I n retrospect, I’m aware that I stopped blogging probably when I had the most important things to say. It was when I started working in an area of deeply entrenched disadvantage. I just couldn’t find the words to talk about people’s lives that were so different from my own. And to not talk about the people who were at the centre of everything we did as a school felt impossible. Dishonest, even. I…
I wasn't going to blog this year. I wasn't going to blog again ever, to be honest. As I get closer to Headship the appeal of social media has waned in inverse proportion to my recognition of the vulnerability it brings. Sharing your soul with anonymous readers opens you up to misunderstanding and criticism that starts to make you wonder if it is, quite simply, worth it. As Edu-Twitter falls, local…
Nurture blogs and that odd in-between time sandwiched between Christmas and New Year make great companions. They’re a chance to take stock, remember what was important 12 months ago, and realign and adjust priorities for the year ahead. Now that I blog so little they’re one of the few posts that seem to still come easily. 2021, fall its flaws, will forever be known as the year I became a mum. As…
I haven’t written a single blog this year so I’m fighting the gnawing feeling that to publish this one is more than a tad self-indulgent (particularly one that has somehow tipped over the 1500-word mark). But in so many ways it’s never felt quite so necessary to have a historical record of 12 months. So, it’s written and it’s here and I’m hoping that when I look back in a year’s time I’m struck by…
96 Normal 0 false false false EN-GB X-NONE X-NONE I like the neat denouement a ‘Nurture’ post provides at the end of a year. I’m still unsure if anyone other than the writer gets much from it, but for me the catharsis warrants the writing and so here I am typing once more. Looking back to my 2017/18 ‘Nurture’ post *, one of my reflections was that it felt like “time for me to be less brave, to…
96 Normal 0 false false false EN-GB X-NONE X-NONE I’ll confess. I found the first Future Leaders summer residential really tough. There were some really bloomin’ clever people who I didn’t always agree with and bag-loads of self-reflection (which for an over-thinker like myself has the tendency to make me somewhat morose). Perhaps made more acute because I was knackered at the end of the academic…
96 Normal 0 false false false EN-GB X-NONE X-NONE Five years ago, the marvellous online community that is Team English came into being, sustained first by the hashtag, then by the @Team_English1 account run selflessly by Nikki and Becky, and most recently grown by the meet-ups and national conferences. The kindness, discussion and professional challenge that goes on in our little corner of…
This post has been agreed by several teachers and is shared across several blog sites. In the last couple of years, we have openly expressed concern at the approaches taken by Tes Education Resources to plagiarism and copyright violation, theft of resources, and the selling of resources that violate copyright. This is not a blogpost intended to cast disapproval on those who sell resources. It is a…
I'm sat here, beer in hand, having not been appointed to a fab job at my brilliant school. I'm a bit bruised and sad, but also aware of the clear strengths of the person who has been appointed (in fact, I'm even a bit excited to work with her). Most importantly, I'm already beginning to consider what I've learned about both myself and the process, and how this information is going to inform my…
Thanks to a spectacular cold front and the inability of Basingstoke council to properly grit their roads, the keynote speech I'd planned to deliver at Southern Rocks 2019 never got to be aired. And now the event's been put off for the rest of this year, it never will. The best laid plans of mice and men and all that. Here is my attempt to reimagine that frosty February morning. On this weekend,…
96 Normal 0 false false false EN-GB X-NONE X-NONE Dear Peter, Many thanks for responding to my tweets about your recent article in the NATE magazine in which you offered your thoughts on @Team_English1 and subsequently allowing the article itself to be shared free of copyright. As you’ve made it clear you’re not yet fully conversant in the social mores of Twitter, I’ve decided to write to you in a…
96 Normal 0 false false false EN-GB X-NONE X-NONE Outstanding Requires improvement Inadequate Requires improvement Good The Ofsted ratings of the three schools I have worked in read somewhat like the fates of Henry VIII’s wives - admittedly, if one of them hadn’t made her infamous trip down the aisle and, of course, if the outcome was an Ofsted judgement and not a decapitated head. However, having…
