Life in United Kingdom

UK University league tables are unreliable as they are often closely bunched together at the top, middle and bottom. Don't read too much into universities placed 10 to 20 places apart – a university in 50th place is usually separated by the one in 60th by only a few percentage points. This is also why some universities ranking fluctuate from year to year – small differences in score can mean big differences in placing. For example, a small drop in the National Student Survey (NSS) may cost a university 20 places in league tables. It makes more sense to cluster universities based on similar criteria. According to DOI: 10.1080/03054985.2015.1082905 , there are 4 distinctive clusters of universities in the UK. A stark division is evident between the old pre-1992 universities and the post-1992 universities, with large differences evident in terms of research activity, economic resources, academic selectivity, and social mix. The difference between old and new universities with respect ...

The Covid-19 pandemic and lockdown measures put in place in most countries provide a great opportunity to online studies. Below is a list of online course providers, many of them are offering learning content for free during Covid-19. Normally, verified certificates (after you complete a course) require a fee but some teaching materials are free. I rank them based on number of free courses they offer, the range of subject areas, and their reputation. 1. edX (US) is the best free online course provider and the second largest MOOC provider in the world. It doesn’t have as many courses available as Coursera, but all edX courses can be audited for free because edX is a non-profit organisation. It focuses on natural sciences and humanities. Popular subject areas are languages and computer science. 2. Coursera (US) is the largest MOOC provider in the world. Coursera offers over 1,000 free courses across 11 subject areas on beginner, intermediate, mixed and advanced levels. The reaso...

THE LOCAL AUTHORITY HAVE INFORMED US OF HALF-TERM ROALD DAHL ACTIVITIES AT DERBY CITY LIBRARIES. To celebrate trie film release of Roald Dahl's ' Fantastic Mr Fox ' at local cinemas from 23 October, libraries across the city will be running free, fun, Roald Dahl-themed activity sessions during the schools' half-term holiday. Activities include quizzes, crafts and Roald Dahl story extracts and 'revolting rhymes'. All sessions are suitable for children aged from six to 12 years. Children can also enter a 'Fantastic Mr Fox' word search competition to win free tickets to see the film at the Odeon Cinema at the Meteor Centre . All correct word searches will be entered into a free prize draw and there is one prize draw at every library in Derby; each with a prize of two cinema tickets. The competition runs from Saturday 24 October to Saturday 31 October 2009, and children can pick up an entry form at any library Further information including session dat...

Elsevier Engineering Index (EI) monthly, also known as EI Compendex Inspec, in the fields of science and technology ISI Thomson's Science Citation Index (SCI) DBLP Biblio ST2I Google Scholar

Recent educational theories from constructive learning theory to active learning and deep learning shift the responsibility of learning to students and degrade educators to facilitators. These modern theories emphasize that learning is an active process and people learn through their experiences. For example, social constructivism encourages the learner to arrive at his version of the truth, influenced by his background, culture or previous experience. It is not rare in today's higher education and further education that a professor starts a class with an empty flip chart paper, chairs a group discussion, records brainstorming ideas, and concludes the lesson with a filled flip chart. Having received most of my higher eduation in a conventional way of lecture delivery, I absolutely hate the 'posh' way of learning and teaching through discussion and brainstorming on flipchart. I first came across this new way of teaching in workshops and some one-off softskill training activi...

The coat of arms is the heraldic symbol of a university. The coat of arms is used in university seal to certify and validate official documents of the university. In what situations are they used? The coat of arms is an emblematic description of the founding of a university. The coat of arms or university seal are used only for official or ceremonial occasions of great formality. They are of a higher level of formality than a logo. In general, they are used on invitations for formal university events, materials for commencement or accreditation, certificates, awards or commemorative pieces. They may also be associated with communications of the Executive Office. In addition, the university seal is used to imprint documents of student academic achievement, such as diplomas, certificates or transcripts. Such use is restricted to the Registrar. There is only one university seal, for use by all its faculties, schools and departments. The Secretary of the University, as "Keeper...

The world's largest natural science, technology and medical publishers The first place: Elsevier The second place: Springer The third place: Wiley-Blackwell Together they represent 63% of serials’ publishing and almost all of the academic libraries’ budgets.

I miss you when we're not together I'm growing up so fast See how big I've gotten Since you saw me last. The years will fly right by You'll wonder how I grew so quick When and where and why? So look upon these handprints That are hanging on your wall And memories will come back When I was very small.

Brenda went to the toilet. When she finished wee-wee, she announced 'Mission complete!' so we can help her wipe her bum.

We have a mobile library instead of a local library in this area.  The librarian let Brenda collect stickers on on each visit. She gave Brenda a Collectors' Card, which has four slots for four stickers. When Brenda collects four stickers, she can exchange those stickers for a certificate. Ten normal certificates can can exchange a golden one, the librarian said. This is a quite good incentive for children to establish a library habit,  we have been taking her to library since six months old, though, once every four weeks, and she loves reading books. This scheme is called the Bookstart Book Crawl , which is a library-joining incentive for children age 0-4 years. Bookstart also provides a free book pack for every baby in UK.

