Before we begin, three cheers for the maturity, self-control and wit of the young man bullied by David Starkey in Jamie's nightmare school, which I daresay most of us watched last night. As for Starkey, he seemed to have no idea how many lines he'd overstepped by taunting a pupil about his weight and labelling the class a bunch of failures. As the Guardian TV critic Sam Wollaston points out:
"The fact that his lesson was a disaster is the fault of everyone - the kids, the school, everyone except himself."
More edifyingly, it's World Books Day (or if you prefer #worldbookday) and the Guardian is launching a new website for young readers, giving them their own space to review and discuss books.
Claire Armitstead, the Guardian literary editor, writes:
"The Children's Books website will be an adult-free zone, with contributions from an editorial panel of young people from all over the world. So far, 100 have signed up from as far afield as Peru and Egypt, and have been busily at work deciding which books they want to discuss and how to do it.
"Our ad hoc research among these 100 pioneers paints an impressive picture of the range of their enthusiasms. Cairo, aged 10, who is Scottish but lives in Egypt, said: 'My favourite author is Anthony Horowitz. I also like reading Biggles, Asterix, Tintin, the Broons and lots of Star Wars books.'
Luke, 13, from Nottingham, said: 'My favourite modern authors are people like Stephen King, Bill Bryson, Chris Ryan, Andy McNab, Ian Rankin and John Grisham, although I do love classics by people such as Verne, Hugo, Dickens, Maupassant and Dumas. I won't even attempt to name my favourite book, it's impossible!'"
The Liverpool-based Reader organisation is launching Our Read, "the world's biggest shared read", today by getting author Frank Cottrell Boyce to read his specially commissioned new book, The Unforgotten Coat, to a group of young people - many of whom have never left Liverpool before - on a train to London.
Helen Carter is on the train for the Guardian and she's been talking to Jane Davis, director of the Reader. Davis says the trip is all about sharing, and enjoying reading, and "showing we're a literate city".
There are 50,000 copies of The Unforgotten Coat to be given away. It's the story of a young girl from Bootle, who befriends two new Mongolian boys at her school.
Cottrell Boyce says:
"One thing I'm really proud of is it's set in Liverpool, in a very recognisable place. It's full of details about their lives. But it's also Mongolia and has details of eagles, wolves and the steppe. It thinks local and acts global which is what stories do."
Education news from the Guardian
• Up to 400,000 teenagers are wasting their time on publicly-funded college courses that do not lead to jobs or further training, Professor Alison Wolf says in her review of vocational courses commissioned by Michael Gove, the education secretary.
Wolf singles out a qualification in "personal effectiveness" that teaches teenagers how to claim unemployment benefits and use a telephone. It was taken by nearly 11,000 people last year and is worth one GCSE.
Katharine Birbalsingh, aka @Miss_Snuffy, is thrilled:
"More power to Alison Wolf! Someone is telling the truth! HURRAH! Stop the madness! Go Alison!"
The ACSL's Brian Lightman says the review confirms the "perverse incentive" of league tables.
• Working-class children are no more likely to move up the social ladder and bag a middle-class job if they attend a grammar school, rather than a comprehensive, according to researchers at the universities of Oxford and Bath Spa, who based their conclusions on data in the National Child Development Survey, which has tracked thousands of adults, now aged 53, since they were born.
• Randeep Ramesh reports that some of Britain's most deprived areas will have budgets for key services such as Sure Start cut by £100 a child next year, more than three times the amount in richer parts of the country.
Andy Burnham, Labour's education spokesman, says:
"The areas being hit hardest are the most deprived – it's not only unfair, it's the wrong long-term decision for the country.
"By cutting too far and too fast and asking children and families to bear the brunt, this Tory-led government is showing that they have no idea what pressure ordinary families are under."
Guardian view
A Guardian editorial responds to news of Exeter's decision to charge £9k for all courses:
"It seems that, far from being the exception, it will be the rule that universities aspiring to world ranking will want to charge the top whack - a problem that neither the business secretary, Vince Cable, nor the universities minister, David Willetts, had apparently anticipated.
That means the Treasury, which had assumed that fees would settle at around the £7,500 mark, is facing a much larger bill for student loans than it had calculated. Willetts is already warning of compensatory cuts elsewhere."
Education news from around the web
• John Morgan reports in the THE that unpublished research commissioned by the Browne review showed that students and parents viewed tuition fees of £6,000 as "the highest reasonable amount".
But the review's report to the government didn't refer directly to the opinion survey, despite it being the sole piece of research commissioned by the Browne panel. The THE has got hold of the survey results under the Freedom of Information act.
• A virtual learning course to improve primary language teaching is reviewed by @dotlepkowska in the Independent. It helps teachers who lack confidence brush up on their foreign language skills.
• The BBC reports that India has ambitious plans to increase its university enrolment rate from around 12% at present to 30% of the population by 2025 - approaching the levels of many Western countries.
• By the end of primary school, pupils shun harder books and opt for easier alternatives more suitable for younger children, the Telegraph reports. Academics from Dundee University found the difficulty of books "declined steadily" from the age of 10 onwards.
"It emerged that The Very Hungry Caterpillar, a classic picture book by Eric Carle which charts a caterpillar's week-long transformation into a butterfly, was one of the most popular books among 14- to 16-year-old girls in England."
• The always useful SecEd comes out on the Thursday - this week's cover story is a plea for ICT to be given higher status as a school subject.
Media skills seminar for education leaders
This one-day seminar on 22 March is organised by the Guardian and the NAHT.
Whether it's sharing good news or handling a crisis, headteachers and senior school management teams need to be able to handle the media in all of its forms. This seminar is for new and aspiring heads, established school leaders who wish to update their knowledge, and chairs of governing bodies who may find themselves in the media limelight. Speakers will cover print and TV, and give up-to-the-minute advice on the internet and social media such as Facebook and Twitter.
Caricature masterclass by a Guardian cartoonist
Sharpen your pencils - the Prince's Drawing School is running a weekend masterclass for adults, led by Nicola Jennings, on Saturday 19 and Sunday 20 March from 10am to 4pm.
The weekend will begin with a brief history of caricature, followed by a look at the proportions of the face. Students will learn to observe and analyse facial expressions and movements, highlighting appropriate characteristics to describe personality. Here's the booking form.
Insight into journalism seminars for teachers
A unique opportunity for teachers to spend a day at the Guardian, find out how a national news media organisation works and get ideas and resources that can be used in the classroom.
News 11 March Learn about the 24 news cycle; meet news reporters, feature writers, picture and sub editors; understand the role newspaper advertising; go on a tour of the editorial floors and take part in a workshop creating you own news front page which will be evaluated by an editor.
Multimedia 31 March Writing for a news website, web editing, blogging, the use of social media, video production; podcasting.
Places are limited and likely to fill up quickly, so book soon.
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