May 2019 archive

The (as-yet-unrealised) wisdom of Homo Sapiens …

Yuval Noah Harari’s ‘Sapiens’ has been sitting on my shelf for FAR too long, waiting, tantalisingly, to be read, but this past weekend I plunged in … and couldn’t put it down. I haven’t finished it yet – so, please, no spoilers – but given that there is a sequel of sorts (Homo Deus), then …

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Why choose to teach abroad?

Escaping (literally) from the turmoil of Brexit and the political machinations of the UK can appear a particularly attractive option at the moment. Although I have written in the past about why teaching abroad can be enormously beneficial, both personally and professionally, I thought it was an apt moment to recall why this is the …

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Addressing our assumptions

Two very different events which I attended at the end of last week in Edinburgh ended with a very similar message about the importance of getting to know the people around us, and I thought this was worth reflecting on for a moment. The first event was a session on diversity – and, specifically, how …

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Real and relevant: adult and child worlds on a Sunday morning

I spent Sunday morning this week with my daughter at Kidzania, the ‘indoor city for kids’ situated in Westfield Mall at White City, London (and replicated in various major cities across the world). For those of you who don’t know Kidzania, it is designed so that children aged 4-14 can explore a replica ‘city’, with …

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The absolute imperative of understanding other people’s cultures

I have just been dipping in again to Erin Meyer’s very readable book ‘The Culture Map’, which I do from time to time, just to remind myself of the urgent imperative of developing cultural understanding in a globalised world – the world in which our young people are growing up, and in which they will …

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