Beyond threshold topics to magic?

Penn (of and Teller) makes a great point while illustrating the threshold topics label.

Threshold topics in mathematics

Fascinating Horizon programme on BBC2 last night, in which Marcus du Sautoy tried to introduce Alan Davies to the joys of maths (while interestingly demonstrating that for a professor of maths, he's not that good at mental arithmetic). Of course, threshold concepts or topics were never mentioned, but that was what this was about, as it opened up a host of new perspectives on the world for Davies. The heading link is to the BBC iPlayer; watch it now before it disappears!

Year 1 Study Day 28 March 09

Thanks to everyone who attended and contributed to the second Year 1 Study Day last Saturday. Sharing the campus with another event made it rather crowded, so thanks for your forebearance, and especial appreciation to the catering staff for their sterling efforts to make sure we were all fed and watered.

The plenary session on this occasion was home-grown. It does not look as though we shall be producing the video as we had expected; the strange arrangement of the twin lecture theatres was not conducive to keeping Peter and myself in view! However, here is the presentation, annotated for the benefit of those who weren't there to hear it.

How To Cheat At Teaching

View more presentations from James Atherton.

The introductory paper for the afternoon discussions on Threshold Topics has been added to the Bedspce site here. It fills out some of the ideas illustrated on the slides, with particular reference to the broadening of the notion of threshold "concepts", to "topics", which may be psychomotor skills or knacks, or affective perspectives. They all continue to work in the same way, however, and of course they overlap.

Is this expansion legitimate? Please comment and discuss.

Study Day on 7 March

Thanks to everyone who made Saturday's Study Day such a success, chiefly to those of you who participated as members of Interest Groups --there was general agreement that some great resources had been shared, and the discussion of them was constructive and helpful. There was also a consensus that Frank Coffield has his finger on the pulse of the PCE sector, with some trenchant comments and some great ideas; like Principals actually doing some teaching!

Briefing for Study Day 7 March

Click on the heading to download the briefing paper for the second-year Study Day on Saturday (first years on 28 March). We're looking forward to seeing you; it promises to be every bit as interesting as the first one, although rather different in style.

Useful resource for ESOL teachers

If you have not come across this on-line journal, I can commend it; as well as being well-rooted in experience, the papers tend to be reflective while retaining a serious academic perspective. A useful model for some of your own work. Incidentally, the current issue is focused on India; it is also interesting to read the distinctive voice of some contributors and to reflect on their different starting points.

Oh! And Happy New Year! I'm sure you're desperate to get back to work and the course after all the irritating distraction of the past couple of weeks...

Automatic bibliographies!

It had to happen! You can now get automatic bibliographies generated for you on-line, from information as minimal as a book's ISBN number. Try it!

Two words of caution, though;

1. It does not set up the in-text flags for you, such as Jarvis (2006), and
2. Its default format is MLA (Modern Languages Association) while like most social "science" disciplines, we use APA (American Psychological Association); in order to get that, you have to take out a subscription, but that is only $7.99 (just over £5.00) for a year.

Pass the word!