Tom H
@nomist.bsky.social
History teacher, parent.
“Sings enthusiastically, if not always tunefully” (Year 2 school report).
“Sings enthusiastically, if not always tunefully” (Year 2 school report).
Reposted by Tom H
NEW BLOGPOST
Abolishing trial by jury: why is the government overlooking the obvious?
thesecretbarrister.com/2025/12/02/a...
Abolishing trial by jury: why is the government overlooking the obvious?
thesecretbarrister.com/2025/12/02/a...
Abolishing trial by jury: why is the government overlooking the obvious?
Today, the government has confirmed that it intends to remove the right to trial by jury in the vast majority of cases in the Crown Courts. Serious criminal allegations, carrying up to three years …
thesecretbarrister.com
December 2, 2025 at 4:38 PM
NEW BLOGPOST
Abolishing trial by jury: why is the government overlooking the obvious?
thesecretbarrister.com/2025/12/02/a...
Abolishing trial by jury: why is the government overlooking the obvious?
thesecretbarrister.com/2025/12/02/a...
Reposted by Tom H
1. Thread.
Ed tech and the best lesson I taught this year.
The best Ed tech in the world for my subject is a book.
It is the ideal delivery method because the effort of concentrating on it helps people learn what's in it.
Ed tech and the best lesson I taught this year.
The best Ed tech in the world for my subject is a book.
It is the ideal delivery method because the effort of concentrating on it helps people learn what's in it.
November 29, 2025 at 8:39 AM
1. Thread.
Ed tech and the best lesson I taught this year.
The best Ed tech in the world for my subject is a book.
It is the ideal delivery method because the effort of concentrating on it helps people learn what's in it.
Ed tech and the best lesson I taught this year.
The best Ed tech in the world for my subject is a book.
It is the ideal delivery method because the effort of concentrating on it helps people learn what's in it.
America is to democracy as London is to underground railways: it’s got the oldest, and one of the biggest, but boy is the infrastructure creaky.
November 5, 2024 at 11:05 PM
America is to democracy as London is to underground railways: it’s got the oldest, and one of the biggest, but boy is the infrastructure creaky.
Reposted by Tom H
Thought-provoking skeets from one of the UK's most interesting policy thinkers: does doing well Maths GCSE predict high earnings because maths is important, or because we are better at fairly assessing maths? (It's both, IMO, but some more thoughts of my own follow.)
Doing well in Maths GCSE is a better predictor of higher earnings than doing well in any other GCSE. Usually we conclude "heh, Maths is important". Hence the push to make Maths compulsory to 18, for example But what if... 2/4 assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/60c36f...
November 1, 2024 at 1:57 PM
Thought-provoking skeets from one of the UK's most interesting policy thinkers: does doing well Maths GCSE predict high earnings because maths is important, or because we are better at fairly assessing maths? (It's both, IMO, but some more thoughts of my own follow.)
Agatha All Along was brilliant until the final scene, a cop-out which was presumably mandated by the Disney/Marvel suits.
October 31, 2024 at 10:37 PM
Agatha All Along was brilliant until the final scene, a cop-out which was presumably mandated by the Disney/Marvel suits.
Reposted by Tom H
Are you a National Trust member? Do you dislike the cancer of concocted right wing culture-war nonsense slowly and steadily making every good thing in this country, go shit? Then grab your membership number and vote online in the AGM by midnight tonight. Just choose the 'NT recommended candidates'.
October 25, 2024 at 2:00 PM
Are you a National Trust member? Do you dislike the cancer of concocted right wing culture-war nonsense slowly and steadily making every good thing in this country, go shit? Then grab your membership number and vote online in the AGM by midnight tonight. Just choose the 'NT recommended candidates'.
Well deserved!
Thrilled to hear that the Horrible Histories TV series I worked on for 11 years is getting a special BAFTA award next month, in recognition of its 15-year impact! www.bbc.com/news/article...
Horrible Histories to receive special Bafta Award
The children’s historical sketch show is rewarded for its "extraordinary cultural and social impact".
www.bbc.com
October 24, 2024 at 8:36 AM
Well deserved!
