PTS-See: A little history of my teaching observations

2009-2010: PGCE – a selection of my ‘targets’

  • ‘It was a pity you didn’t have blackout curtains.’
  • ‘learning objectives’
  • ‘think about the knowledge, skills and understanding’
  • In a single observation: ‘1. classroom management. 2. Pace. 3. More effective use of plenary’

Is it any wonder I felt consistently like I was underachieving when observed?!

2010-2011: NQT – the ‘targets’ from my final observation

‘The lesson really lacked pace, tasks went on too long and the majority of the lesson involved you talking to the students. It was difficult to see differentiation and the tasks you set were not particularly inspiring. Plan for more interactive and exciting tasks that involve AfL and give students a greater understanding of the level they are working at and what they need to do to improve.’

I was given 22 hours’ notice for this lesson. 2 APs and the head sat in my lesson. The students were terrified and refused to speak. It took 3 days for them to feedback to me and they did so in ‘the goldfish bowl’, a room with 3 windows that looked out onto reception. I cried; I felt I’d tried really hard and had done a good job. The receptionist comforted me afterward, having seen how upset I was through the window. My mentor was fuming and suggested I request another observation. I didn’t have the guts to go through it again.

2012-2016: School 2

I don’t have any copies of my observation feedback from this school. Verbally, it often went along the lines of ‘what I would do is…’ and ‘I like to…’ from a teacher with 20+ more years’ experience than me. Once a colleague asked my to help them plan an observation on the basis that I’d seen their observer teach and they wanted to ‘do what he’d do’ so they’d get a better grading.

2018: School 2

I was a bit of a mess after returning from my second mat leave. Having returned with lots of enthusiasm, I very soon felt under-appreciated and very lost; I seriously contemplated leaving teaching for a bit. After a few months and a successful interview at a new school, however I decided to embrace observations and learn as much as I could before I left. I told them I didn’t care about the grading, just the feedback and the learning. It wasn’t the best and I was told it was ‘great to focus on the feedback’, but that we should do another visit ‘for my PM review’. So much for the value of learning.

2018-2019: School 3

A ‘good learning checklist’. Every 2 weeks, someone rocked up with a checklist of 9 items (including one about using the school PowerPoint slides with Bronze, Silver and Gold objectives), and sent you an email with a little breakdown (S for strength, P for ‘present’ and ‘D’ for developing) and a couple of sentences of feedback. I was SO excited by this – feedback every 2 weeks! Imagine how much I’d grow and develop as a teacher! Not quite. Once I had someone walk in, plonk their bum on the radiator for 2 minutes, ask 1 student a question and walk out. I was given 8 ‘strength’ marks. Sometimes, people just wouldn’t turn up. Often people would look up the timetable of the person on-rota to observe them and tweak their lesson to suit what that observer liked to see. Rigorous it was not. Very soon the process lost value; I’m not convinced I learned anything.

2019: School 3 – new leadership

I was observed for an hour. The feedback was solid with lots of concrete examples. I was given a very clear target, a suggested read and some practice strategies. I cried (again). Not because I was upset, but because I was so glad to finally have some good feedback and was so very grateful for it. The observer was a bit freaked out by this.

2021: School 4

Everyone (including the head), has a lesson visit every two weeks, with instructional coaching to follow. There’s an open door policy and people – including quite important people sometimes – regularly pop into your classroom. It’s positive, forward-thinking and focused on making you the best teacher you can be.

And in this positive environment, I realise the cumulative affect of all those other observations. Each time I have feedback, I get nervous. I often feel on-edge and as though I’m going to be told that I’m just not doing a good enough job. Despite a lot of positive feedback over the years, and a lot of reassurance, I still have a little moment when I wish I was wearing waterproof mascara, just in case this is the day they give me a target I don’t understand; a target that confirms that niggling little fear that I’m ‘inadequate’ as a teacher.

My reason for sharing this little history is not to gain sympathy or play ‘woe-is-me’. I’m bloody stubborn, determined, and relentlessly optimistic. I’ve been raised with the view that if what you do isn’t good enough for some people, well, you should go and find other people instead. But if 4 of the 6 schools I’ve worked in have left little scars on me, they’ve probably fatally wounded some other teachers. Of the 50+ English teachers whom I began training with in 2009, I’ve come across 2, and only 1 of those in the last 7 years. In amongst workload, exam data pressures, spec changes and the general pressures of teaching, our culture of observation and judgement is one we have the most autonomy over.

