Taking readers from the Middle Ages to (more or less) the present day, Gray charts how the places where we do our shopping and what we buy have changed over the centuries.
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Review: Extraordinary Learning For All
As a source of potential ideas and inspiration, the book could be very useful indeed.
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Review: Bad Education: Why Our Universities Are Broken and How We Can Fix Them
One has the impression that the main role of the university these days is to maximise profit, while that of the majority of teaching staff is to ensure the ‘correct’ views are passed on to students. All the while, students’ main concern seems to be to seek protection from anything that might make them feel unsafe.
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Review: Next Practices - An Executive Guide for Education Decision Makers
Is a 2014 book on managing the computing provision in a school still worth buying?
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Still relevant (sadly): How to lie with statistics, by Darrell Huff
Although this book is over 60 years old, it is remarkably apposite for our times -- and especially in the fields of educational research and assessing pupils' understanding and progress.
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Quick looks: Bad Education: Why Our Universities Are Broken and How We Can Fix Them
It was a great source of pride to me, getting hundreds of students through their A levels and encouraging them to go to university. But for some time I have asked myself a question: would I recommend this route now?
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Review: The Bright Side: Why Optimists Have the Power to Change the World
At first glance, you might take this to be one of those books full of affirmations and anecdotes designed to lift your mood.
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Review: Small Habits Create Big Change: Strategies to Avoid Burnout and Thrive in Your Education Career
My review of this for Teach Secondary magazine has just come out. Here is the published version, followed by the copy I submitted, which is slightly longer because it has a little more detail.
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Review: Productive Failure: Unlocking Deeper Learning Through the Science of Failing
My review of this for Teach Secondary magazine has just come out. Here is the published version, followed by the copy I submitted, which is slightly longer because it is a little more detailed.
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Review: AI Snake Oil: AI Snake Oil: What Artificial Intelligence Can Do, What It Can’t, and How to Tell the Difference
My review of this for Teach Secondary magazine has just come out. Here is the published version, followed by the copy I submitted, which is slightly longer because it has a little more detail.
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A Town Without Time
We all need a break from work, so why not curl up with a good book?
This is a great boook, full of interesting and wonderfully-written stories, and the publisher has made a copy available to win as a prize.
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Review: The Shortest History of Music -- two reviews in one!
The music programme of study requires students to possess an understanding of the music they perform and that which they listen to, as well as a grasp of music history, and an appreciation of different musical styles.
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Review: The Art of Uncertainty (two reviews in one)
The Computing department would find the section on facial recognition interesting, because apart from possible ethical concerns, the fact is that even if the system has high accuracy, most of its identifications will be wrong.
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Review: The Newsmongers: A History of Tabloid Journalism (two reviews in one!)
I was intrigued to discover that a popular news magazine of the sixties had been anticipated by Defoe.
Read MoreQuick look: AI For Educators
There are some good ideas here, especially for prompts.
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Hitler's People: The Faces of the Third Reich -- Extended review
Nearly a hundred years after the Nazi phenomenon people are still asking the question: how could apparently ordinary or, in some cases, highly cultured, people commit such terrible crimes.
Read MoreEducation book reviews of 2024
This pdf contains the reviews of mine that were published in Teach Secondary magazine in 2024.
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Review: Nuts and Bolts: How Tiny Inventions Make Our World Work
It's rather disconcerting when one considers that buildings like The Shard are essentially held together by nuts, bolts and washers.
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Review: Love Triangle: The Life-changing Magic of Trigonometry
Like, I suspect, many people, I have never knowingly come across an isosceles triangle in my life, and wouldn’t know what to do with it if I did. However...
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Review: Making Sense Of Chaos – A Better Economics for a Better World
Before you rush off on the grounds that this book has nothing to do with Computing, let me reassure you that it does.
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