Here are some things I’ve come across lately that have stuck with me.
Children Are the Future: Authoritarianism, Culture War, and Making Model Citizens
This does a really good job of mapping the connection between what’s happening in education and the broader social and cultural activism of the right.
controlling what they are taught about American culture and life—not to mention science, art, and world history—is a right-wing citizen-making project. It also means that their value hinges on their ability to join the ranks of ideologically aligned and productively capable citizens when they become adults. Such an approach also devalues those youth who diverge from MAGA’s ideal citizen, through their politics, their sexual or gender expression, or by possessing some physical or mental disability.
The dialectic of educational enlightenment: Questioning ‘what works’
Is the demand for evidence-based practice, based on rationality and science, at risk of itself becoming irrational? Big questions are raised in this piece, that draws on the philosophical work of Adorno and Horkheimer.
A more dialectical approach to evidence-based practice would embrace contradiction, context and contingency. It would recognise that good teaching often involves navigating tensions between competing aims – freedom and structure, tradition and innovation, care and rigour. And it would treat evidence not as a mandate, but as a resource for deliberation and reflection.
The new “science of reading” movement, explained
This is a good layman’s overview of the history of the reading wars and the nuances behind that word ‘science’.
Often phonics advocates promote the use of research since research supports phonics instruction … but when it comes to specific prescriptions about how phonics should be taught, they make all kinds of claims that come down to: do it my way, I know best, don’t worry about what the science has to say
BEYOND READING SKILLS: PHONICS, VOCABULARY, AND KNOWLEDGE
Teaching is vastly more complex than is being presented by our curriculum rewriters.
Despite the obvious appeal of drawing on evidence (climate change, cough cough), I think evidentiary claims are too frequently used to close conversations rather than open them. In my experience, the best educators and leaders see lots of complexity, consider context, and artfully weave together different approaches to solve particular problems. Whereas people who are loudest about “evidence-based practices,” ironically tend to be more ideologues who have a few preferred solutions that they think can address every problem. Evidence should help to guide our work, but it cannot-and should not try to determine it.
Effective practices for literacy teaching
This is a summary of the 2025 report done by the EU in response to falling PISA scores.
In fact, successful reading at Level 2 requires a number of different skills, including identifying main ideas, drawing inferences, bringing together information from different sources, reflecting on the author’s purpose, and evaluating evidence. This report therefore includes the teaching of comprehension beyond letters and words, including drawing inferences and judging relevance and trustworthiness. It also includes dispositional characteristics such as motivation, metacognition and world knowledge, since these have a significant effect on reading proficiency.
Lastly, I have created a page focused on learning dispositions as a result of the interest in the dispositions cards. That page also includes an example of a learning story that has a dispositions focus.
Learning stories are one way teachers can respond to dispositions in the dance that is supporting students to grow them.
If you are interested in learning more about dispositions or learning stories I can help. Just drop me an email.
bevan@bevanholloway.com
Democracy Begins In The Classroom 