We can chose our targets wisely; make our processes supportive and non-judgemental. We can research the different ways to develop and support our teachers. We do not have to be the ones who wound and scar our colleagues. When we have the opportunity to observe, let’s not just look, but really see: see them, see their achievements, see their potential, and – most importantly – share that vision with them so they can see it too.

An Autumn #teacher5aday Pledge

Flashback to January: I had all intentions of writing a pledge. In 2020 I’d written a pledge and a covid-edit pledge, but in Jan 2021 it just didn’t happen. Truth be told, I was not a well enough being to make public pledges to my welling. Battered by grief, lockdowns and a general feeling that things were going to get worse before they got better, I didn’t have it in me to make any optimistic pledges.

However, wellbeing does not have a pledge window, so I’m writing one now because wellbeing matters and because there’s a whole audience of ECTs and trainees who haven’t seen a pledge and now seems as fine a time as any to introduce one to them. Here goes.

#excercise

Cardio; swimming. I’ve fallen a bit in love with a sweaty cardio workout, so even when I’m absolutely shattered by term-time chaos, I want to keep up doing one or two a week. I’d also really really like to get back into swimming; I did it a lot as a teen and I miss it. There’s something wonderful about being in water and – if logistically possible – I want to be back in the pool more often.

#learn

I’ve just started at a new school and my god is it a learning curve and a half! So, while my brain’s a bit dead from school, I’m going to learn something a bit different. I’ve recently taken possession of my Nan’s embroidery tin (yep, tin. A whole load of messy threads in an old, enormous Quality Street tin.) so I’d like to make good use of them and master a bit of embroidery.

#volunteer

Due to a variety of reasons, last year I left the Ranger Guide unit I ran for 12 years. It was a heart-breaking move, but one that had to be made. But, my boy has just started Beavers and my girl is about to start Rainbows this term, so I dare say I’ll be volunteering in their units every now and again. I’ll also keep up the volunteering with LitdriveUK as a regional advocate and mentoring the couple of mentees I’ve picked up over the years.

#connect

Let’s be honest, now that we’re actually allowed to see people, this one is MUCH easier. Despite having so many people to catch up with, we’re making good progress. We’re lucky to have a really wonderful support network in the form of our ‘Loughborough family’ (a group of us who went to uni here and stuck around) and we’ve stayed pretty connected to others.

The big change this term, however, is that I’m in a new school which means my work-life balance is changing. While I adjust to the big change, I’m determined to keep the connection with my monkeys so they don’t feel that their Mummy time has been compromised. That means having breakfast with them and doing the girl’s hair every morning, being around for cuddles before bedtime, and leaving work at sensible times each day so I can still do the spelling practice, reading and general family stuff each day.

#notice

This one is perhaps the hardest. Last year I pledged to spend more time in the woods opposite our house (goodness me, covid made us so glad we bought a house opposite an ancient woodland!), and I’m still enjoying noticing the tiny little changes that nature has to offer.

But it feels that the world has changed ever so much in the last 18 months. In that time, I’ve started 3 new roles, moved schools, buried my mother, said goodbye to my father-in-law, and seen my little one go to school. Somewhere in all that, at times I’ve been pretty lost. So rather than noticing something external, I’m pledging to take a bit more notice of me and my own needs. Like many others in our profession, self sacrifice comes easily to me, but I’ve learned more than ever that the best thing we can do for our students (and our family, for that matter) is to look after ourselves to. So, be it a workout, a night zoning out in front of trash TV, or an evening with my mummy mates, I’m going to notice my needs and respond to them. Happy Mummy = happy children; happy teacher = happy students.

Does what it says on the tin: mentoring reads

Now that mentoring has FINALLY become ‘a thing’ and is getting the recognition and discussion space that it deserves, more and more people are tweeting requests for advice and guidance on how to get started and prep for in-coming mentees due to arrive in schools in a few weeks.

Of course, much like there are no silver bullets and quick wins in teaching, there are no ‘quick wins’ in mentoring either. Just like teaching children, mentoring adults is a complex beast (I addressed this briefly in this article in TES: How to make the most of school mentors | Tes News.) There’s no quick way to prep, and no super-simple training to undertake.

However, that’s not to say that great mentoring can’t be summed up simply: role model good behaviours in teaching and professional interactions, articulate your actions and choices, know how your mentee is likely to learn and develop, and be honest, focused, and concrete in supporting their improvement. (note, so little in this is ‘be a good teacher’).

When we extrapolate how all of the above come alive, though, well, it’s quite complex. For that reason, it’s understandable that first-time mentors – and those more experienced – would want to read more about teaching development and mentoring, and to improve their mentoring knowledge and skills. For that reason, I’ve posted a collection of recommended websites, reads, podcasts, videos etc., below. It’s a list that hasn’t been updated for a while, I’ve noticed there are a few gaps, so I’ll revisit and update the list regularly. Moreover, I’ve realised I really, really must be better at blogging my own thoughts/ experience too!

