Norway expels Polish consul

Fifteen genders for 5 year olds

Barnardo`s apologises for child abuse

"The UK's biggest childcare charity yesterday claimed there had been no 'malice' in the mistreatment of children - as it formally apologised to youngsters abused in its homes."

"Former Barnardo's executive Sara Clarke now works for the organisation as a consultant, helping it to tackle historic allegations of child abuse and neglect."

"She said the charity was 'deeply sorry' for any 'hurt' that children in its care had suffered - and accepted that the charity was responsible for 'failures' that led to abuse..."

"The Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry (SQAI) has heard a series of allegations that children in its homes were beaten and raped."

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6609165/Barnardos-insists-theres-no-malice-mistreatment-children.html?ito=facebook_share_fbia-bottom&fbclid=IwAR3AT1ZaPNqZxnh66CIy1DwOCR4KMkQj0vcMXBIKz6zTo-Wxry8gSG4vDNU

Data analytics threatens local democracy

Here is what Xantura has to say about its Fusion platform:

"The Fusion platform is being configured to better target early help services and reduce financial pressures in several business domains, including;

Children`s Services
Adult Social Care & Health
Housing / Homelessness
Community Safety In all these deployments, very careful consideration is given by data owners as to what data will be supplied and under what circumstances it can be shared."

However the reality might involve breaches in a family`s right to privacy given that consent for data sharing is not always sought. For example:

"Hackney Council is refusing to release details about a profiling system which flags at-risk families in the borough to social workers." 
"The Town Hall has also confirmed that people whose data is captured through its services are not told it is being used for this purpose."



"The council has paid a total of £361,400 to private data analytics company Xantura since 2015, and says it is trialling the firm’s Early Help Profiling System (EHPS)..."

"A spokesperson said the decision to keep secret what predictive indicators are used to profile families is at the request of Xantura, which argues the information is commercially sensitive."


But Alexandra Runswick, director of campaign group Unlock Democracy, said: `Commercial sensitivity should not override democratic accountability`. " 
"`Private companies like Xantura – that knowingly get into the business of local democracy – should expect to be open about how software is being used for targeting`." 
"`We know that human biases can be baked into profiling software design. This is a challenge that some of the largest companies in the world haven’t been able to iron out`."
 
https://www.hackneycitizen.co.uk/2018/10/18/council-360k-xantura-software-profiles-troubled-families/

Nine years for Sabine McNeill

"A woman who claimed there was a `satanic child abuse ring` in Hampstead has been jailed for nine years over stalking parents and breaching a restraining order."

"Sabine McNeill, 74, was jailed at Southwark Crown Court on Wednesday. She led a vitriolic campaign claiming children at a school in Hampstead were being subject to child abuse..."

"A High Court hearing in 2015 found the claims of a satanic child abuse ring to be baseless."

https://www.hamhigh.co.uk/news/crime-court/nine-years-for-pensioner-who-has-stalked-and-harrassed-mothers-of-children-at-hampstead-school-1-5848299


Coverage of the Sabine McNeill case begins on UK Column News at approximately 25 minutes. 

 UK Column New Friday 11 January 2019

Here is Sabine in earlier times fighting against UK secret family courts and the abuses that follow from that.

Melanie Shaw case adjourned until February 11

"The sentencing of Melanie Shaw over three charges of prison arson has been adjourned for four weeks."

"The 48-year-old was due to be sentenced at Leeds Crown Court today, Monday, after a jury in the same court in October had found that she had committed three counts of arson being reckless as to whether property was damaged or destroyed."

"The October proceedings were a 'trial of facts' to establish if she had carried out the acts, rather than a formal trial with a 'guilty' verdict', because [she] was deemed unfit to stand trial."

"During today's hearing, which lasted less than five minutes, Judge Belcher said she was not happy with a report that had been supplied by a doctor."

"The judge said the case `can't be dealt with today`."

"She requested further doctor's reports from the defence and adjourned the case until February 11, where she said she would decide on the sentence."

"The judge said: `I adjourn this case for the 11th of February. Reports requested for a hospital order`."

"Shaw did not appear in person for the hearing today. Around 15 of her supporters were in the public gallery for the hearing." 

 "The offences were carried out on February 8 and February 10, 2017, at HMP Foston Hall, Derby; and on June 21 at New Hall prison in Wakefield, West Yorkshire."

https://www.nottinghampost.com/news/local-news/melanie-shaw-arson-sentencing-adjourned-2426844?fbclid=IwAR3dJ_BK8H5BVdbT9zb-73w-eLfPJ4cD-cYXunvcwxUpAt_5K26Lgu2Ym44

Is there a common purpose ?