Don’t look now, but I’ve got a joke about Orpheus.
I’ve got a joke about Achilles, it’s almost perfect but there’s one flaw
I have a joke about Theseus. But it is not very original.
October 23, 2024 at 8:23 AM
Don’t look now, but I’ve got a joke about Orpheus.
😮
Councils have essentially become social and children's care funding agencies, which, as most people don't use those services, means they don't really understand where all their council tax is going...
October 22, 2024 at 5:18 PM
😮
Reposted by Tom H
This sounds like a wonderful book about the infamous Duke of Buckingham, recently played by Nicholas Galitzine in the fun TV drama Mary & George
The Scapegoat by Lucy Hughes-Hallett book review – James I’s beloved bedfellow
www.theguardian.com/books/2024/o...
The Scapegoat by Lucy Hughes-Hallett book review – James I’s beloved bedfellow
www.theguardian.com/books/2024/o...
The Scapegoat by Lucy Hughes-Hallett review – James I’s beloved bedfellow
A biography of the Duke of Buckingham brings the royal favourite, and his ‘entrancingly strange’ world, to life
www.theguardian.com
October 20, 2024 at 10:10 AM
This sounds like a wonderful book about the infamous Duke of Buckingham, recently played by Nicholas Galitzine in the fun TV drama Mary & George
The Scapegoat by Lucy Hughes-Hallett book review – James I’s beloved bedfellow
www.theguardian.com/books/2024/o...
The Scapegoat by Lucy Hughes-Hallett book review – James I’s beloved bedfellow
www.theguardian.com/books/2024/o...
How controversial is it to say that Hadestown in the West End is better than the Broadway version?
October 20, 2024 at 3:29 PM
How controversial is it to say that Hadestown in the West End is better than the Broadway version?
Reposted by Tom H
Adam and Eve invite God round to show him what they've done with the Garden
October 18, 2024 at 9:59 AM
Adam and Eve invite God round to show him what they've done with the Garden
Reposted by Tom H
One of the finest generals this country has produced. An incredible man to interview.
It is not hyperbole to say that he prevented a war with Russia in the Balkans, when Wes Clark was determined to start one.
I wrote about it here. authory.com/JohnBull/Pri...
It is not hyperbole to say that he prevented a war with Russia in the Balkans, when Wes Clark was determined to start one.
I wrote about it here. authory.com/JohnBull/Pri...
October 15, 2024 at 9:39 PM
One of the finest generals this country has produced. An incredible man to interview.
It is not hyperbole to say that he prevented a war with Russia in the Balkans, when Wes Clark was determined to start one.
I wrote about it here. authory.com/JohnBull/Pri...
It is not hyperbole to say that he prevented a war with Russia in the Balkans, when Wes Clark was determined to start one.
I wrote about it here. authory.com/JohnBull/Pri...
Reposted by Tom H
"Westminster’s reliance on Elon Musk’s X is ‘totally wrong’, says Labour MP." Josh Simons MP is right about this:
www.theguardian.com/technology/2...
www.theguardian.com/technology/2...
![Simons, a technology expert who wrote a book on artificial intelligence, told the Guardian in an interview: “I think that Twitter’s algorithm, its ranking model, which determines what we see on Twitter when we open it, has manifestly changed since Elon Musk took over. Not least because I don’t think I’ve ever liked anything that he said ever, and I see loads of him all the time, and I really don’t want to.
“I’ve even said: ‘Show less of this,’ and there he is, every time. And that’s a sure sign – when a founder and owner of a company, you see more of them on an algorithm, despite not liking them – [of] something going on.”
He added: “I think that it is totally and completely wrong and harmful to British democracy that the Westminster bubble gets to know each other through a ranking model designed by a man who’s spending his life campaigning for Donald Trump. I think that it’s shortsighted of us all.”](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:7ozv52xitkpjflxhygf5c65b/bafkreiglkz6v366rqtqxhmnyzwhpidfwhwnugiqkkek4szncmrb5d27mkm@jpeg)
October 14, 2024 at 8:54 PM
"Westminster’s reliance on Elon Musk’s X is ‘totally wrong’, says Labour MP." Josh Simons MP is right about this:
www.theguardian.com/technology/2...
www.theguardian.com/technology/2...
