RattleBag and Rhubarb, WW1

Necessary Heroes

“The necessary supply of heroes must be maintained at all costs.” (Siegfried Sassoon 24 February. 1917, quoting Sir Edward Carson in a speech in Dublin. I have been unable to confirm the details of that speech.) Each night at 8 pm the traffic is stopped at the Menin Gate and  The Last Post is sounded. This is the gate over…

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Education, Poetry, RattleBag and Rhubarb, WW1

Darkness and Light

What 60 schools can tell us about teaching 21st century skills. Here’s the TEDx Denver version of the talk Grant Lichtman gave at #naisac13 in Philadelphia. I take my title from an extraordinary compliment that Grant paid Poughkeepsie Day School on his blog where he wrote: “…Poughkeepsie Day School, a school that has preserved the fires of the Progressive Era, un-extinguished, for decades,…

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Books, RattleBag and Rhubarb, WW1

Regeneration

This July marks the ninetieth anniversary of the start of third Ypres – better known as the battle of Passchendaele . It was an offensive designed to break out of the stalemate of the salient – the bump in the line that bulged around the Flemish town of Ieper, known in French as Ypres and to the thousands of English…

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