Beyond Good

In today’s episode, Femi and Matt discuss differentiation!  They talk about adaptive learning, differentiation as an advanced teaching skill that relies on solid foundations of strong learning behaviour and pedagogical subject knowledge and the botheredness to actually go and do it (especially when classes are compliant.) They talk about prioritising differentiating to support weaker students firs...

In this episode Matt and Femi discuss culture - particularly from the perspective of heads of department trying to shape the culture of teaching staff in their corner of the school.  This one is not maths-specific –  the discussion is relevent to colleagues from any subject area or team. They consider the fact that culture exists – whether you actively seek to shape it, or not, the characteristics...

Today Femi and Matt are speaking about lesson observations and related activities such as lesson visits, coaching and feedback.  They talk about being clear on why the observation is happening; good and less good reasons for doing lesson observations and some of the issues around lesson observations as part of the performance management process. On lesson visits i.e. ‘walking the shop floor’, they...

Today's episode is about mistakes, disappointment and failure – with the discussion ranging from 'recognising that my last lesson didn’t go as well as I wanted', through to acknowledging and responding to under-performance at the level of the whole school. Matt and Femi discuss the importance of recognising and admitting when things aren’t good enough and taking responsibility for t...

Today’s episode is about 'hit and run' CPD, which Femi and Matt approach with an attitude of constructive criticism and attempting to offer a vision of positive alternatives.   'Hit and run' CPD is really just any so called ‘training’ which is a singular, stand-alone event, with no follow up.  All too often these sessions will involve all staff in the hall, with no attempt to e...

Today's episode starts with Matt and Femi chatting about Femi’s observations of coaches at his 6 year old's summer tennis camp, which turns out to be a fascinating lens through which to discuss the characteristics of great teachers as it is all about the ‘how’ of what is being done, and not the ‘what’ – which is so often the focus of discussions in teaching. They discuss the critical imp...

In this episode of the podcast Femi and Matt share their thoughts on four different topics selected from X (formerly twitter): 'textbooks', 'locking the toilets', 'group work' and 'moving schools'. They discuss what the ideal textbook looks like, mixed revision, and workbooks.  The pros and cons of locking the toilets during lesson time, mobile phones, and m...

In this episode Femi and Matt discuss Line management!  The duo get into what good practise might look like; things line managers should do and should avoid, regularity of meetings, line management as a partnership – so a collaborative process, and approaching line management outside of your specialism with genuine humility and curiosity. They discuss the importance of looking at material in advan...

In this episode of the podcast Femi and Matt discuss the ideas of Mastery and 'Conceptual Understanding' in teaching and learning.  The conversation covers: -          Mastery -          Layers of understanding -          A pragmatic definition of understanding -          Common issues in the classroom -          ‘rich’ activities vs repetition -          Chunking and isolating skills - ...

Welcome to this bonus episode of the Beyond Good podcast!  The idea here was just to offer a little insight into what goes on behind the scenes at Beyond Good HQ in a very casual chat between Matt and Femi.  They share reflections on how the podcast has evolved, a few thoughts on Edutwitter, discuss Matt's view that we don’t need any more 'maps of the territory'; and talk about teac...

In today’s podcast Femi and Matt discuss Wellbeing.   After making the important distinction between wellbeing and workload they discuss -          Attitudes to work -          Being present – finding engagement with the task at hand -          Meditation -          Spiritual practice and gratitude -          The effects of being asked to do meaningless or supercilious work -          Socialising...

In today’s podcast Matt and Femi discuss two main topics which are 'setting', and 'de-escalation'. In both cases the points raised should be of interest to colleagues from all subjects. In the long-overdue chat on setting the duo touch on streaming vs mixed attainment; some reasons why different approaches might be more or less suited to different contexts; Why year 7 is not ‘t...

In today’s podcast Femi and Matt dissect the recently published findings of the DFE national behaviour survey.  This is another conversation which is not at all subject-specific and should be of interest to all colleagues. In this episode the duo discuss the challenges with collecting and reporting the data; the student perspective; the gap between what leaders are saying and what teachers and stu...

