It is the best of times, it is the worst of times, but your NQT year is never dull. Last Sunday, we held an NQT surgery on Twitter to look at some of the issues facing new teachers in that high-pressure period. Here are the highlights: What are your top tips for surviving and thriving the NQT year? John Socha, primary school educator and the creato...

Robin Alexander gained his PhD from the University of Cambridge, beginning his career as a teacher before becoming a lecturer at the University of Leeds. He is currently a fellow of Wolfson College at Cambridge, honorary professor of education at the University of York, professor of education emeritus at the University of Warwick, and chair of...

It's summer! For teachers, that means the holidays are either incredibly close or already here (for a lucky few). But for those on either side of their NQT year, it may not be the most relaxing time. If you've just wrapped up your final term as an NQT, you may be looking towards September with a mixture of excitement and apprehension as increa...

The short answer is, of course, that they don't. Not unless they get effective, structured feedback from their students. This is where 'formative assessment' comes in. Paul Black and Dylan Wiliam, in their seminal work, 'Inside the black box: raising standards through classroom assessment' define formative assessment as encompassing: "all those act...

Natasha Devon, until recently the government's mental health champion for schools, said before departing from her post: Time and time again young people – and the people who teach them – have spoken out about how a rigorous culture of testing and academic pressure is detrimental to their mental health. At one end of the scale we've got four year ol...