EdBlogs

A recent Twitter conversation about the advantages and disadvantages of headteachers having a teaching commitment made me thoughtful. I was a head for 30 years and taught each class of year 7 one English lesson every week throughout this time. I was paired with the English teacher who taught them for the rest of the time. If I had to be out of...

Teacher Katherine Birbalsingh received a standing ovation at the 2010 Conservative Party Conference, when she said: "The [education] system is broken because it keeps poor children poor." She went on to condemn a "culture of excuses, of low standards"; "the chaos of our classrooms"; and a "sea of bureaucracy". Birbalsingh has since regretted her co...

As of January 2016, there were 236,805 pupils in Englandwith a statement of special educational needs (SEN) or an Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan. This is an increase of 640 from 2015 – and equates to 2.8% of the total pupil population. Schools are still coming to terms with huge policy changes in this area. Following on from the Equalities A...

Optimism: it's all about whether the glass half full or half empty, right? Wrong. It turns out that most people have the wrong idea of optimism. So what exactly is it? How important is it? And, most crucially, can you learn to be optimistic? Let's start with a quick test. You can choose only one answer per question. 1) You get lost driving to a fri...

Too many teachers don't like technology. As a teacher who trains other primary teachers how to use technology, I find this frustrating because, with the right approach, it can completely transform teaching and learning. I have seen first-hand the distant relationships that can exist between teachers and technology, and can see that – in some cases,...