PLATO

The Education Watchdog

LINKS to Useful Websites


WA Education Sites [from the Curriculum Council]

The Australian Association of Reading Teachers (AART)

Newspaper - Television News available online
URL
Selected RSS News Feeds http://platowa.com/Feeds.html
The West Australian
The Australian
The Sunday Times / "Perth Now"
WAtoday.com.au http://www.watoday.com.au/
Australian Associated Press http://aap.com.au/
PerthNorg Online News
Links to all Australian Capital City DAILY / Sunday Newspapers online
Links to ALL Australian newspapers online
   
Find any online newspaper in the world
   
Major US Newspapers
 Link
The New York Times [Note: MAY require free registration to access individual sections or articles.]
The Washington Post [Note: MAY require free registration to access individual sections or articles.]
USA Today
.
  
The Times (London)
The Guardian (UK)
The Independent (UK) [The website is SO SLOW that I advise you to go straight to the education section.]
   
Education Watch
Educational News from australia.edu
"Yahoo Education News"
.
  
Julia Gillard media releases http://mediacentre.dewr.gov.au/mediacentre/Gillard/Releases/
   
  Western Australia Cabinet [September 2008]
   
CNN
ABC News Online
ABC News Online: WA News
ABC News Online: Education News http://www.abc.net.au/news/tag/education/
Channel 9 News
Channel 10 News, Perth
Channel 7 News, Perth


Organisations
URL
Curriculum Council http://www.curriculum.wa.edu.au/
DET http://www.det.wa.edu.au/
DET District Offices: contact details http://www2.eddept.wa.edu.au/schoolprofile/district.do
Catholic Education Office of WA http://web4.ceo.wa.edu.au/
Assoc of Independent Schools of WA http://www.ais.wa.edu.au/
WACOT http://www.collegeofteaching.wa.edu.au/
English Teachers' Forum of WA http://www.englishteachersforumwa.org/
Parents Against OBE http://www.outcomeseducation.com/
SSTUWA NEW WEBSITE http://sstuwa.org/      Contact details
IEUWA http://www.ieuwa.asn.au/
Members First http://www.membersfirst.org.au/
Useful national education links http://www.naplan.edu.au/useful_links/useful_links.html


The Australian Association of Reading Teachers (AART):

Newsletters and Website

Also see: http://www.rmit.edu.au/staff/kerry_hempenstall
Website of Dr Kerry Hempenstall, Senior Lecturer, Division of Psychology, School of Health Sciences, RMIT University

Dr Hempenstall is an expert on Direct Instruction and his website is a fantastic resource. He is also an expert on Whole Language and much loathed by the advocates of WL around the world. He writes pieces like his Whole Language Guide to Golf, which uses humour to highlight the outlandish beliefs underpinning Wl; his pieces are listed on websites in all English speaking countries. His submission to the Australian Senate Academic Standards Inquiry is available here.


CV, Resume and Cover Letter: free sample templates and resume writing examples

The following will direct you to a variety of interesting articles, sources of information on education, and forums.

Description Link
Campaign for Real Education [UK]:
The Traditional and Progressive Philosophies of Education		 http://www.cre.org.uk/philosophies.html
Is this where the rot started?

"Curriculum makers or curriculum takers? The influence of tertiary selection on secondary schools" by Rod Chadbourne, Edith Cowan University
Issues in Educational Research, 5(1), 1995, 1-9.
 http://www.iier.org.au/iier5/chadbourne.html
Education articles of interest from Zig Engelmann http://www.zigsite.com/
Thomas B. Fordman Foundation "Education Excellence" website [some interesting articles from time to time – updated weekly] http://www.edexcellence.net/
The Washington Post 2-year series of articles: "Building Blocks and Next Steps" [may require free registration] Link
For reference:
Ministerial Task Force Report on Issues Surrounding Proposed Changes to Post Compulsory Education [Robson Report, July 2005]		 http://www.curriculum.wa.edu.au/files/pdf/taskforce_report.pdf
Excellent article: "Negotiating new models of curriculum in changing times: Year 1", in Canadian Journal of Educational Administration and Policy http://www.umanitoba.ca/publications/cjeap/articles/miller.html
Why Traditional Education Is More Progressive
by E. D. Hirsch		 http://www.taemag.com/issues/articleid.16209/article_detail.asp
From national curriculum collaboration to national consistency in curriculum outcomes
by Michael Watt		 http://cmslive.curriculum.edu.au/leader/default.asp?id=14329&issueID=10298
Useful commentary from Steve Kosser, American anti-OBE campaigner and publisher of "The Kosser Education Newsletter"