UK Column News 2 November 2018:

In the studio with Mike Robinson is David Scott from Northern Exposure. 

Mike Robinson begins: "Here is Sarah Thornton and of course over the last couple of days the National Chiefs` Police Council and the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners were holding their partnership summit because, as we know, everything is about partnership, and well, she was saying something that did get some media coverage: that incidents of misogyny, claims against dead people, should not be pursued. So this is about police priorities and the amount of money the police have to spend on various things and, of course, the rise, or at least the alleged rise, of violent crime in the country. So let`s see what she actually said. Here we go."

"Neither investigating gender-based hate crime or investigating allegations against those who have died are necessarily bad things - I just argue that they cannot be priorities for a service that is over-stretched."

"Well this is all pretty hypocritical, David, because why would we not  want to investigate people who have been abusing children even in the past?"

David Scott: "You have an institutionalised abuse network; you have people right up to [a] former prime minister who has been abusing children on an industrial scale; you have the cover-up of that industrial scale abuse ... through the police, through the courts, through the entire system. You don`t want to know, Mike; you don`t want to know because the people are dead and it`s time to move on and we need to be looking at far more important things. And it`s just the same as looking at hate incidents and basically gossip on social media; it`s the same sort of level. We`re going to equate these two things so that people get the idea that investigating the core breakdown of our society is not really that important and should not be a priority for the police."

Mike Robinson: "Well let`s just remind everybody that Sarah Thornton does have form here because, of course, one of the subjects that we were trying to cover for quite a number of years was the abuse that was taking place at Oxford & Cherwell Valley College. And Sarah Thornton was Chief Constable at Thames Valley police, therefore was responsible for any investigation, or not, into the abuse that took place at that college. And, of course, she refused consistently to investigate and we were asking on an issue of the UK Column, when we were printing the newspaper, we were asking: `Was there a conspiracy of silence or a common purpose at work here?` Because all the people involved from the local authority, from the school and the Chief Constable herself, were all involved or graduates of common purpose. So I can`t image why she would want to cover things up. But anyway as you mentioned, one of the other things she said, of course, was `We don`t want to be investigating hate incidents any more unless there`s a crime been committed, but if it`s an incident we don`t really want to be highlighting that or investigating that` ..."

"But this is all a bit strange, David, because apparently we`re going to be investigating the labour party over anti-semitic alleged hate."

David Scott. "It appears not all hate is equal..."

Mike Robinson: "Well let`s move on to education and you wanted to highlight the passing of John Taylor Gatto."

 

"Yes, I wanted just to highlight how important John Taylor Gatto has been and to briefly .... record his passing on the 25 October. He has been an inspiration to many of us. He`s spoken with great vigour and great insight about what exactly is wrong with the education system, the very fundamental harm that it does, and the depth of the problem and what can be done about it, and the joy and vigour that can be obtained from education that`s based on different principles. He`s written several books. `The Underground History of American Education` is an absolute goldmine of information on these matters. There`s one called `Dumbing Us Down` - probably about half a dozen books in all .... Anyone who`s interested in education at all, anyone who`s interested in how to think freely, and anyone who`s interested in how the state is modifying society, needs to read John Taylor Gatto. He was a great man and he`ll be sadly missed."

Mike Robinson: "So we have a quote here. Genius is `as common as dirt`. We suppress genius because we haven`t yet figured out how to manage a population of educated men and women. The solution, I think, is simple and glorious. Let them manage themselves`...`"

"Yes, and this is what he put into practice. He won New York state and New York City, `Teacher of the Year`, He was working in a very poor school and ghetto in New York and with very poor and disadvantaged pupils and they were doing magnificently well. They were going to various universities and no-one could figure out how he did it. But what he was doing was he was engaging with the parents, working with them and the children and completely subverting the system. And so when he won the award he had to resign because the attention he got stopped him doing the subversive creative things that were actually working. So this is an extract of his resignation which was published in the.... Washington Post. It was titled `I quit, I think`."

"I`ve

"I just can`t do it anymore. I can`t train children to wait to be told what to do. I can`t train people to drop what they are doing when a bell sounds. I can`t persuade children to feel some justice in their class placement when there isn`t any, and I can`t persuade children to believe teachers have valuable secrets they can acquire by becoming our disciples. That isn`t true..."

