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From the Head

Brilliant to see such fantastic CPD from Kelly and the Lead Practitioner team last week. I was really pleased to see that the team were clear that recall is important in terms of knowledge along with skills and methods. So much has been said over the last few years in education about whether knowledge is more important than skills, but of course, it is the two working together that leads to successful learning.  

It was great to also see the focus on modelling. Although our students may sometimes disagree with us, it is important that they recognise us as the ‘experts’ in their learning. As so aptly demonstrated by Josh in his superb forward roll (!), we are the ones who know what the students need to do to succeed, and we are the ones who have the tools to verbalise and model this to them. It’s a shame that Georgina didn’t take up the challenge to show her learning from Josh’s expertise, but perhaps we’ll see how she’s getting on after she’s had a chance to reflect on her metacognition strategies for PE……..!

Speaking of great Learning and Teaching, do check out this blog written for the Creative Multilingualism website by Sarah Williams. The blog entry focuses on using drama and games in MFL teaching. Such is the interest, Sarah has been asked to allow it to feature in a book. Well done Sarah!

The countdown to the end of term has well and truly started. More details on the final day will follow soon. Please remember, as I said in my VLE announcement, that we need to keep the focus firmly on learning right up until the final day.

Have a fantastic week,

Mia

Learning and Teaching

Spotted!

A round up of some of the great learning and teaching strategies we’ve noticed being used around school recently…

> Don Smith, adapting his classroom layout by seating students in a semi-circle near the board when teaching key content. 

> Maya Popovitch facilitating a metacognitive discussion with her Year 12/13 ILETS students as a starter to her lesson (right). 

> Katharine Hobbiger using timers carefully in her year 12 Psychology lesson to create a sense of pace and focus, without rushing students’ thinking (below).

A thought about... Modelling and Metacognition

Thank you for all your hard thinking  in the training last week, especially on such a cold December afternoon!  Many colleagues have taken a moment to say how useful it was.

The resources are all available on the T: Drive under Common > Modelling and Metacognition Training, and on the VLE. If you’d like some support putting the strategies into practice or would like to see them being used in lessons, drop the L&T team an email.

Below: training action shots

In focus: PSHE and wellbeing

We’ve now come to the end of our first term of the new PSHCE model, and Keely and I would like to say a huge thank you to everyone in the school, students and staff, for embracing this with such aplomb. All of the lessons that we have popped into over the last few months have shown rigorous discussion, great student engagement and lots of enthusiasm. And, the students seem to be taking what we are doing on board – here are a couple comments from some of my Year 12s:

> "I believe that the introduction of PSHCE is very beneficial as it gives students a chance to explore taboo topics which are not discussed…"

> "I think PSHCE has been delivered brilliantly. The teachers have been very sensible in their delivery as well as empathetic."

Lou Grimley

Coming up...

KS4 PPEs - all week

Tuesday meetings 9 December

Department time 3.15pm - 5.15pm