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PODCAST

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education

How many times have you said to yourself, "If I were the Minister for Education…?" Well I do! Rather than grumble to myself, I decided to podcast my thoughts on ways I"d change the primary education system in Ireland. Every episode I"ll take on a different theme, give some background and hopefully come to some conclusions by the end. simonmlewis.substack.com

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All Episodes

38:41

Special Episode: #ISupportClaremorris

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/12/13

This episode is about a school. A school where over 10% of their pupils have had a positive diagnosis of COVID19. A school where its Board decided that they needed to close the building to stop the spread of the virus. A school that was then told to open back up on Monday morning. And apart from the question as to whether the school should open or close, it asks the bigger question - who actually runs schools?

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36:20

Special Episode: #GRMA - Thanks but no thanks

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/12/11

In case you missed it, today has been designated GRMA day, a day dreamed up to make people say thank you to people working in schools over the last number of months. The idea is that at 11am on Friday, everyone in schools is being asked to play a video where various people are going to thank teachers, SNAs, secretaries, caretakers and anyone else that works in a school. In this episode I'll be trying to figure out why there's been no excitement around it but I'll thank someone by the end.

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26:58

Episode 046: Ban the Rote Learning of Tables

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/12/03

Back in my day, the only way we learned our tables was by learning them off by heart. The motivation of doing so was to avoid being humiliated by your teacher and class. Some of you are old enough to remember games like the “Stand Up, Sit down” game where the goal is to remain standing by answering a maths fact. Thankfully things have moved on but why was learning tables by rote such a bad idea? It worked, didn't it?

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35:39

Untangling the Christmas Decorations

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/12/01

I often compare the Primary Education System to the decorations you find in the attic. Every time you try to untangle a knot, a new knot appears and after a while, you just chuck them over the tree and hope nobody notices the mess. The problem is that I've never managed to make that analogy in December. Until today. Join me as I untangle 3 news stories that hit the headlines and which knot is responsible for all of them.

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29:54

Episode 045: Diversify the Profession

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/11/26

Primary school teaching is most likely one of the least diverse professions in the country. In this episode I explore why this is the case. I don't think there are too many surprises as to why but what can we do about it?

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19:39

Episode 044: Trademark the title of Teacher

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/11/19

Does it annoy you when someone who isn't a teacher calls themselves a teacher? If you're in any way sensible, it probably doesn't. In this, less-than-serious episode, I'll be taking a break from serious issues and trying to find out whether we should trademark the title of teacher, or change it to something better. Lead Thought Classroom Evangelist, anyone?

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22:23

Episode 043: Scrap Section 29s

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/11/12

There are some terms that give any teacher the fear. Put the letters WSE together and you’ll get a wave of panic. Drive-by does something similar. Principals also have another term that brings the fear to them - it’s called a Section 29. In this episode, I’ll be arguing that if I were the Minister for Education, I’d be scrapping them.

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37:15

Unsanitised Poetry Reading: Circular 74/2020

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/11/10

Back in March/April, most schools had come up with a plan for remote learning with the schools closed and all. It only took the Department of Education 6 months to come up with a circular for communication and remote learning. Here's my live reading of the circular, where I slip from apathy to outrage in 30 minutes.

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26:47

Episode 042: Outsource Obesity

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/11/06

It's probably be fair to say that education is no longer the sole function of primary schools these days. Over the last decade or so, schools have now taken on functions of meal-providers, counsellors, psychologists, occupational therapists, web safety gurus, sex educators, religious missionaries, dieticians, social workers, attendance officers, and so on. For every ill in society, it seems that schools are being asked to plug the gap in the 5 hours and 40 minutes per day that we see children. It's

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01:07:44

Mid Term Break. What Mid Term Break?

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/11/04

October 23rd. A fairly insignificant date. But to principals this year, it was the date they couldn’t wait for as it was to signal mid-term break, and for most of them, their first day off work since mid-February when there was a small mutterings about a virus that had come from Wuhan in China and seemed to be causing problems in Italy where bunches of teenagers were skiing on their transition year school trips. However, for many school leaders having a break didn't happen. In this episode, I

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35:19

Episode 041: Add an Initiative, Remove an Initiative

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/10/22

Since 2011, schools have been inundated with new initiatives from the Department of Education. However, other agencies have also dumped their workload on schools too. In this episode I point the finger of blame while proposing a solution that if a new initiative is to come into schools, one must be removed first.

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38:12

Special Episode: What now for Schools during Level 5?

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/10/20

Schools are to remain open in Level 5 but can we do it safely? In this episode, I explore what's been happening over the last few days and ask the Twitterati what they think we need to do to keep schools open safely.

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29:54

Episode 040: Secretaries to be paid directly by DES

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/10/15

If you work in a primary school, one thing you can probably be sure about is that the Department of Education will pay you. Well, that is unless you happen to be the school secretary or another member of what is affectionately called ancillary staff. In probably one of the least controversial episodes of this podcast, If I were the Minister for Education I would ensure that Secretaries would be paid directly by the DES.

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21:34

Budget 2021 - A Reaction

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/10/13

While I don't think anyone was expecting much from this year's budget, at least none of us were surprised. Here's my reaction.

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34:48

Poetry Reading: Guidance on Remote Learning in a...

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/10/08

Any time an important circular or guidance document is released by the Department of Education, I do a live reading of it to try and make sense of it for myself, but also, hopefully to explain it to you. It might save you a bit of time reading it yourself too! This document was released very quietly by the DES today about planning for remote learning. I wonder why!

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33:17

Episode 39: Scrap Homework

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/10/08

Homework is still one of the most divisive things you can talk about. If you surveyed everyone in the country about whether they think you should scrap homework or not, you’d get a 50-50 response. In this episode, I’m going to explore homework at primary school, some of the reasons why teachers and parents and society seem to want to keep it, despite all the evidence, and I’ll be arguing that if I were the Minister for Education, I would scrap homework in its current form.

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45:15

Special Episode: What if we go to Level 5?

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/10/06

On Sunday evening, NPHET announced they were recommending that Ireland moved to Level 5 restrictions. My Monday, the government had rejected the recommendation and imposed Level 3 on the country. But what would school look like at Level 5? I asked Anseo.net listeners and these are their thoughts.

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50:55

Episode 038: Reduce the Number of Stakeholders

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/10/01

Have you ever wondered what happens at these consultations when the Department of Education meets with all the education stakeholders? I always did and wondered what it would look like. And one day, I got that chance. I was invited to represent one education stakeholder regarding a new Department of Education initiative. I went in expecting to be one of about 8 people, maybe fewer. However, as soon as I walked into the Clock Tower room of the inner sanctum, I could see exactly why the education

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35:12

A Principal's Experience of a COVID19 Case and what...

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/09/24

The most popular post I've ever published was this week and I didn’t even write it. It was from a principal who had a positive COVID19 case in his school and his experience of how it was dealt with. In this episode, I’ll be reading his experience and adding my own thoughts. I’ll also be talking a little bit about the DES requiring principals to be on call 24 hours a day and how inspectors have again forgotten the note that they are there to support schools.

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40:15

Back to School: The Good, The Bad, and The Flat Out...

Anseo.net - If I were the Minister for Education ·

2020/09/18

To me Flat Out Busy refers to the agencies and organisations that spent their summers scurrying around scurrying, attending Zoom meetings about meetings, and making statements about statements that they were going to make. They were neither fully good or fully bad and they had the best of intentions but for all the time since lockdown, they didn’t actually manage to achieve very much.

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