Teaching connected-style handwriting, otherwise known as cursive handwriting, has fallen out of fashion on many school curricula. Older generations have sometimes been shocked that some younger people today can’t sign their names on official documents or even read a handwritten note. Canadian provinces have seen a decline in teaching and learning cursive. In Ontario schools, for example, teachers […] … learn more→

From as early as Grade 3 teachers start teaching children how to put across their own points of view. It’s not about winning arguments, but ensuring kids grow up to be thoughtful and engaged citizens. These skills might come in to play at school in essay writing, in oral presentations or in debates. And whether we’re […] … learn more→

My first memories of a writing opportunity go back to around eleven years old. Lying on the floor of my room, I eagerly search the term Togo in the dictionary. I copy on a sheet of paper the presentation of this country which at the same time to make me travel, gives me the feeling rather […] … learn more→

Burnout is a stress-related state of exhaustion and often leads to feelings of isolation, low accomplishment and even depression. Although research has long shown that burnout affects employees, we now know burnout also affects students. As a researcher who specializes in identifying strategies to help college students get through their first year of college, I’d like to offer a few tips […] … learn more→

Memorising poetry was once common in classrooms. But it has, for the most part, gone out of style. There are good reasons for this. Memorisation can clash with creativity and analytical thought. Rote learning can be seen as mindless, drone-like, something done without really thinking about why we’re doing it and what the thing we memorise might mean. […] … learn more→

Plan S has already been credited with sparking something of a revolution in journal publishing. Major publishers are beginning – slowly and reluctantly in some cases – to replace their traditional “big deals” with what are being called “transformative deals”. Often negotiated with national consortia of libraries and research institutes, these combine access to subscription […] … learn more→

The aging of the population is an undeniable global trend with a social impact at all levels to the point that, as stated in the United Nations World Population Outlook Report (2017) , it is one of the social transformations most significant of the 21st century with consequences on services, health, education, family structure, forms of coexistence […] … learn more→

Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson is the 20th Etonian to become prime minister of the UK. Most of his cabinet is composed of privileged, privately educated people, with two-thirds of his ministers among the 7% of the population who went to fee-paying schools. With more than half of Britain’s senior judges, top civil servants and diplomats also privately educated […] … learn more→

Before cities there were swamps. Wetlands and swamps globally have been sacrificed to pave the way for housing, agriculture and industry. Urban developers and dwellers have largely overlooked the vital role that swamps play in buffering storms, capturing carbon, fostering life and filtering water. One of the biggest threats to swamps today is a lack of […] … learn more→

According to tech entrepreneur Patrick Collison and economist Tyler Cowen, academia needs a new discipline called “progress studies.” But their proposal overlooks two crucial facts: human progress has been an object of study for centuries, and innovators ignorant of that scholarship have had devastating effects on the planet and society. When Collison and Cowen write that “progress […] … learn more→