First and foremost – I have to say – I’d advise spending some time thinking over your teaching and practise articulating your teaching choices (there are some good examples of teaching choice articulation here: Teacher Hub | Oak National Academy (thenational.academy). Just like teaching, the better your instruction and explanation of your own actions and choices, the better. Giving mentees a ‘glimpse’ of expert practice and demystifying that process is really, really important and can provide mentees with an all-important mental model of how, why and when. If you can do it while mentees are observing you, even better (at some point I’ll blog about this). Whether you use Teach Like a Champion, Making Every Lesson Count, Walkthrus or whatever other structure or language you use, give yourself a refresher on how and why it all works so that you’re ready to explain that to someone else.

Generally wonderful places to explore:

Reads on mentoring and its benefits:

Advice on supporting novice teachers:

Providing Support and Feedback to move novices forwards

Writing on how teachers develop:

Bits and bobs on instructional coaching

Advice on having good conversations, coaching or otherwise

And, last but not least, this course from OpenLearn: Mentoring and Tutoring Student Teachers

As I said, I must also get better at blogging about this too…watch this space!

Time.

Time is a funny old thing. We can often feel we have too little, that we rush around to much; that we waste it and that we misuse it. We can also be impatient, comparing our use to time to others, and judging ourselves by their timescales.

In 2 days’ time my time at my current school will end before I take on a new role at school no. 4. Feeling philosophical, I have some reflections on what has meant to me in the past and what it means now.

Time is Relative

Time feels different depending on what you do with it. I feel my time at School No 1 was well-spent, and have more fond memories of those first 2 years than I have of the 6 years I spent at School No 2. That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy my time there, but they feel very different looking back than they felt when I was there. I dare say I will look back on the 3 years spent at School No 3 in a very different way again. The number of years and months doesn’t seem to matter so much in hindsight.

Everyone in teaching spends their time differently; their paths are different with different hills, crossings and stiles. Plenty of people I know (and some I trained or mentored) hold positions and roles higher than mine. For years this has frustrated me, especially when they’ve stepped into roles that opened up shortly after I left a school. What I’ve come to realise though, is that time they spent ladder climbing while I’ve been hanging around on the same rung – or even stepping down to the floor – doesn’t devalue the progress or learning I’ve done while on that rung.

Time ‘just’ in the classroom is still time spent making progress

This point is not to diminish the achievements of people who have had brilliant ladder progression in the career, far from it. It is, however, a note that ladder climbing is not the only measure of progress. Often when teachers spend time climbing, they lose time refining classroom practice as their hours and energies are divided. Given this, we mustn’t forget that time in the classroom – seemingly standing still on paper – is time well-spent making progress. In the 3 years at School Number 3 (at which I’m a classroom teacher with no additional roles), I’ve really refined my classroom practice. Moreover, I’ve learned more about leadership in those 3 years than I did when I had a TLR.

Time ‘just in the classroom’ is still time spent making progress

Okay, yes, I’m repeating myself here. But it’s a point worth repeating for our newer teachers. So often I’ve seen and heard of teachers new to the profession gaining TLRs early on. I was one of them. In my 3rd year of teaching I gained my first TLR, and I felt at the time that it was a sign I was ‘making progress’. The expense of this was my classroom teaching. As I re-enter leadership, I know that I’m doing so with much better classroom habits and routines than I had when I was last in it.

As a profession we need to be better at recognising that time in the classroom can be time spent making progress.

There’s LOADS of time

Assuming the age at which we’ll be able to claim our pension doesn’t change much, I have another 30 years working. 30. 30 whole years. Goodness knows what I am going to do with those years. Why on earth was I rushing to climb, what was I thinking I’d do with that time? Moreover, in those 30 years I won’t have 2 tiny gorgeous people to raise. I can climb any time; I can only spend time with my young children now.

There’s not loads of time

Okay, time is relative, so run with this…

We get our time once and then it’s gone. I can’t go back to being 25 and new to the profession; my mum won’t get to be 38 and on the brink of leaving it again. When we make ourselves slaves to timescales and ladders and expectations, we can unnecessarily punish ourselves in the name of ‘career progress’ (see above – no on-paper progress can still be progress!). I have spent too many years feeling ‘career guilt’ as if I’ve been neglecting my career and not ‘fulfilling my potential’. None of that time was spent well.

