Around 96% of Irish primary schools are under the patronage of a religious body, with around 92-93% of schools under the the Catholic Church. This means that anyone who does not identify themselves as Catholic has very little chance of getting into a school that fully respects their religious identity. There is little appetite for … Read more
Every week I take the questions from ClassDojo’s weekly chat on Twitter, #dojochatEU. This week’s topic was Peer Learning. Let’s go through the questions and if you can, tune into the Twitter chat every Wednesday from 8:30pm. Q1. What does peer learning mean to you? Simply put, I think it means learning through your classmates and teacher … Read more
As most people know, there are a number of parents in Ireland who have been in the media lately claiming that they cannot enrol their children in their local school as they do not have a Baptismal Certificate. However, in the vast majority of schools, this is not the case. The Catholic church claim that most … Read more
With just a few days to go before the election, it’s sad to note that education hardly featured in any of the debates. If we value education so little in this country, there isn’t much hope that things will get better.
The third person aiming to be a member of the Teaching Council, Gregor Kerr, agreed to go through our interview. Have a read through his answers to our tough questions. Why do you want to be a rep for the Teaching Council? The main reason I have decided to stand in this election is because I … Read more
After the Celtic Tiger and the country went bankrupt, the government had to save money and make cuts to education. Because they have less of a voice, they cut from the most vulnerable people in our society. Over the last few years, they made cuts to children from EAL and Traveller backgrounds. They cut as much as … Read more
While most people have very little sympathy with teachers when it comes to pay, like everyone else, most teachers were hit very hard in the recession years, with some teachers losing up to 30% of their pay. On top of this, almost all allowances were cut and there were pay freezes. Furthermore, anyone who graduated … Read more
I developed an infographic based on the data received from my survey on how inclusive are Irish Catholic Primary Schools. I’ll be publishing my thoughts in the coming days.
Every week I respond to the ClassDojo #dojochatEU Twitter conversation, which happens every Wednesday evening. This week’s topic was “Has technology a place in education?” Here are the questions: Q1. Why do you think #edtech has a place in education? Education and technology must go hand in hand because the world and technology go hand in … Read more
ClassDojo have just released a way for principals and other school leaders to get involved in their schools that are running ClassDojo. Principals can now set up “School Leader Accounts.” This allows them to see the general highlights of what is happening in the school. For example, they can see how many teachers in the … Read more