The Invention of Childhood

I'm about to share a terrific thing with you and I honestly cannot take any credit for this whatsoever.

In 2006 the former Children's Laureate, Michael Morpurgo, who is probably best known for writing War Horse, presented a series on Radio 4 called The Invention of Childhood. It's a brilliant series covering 1000 years of history; from the Norman conquest to the 20th Century, but focusing on what it meant to be a child at various key historical points.

I'm not sure if the content is relevant to anything you may be working on at the moment, but if you need 20 minutes break from dissertation writing you could do much worse than have a listen.

You can find the original Radio 4 webpage, complete with some nice links to the OU, here.

If you want to listen to the series it begins here.

And finally, a big thank you to Leona for telling me it was being broadcast again.

For any final year students requiring dissertation support

I fear this is probably a reckless thing to mention at this stage but (here goes...) if you still need a one to one session covering any area of organising or researching your dissertation, now is realistically the latest you can ask. Hopefully, many of you will be handing in within the next fortnight or so.

With that in mind, please contact me now if there's anything realistic and practical I can do to help.

That aside, I wish all of you well who are on the final stretch.
And at this point I'd offer two pieces of advice-
1) Get at least 7 hours sleep a night.
2) Don't forget to eat.

I know, I know...I sound like your dad...again...

Record numbers of children being taken into care

New figures released today show that the number of children taken into care has topped 10,000 within a 12 month period for the first time.
This news is in every newspaper and all over the TV news. You won't have any problems finding it!
However, the statistics were compiled by the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Services (CAFCASS), so if you want just the facts without the political analysis you can get straight to their website from here. This site is really useful for statistics going back to 2009.
From what I've read this morning most of the newspaper pieces refer back the baby P case as a catalyst for the steady increase in child removals. If you've an opinion you'd like to share I'd be glad to hear it.