Leadership

Solving the Marking Workload Problem

Having provided the necessary click bait in the title; I’m very tempted to write my shortest ever blog by giving the following solution “You must do less marking, as a teacher; demand less marking, as a school leader or parent”.  End of; problem solved. Continue reading →

Help Teachers Keep the Faith #ThursdayThunk

The number of teachers leaving the profession is potentially catastrophic. Just in my own little world I have learnt of four cases this month. If this is extrapolated across the country; we are in deep trouble.  I believe Stephen when he argues that we need to retain our way through the teacher supply crisis (we can’t recruit our way out) and the prime responsibility for this must lie with school leaders at every level. Continue reading →

Teacher Monitoring; Lessons from Pig Wrestling

Imagine the Department for Education offered you £100, 000 to do either:

a) Employ two more senior leaders to monitor and improve the quality of teaching in your school

b) Give every teacher an hour or two additional non-contact time per week to collaboratively plan learning, assess gaps in pupils’ knowledge and support pupils who were behind with their learning.

Instinctively I’m drawn towards b); systemically we have implemented a) across schools in England for the past few decades. Continue reading →