I read somewhere recently that you should plan for how you want your year to end, rather than setting resolutions for the new year. This year, imagining a year ahead is really difficult for me due to the serious illness of someone I love. Looking back at the first of last year's 'hopes ' that ' My new Withings fitness tracker stays on my wrist' now f eels horribly insignificant. To be fair, for…
Many moons ago, when WomenEd was but a spark being kindled into being by its founders, I wrote a blog post that started with a plea to “the wonderful women involved in Women Ed”: I'd love to be involved too. But let's get serious. Let's stop talking about wearing heels to work. Let's stop using sassy pop references. Let's talk about the fact that boys are underachieving as well as the appalling…
This year has been my first as a member of a Senior Leadership Team. I don’t blog much anymore but I’ve managed to signpost it with blogs at the start , in the middle , and now this one at the end. I’m proud to say the year is ending with a move to a new school as Assistant Headteacher. But it hasn’t all been success and there’s a deep sense of sadness that I’m leaving my school with the…
I've been pretty rubbish at blogging about practical teaching strategies for a while now. Perhaps it's my new role this year or starting to write for TES, but squeezing blog writing into my schedule has become a bit of an impossible task. Luckily, the seconds it takes to quickly take a photo and write a tweet has meant I haven't stopped documenting much of what works in my classroom. For a while…
It’s February half term, that most emblematic of school holidays. It signals to teachers up and down our fair land that the crucial halfway point has been breached. From here on out, days will lengthen, but exam pressure will correlatively increase. For me, this week marks midway between the start and end of my SLT secondment: the perfect time to update the post I wrote just four weeks in. As…
Three positives for 2016 1. Our GCSE results improved. This one of course needs couching with 'They're still not good enough', but for once I felt like the improvements I've seen in my school over the last five years were borne out by external verification. 2. I become part of the Senior Leadership team. And it was ace. Honestly, being challenged in totally new and different ways has renewed my…
I’m going to let you into a secret: I’m not a very nice person. Now, before you start with platitudes and denials, let me elaborate a little. Firstly, I am incredibly lazy. There is not a single shred of me that would rather get up on a Sunday to mark students' work than stay in bed. On break duty, I’d much rather mill around the central courtyard than pace the corridors and my gym kit has…
Every teacher knows that in each academic year your week develops a distinct rhythm. Perhaps your PPA is clustered on one day – a time of valued coffee breaks and essential catch-ups with colleagues over your marking – whilst on another you might find *that* troublesome Year 9 group follows your ‘interesting’ Year 11s. Add in a morning briefing, break duty, and lunchtime detentions and there are…
Last year, I wrote a post about ‘ The five stages of post-results grief ’ that I went through in the subsequent days and weeks after results day. This year, I am pleased to say, that the number crunching wasn’t accompanied by the overwrought sobs of the year before, but I have been surprised to still find myself experiencing the proverbial rollercoaster of emotions which leads me to this post: ‘…
On Tuesday, I get tattooed for the seventh time. Some would say it’s the teenage rebellion I never quite grew out of. But then, at 32 and with a similarly tattooed spouse (and mother who I’m convinced will get her first by the end of the summer) I’ve not really got anyone to rebel from. So, perhaps it’s a rebellion not from ‘who’ but ‘what’? Like most schools, our policy is for staff and students…
WOOO WOOOOOO all aboard the 'Assessment without levels' juggernaut! So, this time last lear the time had finally come for my school to take its first steps on the journey that is redefining assessment in a life after levels. And what an exciting trip it's proven to be. Because, once you get over the terrifying, often chaotic, smorgasboard of options available to you, and get your head around the…
There is something spitefully gleeful about telling a class you’re beginning study of poetry. As a teacher, you wait for the groans - the hyperbolic sighs – and allow yourself the smug warmth of a wry side-smile… for many an experienced English teacher will know that this much maligned genre is a source of joy for both teachers and students alike. Maybe it’s the way most poems are able to fit…
Last year, in the whirl of final exam preparation, the 'walking talking' mock (WTM) first began to appear on my timeline. The sometimes cult-like prophets of PiXL extolled its virtues as a way of improving exam technique and raising student achievement. Kristian Still 's 2015 blog post does a fantastic job of capturing the erstwhile hype from when this approach was first mooted. For the…