different languages as the basic structure remained the same, even if the language content changed. The model was planned for children up to aged eight; older children were encouraged to caringly help younger children in the belief that teaching bonds and helps consolidate learning. Many young parents, unaware of young children’s ability to self-learn-languages, believe that language learning should be instructed by a trained language teacher in ways similar to those they may have learned from, years ago, following graded textbooks. A classroom situation, where the teacher instructs and children listen and study, is not what young bilingual children need, if they are to use their early established, self-language-learning skills in two languages.
Children were free to move and socialise as they shared picture book reading and different mini-projects including board games. From their first babbles, young children enjoy playing with language, and respond to adults who playfully share tongue twisters and jokes, enjoying rhymes and songs which are elements of literacy that too often are overlooked in formal language-learning programmes. Culture is intertwined with language. Snack Time brought the community together talking about News and children’s life overseas, and celebrating birthdays (not a common tradition in Japan at that time) with a home-made cake to foster a feeling of sameness and confidence in being bilingual. International Days were popular as they gave young children, helped by parents, an opportunity to make a ‘Show and Tell’ presentation about their life overseas: we all learned about Saipan. At that time Japanese schools did not value the importance of transition programmes for returning children.
News travelled fast, and by 1979 we opened the
'Very young children are remarkable communicators from birth.'Opal Dunn (second from right) presentation of decoration from Emperor of Japan
IC Bunko Association to cope with the demands for information on how to open and manage an IC (International Children’s) Bunko. By 1980, when we left Tokyo, there were fifty IC Bunko communities including French, German and American-English Bunko led by native speakers.
Later, on one of my visits to the UK, I met Japanese parents in south London worried that their bilingual children were forgetting Japanese, as they could not manage to cross London with their young families to attend the Japanese Saturday School. I discussed with a Japanese publisher the need to open a Japanese IC Bunko in London, and he encouraged me to ‘go ahead’ and even offered to donate some Japanese picture books.
In 1983, we opened Korisu Bunko, an IC Japanese language Bunko in south London modelled on Dan Dan Bunko, but asking mothers to accompany their children and be responsible for them during Bunko sessions. Not being Japanese, I asked mothers to take over the role of native speakers, even planning and managing activities. My role in IC Bunko Association then changed to ‘Adviser in Language Development’, helping to train mothers. News of Bunko travelled fast and in 1985 a London, later UK, branch of IC Bunko Association opened to cope with enthusiastic requests coming from Birmingham, Newcastle and Scotland. At the same time ICBA HQ in Tokyo was working with new IC Bunko in Australia and world-wide.
By 2021 the number of Japanese language Bunko for young bilingual Japanese children had increased worldwide, but IC Bunko in European languages had gradually closed and English language Bunko diminished as foreign wives in Japan, who provided essential native speaker input in foreign language IC Bunko, could now obtain work visas to pursue their own careers, and working full-time left them with no time to participate in Bunko. In 2021 there were 57 IC Bunko worldwide in 14 countries serving over 600 children.
During Covid many IC Bunko closed, but throughout IC Bunko Association and UK Branch Office remained in contact using Zoom or mail. Now IC Bunko communities are beginning to re-open as parents realise the important role socialisation in an IC Bunko can play in the mental health of young Bunko children, some of whom may have inadvertently seen frightening pictures or images on television or overheard adults' disturbing discussions during the pandemic.
Little by little my volunteer efforts to value and support international children growing up bilingual became recognised, and in 2008 the Japanese Government awarded me the Japanese Insignia, Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Rays for my outstanding
contribution to the International Education of Japanese children. In 2020, to my surprise, was awarded the British Council ELTons Outstanding Achievement Award for innovation in English Language Teaching, for a lifetime pioneering innovation in English Language Teaching for Teachers, Young Learners and Parents.
Today, 45 years later, the advantages of a Bunko community and its flexibility to fit local circumstances are better known, and it is hoped that more parents will make time to create their own Bunko communities, big or small, to help bilingual young children worldwide develop and use their self-learning-language skills in the weaker of their two languages and culture. Bunko communities can be created in various venues, from popup Bunko during the long summer holidays to regular weekly after-school Bunko.
Just as parents and families become more aware of how children self-learn and absorb activity-linked shared language, this must also be better understood by educational decision-makers including policy-makers and publishers. A Japanese Bunko graduate records that he never studied Japanese in Bunko, but somehow he knew how to talk. He refers to the opportunities that Bunko offered him to listen to the flow of authentic spoken Japanese language and interact with adults or older children self-acquiring Japanese at his own level.
Parents need to understand that the time when young children effortlessly pick up spoken language happily sharing without needing to study is optimal during their Absorbent Period. Learning spoken language is an intimate skill and is easier and more successful for the child when teachers and parents work collaboratively. What is happily absorbed during this period not only creates memories and bonds a family; it contributes to lifelong, positive interests, and attitudes that cannot be measured and are often hidden until after adolescence. Bilingual children are future international citizens. Making time for them during their Absorbent Period is an investment in their future and a contribution to developing international understanding. ◆
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Opal Dunn has Froebel Teacher Certification, trained in EFL, completed a Montessori Teacher Course and has innovated Early Years programmes for young children growing up bilingual and bicultural. She is an author of interactive picture books, as well as books and articles for parents and Early Years teachers. ✉ opal.dunn@gmail.com
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by Margaret White
London: Routledge, 2018 | Reviewed by Nicholas Tate
This is a book which comes impressively packaged with recommendations from la crème de la crème of the English academic and cultural establishment: two top English university vice-chancellors, two Cambridge professors, two Masters of Cambridge colleges, a former Archbishop of Canterbury, and ten other distinguished persons. One can’t help being reminded of the sixteenth-century French thinker Michel de Montaigne, whose own recipe for ‘a good education’
highlighted the virtue of modesty. But don’t let this put you off. The book is well worth adding to an international school’s curriculum library.