As a profession, let’s start forgiving ourselves for the ways we spend our time and allow ourselves the breathing space that taking time provides. There’s no rush; we’ve plenty of time.

Claudio: A Study of Toxic Masculinity

It’s well established that English teachers hate Gerald – and rightly so. There is, however, one who I feel is worse that Gerald. Yep. It’s true. A prime example of toxic masculinity at it’s worst.

I’m talking about Claudio. Yes, that ‘lamb’ who can do ‘the feats of a lion’ from Much Ado About Nothing. While at first he seems a romantic sweetheart, he’s absolutely not. The wedding scene is a prime example of this.

It’s worth stating before this that Claudio has decided to ‘shame’ Hero at the wedding entirely on the spot when he’s tricked into believing that Hero has been doing the deed with Borachio. There was no ‘let’s take stock’ or ‘let’s ask her’. Nope, we’re going straight in with big fat display of revenge in the most public way possible. It’s a 16th century version of hacking someone’s facebook page and posting a load of vicious lies on their profile page. Let’s take a closer look.

LEONATO

Come, Friar Francis, be brief; only to the plain
form of marriage, and you shall recount their
particular duties afterwards.

Okay, so, we’re starting with Leonato; worth noting here that Leonato wants the service to be as brief as possible. Does this feel like a romantic affair? Nope. It’s like going to a meeting with a bank manager you don’t particularly like. Not cool, Leonato.

FRIAR FRANCIS

You come hither, my lord, to marry this lady.

CLAUDIO

No.

Blunt start, Claudio. This simple line offers a lot of agency to the director and their actor. Does he play in cool and playful? Is he spiteful? Either way, it’s a cold way to start, and a clever way too given that the audience know his intentions. If you’re looking for the origins of East Ender’s use of dramatic irony, this is it.

LEONATO

To be married to her: friar, you come to marry her.

FRIAR FRANCIS

Lady, you come hither to be married to this count.

HERO

I do.

FRIAR FRANCIS

If either of you know any inward impediment why you
should not be conjoined, charge you, on your souls,
to utter it.

CLAUDIO

Know you any, Hero?

Oh, things are heating up. He talks directly to her, but he’s really prompting her to confess. It’s bitter and childish. He could be prompting her honestly for an answer, but he’s chosen to do so in front of a large audience of her entire family; he’s setting her up.

HERO

None, my lord.

FRIAR FRANCIS

Know you any, count?

LEONATO

I dare make his answer, none.

Interesting here, Leonato doesn’t ask Claudio if there’s a problem, he simply talks for him. Mustn’t cause beef with brave young Claud…

CLAUDIO

O, what men dare do! what men may do! what men daily
do, not knowing what they do!

In perhaps the only moment where he thinks about someone else, Claudio despairs for Leonato and his unwitting defence of Hero. We know he’s concerned with reputation, and here he really proves it. Look at those exclamation marks, look at that rambling: he’s dismayed that Leonato is defending his daughter, and yet still hasn’t directly explained why. He’s drawing attention for his grand (and ill-informed) shaming. God forbid anyone not hear about how badly poor Claudio has been treated.

BENEDICK

How now! interjections? Why, then, some be of
laughing, as, ah, ha, he!

And we have Benedick wading in to make light of Claudio’s ramblings. He MUST be making a joke; of COURSE he’s making a joke. Lols. (Is no-one going to ask Claudio directly what’s going on?!)

CLAUDIO

Stand thee by, friar. Father, by your leave:
Will you with free and unconstrained soul
Give me this maid, your daughter?

Step back, friar – this isn’t for your innocent ears (how kind). Some nice dialogue about women as things one can ‘give’. Like tea sets or a carriage clock.

LEONATO

As freely, son, as God did give her me.

God give man woman. Man give woman other man. Ug!

CLAUDIO

And what have I to give you back, whose worth
May counterpoise this rich and precious gift?

Remember that at the start Claudio called Hero a ‘jewel’? Yes, we’re continuing the precious possession talk. And trading her for stuff. Nice.

DON PEDRO

Nothing, unless you render her again.

Worthless. She is worthless. She’s not a virgin, so unless you make her again, she’s worthless. Remind me again what these men value in women?

CLAUDIO

Sweet prince, you learn me noble thankfulness.
There, Leonato, take her back again:
Give not this rotten orange to your friend;
She’s but the sign and semblance of her honour.
Behold how like a maid she blushes here!
O, what authority and show of truth
Can cunning sin cover itself withal!
Comes not that blood as modest evidence
To witness simple virtue? Would you not swear,
All you that see her, that she were a maid,
By these exterior shows? But she is none:
She knows the heat of a luxurious bed;
Her blush is guiltiness, not modesty.