http://www.ibc-pa.org/KEN/

http://www.ibc-pa.org/KEN/speaker.html

http://www.ibc-pa.org/KEN/Pe3_13.html
Article in "Education Reporter" entitled "Final Curtain Falls on Model OBE Program " (USA) http://www.eagleforum.org/educate/1999/may99/obe.html
A link to many of Dr Kevin Donnelly's articles on education / OBE and subsequent discussion On Line Opinion (Kevin Donnelly)
Donnelly's article "Outcomes Option Flawed" and subsequent discussion On Line Opinion (Kevin Donnelly)
Donnelly's article "[OBE] Unhelpful for Students and for Teachers" and subsequent discussion On Line Opinion (Kevin Donnelly)
Free online copy of Donnelly's book "Why Our Schools Are Failing" [requires Adobe Acrobat viewer - obtain a free copy of viewer by clicking here] http://www.mrcltd.org.au/content.cfm?PageID=PubsMonographs
WA Parents Against Outcomes Based Education website http://www.outcomeseducation.com/
Parents threaten lawsuit over OBE: claim that new system of teaching failed pupils Full story in The New Zealand Mercury, reporting on events in South Africa, at:
http://www.themercury.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=283&fArticleId=348579
Excellent article on OBE by Prof Richard Berlach, Notre Dame Univ Australia [required Adobe Acrobat viewer - obtain a free copy of viewer by clicking here] Australian Association of Research and Education
Excellent article "What is OBE?" from Halcyon House: Critical Issues in Education http://www.halcyon.org/obeinfo.html
Healthy discussion on OBE WA State School Teachers Union
"Win the battle, but lose the war?" PLATO Forum discussion thread, started by Dr Kevin Donnelly http://pub39.bravenet.com/forum/3280197123/show/534150
An excellent journal for latest trends in education Curriculum Leadership
A good paper "Assessing the Assessment of OBE" by Dr Malcolm Venter APAPDC Online Conference 2000
Some pros and cons of OBE by Dr Gwennis McNeir Clearinghouse on Educational Policy and Management
"OBE - Miracule Cure or Plague?" by Dr Bruni Manno Thomas B. Fordham Foundation
OBE - The Hijacking of America's Children Frank Morriss
"Outcomes-Based Education" by Dr James Deuink BJU Press
"What's Wrong With OBE?" by Dr Paul Cates Faith Christian Ministries
Anthology of OBE articles Arthurhu.com
"The Nazi Model For OBE" by Berit Kjos Kjos Ministries
Final Report of the Royal Commission on Learning, Ontario, Canada

Brief excerpt from the report
Full report (beware: a very long report)

What's Wrong With OBE?: 1993 Phyllis Schlafly Report

Ourcivilisation.com - The Decay of Education in the West
Curriculum Council - Our Youth, Our Future eNews: SeeE-news issue 7 (1 July 2005) for a short research paper compiled by the CC on OBE. Scroll down to the bottom of the page for links to all eNews issues published so far Curriculum Council - Our Youth, Our Future eNews
Queensland Teaching and learning reforms for Prep to Year 10 Queensland Government - Dept of Education and Arts
This parallels exactly what is happening here in WA EducatioNation - Education for Intelligence and Freedom
A considerable amount of material on the views of William Spady, one of the original OBE "gurus", many showing the evolution of OBE and "where it all went wrong" http://www.mackinac.org/5279

http://aad.uoregon.edu/culturework/culturework28.htm

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=255377&area=/the_teacher/teacher_features/

http://www.ibc-pa.org/KEN/Pe3_14.html

http://www.watchd46schools.org/Docs/KeyPointsAgainstSDP.pdf

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=242679&area=/the_teacher/teacher_features/