Today Femi and Matt discuss teacher effectiveness vs years of service and some issues with the word ‘ experience’ which is generally used as a proxy for competence .  As is increasingly the case the discussion is pertinent to all subjects and is not by any means maths-specific.  There’s a lot of thinking out loud here and, unusually(!), the boys actually managed to land some insight and conclusion...

In this episode Matt and Femi dig into the dilemma that is ‘homework’!  Reflecting on their experiences over the years they ask; how effective is it (academically)?, weigh the costs and benefits, and highlight the demands on teachers.  They discuss the different approaches to homework they have tried over the years, the problems each approach threw up and the strategies used to overcome them.  The...

Today Femi and Matt discuss their approaches to handling complaints.  None of this is specific to maths and so the conversation should be relevent for colleagues from a wide range of backgrounds.   The pair talk about  - Receiving complaints well - Prioritising responding to parents and acting promptly - The importance for people of simply being heard - The pros and cons of different approaches to...

Today Femi and Matt discuss an article by Dylan Wiliam titled ‘Teacher Quality: why it matters, and how to get more of it’.  In addition to this central theme the pair touch on the failures of policy initiatives to raise standards, teacher learning communities, considerations of the alignment of personal professional development with the school priorities, the learning cycle of teacher improvement...

Matt and Femi are in a pensive mood for a  thought-provoking discussion on CPD.  They discuss the good and bad of inset days, utilising skilled practioners to model and share expertise, team building, sequencing and differentiation in professional development, ‘hit and run’ CPD vs sustained behavioural change, coaching and culture, Jim Knight and the Impact Cycle, video, email, the tremendous impo...

In this episode of Beyond Good Tom Bennett joins Matt and Femi to discuss all things schools and behaviour. Tom Bennett began teaching in the East End of London, and is currently the Director and founder of researchEd and a Teacher Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge.  From 2008-2016 he wrote a weekly column for the TES and TES online, and is the author of four books on teacher-training, b...

In this week’s episode, Matt and Femi discuss a comment made by Adam Boxer –that the most common issue he sees in classrooms he has visited is that students are simply not properly paying attention to the teacher. This is another conversation that will be relevent to teachers of all subjects – it is not maths-specific.   The duo talk about why this is a problem and how it makes teaching harder, wh...

In this episode Matt and Femi discuss Ofsted.  What is on offer is not a position on Ofsted, it is simply a balanced discussion limited to the perspective of class teachers and middle leaders.  There is no subject-specificity to this one, so hopefully educators of all stripes will find this useful. The discussion took in some of the following features of the landscape: Ofsted preparation and the b...

in today’s episode Femi and Matt discuss centrally planned lessons.  Their discussion extends to the various forms of lesson resources such as starters, practise materials, and mixed revision as well as teaching examples.  They talk about workload, modelling, the use of different media, meeting the needs of the students sat in front of you, the effects on pedagogy and teacher development, the util...

In this episode of the podcast Femi and Matt discuss the broad ranging, but critical, topic of 'checking for understanding'.  The discussion covers the various time-scales at which teachers might check for understanding; from moment to moment through the lesson all the way up to termly tests, and they discuss a variety of strategies that teachers use to check for understanding and debate...

In this episode Femi and Matt speak to Rachael Southern who they asked to come on the show after learning about her fascinating and inspiring story:  Rachael has recently returned to teaching after nearly a decade out pursuing a successful career in corporate law in the city. Not only is Rachael’s journey a fascinating one, but she is in a fairly unique position to share her observations and insig...

This episode begins with some further thoughts on department development plans - following on from episode 15 on that topic.   Matt and Femi talk about defining what processes will be running in the department rather than trying to describe a particular endpoint and also incorporating teacher’s career ambitions into departmental development plans. They then posit that teachers are the most importa...