My Diminishing Returns

  Since becoming a NQT mentor, I have focussed on keeping observation feedback brief and actionable. Remembering how much there is to think about and how little bandwidth there is to consider how to improve, I have tried to strip back feedback and focus on a small number of areas that are practical. One reason for this is reflecting on my own NQT experience and some of the nebulous feedback I was given. I completed my NQT year in a school with an ‘interesting’ approach to teacher development and I have recently been looking back at some of the most useless observation feedback I’ve received. I mention this not as a judgement of the observer but as a reminder of how much feedback to trainee teachers really isn’t that useful. 1.        ‘Did all kids understand what you were teaching?’ I recall constantly being asked this as a new teacher. The short answer of course is no, not all kids will ever have fully understood everything I have taught. Shou...

  Over summer (and the March lockdown) I read blogs from BenNewmark and Adam Boxer on how to create and use booklets of practice questions as opposed to power points. It has been a real game-changer for me in terms of the amount my pupils are now practising content, the mental capacity I have during a lesson to focus on how pupils and it massively reduces workload which gives teachers time to plan for their explanations and questioning. The blogs linked above explain the advantages of using them far better than me, but I wanted to speak about the process of creating and using them for me. It has been a process of trial and error for me this year and some of the key lessons learned are: 1.        It is incredible CPD for your subject knowledge I underestimated how much creating booklets enhanced my subject knowledge. I thought I understood by subject well but when you create these booklets, you specify exactly the knowledge you want pupils to ...

  I have just completed the end of a never-ending first term as a head of department in a small department. Being in a new role in a new school would have been enough of a challenge without having to worry about what pupils have missed during lockdown, blended learning, year group bubbles and all the rest but here are a few things that I have learned: 1.        Relieve pressure rather than passing it on Running an Economics and Business department where there is only KS4 and KS5 there is always a big focus on exams. For all the focus on spreadsheets of data and looking at ALPS scores and the like, there is a real temptation to pass on that pressure by talking about where the data is against departmental targets. One thing that I have found so important is to make sure you take that on and just allow staff to focus on the important thing, planning and delivering excellent lessons. By all means, work with staff to identify areas of focus based on a...

 At the start of this half-term I shifted out department homework to using carousel learning . For the uninitiated it is a (for now at least) free platform to enable quizzes with a range of great features to make for effective retrieval homework, an evolution of Adam Boxer’s retrieval roulette. I say retrieval, of course there is no way of knowing that pupils are not looking at their notes or googling answers but the effort level of doing this means I suspect most are generally trying to retrieve. I started off my briefly explaining the benefits of retrieval which helped with this. Looking at their answers it does seem they are genuinely trying to remember answers from memory. It’s been a real game changer for me and there have been a number of benefits. Benefits 1.        Spaced practice. When you upload a question bank you can then select random questions from a range of different topics meaning that pupils are regularly retrieving informat...

 A topic in Micro I have always struggled to teach is the price mechanism. It's a bit embarrassing to admit this given it is the foundation of all market economics but I often find that whilst pupils can understand the concept of an equilibrium and how an equilibrium can change, exactly why the price mechanism leads to an efficient allocation of resources can appear quite nebulous. This year, I have tried to break down what the component parts of this to sequence it more effectively and what I have got to is: 1. What is the economic problem 2. What is the impact of a change in prices on Demand/ what causes a shift in Demand 3. How do prices respond to excess demand or supply? 4. How does this lead to a new equilibrium? 5. What are the functions of the price mechanism that cause a new equilibrium? 6. How does this lead to an efficient allocation of resources? 7. How does this link back to the economic problem? The first 4 question are relatively easy to understand when explained exp...

 I read a blog about how a visualiser is used in RE by  Miss Cox and I’ve been reflecting on how I use my visualiser. A few of the main ways that I use it are: 1.        When explaining a new concept When I explain a new concept, I have all eyes on the board (using SLANT) and not taking notes as pupils listen to my explanation. I have been reading about the modality impact in cognitive load theory and the benefits of optimising intrinsic load with both visual and auditory working memory. What I try to do is slowly build a diagram under the visualiser whilst I am talking. So before half term I was going through the impact of a progressive tax and after I explained what the term is (more on definitions later) I will gradually start to explain how it will reduce inequality by first drawing a quick diagram showing the gap between rich and poor pre-tax and then a second diagram highlighting the difference after-tax. I try to avoid the split...