1. The Olympics start on Friday, almost spectator-free, and the sport karate will be included – to my surprise – for the first time ever. Here’s a good long (free) read from The Smithsonian magazine on the history and traditions of the sport, not all of them as old as one might imagine https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/centuries-old-sport-karate-history-olympics-180977941/

2. Even though we have ample supplies of vaccine here in UK, unlike many other countries around the world, we still face a challenge getting young people to get vaccinated. We all thought we were immortal when we were younger? Maybe! The Young Scot organisation have produced a short set of video interviews https://youtu.be/wZ4WFgy7B1o and a matching article to encourage vaccination https://young.scot/get-informed/national/young-people-tell-us-why-they-re-getting-a-covid-19-vaccine This is another of those ones where I blithely observe there’s a lesson in there somewhere!

3. A recent report from the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) on Cognitive Science Approaches in the Classroom investigated approaches to teaching and learning inspired by cognitive science that are commonly used in the classroom, with a particular focus on acquiring and retaining knowledge https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/evidence-summaries/evidence-reviews/cognitive-science-approaches-in-the-classroom/

PDFs of three documents below: the summary version (which is itself over 50 pages long), the full 372-page version and …. a one-page summary of the summary!

4. And, finally, courtesy of my colleague Simon, ten more extraordinary cricket catches https://youtu.be/fDhNfxxAzLs