Steve Shann's Page

In another place on this Ning, a number of us have been discussing Charles Taylor's The Ethics of Authenticity. I've found it a stimulating discussion, an… Continue

I’ve just this minute finished marking the 90 submissions written by my postgraduate students in the Literacy Across the Curriculum unit. This is the final task in what has been an intense little unit.

There is so much that I want to write about this experience. I’ve set aside time in December to do this writing.

Before then, though, I wanted to say a public thankyou to those people who helped me put it together.

Of course the main ones are my colleague, Kaye Lowe, and the students who gave s… Continue

Our government in Australia is considering a simple plan. To improve literacy you mandate regular high-stakes multiple-choice national testing in our schools. This keeps teachers on their toes and students focused on what matters most.

I’ve just come out of a classroom where literacy rates seemed to have improved quite unexpectedly and dramatically. For eight weeks, a group of 90 postgraduate students, all of them training to be teachers in secondary classrooms, have been doing a course called… Continue

Second of two related posts. The first is called 'Inching towards a more charged focus question'.

I used to think that I worked best on my own, down at the coast with my own emerging thoughts and the world shut out. It was never true, I now realize. Even when I was writing my PhD thesis down here, I was reading books and articles and drawing on long conversations with my super… Continue

So. Here I am, at the coast on my own for three days. Time to think and read and write. Bliss. It’s 7.30 at night and I’ve finished dinner (but still got my apron on); a salmon and bean frittata with an avocado, pea and olive salad. A glass and a half of cheap but pleasant red wine. I’ve been for a walk on the beach during a break in the wet weather, there’s a fire on, and I’m like a pig in poo.

I’m planning to write a short blog post each day. I’m here to sort out the focus and structure of th… Continue