The book draws on the experiences of the author in a highly distinctive sector of the English educational system: prep and pre-prep (ie private) schools for 4-13 year olds, and in particular on her own school which is a Christian foundation. Although drawing on other sectors and other writings it is not a research-based study. Once again, don’t let any of this put
benefit from similar degrees of autonomy. Another feature of the book which may put some readers off, but shouldn’t, is that it is powerfully and positively ‘conservative’ while promoting innovation where appropriate. Given educational orthodoxies in the current Anglosphere, being ‘conservative’ is often the only way these days of being genuinely ‘revolutionary’. The author is keen on education as an induction into students’ heritage, on continuing to study ‘classical’ authors, on education for virtue (without
It is good for international schools to look over their shoulder at how national educational sectors function
you off. Moving between different sectors across four countries, have often been struck by how incredibly parochial educational ecosystems can be, international education and the world of the International Baccalaureate not excepted. The lessons from this author’s experience are generalisable, and it is good for international schools to look over their shoulder at how national educational sectors function, especially where these
drawing attention to that word), and on the place of the subject in the curriculum. She can see the value of building on the history and traditions of schools and national education systems, rather than going for the ground zero approach so tempting to new heads and education ministers. She supports school uniform. What attracts me about the book is not so much the ‘model’ – which is the main claim it is making about itself – but the ‘vision’ of ‘a good education’ which inspires it. When finally the vision comes to be summed up it is something of a damp squib – a bland statement which cannot imagine anyone who has ever worked in education disagreeing with. The real ‘vision’, like all things subtle and deep, emerges in the course of the book
up. Its elements include a commitment to rigour and perfectionism in all aspects of school life, a school community based on love and goodness and a sense of the uniqueness of each child, truthfulness and accuracy in everything, and the highest aspirations for every student and staff member. A few years ago I was mocked for arguing in a book that schools in their academic work should be places that focus inter alia on the ‘intellectual virtues’ posited first by Aristotle: disinterested curiosity, exactness, doubt, intellectual honesty and a love of truth. Tell this to someone teaching double French on a wet Friday afternoon, I was told. It is good to see that such low expectations would have no place in a school following the vision of education outlined in this book.
The core of the book’s ‘model of learning’ is the notion that there are four foundational values, four pairs of character traits, four educational principles or dimensions of learning, and four practical outcomes. All are discussed in turn and their implications teased out in relation to the planning of educational programmes as a whole, ‘the academic core’, the wider curriculum, individual subjects, and individual lessons. The overall framework, built up diagrammatically throughout the book in thirty-five stages, is a useful one, though its final expression – a double octagon, with four chevrons, four arrows, four squares and a plethora of abstract nouns – will probably be more attractive to people with spatial intelligence stronger than mine.
Viewing learning through the four dimensions of height, breadth, depth and length catches one’s eye. Height involves assessing the ambitiousness of aims and the quality of outcomes. Breadth is about the extent of opportunities and range
of attainments across all areas: academic, arts, sports, personal development. Depth invites us to plan how collaboration among learners, opportunities for creativity and curiosity, and an insistence on rigour can deepen attainment. Length is about instilling the habits of learning that embed diligence, tenacity and resilience, and ensuring that learning becomes a lifelong endeavour. The chapters on breadth of attainment in the academic core and the wider educational programmes, on heights of excellence within individual subjects, and on depth within individual lessons, are the best in the book.
I am less sure, conceptually, about the four foundational ‘values’. These look more like educational ‘principles’ to guide the planning of an educational programme: the centrality of the individual child and his or her needs and talents; learning as something done in community; and learning as a lifelong task intrinsic to being human. The ‘values’ –more appropriately ‘virtues’ – which also need to be central to learning are hidden under the eight ‘character traits’: honesty, bravery, fortitude, generosity, etc.
Two aspects of an educational
programme are in my view underplayed. There is little discussion of the development of concepts. This may be assumed in the discussions about ‘understanding’, but ought to be more explicit given its importance. I would also have welcomed a greater stress on the value of diagnostic and formative assessment in promoting each of the four dimensions.
None of the components of this ‘model of learning’ are likely to surprise people who have been working in education for some time. What is novel is how they are put together, and the thoughtful, wise and jargon-free way in which the author reflects on them and their interaction.
The book is particularly good at making the reader ask the fundamental question ‘what is education for?’ and to respond to it searchingly.
have a final caveat. The author sees education as ‘the primary determiner of the future of society’. am not so sure. Were the strengths of the Soviet education system the main reason for Russia’s many decades of success, and its failings the cause of its collapse? Are countries ranked high in global happiness, benevolence and trust surveys there as a result of superior education systems, and those ranked low because theirs are inferior? It is impossible to answer these questions. It is also a good idea not to try. Once we start seeing education as a means to shape society we end up with a utilitarian vision of its purposes we know too well from governments, or with political pressures to use education systems as vehicles for indoctrination, as at present in the contested areas of race, sex, gender and climate. A huge advantage of international schools is that they are free from the former pressures and although open to the latter – both internally and from accreditation bodies –better placed to resist them.
A final reason therefore for recommending the use of this book is that it eschews all this. Its four ‘practical outcomes’ get to the heart of what most of us who have spent our lives working in and with schools think education is for: experience of success, variety of achievement, habits of study and love of learning. ◆
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The book is particularly good at making the reader ask 'What is education for?'
