- This week I did two presentations – one at the University of the Free State (Effective enrollment: Creating a composite measure of educational access and educational quality) and the other at the NAPTOSA Gauteng Leadership Conference (South African Teacher Content Knowledge in Local and International Perspective).
- “When Schooling is the Fiercest Thing“ – World class presentation by Lant Pritchett on schooling in developing countries (at the Young Lives Conference). Insightful, interesting and funny. If you only watch one lecture this year on education in developing countries, this should be it! (The curriculum paper he talks about can be found here).
- “Much More Than Counting“ – Comprehensive (and very accessible) report by DG Murray Trust on supporting Mathematics between birth and five years of age. I particularly liked the table explaining what children should be learning at each stage and what can be done to support that learning.
- The attack of the MOOCs – Economist article on the rise of online higher education. More posts on technology and education to come (the tech seed has been planted somewhere in my consciousness).
- The amazing, surprising, Africa-driven demographic future of the Earth, in 9 charts (via @LydiaPolgreen).
- Two excellent In Our Time podcasts – one on the British Empire and the other on the Mughal Empire – both fascinating and led by wonderfully knowledgeable people. Really loved the Mughal Empire one.
- On 17 July 2013 Queen Elizabeth II signed into law a bill legalizing same-sex marriages in England and Wales. I now don’t understand people who can’t see that the trend is inevitable (and positive).
- 2010 Umalusi/HESA report on “Evaluating the South African National Senior Certificate in relation to selected international qualifications: A self-referencing exercise to determine the standing of the NSC“
Nic Spaull 
Loved going through your NAPTOSA presentation. Very informative. There is some very interesting research on teacher competencies and educational quality which really backs up your claim about low teacher CK resulting in limited cognitive development for learners. It also opens old debates about the value of C2005, RNCS etc etc and its efficacy in a South African context (weakly classified and framed curriculum requires subject specialists hence the demise of the implementation of ‘OBE’).Brings me back to our current debate on the merits of the PGCE vs the BEd degree. That would make for interesting research, Who are the more valuable teachers in raising the quality of their pedagogic practices? I hazard a guess that PGCE trained educators come out tops but that is a very subjective statement based on experience of both programmes. Excellent research!
Thanks Tracey!