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=238591&area=/the_teacher/teacher_features/

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=235189&area=/the_teacher/teacher_features/

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=235035&area=/the_teacher/teacher_features/

http://www.mg.co.za/articlePage.aspx?articleid=234948&area=/the_teacher/teacher_features/

http://www.learningtolearn.sa.edu.au/Colleagues/files/links/Spady_ParadigmPioneer.pdf

http://comnet.org/cpsr/essays/obe.htm

 

Useful Bits and Pieces
[suggest you download the .pdf files if you want to print]

How to Set Up Your Internet Browser [download as .pdf file]

How to Control the Fonts on Your Internet Browser [download as .pdf file]

HTML Primer

For more advanced info on web design [from About.com]

More tutorials (from Bravenet)

Multimedia in a Word .doc example [220 kb Word .doc]
A Quick Look at Web Authoring Tools [download as .pdf file]
The Australian Copyright Act [.rtf file]   [Warning: 3.6 MB]

Basic html

To create a link on the Forum:



Bold, italics and underline:



To create coloured text on the Forum:


The Computer Expert Primer [How to Think Like a Techie]

[provided free to educators by the Science and Mathematics Education Centre, Curtin University: © Curtin University]


How to Write a Report

This document, and the associated teaching materials, were developed by Steve Kessell, for Year 11 - 12 science and IT students. It was simplified from material he taught undergraduate technical writing IT students at Curtin.

Click here to access the Writing Manual. At the bottom of that document, you'll find links to download: The Manual, and the teachers' notes etc.

Steve has given permission for anyone to download and use these materials for any non-profit educational purposes.

Search the PLATOWA website and its Breaking News Archive

 Note: The FreeFind search will sometimes give you a link to a news item on the PLATO home page, but you find the link doesn't work. That's because the search index is updated only once a week [since we have a free version of the service], while articles are moved from the home page to the Breaking News Archive after two days. Thus search results that link to the Archive should always work.

Search Tips

By default the search engine tries to locate pages which have exact matches for all of the words entered in your search query. If that fails, it then tries to locate pages which contain any words in your search query. If that happens a short message is displayed at the top of the search results indicating this has been done.

In addition, there are several ways to modify the default search behavior.

1. phrase search
The search engine supports three types of phrase search.

  • To match an exact phrase, use quotes around the phrase
    Example: "Greg Williams"
  • To match a near (within a couple of words) phrase, use square brackets [around the words]
    Example: [Williams OBE]
  • To match a far (within several words) phrase, use braces {around the words}
    Example: {Williams levels}

2. + and - qualifiers

If you prepend a word with + that word is required to be on the page.
If you prepend a word with - that word is required to not be on the page.
Example: +always -never

3. * wildcard
If a query word ends with a * all words on a page which start the same way as that query word will match.
Example: outcom*

4. ? wildcard
If a query word contains a ? any character will match that position.
Example: O?E

5. boolean search
You can use the following boolean operators in your search: AND, OR, NOT. These operators MUST be in capital letters.
Example: (Kessell AND Curriculum) OR (Williams AND outcomes)

All of these techniques can be combined: +alway* -ne??r*

Note: Like all search engines, this one will give you only the web pages that meet your search criteria.

Many of the PLATO pages, especially those in the Breaking News Archive, are rather long [7 days' education news], so you will want to use your Internet Browser's search capability to find the words within the page:

Edit –> Find [in/on this page]

This page last updated 5 October, 2008 9:11 PM