And we’re really into the beef now. The ‘rotten orange’ line is an interesting one. In the 16th century oranges were, for the first time, more available in Europe as they were grown in Spain and France. They were expensive and sometimes given as presents at Christmas – a direct sign of how wealthy the giver was: ‘So much wealth have I that I can give it awa’ (to my other wealthy friends). Fruit is also, of course, a sign of fertility. Not only is Claudio yet again comparing Hero with an expensive item, but he’s also suggesting she is putrid and infertile. In an era concerned greatly with heirs and lineage, that’s quite an insult.

He also talks at length about her blushes and how they’re the ‘sign and semblance’ of her virtue. He repeatedly mentions that they’re a sign of her maidenhood – interesting given that the ‘virgin queen’ at the time was known for her alabaster skin and heavy blush.

The thing that is perhaps the most telling in this section, though, is not what he says about Hero, it’s that he says these things about her rather than to her. He doesn’t address her once despite the fact that she’s right there! This isn’t a man who is emotionally-damaged, this is a man who is ego-damaged and wants everyone to know how wrongly he’s been treated. It’s an extraordinary performance that denies her a voice and decries her *apparent* behaviour.

LEONATO

What do you mean, my lord?

CLAUDIO

Not to be married,
Not to knit my soul to an approved wanton.

‘Approved’. Really? Of course, we can’t have a fight without some name throwing and ‘wanton’ is a good ‘un in you’re going to hit someone hard in regards to promiscuity. Suggesting that lacks any restraint or that she’s had multiple partners, he’s really dragging her name through the mud here.

LEONATO

Dear my lord, if you, in your own proof,
Have vanquish’d the resistance of her youth,
And made defeat of her virginity,–

That word ‘defeat’ is interesting. In a play that begins with noble soldiers being rewarded for their successful conquests, one has to wonder how this aggressive verb positions women and their virginity. A challenge? A conquest? A prize? Rather unpleasant language if you ask me.

CLAUDIO

I know what you would say: if I have known her,
You will say she did embrace me as a husband,
And so extenuate the ‘forehand sin:
No, Leonato,
I never tempted her with word too large;
But, as a brother to his sister, show’d
Bashful sincerity and comely love.

Oh, and in comes the defence! Let’s not forget how much of an ‘approved wanton’ our Hero is, positioning himself on the other end of the scale, Claudio here has never spoken to Hero as if they were even romantically involved! He spoke to her ‘as a brother to his sister’. What a good boy he is! How modest! How pure! Given that he first courted her via Don Pedro dressing up and speaking as him (catfish alert!), he’s now protesting his innocence and purity. Borderline gaslighting…

HERO

And seem’d I ever otherwise to you?

She’s had enough. She’s going to speak up – good for you, Hero!

CLAUDIO

Out on thee! Seeming! I will write against it:
You seem to me as Dian in her orb,
As chaste as is the bud ere it be blown;
But you are more intemperate in your blood
Than Venus, or those pamper’d animals
That rage in savage sensuality.

Now that he’s apparently aware she’s in the room, he responds to her defence by telling her to get out. And then he exaggerates again how he thought she was precious and chaste, but how she’s actually an animalistic, uncivilised beast with no self control. (At this point, I’d like to remind everyone that she’s *apparently* had sex with one person. One. Benedick, on the other hand has quite a reputation with the ladies, but that’s never challenged because, well, boys with be boys…

HERO

Is my lord well, that he doth speak so wide?

Poor Hero, she thinks he might be unwell. Here she’s unconcerned for her reputation and the slander, she’s worried about him. Submissive and self-sacrificing we might argue?

LEONATO

Sweet prince, why speak not you?

And, to end our exploration, her own father ignores her as well and turns to the only person who could possibly give more light on this situation: another man.

The newspapers tell us that schools need to teach young people about gas lighting, psychological abuse, everyday sexism, and toxic masculinity. Many young people ask us what the relevance is of teaching Shakespeare (or any literature for that matter). They’ll tell us teachers that these are ‘just characters’ and – as one of my year 11s did yesterday – tell us that it’s ‘just a story’. They’ll ask what the ‘point is’ of learning literature.

Literature IS life. It IS the good, the bad and the ugly. If stories have taught children about the big bad wolves for centuries, let’s talk about those big bad wolves. Let’s explore what big bad wolves behave like, and let’s discuss how to identify and challenge such behaviour.

Let’s make our classrooms places where potential Claudios learn to be better.

