A year ago, I wrote a rant about Alpha schools. A few times a year, I let myself go. No, this will not be a new rant. Sorry. But in my post and the follow-up post, I argued that we couldn’t separate Alpha School’s spectacular claims from the extraordinarily selective population it serves. Now we… Read More Do We Know the Alpha and Omega of Alpha School?
I once did research myself into what makes a teacher a ‘real teacher’ in the eyes of their students. This was and is not an easy question. The question ‘What makes someone a good teacher?’ is also one of those questions almost everyone thinks they have an answer to, but the discussions start once you… Read More What makes a good teacher? A lot of research confirms what you probably already thought
We all start life from unequal positions. James Heckman once argued that being born is the greatest source of inequality. And, in a way, education is one of our attempts to undo some of this. Now suppose children receive a good preschool education at age 4 and, as a result, build an advantage over children… Read More Can Better Education Make an Earlier Advantage Look Smaller?
I’m afraid I’m the second type in this video, and my colleagues might hate me for it. Sorry! Check here for more Funny on Sunday.
I want to discuss a new study on PIAAC, the lesser-known adult sibling of PISA. PIAAC measures, among other things, literacy and numeracy among adults, while PISA assesses related skills among 15-year-olds. There was something in the Flemish results in 2024 that fascinated me. I wrote on my Dutch blog: By 2012, average PISA scores… Read More PISA scores fall. PIAAC scores don’t. How can that be?
This blog has an AI problem. No, not because it was written by AI (although I translated it with AI’s help). Or rather, I have an AI research problem. The problem is that I am increasingly unsure which new studies on AI and education are still worth discussing here. I have a monthly podcast in… Read More This blog has an AI problem
Heleen Reynolds writes great summaries of books about education. Now she made a summary of our book, which she describes as: Cognitive science draws on psychology, and this EXCELLENT book not only gives a comprehensive (and readable) background, it is FULL of useful applications for your classroom. Super useful! Download summary Download ‘Do This’ version
We are in the final week of the summer holiday here in Flanders. Many parents, and even quite a few pupils, if they are honest, will say that the summer break is simply too long. It is a discussion that comes back with some regularity, and one I get called about every few months. And… Read More Should the summer holiday be shorter, or perhaps longer?
This weekend, I came across this piece on ScienceDaily. Like any good press release, the message is one that rather invites you to click: speaking several languages could keep your brain up to thirteen years younger. This sounds promising, especially if you speak several languages. The newspaper articles almost write themselves, but before you download… Read More What should you do when a press release claims multilingualism can make your brain 13 years younger?
My wife was at a conference in Finland last week and sent me this link, along with the slide below, saying, “this might be interesting for your blog.” At first sight, it is about a large-scale experiment in which children in Finland start something resembling kindergarten a year earlier, at five instead of six. Primary… Read More Who actually expects the most from educational innovation?