Documents the innovations of a group of eccentric geniuses who developed computer code in the mid-20th century as part of mathematician Alan Turin's theoretical universal machine idea, exploring how their ideas led to such developments as digital television, modern genetics and the hydrogen bomb.
In Schools and Special Needs, the authors provide a critical perspective on the dominant `inclusion' model of special needs education, in terms of implementation in schools and effectiveness of pupil learning outcomes. They take issues with the major advocates of the inclusion model and argue that a different way of understanding special educational needs in mainstream schools is both possible and necessary. The authors, who are eminent in the special needs field, use up-to-date material to develop a new model for special education in schools.
Famously, over a four-year period, James Dyson made 5,127 prototypes of the cyclonic vacuum cleaner that would transform the way houses are cleaned around the world. Dyson reveals how he came to set up his own company and led it to become one of the most inventive technology companies in the world. Dyson has always looked to the future, even setting up his own university to help provide the next generation of engineers and designers. It is a compelling and dramatic tale, with many obstacles overcome."--Provided by publisher.
In England, as in countries across the world, shrinking public funding, growing localism, and increased school autonomy make tackling the link between education, disadvantage and place more important than ever. Challenging current thinking, this important book is the first to focus on the role of area-based initiatives in this struggle. It brings together a wide range of evidence to review the effectiveness of past initiatives, identify promising recent developments, and outline innovative ways forward for the future. It shows how local policymakers and practitioners can actively respond to the complexities of place and is aimed at all those actively seeking to tackle disadvantage, including policymakers, practitioners, academics and students, across education and the social sciences.
While many books explore the possibilities for developing inclusive practices in schools, and ‘inclusion’ is widely regarded as a desirable goal, much of the literature on the subject has been narrowly concerned with the inclusion of pupils with special educational needs. This book however, takes the view that marginalisation, exclusion and underachievement take many forms and affect many different kinds of child. As such, a definition of inclusion should also touch upon issues of equity, participation, community, entitlement, compassion, respect for diversity and sustainability. Here the highly regarded authors focus on: barriers to participation and learning experienced by pupils the practices that can overcome these barriers the extent to which such practices facilitate improved learning outcomes how such practices can be encouraged and sustained within schools and LEAs. The book is part of the Improving Learning series, published in partnership with the Teaching and Learning Research Project.
Despite consistent improvements in the school systems of over recent years, there are still too many children who miss out. It is not only children from disadvantaged backgrounds attending hard-pressed urban schools that the system is failing - even in the most successful schools there are often groups of learners whose experience of schooling is less than equitable. As a result of their close involvement with a group of schools serving a predominantly working-class community over five years, the authors of this book offer an analysis of how marginalisation within schools can arise, and provide suggestions for responding to this crucial policy agenda. They propose a teacher-led inquiry strategy that has proved to be effective in moving forward thinking and practice within individual schools. However, their research has shown that using the same strategy for system change is problematic within a policy context that emphasises competition and choice. Learning from this experience, the authors analyse the factors that inhibit the collaborative approach needed to reduce inequities that exist between the schools, in order to formulate proposals that can move the system as a whole towards more equitable provision. In Developing Equitable Education Systems, the authors focus on the way teachers’ sense of ‘fairness’ can become a powerful starting point, helping individual schools to inquire into and develop their own practice and provision. They provide practical suggestions for practitioners about ways of working that can create a greater sense of equity within particular school contexts, and highlight the barriers to a wider strategy for reducing system inequities that reside in local and national policies and traditions. At a time when government policies in many countries move to extend the diversity of educational provision - for example, through the introduction of charter schools in the USA, free schools in Sweden and academies in England - the authors also include a set of recommendations that offer a timely warning against the fragmentation of school systems in the misguided belief that competition benefits all children. They suggest that a more sensible approach would be to avoid situations whereby the improvement of one school leads to a decline in the resources available to, and subsequently the performance of, others.
Project Orion describes one of the most awesome 'might have beens' (and may yet bes!) of the space age. This is essential reading for anyone interested in government bureaucracies and the military industrial complex." -Sir Arthur C. Clarke
This book, for the first time ever, critically examines the role of full service and extended schools. The authors draw on their extensive international evaluations of this radical new phenomenon to ask: What do extended or full service schools hope to achieve, and why should services based on schools be any more effective than services operating from other community bases? What pattern of services and activities is most effective? What does extended schooling mean for children and families who are not highly disadvantaged, or for schools outside the most disadvantaged areas? How can schools lead extended services at the same time as doing their ‘day job’ of teaching children? Why should schools be concerned with family and community issues? Beyond the advocacy of ‘extended provision’, what real evidence is there that schools of this kind make a difference, and how can school leaders evaluate the impact of their work? This book will be of interest to anyone involved in extended and full service school provision, as a practitioner, policy-maker, or researcher.