Another Golden Star of the Week for "been working very hard in phonics ", well done.

"School bank is a great success." so it is written in the school news letter. Children can join the Bank at any time, but the Bank is only open every Wendnesday from 8.30-8.55. Children can save as little as one pence.

Parents are invited to Food Tasting Session because there are 'further improvements' to the school dinners, new approach to school dinners will include a new style servery area with a pasta/salad bar, jacket potato bar, sandwich bar and hot food bar.  'Children will use plates and pudding bowls rather than "airline trays" we currently use',  says the teacher.

The primary school encourage its children to bring a bottle of plain water to school each morning. Research has proved that drinking water throughout the day aids our memory and helps our eyes. If you bring a bottle of plain water to school, the water bottle should not have been placed in the freezer overnight, because bottles are kept on tables in the classroom, and once the ice defrosts, the puddle of water can wet and ruin children's work. School should have water fountain or water cooler near classroom, but if it's not well maintained and in bad condition, such as in this public school, a pupil feel thirsty and refused by teacher to buy plain water from canteen , the reason he didn't drink from water fountain is the water from the cooler tastes weird and seems very dirty.

There will be a Reigate's got a Talent Show in my daughter's School on Wednesday 10th December 2008. This show name is after the British Got Talent Show . There will be singers, musicians, comedians, variety, magicians and dancers, plus Reigate school choir and a grand finale performance. Of course we need to pay the tickets, it's only 50p, though. I showed the leaflet to my wife, her first question was:　"Is it free?" This question always come to her before she think about any treats or surprise. But I think I won't miss it. I am looking forward to the show!

My daughter got her first achievement report, this is for last half term, foundation stage 1, autumn term (1): CLL: a green button; PSRN: an orange button; KUW: a green button; CLL is short for Communication, language & literacy; PRSN means problem solving, Numbers and Reasoning; KUW means Knowledge and Understanding of the World. Green button means target achieved; orange button represents target partly achieved; and Red button indicate target not achieved. My daughter has problem to count after 11, she mixes up 12 an 13 and 14, or just skip one of them. Topics for Autumn term (2) are colour, light and sound.

A letter from Daughter's nursery, which is about Fingerspellaton. The school will be taking part in the National Deaf Children's Society(NDCS) Fingerspellathon to raise money for deaf Children. Quit obviously, I can understand "Fingerspell", but what does the suffix -athon mean? According MSN Encarta Dictionary, -thon means: activity or event lasting a long time, especially one done for charity, such as in "talkathon". The Fingerspellathon will be held in the week beginning Monday 17th November, and all sponsorship monies will be handed in by Friday 28th November, it quite a long-lasting event, then.

One item in my daughter's School Newsletter on Monday 5th October is about "Harvest Festival": We managed to send a whopping 57 bags of food to the Padley centre following our Harvest celebration. Thank you on behalf of the Padley Centre for your generous support. Padley centre is a Derby-based charity for people with complex needs. Those people are the most socially excluded people in the local community, such as: homelessness, mental health issues, learning disabilities,drug or alcohol addiction, long-term unemployment, ex-offenders, and other people whose needs related to rebuilding a shattered life. Harvest festival seems a remote and strange thing to me, since I left our village in south China more than thirty years ago, and moved from one city to another. Citizens don't sow for harvest, what does a harvest festival mean to us? In my memory, we had "taste new" rituals at the beginning of autumn harvest season (the eighth month of lunar calendar), my mum...

In United Kingdom, all schools have places for Parent Governors on their Governing Bodies. Parents have an influence over the education the school provides for all its children. Governors make decisions about many aspects of the school including the curriculum, staffing and school's finances. There is also a vital role for Parent Governors in providing a link between the school and parents. The Parent Governor will be expected to attend at least six full meetings of the School Governing Body each year and also other meetings of Committees of the Governing Body. They will take an active interest in the school and the children and help promote the parental view at meetings of the School Governing Body. All people who have parental responsibility for a child at the school are eligible to stand for election as a Parent Governor. If there are more nominations than vacancies, an election is held. The election will be organised by the Head Teacher of the school and every parent of a pupil...

Received a Parent/Guardian Declaration form of Child ethnic origin from Derby City Council. I have to fill this form whenever I applied a job for equal opportunity. But as for this form, it's being noted that I am not obliged to provide this data if I don't wish to. Totally 18 categories of ethnic origin. It's quite interesting that we can group them further into 5 larger categories: White Mixed Asian Black others But quite interestingly, traveller of Irish Heritage and Gypsy/Roma are treated as separate group, are there a lot of travellers and Gypsies in this area? It might be just a kind of political correct bureaucracy. In this world, mixed people might become majority, or become a trend. It seems that more mixed up of human genes, more ethnic characteristic gene information are lost. Chinese has 56 ethnic groups, but here all Chinese are treated as one. When we stayed in hospital, the hospital authority specially arranged Chinese midwife and nurse for us, hope to better...