Teraknor

Don't be afraid to do the right thing, fear not making a contribution. Ignore the crowd and want no absolution. Take courage when all others are headless fowl, take courage when nobody wants to own the challenge ahead. As those in authority care not and wreck the good work done. Remember, they know little and understand less. Telling them, will not make them listen. Shouting does not make you heard. If you do not seek glory, recognition or appreciation. If you comprehend, seeing the challenge ahead and prepared for the fight then maybe, possibly maybe you are worth knowing.

If you follow this blog and occasionally pay attention, it often presents observations of education at its finest as well as most fetid. Observing some attitudes in the skills competitions, it strikes me that for some out there. The notion of acquiring success is more important that growing and developing the talent pool that would create successful competitors. Watching former colleagues; I am more inclined to believe it is a culture of development, mentoring and motivation. From this you find competitors that have the magic 'it factor' and stand a chance of success. Yet out there are educational establishments and training providers that could be suspected of being more interested in the short term accolade. Rather than putting in the effort required to garner repeated success. The two best british competitors have come from one college in the last six years. Without a doubt, it wasn't the college as a whole, but the considered efforts of one soul with the suppor...

For those  +Daily Mail  readers who dismiss our youth ... may I introduce a clutch of motivated souls who go the extra mile to excel at what they do as well as compete so that one day they may represent our nation at  +WorldSkills You will see this one of many at Flickr Bartosz, Gold Winner in Cisco Competition

By the time this automated post hits the interweb; I will be deep into the second day of judging at the Skills Show. Privileged to be amongst 100's of educators, experts and employers supporting the competitive aspirations of many young people (and some older) as they all work towards Gold, Silver, Bronze in their chosen fields and maybe selection to represent the country in international competitions. Much is said of the competitors, but often little credit is given to the judges, who are the motivators, movers and drivers behind this massive community. With this in mind, I would like to give a 'massive shout out' in the fields of Information Technology and Computing to ... Toby Bell, Northumberland College, the organiser and a massive hero Andy Jones, Northumberland College, the go to guy Pauline Ingrams, Highbury College, the quiet motivator Brian Proctor, Barnfield College, who cares far beyond the call Jefferson Martin, Highbury College, the stalwart ...

Less Dave Brubeck, more a chaotic shambles. I have to grin and bear it whenever I see an unsquare dance take place within education. Chatting to someone I recruited into further education sometime in the last millennia. I was entertained by their tale of lesson observation. Due to their technical nature and still working in the sector (as an ISP amongst other commercial interests) they are the kind of person most colleges would consider an asset. With this in mind they predominantly teach at the higher education level. So, along comes observer, using an Ofsted model of observation to witness a higher education lesson in action. Some of the students were working on their own HE learning; which is normal as well as others engaging in the lesson. Which is also normal. In a post 18 post level three world, the process of learning and engagement becomes student lead, not teacher managed. The experienced academic facilitates the exploration of knowledge, understanding and all the cleve...

Most of you know that I am a Star Trek fan; I tend to avoid the full fandom, just enjoying the programmes and occasionally playing with the toys. With so many programmes, spanning over 45 years of television. You will get some interesting plot ideas applicable in everyday 21st Century situations. The corbomite manoeuvre is the classic notion of bluff and the potential of retaliation. The aggressor, does not know the entire strengths of their new found adversary. The defender, uses guile as well as force to offset the notably strong assailant. In this class episode, Kirk persuades a more powerful aggressor, that the hull of the enterprise is built with this mythical substance. When fired upon, it will return the force applied in equal measure to the assailant. Now the question is, do you think I am using this tactic ;-)

Watching some forum participants; spill trite into an electronic medium.   I have formed the somewhat biased opinion that there is a category of souls who like the sound of their own electronic voice. So, yes, I am one of them. Looking at my blog statistics, there is a definite ebb and flow of followers clicking on my links. Currently I am in neither peek nor trough, just trying to work out if the readership is going up or down. In expressing ourselves, it is clear that mass electronic self-communication has become more than a megaphone, speakeasy or pamphlet. Here an idea, no matter how banal can take on a life of its own. Whilst matters of considerable importance are ignored; as Internet pseuds debate the Lilliputian egg.

The floppy disc is a redundant technology; some souls still hold on for dear life, expecting miracles from this 1.44 megabytes of storage possibilities. Why, I really do not know, being able to store that minute of mp3, may hold some importance somewhere. Most computers no longer come shipped with floppy drives. It is a pointless cost for a device offering storage a millionth the size of a typical hard drive. So, what is going to happen the the flash drive (aka memory stick). I found this one (above) in the garage today, after a much needed tidy up. Its 4gig, nothing special yet I cannot recall needing to use one in the last year. Now, with cloud based services, drop box and google drive. The transfer of large volumes of data relies on the interweb and automation rather than a data device in my pocket. Solid state media has become the stuff of larger scale storage and I know that this device, popular for over ten years will linger for a long time yet.

You see them everywhere, magazines, website and aghast reputable news papers all doing top ten lists. You have seen them, ten reasons, ten best, ten things to and so on ... So, being no better, here comes my top ten of ten reasons why top ten lists are crap: Reason one, I will always put my most biased least research opinion at the top Now, I will try and add another witty item, most lists do. For many of us, the notion of a list, gives a complex concept, or something that is important to us credibility. Our minds work in number groups, we all see patterns. Ancient cultures focussed on this; numbers such as 3, 7, 10 all have meaning (as does 6). Ok, they also gave this some mythical meaning, ironically we still have in modern culture, four horse riders etc Now we have reached the half way point, this alone would merit comment. Have you noticed that this is simply the number nine, gone awry? Have you ever tried to remember something by using a mnemonic (or acrostic). Richard...

If there was to be a right wing faction of the Guardian newspaper; I suppose I would be a fully signed up member. More conservative than liberal (note the small c and l), all in favour of many capitalist values. I stop at the 'self interest' of the Telegraph, the corporate megalomania of the Times and the nimby mindset of the Daily Mail. For me, there is nothing wrong with capitalist values so long as they include social responsibility. Preferring to get my news via Twitter; my iShiny and old aunty beebs interweb site. The bile between different pundits make the news more interesting. Reading this article (and blog entry) ...  http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/01/richard-littlejohn-wrong-about-jack-monroe-daily-mail  it does not take much to see that some more well known and named columnists. Focus not on the truth, nor news, but playing up to their own baying audience. I don't know 'Jack'; something tells me this is a brave and considered sou...