1. UnHerd (good double pun) put 10 statements in front of 10,000 UK voters, covering Brexit, gender ideology, political disillusionment, conspiracy, Net Zero, immigration, the monarchy, the cost-of-living crisis, housing and lockdowns. In each case, respondents chose whether they agreed or disagreed, and how strongly. UnHerd was also able to compare their 2022 results with their 2019 survey, and – unsurprisingly, maybe – they’ve chosen to start with their Brexit question, where the 2019-2022 contrast is especially stark https://unherd.com/2023/01/introducing-unherd-britain-2023/

With the exception of a curious little cluster of four contiguous constituencies around The Wash https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wash, everyone now thinks Brexit was a mistake.

That said, there are big differences: the journey I’ve made up the A1 today from Cambridge, where the split is 69/17 in favour of ‘Mistake!’ https://britain.unherd.com/constituencies/cambridge/ to Richmond, where the margin is much narrower, at 47/37 https://britain.unherd.com/constituencies/richmond-yorks/ illustrates that.

2. The first NATESOL event of 2023 is Writing for EAL Learners with Jonathan Bifield this Saturday, 4^th February, at 10:00 UK time. More info and registration here and in the PDF below https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSc1Slw4966h8n1nged0MSgWBSXNs63Wd57A8fUxfR3aPPEs-A/viewform

From Jonathan’s blurb: “One thing is clear from the research evidence, that the best place for the explicit teaching of writing to take place is in the classroom or subject the writing is being done in.” His focus is on EAL learners, but I think what he has to say will have wider applicability.

3. Thanks to Nik Peachey for sharing this one: Matt Miller’s evangelical Ditch that Textbook website https://ditchthattextbook.com/

Here’s a real smorgasbord of ideas from Matt and his colleagues to do with how we use ChatGPT in the classroom https://ditchthattextbook.com/ai/#t-1671292150919

and here’s a short video on bringing the world into your classroom, 4 ways to connect your class to the world https://youtu.be/TMvsexTFbHc

PDF below of Matt’s 101 Practical Ways to Ditch that Textbook – but you may well decide you’re neither ready nor able to ditch yours quite yet!

4. Some deserved, good (and fairly slick) PR here for one of my favourite restaurants, Dishoom, who’ve just reached a target of delivering 15 Million Meals for free in partnership with the Magic Breakfast charity in the UK and the Akshaya Patra Foundation in India https://youtu.be/8xT_VAj_fHE

Here’s the Magic Breakfast site https://www.magicbreakfast.com/

and here’s the Akshaya Patra Foundation one https://www.akshayapatra.org/

And here’s how to cook rotis! https://youtu.be/cDr1iJwD170

5. And, finally and puzzlingly but I hope not ghoulishly, two ‘real crime’ stories:

one from Norway https://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/the-spectacular-case-of-lorenskog-norway-s-ongoing-search-for-a-murderer-a-b615c528-392e-4708-8796-5047d2620484

and one from Wales https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jan/28/the-killer-could-still-be-among-us-two-elderly-siblings-and-a-brutal-that-mystifies-locals-nearly-50-years-on