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ALL teaching is very demanding & time consuming, but the challenges of a primary teacher and a secondary teacher very different. This tongue-in-cheek article celebrating the different cultures of primary and secondary schools, and celebrates the dif…

The expansion of secondary education is now the world's most pressing educational challenge. This carefully prepared and thoroughly researched book should inspire policy-makers and educational planners to explore how open schooling can expand secondary education cost-effectively in their jurisdictions.

"In his new book, Professor Keith Taber reassures practicing and training science teachers, as he explores a range of issues faced by secondary school educators and discusses strategies for teaching the nature of scientific knowledge, making practical work effective and challenging young scientists. Throughout the academic prose, Professor Taber reflects on the nature of scientific knowledge in science education encouraging creating narratives, challenging misconceptions, and exploring principles of constructive teaching. The book continues with exploring specific challenges, such as teaching electrical circuits to lower secondary school students, along with a chapter dedicated to supporting gifted students who excel at the subjects."

"Research undertaken by University College in London has found that school break times in England have shortened, with infants receiving 45 minutes less per week, with their secondary peers losing 65 minutes over the same period. Researchers analysed questionnaires completed at 993 primaries and 199 secondaries in 2017 along with separate pupil surveys at 37 schools. These were compared with surveys in similar schools in 2006 and 1995. The report claims their results gave the impression that breaks were being kept as "tightly managed and as short as possible" and this meant pupils could be missing out on social development and highlighted how "school is increasingly the main, and in some cases the only, context where young people get to socialise"."

"Genius Hour: From discussions with Primary school teacher friends of mine it was pointed out that something happened in Year 7 that changed students from the risk taking and independent learners that they were in Year 6 into passive learners by the end of Year 7. I had noticed the same thing with my own niece as she transitioned from primary to secondary, so I started to think about what was causing it. The more I looked the more I noticed that in secondary there is very little opportunity for students to make choices or take ownership of their learning and I wanted to change this."

Interesting Idea for getting Secondary teachers involved with global collaboration.

This press release tells more about Sophia. "Sophia is a social teaching and learning application that makes free, credible academic content available to anyone at anytime. It is a mission-driven organization that aims to break traditional cost and access barriers to post-secondary degree attainment. For more information, go to www.sophia.org."

This great maths site has an amazing collection of maths self-marking problem solving questions. Search by age level or topic. This covers both Primary and Secondary levels. Topics include numbers, geometry, algebra, data analysis, probability and more. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/Maths

This is a fabulous video site where students from MIT teach science for Primary and Secondary children. View videos on a range of topics including engineering, biology, physics, astronomy and more. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/Science

The Project-Based Learning designs on this website were created by West Virginia teachers who worked with the WVDE Office of Instruction through participation in the Teacher Leadership Institute, the Secondary PBL project, content-specific professional de

Following on from the results of our online poll, #UKEdChat this week will focus on Good Behaviour Strategies used in schools. Whether in the Early Years, Primary, Secondary or beyond, the behaviour of students can positively or negatively impact the rest of the class as well as interfere with teaching and learning. The session will release six questions (see below), so join the session on Twitter from 8pm via the #UKEdChat hash-tag. Questions: What student behaviours to you find to be the most annoying when teaching? Where do you go for support when you are finding student behaviour a problem? What has been the most positive intervention made in helping build a positive classroom behaviour? What are the foundations in ensuring positive pupils behaviour in any classroom? What are the most effective consequences used when dealing with disruptive behaviour? Think back to when you were a school pupil. What was the worst behaviour you displayed?

We all remember science lessons from our school days. Whether the lessons were with the more 'characteristic' teachers in the school, or whether you all released the gas taps when the teacher foolishly left the room, we all seemed to miss the link that science is life! And what an opportunity science teachers have in releasing the magic of life to their pupils, answering BIG questions like "Why am I like my parents?", or "What will my life be like in 2050?", or "Why is Pripyat a deserted town?"

A superb e-safety resource with separate sections for primary and secondary students to work through. Choose to sign in to save progress or use without signing in. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/ICT+%26+Web+Tools

A useful and fun set of cross-curriculum photo slide shows for maths, English, science, history and more. They are arranged by age and range from kindergarten Secondary school. A great resource for introducing topics. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/Video%2C+animation%2C+film+%26+Webcams

Upload your Charles Dickens lessons and resources in this competition to submit the best resources. This is a UK competition, but perhaps some others may want to enter as well. I also wanted to include this because of the great list of Charles Dickens resources here. If you teach Great Expectations or any other Dickens classic, you'll want to download these free lesson plans and resources. To be eligible for the Charles Dickens / Literary Heritage competition, all lesson plans & teaching resources shared must only cater for texts by authors found in the literary heritage section of the Secondary English National Curriculum, or from current GCSE & A Level awarding body specifications for English. Your can submit resources for poetry, prose or drama texts (or all three!) across the relevant key stage. At GCSE and A Level, resources can be submitted to support teaching and learning of controlled assessment and / or examination units. When you upload resources for entry to the competition, please take care to tag and classify your resources accurately in the relevant key stage, topic and sub topic areas. For example:

A collection of maths and science rap videos aimed at secondary topics. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/Cross+Curricular

This site has an extensive collection of science and maths resources and videos to use with secondary students. Free sign up required. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/Cross+Curricular

The US is not the only country in government educational induced turmoil. Here is an overview of what is happening in England right now. "Make teachers redundant or have them teach subjects they are not trained in - that is the stark choice cash-strapped secondaries will face if national curriculum changes proposed this week are introduced, ministers are being warned. The bleak scenario is predicted by heads' leaders and teacher recruitment experts if the Government follows the recommendation of its national curriculum review expert panel to make history, geography and modern foreign languages compulsory for all 11 to 16-year-olds from 2014."

Here's the page that high school literature teachers will want to go to. On the left hand side you'll see "Sub Sub topic" and you can click  on the play. Click More and you can see even more plays. This way you can find information by play. One of the things I found is a popular resource that uses Simpsons Images linking to Macbeth. (Not sure about copyright but  it is there and is very popular.) Curriculum directors will want to share this with their English departments.

Students across the country have already started working on their IWitness Challenge project sponsored by the USC Shoah Foundation - The Institute for Visual History and Education, but there's still time for youngsters in your community to enter this free online program geared to all secondary-school students. The deadline to enter the Challenge is Dec. 2, 2013. The winning student, along with their teacher and a family member will be brought to Los Angeles to showcase their work as part of the 20th anniversary activities for the Shoah Foundation, which was founded by director Steven Spielberg in 1994 after making "Schindler's List." Tthe IWitness Challenge (iwitness.usc.edu) connects students with the past in a very personal way that spurs them to take action to improve the future. With access to many of the Shoah Foundation's 52,000 testimonies of survivors, liberators and rescuers, students experience history in a way that hits home. Instead of reading facts from textbooks, students feel the emotions and build relationships with those who lived through seemingly impossible situations. But students do more than watch the testimony. The IWitness Challenge compels them to think, to make smart choices and to create their own project and video from what they've learned. By encouraging teachers and students to create their own lesson plans, IWitness allows them to expand on practically any subject they wish to pursue. From civics, government and history to poetry, art and ethics, educators can tailor lessons appropriate for their classrooms. And by using the embedded editor, participants not only learn valuable searching and editing skills, but also how to make ethical editing decisions that ensure their finished assignments are a fair and accurate reflection of what they've seen. All work is kept safe inside the IWitness site and not accessible to the public. Using IWitness is free, but teachers or homeschool parents must register at iwitness.usc.edu.