Beyond Good

Do meeting proformas handed down from SLT to middle leaders help or hinder?  Is a checklist better?  How well do SLTs leaders model running high-quality meetings and line management?  Matt and Femi discuss.

Nothing advertises SLT being detached from reality more than forcing staff to spend entire day(s) sat listening to speakers in the hall.  Matt and Femi discuss alternatives.

Femi and Matt discuss what it takes and means to be clear with staff and say what it is that actually want to say!

Matt and Femi discuss issues around QA of books, including the importance of a clear, shared understanding of what a book is for!  Amongst much else, they touch on whether there are subject-specific variations, what qualities you might look for in work, and the crucial understanding that marking is one of the tools that can be used to give and gather feedback as opposed to a stand-alone dimension...

Matt and Femi discuss the terms 'inclusive teaching', 'adaptive teaching' and 'responsive teaching'.  The point is also made that great teaching is, by definition, inclusive teaching: if not all of your students are making great progress then it's hard to claim that the teaching is 'great'.

Reflecting on a lovely message received from a former student, Matt and Femi discuss what it means to believe in our students and how that belief plays out in our actions and behaviour.

Welcome to Season 4! After brief introductions for new listeners Matt and Femi discuss the first part of Viviane Robinson's book 'Reduce change to increase performance'.  In particular they focus on the distinction between change and improvement, problem and goal clarity, the importance of understanding the beliefs and values that underpin the status quo, the concept of double loop...

Femi reflects on the last year with one particular class in mind and asks: "Are my lessons challenging enough?"

Femi has been teaching a Science class and shares his approach and reflections with Matt.  They discuss 'learning to learn', booklets, AI, rounds of teaching and CFU, shed loads of practise, feedback and self-checking answers, precision and rigour and much more!

Amongst other things, Femi and Matt talk about how hard it can be as a middle leader to lead on change without strong models to refer to.

Matt and Femi discuss the subtle ways students can often make life difficult for teachers, and why this happens in some classrooms but not in others.

Matt and Femi have a chat about teachers using seating plan resets as a strategy, debate breaking down intangible aspects like 'feel' into granular concrete components when coaching, and the role and possible negative effects of prior information when it comes to planning seating plans and thinking about a new class.

Matt and Femi talk about coaching, and how teachers working on their craft will often need to stick with a particular focus and practice it with reflection and feedback to master it.

Matt discusses with Femi a recent conversation he had with a teacher that he supports regarding resetting a challenging class in which norms had severely slipped from previous high standards.  The conversation will be of particular interest to heads of department supporting colleagues in their team.

Matt and Femi discuss economy of language during explanations and the advantages of keeping teacher talk lean. Contact us at: beyondgoodpod@gmail.com

Matt and Femi discuss a couple of really common issues that undermine teachers' ability to deliver powerful, clear and memorable explanations.

Matt and Femi discuss what to do with a comment often heard by the coffee machine... "This class doesn't retain things!" beyondgoodpod@gmail.com

Matt and Femi talk to James Gisby about the challenges and intricacies of teaching History, and what good History lessons could look like.  

Matt and Femi discuss why effective learning can often look somewhat boring from the outside, and why that can sometimes be problematic in schools. beyondgoodpod@gmail.com

Matt and Femi discuss the importance of very prompt transition moments in lessons.   Reach out by emailing beyondgoodpod@gmail.com

Matt and Femi discuss the pros and cons of group / whole staff PD vs the somewhat more time-consuming approach of coaching, considering how to leverage each one for it's strengths and the symbiosis between the two different approaches. Get in touch! beyondgoodpod@gmail.com

Matt and Femi discuss two topics in this episode - the first is whether there is any merit in having students copy things down into exercise books, or even cutting them out and sticking them in.  The second is the complaint one occasionally hears that there is too much to get through / not enough curriculum time and therefore we don't have the 'luxury' of doing any retrieval practic...

Matt and Femi discuss the common situation of encouraging students to go back and check their work once they've done all they can on an exam or test paper.

Join Femi and Matt to hear about how and why Femi has finally decided to start to use mini-whiteboards in his lessons.

In this episode Femi and Matt talk about how incredibly useful it is to base coaching around video footage from the lesson, and go through the practicalities of doing it (what equipment, how to set up, etc.) Questions or comments?  Emails us: BeyondGoodPod@gmail.com