A pleasant surprise to find @stephenkb.bsky.social in the new Reform machzor whilst hungrily leafing through it yesterday.
October 13, 2024 at 2:23 PM
A pleasant surprise to find @stephenkb.bsky.social in the new Reform machzor whilst hungrily leafing through it yesterday.
Tip to history departments doing open evenings: don’t have on the whiteboard “How effective were Nazi policies towards Jews and minorities?” 😬
September 11, 2024 at 8:44 PM
Tip to history departments doing open evenings: don’t have on the whiteboard “How effective were Nazi policies towards Jews and minorities?” 😬
Unreasonably smug at getting to teach this Mughals lesson for a second time, having put a lot of time into planning it last year
September 6, 2024 at 1:48 PM
Unreasonably smug at getting to teach this Mughals lesson for a second time, having put a lot of time into planning it last year
Reposted by Tom H
The only liveaction remakes Disney should have any business making are Muppet retellings. You tell me that a Muppet retelling of Aladdin or Peter Pan wouldn't be amazing
September 3, 2024 at 5:54 PM
The only liveaction remakes Disney should have any business making are Muppet retellings. You tell me that a Muppet retelling of Aladdin or Peter Pan wouldn't be amazing
Reposted by Tom H
What is common knowledge in your field, but shocks outsiders?
People would not regularly die at 30 in pre-industrial times, and it only looks like that on graphs of average life spans because historians - for some reason - insists on including infant deaths in them. The actual number is ~55-60.
People would not regularly die at 30 in pre-industrial times, and it only looks like that on graphs of average life spans because historians - for some reason - insists on including infant deaths in them. The actual number is ~55-60.
What is common knowledge in your field but shocks outsiders?
We don't all have the same number of bones or muscles. There's an average, I guess. We all kind of cluster around it. Some muscles are pretty rare. Some people just invent their own artisanal bones.
We don't all have the same number of bones or muscles. There's an average, I guess. We all kind of cluster around it. Some muscles are pretty rare. Some people just invent their own artisanal bones.
Court ordered therapy almost never works and usually makes the problem worse.
Can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them stop harming their kid/spouse, the kid/spouse won’t rebuild the lost affection, and mostly abusers just learn to be more efficient and cruel abusers.
Can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them stop harming their kid/spouse, the kid/spouse won’t rebuild the lost affection, and mostly abusers just learn to be more efficient and cruel abusers.
September 4, 2024 at 8:10 AM
What is common knowledge in your field, but shocks outsiders?
People would not regularly die at 30 in pre-industrial times, and it only looks like that on graphs of average life spans because historians - for some reason - insists on including infant deaths in them. The actual number is ~55-60.
People would not regularly die at 30 in pre-industrial times, and it only looks like that on graphs of average life spans because historians - for some reason - insists on including infant deaths in them. The actual number is ~55-60.
Will never forget the reassuring advice from my first PGCE mentor to my cohort (to be said in Welsh accent): “Just remember: the kids don’t know ANYTHING!”
I’ll offer the same advice now that I offer every year:
Try and remember that nobody else knows what the hell they’re doing, either.
Try and remember that nobody else knows what the hell they’re doing, either.
September 2, 2024 at 5:41 PM
Will never forget the reassuring advice from my first PGCE mentor to my cohort (to be said in Welsh accent): “Just remember: the kids don’t know ANYTHING!”
The most shocking thing about this is that their comparison ‘small’ car is a Ford Focus. The Focus is not a small car!
September 2, 2024 at 5:39 PM
The most shocking thing about this is that their comparison ‘small’ car is a Ford Focus. The Focus is not a small car!
Overheard the kids at school talk about the past as “the OG days” and now I really feel old
August 31, 2024 at 12:43 PM
Overheard the kids at school talk about the past as “the OG days” and now I really feel old