Teaching Together

As the year comes to a close, join us as we craft some adorable clay fridge magnets for Grayce's kindy students and and spend some time reflecting on her first year as a teacher. We also dive into the festive season with a lighthearted discussion about Christmas gifts—teacher presents, thoughtful gestures for colleagues, and ideas for managing the gift budget. It's a little different to our usual...

In this special episode, we chat with one of our friends, Hannah, about the ups and downs of her first few years as a teacher. Together, we reflect on first-year challenges, favourite teaching moments and the lessons that come with more time and experience in the classroom. Hannah shares her journey to obtaining approval to teach in the NSW Department and the importance of working together with yo...

Today's second Recess Digest episode continues exploring some more of the "Habits of Mind" - Metacognition, Flexible Thinking and Questioning. We feel that these dispositions are all really closely related and that fostering them in your classrooms doesn't happen without intentional planning and purpose. Listen in for some ideas and strategies to develop routines and habits in your classroom that...

In today's (slightly longer than usual) episode, we’re breaking down key strategies from the ' Great Teaching Toolkit ' to help you promote deeper learning and critical thinking in your classroom. We guide you through six core elements—Structuring, Explaining, Questioning, Interacting, Embedding, and Activating—giving you practical tips and examples that you can start using right away. You’ll lear...

In today's episode, we’re here to help you feel more confident and prepared for your teaching placements. From packing your teacher-bag to managing lesson timing and taking care of your voice, we’ll share practical tips that make a big difference. Whether you are heading out on your first or final placement, this episode episode is packed with essentials to guide you through. Helpful Links 💡 Voic...

Imagine this. You have spent all weekend writing detailed feedback comments all over your students' assessment tasks, only to have them look at their score and throw the rest of the paper away. Sound painful? Join us today as we explore the powerful impact feedback can have in your classroom and how you can make feedback more effective for you and your students without adding to your workload. Thi...

Welcome to the very first of our Recess Digest episodes, where we aim to bring you quick ideas and helpful insights in the time it would take for you to eat your recess! Today we dive into two "Habits of Mind" that are essential for both students and teachers: persisting and managing impulsivity. These are skills that not only help in academic success but also support emotional intelligence and lo...

The 3 R's - Reading, Writing and Arithmetic - are probably more commonly referred to these days as literacy & numeracy. We know, as teachers, that these facets of learning are essential and need to be integrated across all curriculum areas, but that is easier said than done! The release of the National NAPLAN results last week sparked a great deal of conversation in the media around the state...

Most of us would agree that creative thinking is important for our students to develop, but cultivating it and teaching students how to 'think creatively' is not an easy task. Join us today as we unpack some of the latest PISA results assessing creative thinking across the globe and explore some frameworks and structures that you can use in order to better cultivate creative thinking in your stude...

The height of the COVID-19 pandemic was a challenging time for everyone, and an especially unprecedented time for the education sector. If you think you still see and feel the lingering effects of COVID lockdowns ('long-covid' if you will), you are not alone! Join us today for an affirming conversation about the impact of extended periods of online learning on both teachers and students and some p...

Being a teacher means being loads of different things; an educator, an entertainer, a mediator, an event planner, a cheerleader, a detective...the list goes on. A skilled interpreter of legislation is one thing that most of us aren't, (unless you've had a super interesting career change), and is the reason why the NCCD is actually super important and very beneficial. Join us today as we unpack wha...

It would be a terrifying thing to have to count up the number of tears cried, doors slammed, voices raised and detentions served over homework. Most of us know that it holds some value, so why does it cause so much pain and frustration? Grab your favourite cup of tea and tune in as we unpack some of the flaws with typical approaches to homework and share strategies that you can implement to make i...

Join us today for Part 2 of our discussion about the GTPA. This episode, we unpack Practice 3, 4 & 5, as we share some examples of layout, evidence and of course some laughter along the way!

Join us today as we shine a light on the Graduate Teacher Performance Assessment (GTPA) both for pre-service teachers undertaking it, and for teachers who might be supporting pre-service teachers through this daunting process. This is Part 1 of a two-part series where we chat about some of our GTPA experience and top tips, as well as giving you an overview of the GTPA as a whole. In this episode,...

As educators, we're constantly seeking ways to enhance our teaching practices and empower our students. Rapid advancements in technology has changed much about the way that we teach and has required us to be adaptable flexible in how we approach learning and the digital world. In this discussion, we unpack what current research has to say about how teachers are feeling about AI in schools and addr...

Welcome to the Learning Lounge! Today, Sierra has the pleasure of sitting down with Dr. Shyam Barr, a passionate educator and educational consultant who specialises in supporting learners of all ages to develop their skillset of self-regulated learning. Join us today for an informative conversation about what self-regulated learning is and why and we should teach it, as well as how to implement so...

Well it's been a long 11 weeks but we have FINALLY made it through Term One, which is especially exciting for Grayce who has slayed her way through her first full-time term as a classroom teacher! Join us today as we reflect on what we have loved and learnt this term, discussing everything from parent-teacher interviews and imposter syndrome, to the joy of students' lightbulb moments, holiday plan...

We've all had this moment. You look up at your classroom door, at the beginning of a lesson, only to see an unexpected face, and all the error messages start going off inside your brain. You have a Teaching Assistant scheduled to you today. They have arrived with a smile. It should bring some relief, but you have an overwhelming sense of dread and frustration because you didn't know or your forgot...

In a digital age where the line between home and work is becoming increasingly blurry, how do we stop emails from infiltrating our time and zapping all of our energy? Join us today for a discussion about the pros and cons associated with email and some strategies that schools and teachers can implement to help reduce workload and stress for teachers. Recording this as PD? Here are the relevant Aus...

There's a lot of conversation in the teaching world at the moment about the amount of time it takes for us to get through everything on our to-do lists. Today we discuss the importance of good time management for experiencing job satisfaction and share some tools and strategies for improving time management and building good habits into our admin time and planning periods. Recording this as PD? He...

In a study conducted on teacher expectations during the 1960s, two teachers received their class lists for the year which included student IQ results. BUT, on one of those lists, the IQ 'results' were actually just the students' locker numbers. At the end of the year, the students who were listed as having a high IQ performed much better than those who were listed as having a low IQ. What's amazin...

Most of us are creatures of habit, and we all know the power of a good routine, whether inside or outside of the classroom. Today we are unpacking a little bit of the science behind routines and their power to help our students (and us) engage more easily with learning. We also introduce some of our favourite thinking routines and Sierra shares some glows and grows she has had with routines in her...

Classrooms can be fun to set up at the start of the year, but snazzy decor and colour coordination are not the only things - or even the first things - that we should be planning for in our classrooms. Today we are busting the expectations around having a picture-perfect classroom, as well as unpacking some helpful questions that can guide us when creating positive AND pretty learning environments...

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