4 steps to help you innovate this year
It is always a pleasure to be invited to write for Innovate My School. My latest feature focuses on how to develop the mindset of an innovator and how to […]
Inspection ready (Middle Leaders)
Middle Leader unsure if you are fully prepared for an inspection? Preparing for an inspection isn’t easy, there’s a lot to pull together and plan. Everyone knows inspections require late […]
Department meetings
New to a school? New to a Department or Faculty? Everyone is new at some point, don’t worry about it! Six years ago I was new in a Department, two […]
Appraisal Tips
Have you set some professional target this year? Have you started the appraisal process yet? Here are 2 top tips for your appraisal so you walk into your meeting […]
Diary update
I've been asked to present at the upcoming Bloomsbury TeachMeetBooks FREE event - info on how you can sign up to attend here ...
Introducing colour coded AFL to your school
I've created this 'quick start' guide for anyone who wants to try and implement a colour coded assessment methodology in their department, faculty or whole school. Download for free.
Visual Management for school improvement
It's a little bit more than colour coding, but that's a good start on the road to improved productivity!
Ofsted Ratings MAP
Find and view your school and others by rating on a useful map of the UK...
Life beyond levels
A simple start to assessing without levels - and directions to further reading and support online.
School improvement: Has everyone got the message?
This post looks at how to best communicate a school improvement message!
Ofsted Guide for improving schools
Download this Ofsted guide to help you wade through the ups and downs of the months following an inspection.
When the going gets tough (pt:1)…
This post looks at how schools respond to Ofsted inspections...
Whole School Teaching and Learning Strategy
My whole school (start of) teaching and learning strategy...
Tracking – visually
Tracking made visual As a busy (amazingly so) Head of Department I want a way to track every single pupil in my departments care. I want to know what ‘group’ […]
Boys, learning and progress
A collection of facts and thoughts on the problems we face engaging boys in their learning. As well as some suggested strategies you can use in a lesson to engage […]
The Art of Observing
Seeing is believing Being able to observe good teaching and learning is an art! It’s something that comes with practice. There are a number of obstacles in the way of […]
Cloud Computing
Clouds in school The concept has been around ages! 6 years ago I tried very hard to convince a school that this was the future, to no avail, thankfully my […]
Share ideas to improve
Share ideas and improve learning and teaching Site readership in 2013 It’s quite exciting as a teacher sharing ideas online to see a visual presentation of where in the world […]
Ideas worth a display
Cover all the bases! You’ve got to cover all bases when trying to share good practice! That’s what I’ve learned in the last two years as I’ve done more and […]
If you don’t grade lessons
Yesterday I asked ‘should ofsted grade individual lessons during whole school inspections?’ Thanks (in no small part) to a ReTweet by @GuardianTeach & then the passionate participation of my own […]
TeachMeet – Sharing best practice
I think CPD needs an overhaul. It takes some really special CPD these days to remove the look of boredom from teachers faces as they sit in their school hall […]
Grade or don’t grade?
Grading debate. There’s a lot of talk online at the moment about Ofsted grading individual lessons during inspections, you can read more on this HERE and HERE. What’s your opinion? […]
Cross Curricular Planning
Follow a Primary example! Now this post isn’t likely to be earth-shattering to many teaching in Primary schools, but it’s something that Secondary teachers often lament the lack of in […]
Reflecting on your lessons
Here comes the 1/2 term break Ready for the break? Time to take stock, relax, regroup and then think back through past teaching and formulate some future plans? Working with […]
Questioning – Improving students ability to question
My Starting Point I wanted my students to take a greater responsibility for their learning and I believed that trying to encourage more questions from my students would support me […]
Questioning – what to look for
Questioning This is my topic this year, I’m reading up on it and practicing it as much as I can, so I’m sharing this weeks thoughts on questioning with […]
TeachMeet Bedford (Fee CPD)
TeachMeet I’m a huge fan of teachers sharing ideas, the best career development always seems to happen when just see something or hear something that sparks an idea off. That’s […]
Better questioning
Questioning; my question to empower students I really want my students to have stronger questioning skills, I think that by giving them practice at answering better questions and generating better […]
Action Research
CONTEXT: Part of my role is to co-manage a team in school which conducts action research each year as in partnership with Cambridge University. (More info here) Mobile Technology: Controversy: […]
Raising Achievement
I read this somewhere, an Academy school showcasing one of its initiatives which it felt had greatly contributed to the rise in achievement at GCSE. I’ve created the idea in […]
Lesson planning as a team
Lesson planning, divides opinion, is it an out of date activity to write out pages of plans for one lesson? Are sound resources and detailed schemes of work more workable […]
Action research projects…
Having introduced two major action research projects to our staff this year; Collaborative learning project Tablet computer project I’ve found it useful to jot down a very simplistic ‘check list’ […]
