I believe that there's a fine line between letting people know you're an expert, and displaying too much self-regard. If keeping on the right side of that line proves a bit of a challenge, here are three "rules" that could help.
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Teachers and writers
Teachers and writers have a lot in common, as I pointed out in this article from 2008 -- most of which is still relevant!
Read MoreEveryone’s an educational expert, but it was ever thus
Have you noticed how everybody seems to be an expert on education these days? In fact, you only have to pick up a newspaper more or less any day of the week to find some minor celebrity saying something asinine like “Schools should teach kids how to stay safe online” (Really? What a great idea. How come we didn’t think of that?!). I don’t take much notice of these people, but it does annoy me when they somehow get on to conference programmes.Should we welcome the nanocams?
I’m reading a short story by Ian Creasey called “The Edge of the Map”. In the world depicted by Creasey, automated cameras called “nanocams” take photos and newspapers (and other media, presumably) source their illustrations from the pool created by them. In other words, there is no need for specialist photographers.
This raises a number of interesting questions.
5 reasons schools need computing teachers with expertise in the subject
Some Principals and Headteachers think that a good way around the problem of teaching computing is to not worry about whether teachers have subject knowledge at all. “All we need are facilitators”, they say, “while the kids can teach themselves and each other.” This is, as any teacher knows (or should know), easy to say, less easy to do, and not altogether the most desirable thing to do even if you can do it. However, just in case your school happens to be “led” by one of the aforementioned Headteachers, here are some arguments you may want to use. I think that any one of them should suffice, and all of them together make for a cast-iron case.
Read MoreThe beauty of expertise
This article considers the need for computing and ICT to be taught by experts in those subjects. Anything less simply will not do.5 ways to establish credibility on your blog
I don’t know what it’s like living in other countries, but here in England we are fortunate indeed. If I want to have a discussion on any subject at all, I can simply walk into the pub nearest to where I happen to be at the time, where I am virtually certain to discover a self-styled “expert” declaiming about the economy, or what’s wrong with kids today, or how to solve the financial crisis, or whether or not kids should be taught how to programme, or how the entire education system should be put right.