Matter and difference
Leaders don’t matter until they do what matters. I really liked this quote, though I felt it needed an answer. So I tweeted ‘what matters to staff.’ I admit there were only a few responses but dealing with behaviour and …
Decoding and Vocabulary
It’s called reading. It’s how people install software into their brains. So last week I asked Twitter what the key skills of reading were? DECODING – identifying written words to decipher a text. VOCABULARY – Geoff Barton continues to inspire …
Wood, trees, fishes and boxes
On the topic of analysis. David Didau has been discussing the processes for teaching analysis skills. If your students have not been PEE, PEED, to within an inch of their literacy lives, maybe they have been TEPE’d to death? Maybe …
Plenaries
noun plural noun: plenaries The summing up task used by teachers to find out what the students actually learnt, typically undertaken at the end of a three part lesson, but sometimes employed mid way through the lesson. If I am …
Value Added
I have covered the basics of transition matrices before though I raise it again because to make valid assertions as to school and Department performance comparisons, we must take into account the ability profile in each subject in our schools …
Breaking the plane app
Having recently shared a teaching guide of good practice with our staff, I doubt there is anyone that would challenge the need to vary your teaching position, to “room zoom” or circulate at appropriate times. Simple to move out from …
Drive by data – change
This term, my data colleague and I have been working hard on a new, more transparent student estimates and staff estimates system. Made more diffificult by high student mobility and numerous boarding students without KS2 data. Now before we go on, student …
Talent or genius
Talent hits a target no one else can hit. Genius hits a target no one else can see. – Arthur Schopenhauer Would it be fair to say that most target setting systems in most schools therefore directs talent? If that is indeed the …