#OnlyLearning

Amidst a very busy week, I really benefitted from listening to Martin I. Jones, Dr Jonpaul Nevin and Nathalie Pattyn (via the Optimising Human Performance podcast) discuss how good training programmes build both #robustness (how long it takes to knock you down) and #resilience (how quickly you get back up after you are knocked down).  We often discuss teacher resilience, especially in Initial Teacher Education (#ITE), but we perhaps don't talk as much about the need for robustness. A particularly difficult criteria to identify during the application and interview process. With Student Teachers currently on placement in schools, Nathalie's comments that screening and interviewing can only accomplish so much, was a great reminder of one of the core strengths of the #PGDE school experience module: the chance for qualified teachers to scrutinise the #values and #character of a student teacher before we potentially accept them into the profession (à la the GTC Scotland standards) If...

Dr. Steve Munby's advice to School Leaders and Senior Leaders when asked, "How can we change the system?" has lived rent-free in my head for over three years because of the power of the embodied sentiment: "Don't try and think you can change the whole system, but you can operate within your sphere of influence. Some fundamental things... believe and behave that children's learning in other schools is as important as children's learning in your own school. And once you really accept that we're here to enable all children to be powerful learners, not just the ones that happen to be in our school - that's a fundamental shift in approach. It means, when a school down the road is struggling, you don't say "Oh great! The parents will send their children to my school". You pick up the phone and say, "How can I help?" and "Come and do things together". Because improvement of all schools in the area - and the learnin...