Old Hat(tie)? Some things you ought to know about effect sizes
Ever since Hattie published Visible Learning back in 2009 the Effect Size has been king. For those of you who don't know, an effect size is a mechanism for comparing the relative merits of different interventions. Hattie pointed out that everything that a teacher does will have some effect but that there will also be an opportunity cost: if you're investing in time in one type of intervention you will be [...]
Who you might like to follow on Twitter
Earlier in the year I made a list of those people on Twitter that I recommended that people interested in education should follow. Since then, two things have happened: 1) I’ve encountered more people worth following 2) The original post has gone mad and for some reason fails to display many of the people I intend it to (in some case this has resulted in people feeling a bit miffed.) [...]
A tale of two lessons: further thoughts on the Cult of Outstanding
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, [...]
Some reviews of The Secret of Literacy
To further whet your appetite for my forthcoming book and in the spirit of shameless self-promotion, I thought I'd share a couple of pre-release reviews. (Just in case you weren't aware, it's out on 31st January, and I'm quite pleased with it!) First of all, there's a very generous review from the headguruteacher himself, Tom Sherrington: The Secrets of Literacy is an essential book for all teachers and school leaders. It [...]
The Cult of Outstanding™: the problem with 'outstanding' lessons
First of all I need to come clean. Up until pretty recently I was a fully paid up member of the Cult of Outstanding™. Last January I considered myself to be a teacher at the height of my powers. In the spirit of self-congratulation I posted a blog entitled Anatomy of an Outstanding Lesson in which I detailed a lesson which I confidently supposed was the apotheosis of great teaching, and stood back [...]
How can we make classroom observation more effective?
If the belief that it's possible for untrained observers to pitch up in lessons and grade their effectiveness is comparable to a belief in witchcraft, (and Professor Robert Coe's research confirms that this is the case) where does that leave us as a profession? Observing lessons is the fetish du jour of almost every single school and school leader and, even if we informed and honest enough to accept that [...]
Don't trust your gut: a little bit more on the problem with grading lessons
This evening, there will be debate on the role lesson observation in England's schools with such educational luminaries as Professor Robert Coe, David Weston (the man behind the Teacher Development Trust), Lead Ofsted inspector Mary Myatt, Sam Freedman (Director of Teach First and ex-special advisor to Gove),, Dame Alison Peacock (Headteacher of The Wroxham School) and, er... me. Quite what qualifies me to participate beyond having a big gob and a stubborn [...]
Coming soon… the secret of literacy revealed
This isn't really a post, more a shameless piece of self-promotion. I would normally cringe at the idea of publicly bathing in the warm glow of congratulations but in this case it feels exciting enough to be worth making an exception for: one of my education heroes, Doug Lemov, the mastermind behind the Uncommon Schools network in the US and best selling author of the marvellous Teach Like A Champion [...]
What you may have missed on The Learning Spy in 2013
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a teacher in possession of an internet connection, must be in want of an annual review for each of the education blogs to which they're subscribed. As is traditional, the descent into the dark days of December demands that education bloggers will be preparing their annual statements. Here, not to be left out or out done, is mine. 2013 has been something of [...]
Principled curriculum design: the English curriculum
The tragedy of life is that one can only understand life backwards, but one must live it forwards Søren Kierkegaard Back in March 2013, I wrote about the principles underlying my redesign of a Keys Stage 3 English curriculum. It received a mixed response. Since then Joe Kirby and Alex Quigley have published their ideas on redesigning this area of the curriculum and have, in different ways, influenced my thinking. [...]
Can a good teacher teach anything well?
I used to work for a headteacher who was fond of saying "We're teachers of children, not teachers of subjects." This was justification for having non-specialist teachers in certain shortage subjects. Like any axiom, there's some truth in this statement: teaching children is an art unto itself. There's definitely a case to be made for the fact that I might do a better job of teaching a maths lesson than [...]
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