Author Archives: classteaching

Bright Spots: SPDS

Posted on April 17, 2018

One of our greatest successes at Durrington High School is our subject planning and development sessions (SPDS). These are fortnightly, subject-specific CPD sessions in which curriculum teams meet to develop subject and pedagogical knowledge and ideas. To ensure the most effective practice … Continue reading →

Posted in Bright Spots, CPD Events, General Teaching | Leave a comment

Metacognition: Making it Happen in the Classroom

Posted on March 20, 2018

According to the EEF Toolkit, metacognition and self-regulation is one of the top two most effective teaching and learning strategies (the other being feedback), and can increase students’ progress by as much as eight months. The EEF succinctly explains that metacognition involves … Continue reading →

Posted in General Teaching, Teaching Forums | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

A ‘Mastery-light’ Subject Curriculum Model

Posted on March 12, 2018

By Andy Tharby Before we consider the shape and dimensions of a subject curriculum, we should first consider its purpose. In my opinion, a curriculum should always be challenging in its depth and breadth so that: students acquire powerful knowledge … Continue reading →

Posted in General Teaching | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Bright Spots – Memory

Posted on March 8, 2018

Over the past few days I have been visiting lessons attempting to uncover good practice in the field of memory creation and retention.  At Durrington we have made the use of memory strategies gleaned from cognitive science one of our three … Continue reading →

Posted in Bright Spots, General Teaching | Leave a comment

Mobilising the evidence – Part 2

Posted on March 7, 2018

On our January INSET day, five teachers presented to the rest of the teaching staff, about how they had taken the research evidence that had been presented to them at previous INSET days and other CPD activities and mobilised it … Continue reading →

Posted in CPD Events, General Teaching | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Explicit Vocabulary Instruction in PE

Posted on March 1, 2018

Back in November Fran Haynes wrote a blog detailing how and why explicit vocabulary instruction had become the new focus for our whole-school literacy policy (you can read it here).  From the myriad of literacy strategies this was the one we … Continue reading →

Posted in General Teaching, Teaching Forums | Leave a comment

Classroom Change: How the EEF’s Implementation Guide Can Support Classroom Practice

Posted on February 19, 2018

The EEF has recently published their guide to implementation entitled ‘Putting Evidence to Work’, which provides a detailed, analytical framework designed to ‘help implement any school improvement decision, whether programme or practice, whole-school or targeted approach, or internal or externally … Continue reading →

Posted in General Teaching, Leadership, Teaching Forums | Leave a comment