On subject knowledge…

In my almost 10 years as a qualified teacher, in 3 schools, I have yet to be asked these questions:

1: What are your specialisms?

2: What don’t you know?

Bar an subject knowledge audit in my PGCE where we had to rank our knowledge of different areas of English and document how we improved on our weaknesses, I’ve never been asked or encouraged to actively consider my subject knowledge at all.

This isn’t the fault of anyone in particular. When I qualified we spent a vast  amount of time making card sorts, ensuring kinesthetic learners were catered for, giving ‘experiences’, and focusing on skills. Yes, reader, skills. ‘English is a skills-based subject’ was chanted across the nation and we rarely mentioned ‘knowledge’. Naturally, following that concept, enhancing and improving one’s subject knowledge simply wasn’t prioritised.

No longer.

With Ofsted’s new framework focusing so much more on knowledge than its predecessors, there is a growing thirst for subject knowledge CPD. The success of Litdrive and the Team English National Conference (which this year sold 500 tickets in under 2 hours) are testimony to it. Now more than ever, would be a really, really good time for HoDs to ask ‘what do you know?’; ‘what don’t you know?’.

If someone did ask me this, then, what would they discover? Why is it important?

1: It can provide accurate, relevant resources and knowledge: I know shed loads of 19th century social history. In terms of teaching context for a Victorian novel, I am your woman. Why, then, wouldn’t you utilise that specialism when planning? If me spending 20 minutes making use of what I already know means that students have accurate and relevant knowledge, that will enormously benefit students and staff alike. This would work even better with collaborative planning. Pairing teachers of different specialisms and experiences for some collaborative planning can be a mutually beneficial exchange of planning/ teaching experience and subject knowledge.

2: It saves time: as above, imagine 5, 8, 13, however many teachers you have in your department, that would spend time trying to find resources that, to use a recent example, introduce students to Victorian London. Knowing who knows what means you can direct people to areas that they know lots about and can hours of teacher workload. It’s always going to easier to work within the realms you know well.

3: Tailored, in-house CPD: As I said, when it comes to social history, I’m your woman, but I’m far from an expert in everything. Poetry, for example, is a weakness of mine. I’m sure, however, that I have colleagues who know lots about poetry, but perhaps little about drama, and colleagues who know lots about drama, but little social history. If a school’s best resource is its teachers, well, that counts for subject knowledge CPD too. With departments often having really rich resources in-house, the better you know those resources, the better you can utilise and share them. Once you know who knows or doesn’t know things, you can pair or group them up to exchange ideas, questions, reading recommendations etc. Tailored, relevant, easy-access and free.

4: Gap filling: Not everyone who qualifies to teach a subject will have a degree in it. Sometimes teachers get jobs that aren’t the subject they qualified in. This isn’t a problem, unless there are big gaps in subject knowledge. It makes sense, then, for HoDs and middle leaders to know where those gaps are so they can prioritise subject knowledge training. Not everyone is proactive in developing their subject knowledge, and there may be times when subject knowledge is lacking in a particular areas because, well, Mr X simply isn’t very interested in it. However, if we’re going to do a good job for our students, we really need to. If HoDs know their team’s knowledge, it they can ensure those gaps are being filled and students are getting a good deal. It can be woven into performance management or part of a supportive coaching programme, but if managers don’t know a gap exists, there’s little they can do to change it.

5: It shows you value individual people: Showing that you are genuinely interested in what someone has to offer, and then utilising that interest, is a really easy way of communicating to your team that they matter and that you value them and their development. Far from being a body in-front of a class and a generic team member, each teacher becomes an individual with expertise and experience specific to them and their experiences.

There’s lots of stuff I know and there’s lots of stuff I don’t. I’m not ashamed or afraid to talk about either and nor should I be. If we all knew where everyone’s knowledge lay, we’d all benefit. So, go on, ask.

‘It’s only words’?

‘Miss, I can’t do this. I don’t sound like that; I’m from *insert place name*.’ One of those student responses that will stick with me, and not because it’s bizarre or funny (like that time a year 9 asked me how we ‘get new nuns if nuns don’t have sex’). This one, instead, was the moment I realised how much our language use can alienate our students.

Whether we recognise it or not, our vocabulary is heavily influential on our identity. Think about it, we wouldn’t use different words around different people if it weren’t and our year 9s wouldn’t squirm when we use ‘their’ words. I identify as an academic, English teacher, and thus I use words that fit the vocabulary of an English teacher (such as ‘thus’). The young man whose words opened this blog did not identify with the sentence starters I had given him. He did not feel that writing ‘Good morning. Across the UK…’ was something he would ever say; it was ‘too posh’, and didn’t fit with who ‘he’ perceived himself to be.

From that moment on, I changed my vocabulary game. No longer would we play around with mentioning new words and hoping they remembered them. No, no. Now we would LEARN new words; play with them, use them and speak them until they became part of our classroom rhetoric. They would be a foundation of our class identity and we’d use them frequently.

It’s taught me a lot about vocabulary as part of our curriculum. Here are some key things that have improved our vocabulary building.

Identify key vocab; make it non-negotiable

Written into our schemes of work are topic, tier 2, and tier 3 vocab. I wanted more than this though. For recent MTPs – particularly for our non-mainstream students – I’ve identified vocabulary to introduce teach week, that’s connected with each ‘big question’ (these run for a week, sometimes 2). By having vocabulary explicitly connected with a long-running big question, students have lots of opportunities to use that vocabulary in context so that it’s embedded and intertwined with their new knowledge.

Remind yourself

Last year I had my own classroom with boards on the back wall. These were a great place to put words that I was keen for students to embrace. While not distracting them, this meant that I was reminded constantly to use them and encourage students to use them. I used drawing pins so that I could change them frequently when we moved onto new words, or when I felt they were embedded enough in my own vocabulary that I’d use them without the reminders.

Use, use, use

In order to embed vocabulary, students need to use their new words as much as possible so they’re integrated into lots of different tasks across their units. Starters include definitions or ‘use these in sentence’, class discussions include key vocab, summaries include ‘must use’ words (no prizes for guessing what those were!). Retrieval practice questions include them, as do model answers.

I also use those same words as ‘trigger’ words for retrieval. If we come across an opportunity to use the word ‘submissive’ while discussing female characters in Much Ado About Nothing, I’ll throw in a question about other submissive characters we’ve come across in other texts: ‘Hero’s admired here for being submissive; where else have been seen a woman being expected to be submissive?’.

Challenge invading colloquialisms

I love a good colloquialism, but when we’re being academic writers, students need to be more academic. When words come up that aren’t academic enough, we embrace and we challenge. Today we looked at the word ‘gutted’ and discussed alternatives: dismayed, disappointed, upset etc. We’ve also discussed alternatives to swear words: important in academic writing, but also important for their lives. Not everywhere and everyone will accept swear words, so we have to discuss swear words and offer alternatives so that students are able and comfortable using a range of words so that they can communicate with a range of people, adapting their vocabulary to suit.

The result?

That young man who wouldn’t write ‘good morning’ because it was ‘too posh’ for him, well, he’ll now use words such as futile, submissive, therefore, and reinforces. He no longer sees them as imposter words that he’s being forced to use; they’re his. His identity has changed; he is no longer *name* from *village* that he believed would stop him talking in a formal way, but is *name* who can use big words in the big world and is ready to do big things.

Teaching: the route to eternal life

Humans have long been keen to find the route to eternal life: pills, potions, spells and more, all the in the quest to capture the secret of lasting influence and experience. What has been forgotten in this, however, is that living on as an individual is, well, impossible (to start with), but is also not the point.

Last September in a hellish few weeks, we suddenly lost both my mum and my father-in-law. Having no experience of death before, this completely threw my two children, aged 3 and 5 at the time. Quite determined to live forever, my daughter is unimpressed with the concept of death, but we’ve adopted the narrative that people have to die so that other people get a turn at living; Grandma, for example, had to die so that one day Mummy can have a turn at being a grandma.

Over the last 6 months though, I’ve come to the realisation that my mum isn’t really gone at all. Turns out, low and behold, she’d discovered the truth to eternal life; she was a teacher.

Over 5 decades she taught countless children and adult too, not just when she was in the classroom, but when she left teaching and visited local primary schools to teach pupils about their local history and the wildlife in my home village. When I was growing up, and even when I visited home as an adult, we would be frequently stopped in the street or talked to by her ex-pupils who invariably said ‘I remember you taught me…’.

After she died in September, the messages came in droves. Having become a key figure in the community, there were literally hundreds of dedications, many from people she’d taught. Again, lots of ‘I remember she taught me…’.

And that’s what we do. We teach, we talk, we share our lives and our values with children. Sometimes those values will stick, and they’ll be passed on. Mum, having been told as a child by her nan, ‘you should always say good morning to people; you might be the only person to talk to them all day.’, passed that message to me, and I’ve passed it to my children. I also pass it to my students, and I’m sure she did to her pupils.

And so it will continue. Those values, that care, those messages and that knowledge will be passed on. Eventually we will become unhugable (ie, our bodies weaken and leave), but if we teach with compassion, care and dedication, the values and ideas that form us stick around. And what more could we want of eternal life than that?

