Fun and games are rife at the moment as we have just had the call ‘advising’ us that Ofsted are in this week to do a full inspection over Wed & Thur. A document circulating internally to calm everyone down opens with this:
“Outstanding teachers continuously reflect on their teaching, they analyse particular aspects of their work and find ways to develop. The main purpose of lesson observation is to provide a focusing tool for reflection and improvement.”
This struck a chord with me and really highlited the value of what were all learning here. I know we are not all working in education, but does that really make a difference?
Since having such a long summer break away from monitoring the learning of others (and also myself), its now time to fire up the brain again and get straight in the thick of it. At my academy, we have an approaching Ofsted inspection and I have spent a fair bit of time with an advisor as have many of my colleagues. What is astonishing is how much of a fuss people are making over something they should be doing every day, after all, the new rules (1st Sep 09) are fair right…? But there was one shining piece of advice that kept coming through the acronyms, statistics and all manner of other jargon and that was:
“Teach Well”
Bottom line, do the day job and the rest will come. Another sound piece of data / research is the recall rate of students. I have subsequently pinned the following on my desk and always challenge what I am doing on this scale, its quite interesting and enlightening I have to tell you!
Although not my brain child, my Academy is now rolling out a trial scheme with the view of creating reflective students. The whole idea comes from developing ‘parent tutor day’ which is where form tutors meet with individuals from the group accompanied by their parents to discuss a multitude of different things. This time around, instead of the tutors whaling on at the students about what they are good at, bad at and need to improve, students are taking the stage.
Students will present a reflective dialogue for around three minutes to their tutor and parents identifying key areas that they themselves have identified. This is developing several initiatives in the students:
Development of reflective ability
Presentation skills
Above is a sample of some of the things they are talking about in their dialogues, but there is a range. Some have done a SWOT analysis and others have gone with a more traditional exploration of themselves.
I can only hope that this idea is developed into an ongoing initiative as i think being a reflective learner is vital to progress. In education, students are pushed to the limit, rarley being offered structured time for personal constructive reflection, seeing what has been attained and what needs still to be done.
“How can I drive a sense of urgency and engagement in my students at both KS4 and 5?”
This is the question i will be using in the majority of my studies from this point forward until the end of the semester. I will apply an action inquiry to this question and perform reflective analysis. Im quite excited at this point, as this is so true to life and i have already started making progress with the area of engagement but hoping that studies will provide me assistance in formulating a plan. Will go nicely in the CPD evidence folder too!
All the things i have learnt over the past few months have really helped me enrich my work and add value to my teachings. After a brief stint of research with Greenwich University about diversifying teaching large groups through a possible ICT infrastructure, i have now started to build a relationship with Wiley publishers.
Me and my Academy have used Wiley for many years and following a meeting i had with one of the people in charge of development of future media, i am now working on a project with them, testing how we can get the concepts from a book and traditional media and make it applicable in the classroom.
I look forward to seeing how this one develops and how the BALTR can contribute to it and vice versa!
Have just delivered a Y12 lesson on diversifying the AS/A2 pathway. Nay on everything i have learnt from my course has been applied to the lesson from project management, to learning style analysis and the then on application of that information to their individual subjects. They have also learnt the value of keeping a portfolio of their work whether it is a requirement of the course or not and how that is usefull after the course has come to a close in later life.
Of all the media i have ever seen, there is one that has stuck with me. For every new class i take on, not matter what the key stage, i show them this video. Its truly captivating and is simply excellent.
Its a little outdated now, but it still has terrific impact. It also sums up perfectly what my mission is in education and the mission statement of my department.
I hope you enjoy it as much as i did.
Check out the website at the end of the video on how to download higher resolution copies of the video and to find out more about it.
p.s. i think YouTube is over used and there are many better video sharing sites out there such as vimeo, but wordpress was having none of it, so back to old faithfull i went.
Posted by Toby 
Posted by Toby 
Posted by Toby 
