Catherine McTamaney, looks at how she changed teaching and why she remains influential today One hundred and fifty years after Maria Montessori’s birth, tens of thousands of teachers around the world still hail her innovations and educational philosophy. One of Italy’s first female doctors, Montessori applied her...
Can her baby have too much of a good thing, asks Michelle Dickson-Garay It seems that some things are naturally associated with becoming a mum. Growing larger during pregnancy is natural, getting less sleep after your bub is born is natural, losing your memory while breastfeeding...
From shopping lists to jokes on the fridge—learning how to be a confident and communicative writer is one of the most important skills students learn at school, report researchers Anabela Malpique, Deborah Pino Pasternak, Debora Valcan and Susan Ledger But NAPLAN results show a significant decline in...
This is why it matters – and we can do something about it, write researchers Linda J. Graham Callula Killingly Jenna Gillett-Swan and Penny Van Bergen “School SUX!” We’ve all heard it and some of us have felt it. It’s such a common sentiment that parents and teachers...
Sarah Halfpenny reflects on some of the more character-building experiences of her life. My first face-to-face encounter with Hector the Road Safety Cat was not a good one. Despite his daily televised preachings of road awareness in an attempt to save young lives, he almost cost...
Reading aloud to young children is the most effective means of helping them to develop language, writes Nan Williamson No-one expects a child’s body to develop and grow without a constant diet of healthy, varied wholesome food. The same is true of language and vocabulary. Children’s...
The “Real” 7-Up – the 30-Year Study Linking Childhood Obesity and Fitness to Midlife Cognition The world’s first study of the impact of childhood fitness and obesity on cognition in middle age, followed over 1200 people who were children in 1985 for over 30 years, has...
Why has the revision of the primary school geography curriculum caused it to be 'stripped back'? asks Alaric Maude Revisions to the Australian primary school curriculum for geography mean children will learn much less about the world and its diversity than they do at present....
Dr Andrew Thompson discusses how veganism without good health management can lead to poor health outcomes More Australians are adopting vegetarian and plant-based diets, with many choosing to cut their intake of meat – and even fish, dairy, and eggs – to improve their health....
There’s strong evidence that feeling useful builds resilience in children, but how much and what sort of work are modern parents asking kids to do? reports Andrew Trounson, University of Melbourne Next time your child complains about chores, tell them it’s for their own good. Giving children...