GOMO and the Art of Self-forgiveness

Let’s be honest, covid and the lockdowns, bereavements and disruption it has caused have sucked. Big time. BUT, amongst the sorrow, many beautiful things have been born. ResearchEd went virtual, all manner of organisations brought us online conferences, EduClubhouse was born, incredible educators set up on zoom to share their experience, etc. etc. etc. The amount of free, readily-available CPD out there is endless.

In so many ways, this is wonderful, democratising, even. Those teachers who can’t afford the cost of the tickets and travel to conferences, or couldn’t give up their Saturdays or afternoons for CPD because of childcare or other commitments, can all of a sudden access so many amazing learning opportunities they wouldn’t otherwise have been able to embrace, with a level of flexibility hitherto unprecedented.

On the other hand, it can be incredibly overwhelming. We exist in a world where our baseline anxiety sits pretty high on a daily basis and where a large number of us are juggling our daily teaching remotely while also undertaking planning, managing childcare, and having zoom catch-ups with family and people we’d usually see.

During the first lockdown, I devoured the CPD on offer. And I mean DEVOURED. Lockdown 3 though; so little. The mental exhaustion of everything means that while part of me wants to sign up to everything, another part of me wants to move to a mud hut in the woods as far from technology as possible.

This is where GOMO kicks in: the guilt of missing out. If I want to be a good teacher, I should be signing up to these things, right? I should have read that book; I should have attended that webinar, and surely I should have listened to that podcast?! Half of twitter have done these things! How can I possibly deliver effective post-remote teaching if I haven’t been to super-CPD-with-that-amazing-person?! HOW?! I’ll be behind! What will happen to my students if I haven’t drowned myself in CPD and immersed myself in readily-available wisdom of others?

This, my friends, is where we need to slow down. We need to give ourselves credit for what we already know and for what we have achieved. Both our profession and its individuals have grown, learned and adapted in so many ways over the last year. Each of us – regardless of age, experience, situation or lockdown-CPD saturation level – has learnt so much. Let’s take time now to learn the art of self-forgiveness and allow ourselves breathing space without feeling that we need to play the CPD catch-up game. We’re all so keen to avoid the student ‘catch-up’ narrative and emphasise that students need stability and well-considered curriculum input, but we forget that we need the same.

Let’s trust ourselves and our knowledge, do what we do best, and rid ourselves of GOMO.

This much I know about connecting with others.

As of midnight, the area where I live will be tier 4. A lot of my friends will be in tier 4; most of my family already are. And while we’re all worried about connections and how we feel connected to others, I’m to share what I’ve recently learned about connections. Forgive the slightly rambling nature of my writing; I’m very much thinking on the page.

At the start of this year, I made a #teacher5aday pledge. In March, I updated it in light of lockdown. In the #connect section, I said this:

This is going to be both the easiest and hardest bit of the time ahead of us. While I can call my mum any time (she’s even joined Facebook this weekend!), there will be times when I just want a good mummy cuddle. Likewise, having a virtual cheers with friends won’t be quite the same as treating ourselves to a night out.

That was March. Since then we’ve done both my birthday in tier 1, both children’s birthdays in the November lockdown, and – most significantly – within a indescribable 25 days in September, experienced my father-in-law’s cancer diagnosis, swift decline and passing, and the sudden death of my Mum.

Connection now means something different. Those virtual cheers have been ones with ‘all’ the family, with a distinct feeling of absence. Those calls and cuddles with Mum, well, those won’t ever be had again.

But – giant, enormous BUT – I am no less connected to anyone. As I’ve waded through the 300+ messages posted on the announced of her death on my hometown’s social media account, read the scores of letters and cards written to my dad, listened to the tributes to her on local radio, and have gone to sleep tightly clinging to the bear she bought me for my 30th (knowing that Teddy is getting a little fragile these days), I have come to one conclusion:

I am no less connected to anyone for not having them with me right now.

Instead, I have realised that actually, I am more connected than ever. Connection in many ways is who we talk to, see, and interact with, but in another way it’s what we feel. I can talk to any number of people without feeling connected, but those who I’m truly connected with are always with me. I am always connected to them: my strength, my enthusiasm, my perspectives; my ongoing survival is not done in isolation. It is because we are connected to others that we keep smiling; that we keep going.

So send a message to someone you’re missing, have a phone call with an old friend, or sit quietly and connect with those you can’t talk to. Our connections are never lost; they are who we are.

Design a site like this with WordPress.com
Get started