GTC Scotland do not have a policy position on reading

 The General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) held its second `Excellence in Professional Learning Awards` in September. It looks like they are here congratulating practitioners for `nurturing North Ayrshire`. It`s a pity they pay so much attention to how practitioners `nurture` and yet do not give much attention to how teachers are taught to instruct learners to read.  

Given the focus in Scotland on `adverse childhood experiences` (ACEs) one thing seems to be overlooked: a lifelong inability to read is one of the most devastating experiences a child could possible undergo; and yet, as the Clackmannanshire study has shown, is well within the grasp of primary teachers to do something about. Yet as the GTCS reveals there still remains a cavalier approach to the teaching of reading.
 

Here is an important tweet  from Anne Glennie, Scottish primary teacher and literacy consultant and trainer, who quotes:
 

"GTC Scotland would like to advise its readers that it does not hold a policy position on teaching children to read. We aim to publish a wide range of articles in `Teaching Scotland` offering different viewpoints. This is to inform our readers about current practice in education. Publication of a particular point of view does not mean that we endorse it."
 

There are several comments following the tweet:

___________________

 

 

"What is the point of the GTC in that case?"
___________________

 

 

"GTCS functions include: Setting the Professional standards expected of all teachers."

"Accrediting programmes leading to the award of GTCS Standards, including Initial Teacher Education programmes at Scottish universities."

"How can they hold teachers in Scotland to professional standards but not hold policy positions on the science behind reading?"
___________________

 

 

Debbie Hepplewhite Retweeted Anne Glennie
 

"This is utterly unaccountable - extraordinary - unforgivable. What have 'views' to do with the science of reading instruction? Such irony as the Clackmannanshire research is important - supported a move in England towards official systematic synthetic phonics."

_____________________________

The letter from Alison Taylor that prompted the GTC announcement that they do not have a policy position on teaching reading is here:

"Dear Editor, 

 

I was disturbed to see an article in Teaching Scotland no 75 about Reading Recovery. This `intervention` has been withdrawn in many English speaking countries because it does not tackle the core of the literacy problem, and yet here in Scotland we are promoting it."

"To Raise Attainment for All and Close the Gap, Scotland must improve the teaching of beginner readers, so it is essential to educate all our primary teachers in the science behind reading and evidence based methods to use. We are not taught the complexities of the English Alphabetic Code at university so can end up using a mixture of effective and ineffective approaches."

"About 21 months ago I was introduced by Anne Glennie `The Learning Zoo to teaching decoding through systematic synthetic phonics (SSP)` which is part of the Big Five for teaching literacy. This started my reading journey of the science behind reading. In the schools I work in, we now use evidence based methods to teach literacy, both universally and for PEP interventions. This has had a huge positive impact on developing the literacy skills of our pupils."

"In my experience many pupils are included in intervention groups (such as Reading Recovery) that encourage pupils to `guess` words using multi-cueing (use the picture, first sound or context clues - when what they really need is systematic and explicit teaching of the Alphabetic Code from simple to complex code. They then require practice, little and often, in decoding and encoding using the letters and sounds. Schools need decodable books as a resource to do this. Many schools teach phonics but do not have this vital resource to enable children to practise the letters and sounds they are learning. All beginner readers need to be taught the same skills and knowledge. Some children including those with `dyslexia` need lots of extra practice to retain their learning of sound to print."

"Many poor readers are relying on memorising words for decoding and have no other strategy to use when they come across new words. Teach them to decode using SSP and they have skills and knowledge that will stay with them forever. Get them to practise to mastery and we help all pupils. `Reading` is a life skill and we must not let the children in Scotland down. Let`s get it right from the start."

______________________________

 

Last year`s ceremony:

 

 

Vulnerable children are being tricked by the transgender agenda

"An astonishing 17 pupils at a single British school are in the process of changing gender, The Mail on Sunday can reveal."

"Most of the youngsters undergoing the transformation are autistic, according to a teacher there, who said vulnerable children with mental health problems were being ‘tricked’ into believing they are the wrong sex."

"The whistleblower says few of the transgender children are suffering from gender dysphoria – the medical term for someone who feels they were born in the wrong body – but are just easily influenced, latching on to the mistaken belief they are the wrong sex as a way of coping with the problems caused by autism."

"Earlier this year, The Mail on Sunday revealed that a third of youngsters referred to the NHS’s only gender identity clinic for children showed ‘moderate to severe autistic traits’..."

 

 "She was advised to keep parents and other teachers in the dark if a pupil claimed to be transgender..."

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6401593/Whistleblower-teacher-makes-shocking-claim-autistic.html

Judge Belcher arranges more delays for Melanie Shaw

Bad news for Melanie: