On mastery 2
Some footnotes to On Mastery (q.v.) ... About six weeks after the inauguration, when Carlos Fabra had invited the citizens of Castellón to enjoy the delights of the new Castellón airport, they were legally...
Moderating orals
Moderating orals is a bit of a weird business … Here I sit in my top-floor studio, laptop and speakers in front of me and the piles of DHL packages arranged around the desk, having (as I tweeted the...
Books'n'roses revisited
After posting my comments on Sant Jordi, I thought to check on a few details that I decided not to include. This led me to a Wikpedia article, which informed me that some of my ideas were not quite accurate....
Books'n'roses
Yesterday, the 23rd of April, was the day of Sant Jordi. Which is a very big day indeed in Catalonia, centred around a tradition that I find enchanting - that you should give a rose and a book to...
Top-up and Trickle-down
Esperanza Aguirre, the flamboyant right-wing president of the Community of Madrid, has announced an educational initiative: the Bachillerato de Excelencia. This 'elite baccalaureate' will be aimed at...
About prototypes
The use of the word 'prototype' in the new Subject Guide has been bothering me. My initial sense of the word was equivalent to the first of the definitions given by the OED - "a first or preliminary version...
On mastery
It is always a pleasure to watch a master at work - the cook working elegantly under pressure, the guitarist casually creating complexity, the plasterer flicking out a perfect surface. And the most impressive...
View from Berlin
Another workshop finished, this time in Berlin. Experienced teachers, who worked well together, throwing out lots of ideas and comments. One of the fascinating aspects of being a workshop leader is that...
Carnaval's over
Carnaval is big here in Sitges. People proudly refer to an article some years ago that claimed that the Sitges Carnaval was the third best in the world, after Rio and Las Palmas in the Canaries. Well,...
The King's (rude) Speech
I note the Guardian's report of Colin Firth's objection to the version of 'The King's Speech' to be released in the US, censoring the bad language used by the King at certain points in the film. To recap,...