As timely now as it was when it was first published in 1997, Darwin Among the Machines tells the story of humankind's long journey into the digital age. Historian of technology George Dyson traces the course of the information revolution, illuminating the lives and work of visionaries -- from Thomas Hobbes to John von Neumann -- who foresaw the development of artificial intelligence, artificial life, and artificial mind. Weaving a convincing, occasionally frightening narrative of the evolution of the global network, Dyson explores the limits of Darwinian evolution to suggest what lies ahead. Computer programs and worldwide networks are combining to produce an evolutionary theater in which the distinctions between nature and technology are increasingly obscured, he argues. We are living in the midst of an experiment -- one that echoes the prehistory of human intelligence and the origins of life. Now in a new paperback edition, this classic work on the emergence of collective mechanical intelligence will resonate for generations to come.
Dyson has become a byword for high performing products, technology, design and invention. Now, James Dyson, the inventor and entrepreneur who made it all happen, tells his remarkable and inspirational story in Invention: A Life. Famously, over a four-year period, James Dyson made 5127 prototypes of the cyclonic vacuum cleaner that would transform the way houses are cleaned around the world. In devoting all his resources to iteratively developing the technology, he risked it all, but out ofmany failures and setbacks came hard-fought success. His products - including vacuum cleaners, hair dryers and hair stylers, and fans and purifiers - are not only revolutionary technologies, but design classics. This was a legacy of his time studying at the Royal College of Art in the 1960s, when he was inspired by some of the most famous artists, designers and inventors of the era, as well as his engineering heroes such as Frank Whittle and Alec Issigonis. In Invention: A Life, Dyson reveals how he came to set up his own company and led it to become one of the most inventive technology companies in the world. It is a compelling and dramatic tale, with many obstacles overcome. Dyson has always looked to the future, even setting up his own university to help provide the next generation of engineers and designers. For, as he says, 'everything changes all the time, so experience is of little use'. Whether you are someone who has an idea for a better product, an aspiring entrepreneur, whether you appreciate great design or a page-turning read, Invention: A Life offers you inspiration, hope and much more.
The nature of work in the United States is changing dramatically, as new technologies, a global economy, and more demanding investors combine to create a far more competitive marketplace. Corporate efforts to respond to these new challenges have yielded mixed results. Headlines about instant millionaires and innovative e-businesses mingle with coverage of increasing job insecurity and record wage gaps between upper management and hourly workers. A Working Nation tracks the profound implications the changing workplace has had for all workers and shows who the real economic winners and losers have been in the past twenty-five years. A Working Nation sorts fact from fiction about the new relationship between workers and firms, and addresses several critical issues: Who are the real winners and losers in this new economy? Has the relationship between workers and firms really been transformed? How have employees become more integrated into or disconnected from corporate strategies and performance? Should government step into this new economic reality and how should it intervene? Among the topics investigated, David T. Ellwood explores and explains the apparent paradox between the steady rise in per capita national income and the stagnant wages of middle- and working-class workers. Douglas Kruse and Joseph Blasi study relative changes in long-term vs. temporary work, and evaluate the introduction of profit-sharing schemes and high performance workplace programs. William A. Niskanen and Rebecca M. Blank, both former members of the president's Council of Economic Advisers, offer their perspectives on what direction government might take to make this a working nation for everyone. Though Niskanen and Blank take alternative approaches, they both conclude that the primary policy emphasis ought to be on the problems of the least skilled more than on inequality per se, and that a focus on childhood education and tax supports for low-income working families should be of primary concern. A Working Nation paints a compelling and surprisingly consistent picture of today's workplace. While the booming economy has created millions of new jobs, it has also lead to an alarmingly unbalanced system of rewards that puts less-skilled, and many middle-class, workers at risk. This book is essential reading for those seeking the most efficient answers to the challenges and opportunities of the evolving economy.
A fictionalised account of the wreck of the barque Charles Eaton, which ran aground on the detached reef near the entrance to Torres Strait in 1834. Part two contains background information and historical documents.
What are the real “basics” of writing, how should they be taught, and what do they look like in children’s worlds? In her new book, Anne Haas Dyson shows how highly scripted writing curricula and regimented class routines work against young children’s natural social learning processes. Readers will have a front-row seat in Mrs. Bee’s kindergarten and Mrs. Kay’s 1st-grade class, where these dedicated teachers taught writing basics in schools serving predominately low-income children of color. The children, it turns out, had their own expectations for one another’s actions during writing time. Driven by desires for companionship and meaning, they used available linguistic and multimodal resources to construct their shared lives. In so doing, they stretch, enrich, and ultimately transform our own understandings of the basics. ReWRITING the Basics goes beyond critiquing traditional writing basics to place them in the linguistic diversity and multimodal texts of children’s everyday worlds. This engaging work: Illustrates how scripted, uniform curricula can reduce the resources of so-called “at-risk” children.Provides insight into how children may situate writing within the relational ethics and social structures of childhood cultures. Offers guiding principles for creating a program that will expand children’s possibilities in ways that are compatible with human sociability. Includes examples of children’s writing, reflections on research methods, and demographic tables. “Dyson’s ethnographies offer new ways of thinking about writing time and remind us of the importance of play, talk, and social relationships in children’s literacy learning. If every literacy researcher could write like Dyson, teachers would want to read about research! If policymakers took her insights on board, classrooms might become more respectful and enjoyable spaces for literacy teaching and learning that soar way above the basics.” —Barbara Comber, Queensland University of Technology, Australia
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