"You have a blog... tell them how you feel"

This made me so defeated. It's an article about Internet plagiarism in universities. Most of it's fairly dull, but this bit jumped off the screen and slapped me round the face...

Some institutions may share some of the blame because they "go around insisting everyone is using PowerPoint and gives out hand-outs", according to Baroness Deech.

She said: "If people were given books, there might be more chance they would digest what they are reading."

We spoonfeed them handouts and PowerPoint presentations because it gets us better results. Do you want young people to be given the chance to think, to try to read proper books and extract the key points for their essays, to attempt their own research and do things for themselves? Fine, but more of them will fail. And we are supposed to be avoiding failure at all costs.

Which do you want? You decide, and when you decide, tell us teachers which you want. AND THEN SHUT UP. Sorry, Ruth Deech. You've kicked the last spark out of my already exhausting day.