pequeño jardín interior” pp. 252
1.15. LOS JARDINES DE KIOTO
“The teaching is exactly right in tone.”
Display a bar chart or a graph and create a huge arrow with a message emblazoned across it saying ‘This lesson is pitched here.’
Pitch, in a musical sense, is the degree of height or depth of a tone or sound. The sound produced can sometimes go wrong, it can be flat or sharp. This is quite often the case in teaching too. We can get it wrong and pitch the learning too low (the lesson is boring) or too high (it becomes frustrating). Think about the following points when planning your lessons to become pitch perfect.
Pitch perfect planning:
1 Do you have access to the latest classroom data?
2 Do you have access to all student support plans, statements and reports?
3 What information will you use for this lesson? Which information will you ignore? 4 What are the success criteria for high and
low ability students?
5 What is Plan B if Plan A fails? Which parts of each plan are imaginative?
Analysis of pitch:
1 Were all the students engaged? Were there any low-level behavioural events?
2 Did all your students complete the work set? 3 Did troublesome Michelle Know-It-All
remain engaged and make progress? Was it ‘rapid progress’?
4 How did you monitor the extension activities set for Nafisa Stops-When-I’m-Not-Looking? 5 Which techniques worked well? What else
could you do if you had more time?
Encourage students to vote for the lesson’s degree of difficulty. This could be adapted in light of cold winters and hot summer afternoons. Of course, your planning and subject knowledge will ensure that nothing is lost and you simply call their bluff!
Taking it further
Display three versions of class activity and spin the arrow to select what version is taught!
Bonus idea
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IDEA 35
What? Me?!
“Outstanding lessons demand that expectations are consistently high.”
Rather than shouting, walk over and sit down next to the student and speak on their level.
Does this sound familiar? You call out Bryan Swagger-By-Style’s name. He jolts upright, looks at you baffled; he turns his head to a friend and then looks back at you, lifting his palms to the air and raising his arms aloft, he exclaims ‘What? Me?! It wasn’t me!’ Now, I’m sure we’ve all seen this in action in our classrooms when our expectations are so high that even the best of our students can be caught off-guard in the most testing situations. Delivering high-pitched, dour or didactic lessons can leave students yearning for freedom. These lessons cannot be avoided during coursework, revision and assessment periods, or when you are just not up for a jazz hands lesson and really need to just get your students to knuckle down.
‘What? Me?!’ stems from those of you who want to teach consistently outstanding lessons and grow frustrated with students who show that slightest ebb of focus in a lesson. If you do encounter the ‘What? Me?!’ in you lesson, then here is what to do:
1 Share your expectations. Encourage your expectations to be pooled by the class. 2 Double check that these expectations are
sensible, achievable and realistic. 3 Make the class own these expectations.
Avoid the word ‘rules’ at all costs. Ask yourself why a
‘What? Me?!’ would be exclaimed in your lessons. Do you need to rethink engagement and lesson activity?
Teaching tip
Avoid the cross- classroom
conversation when a ‘What? Me?!’ remark is heard. Quell other students becoming involved, by walking over to the student and sitting down at their level. Rebuke any outbursts with very quiet and calm conversations about expectations and current classwork to be completed. Bonus idea #WhatMe
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IDEA 36
Be vigilant!
“If you popped in to observe your own child in a classroom, what would you hope to see?”
Make a list and carefully examine the relevance and effectiveness of your interventions.
Intervention relates to use of support in and out of the classroom. It might be deploying TAs effectively; using a range of differentiation strategies; or focusing on the use of literacy and numeracy to support learning. Whatever the case may be, your interventions have to be relevant and must enable progress. For example, how does the teaching of keywords enable all students to improve their learning? The 2012 Ofsted report reminds us that intervention and support must be ‘appropriate and have notable impact’. An outstanding teacher must be vigilant to meet this challenge and ensure that they can provide evidence of learning and progress over time. How do you ensure your interventions have notable impact?
1 Do you consciously know what your interventions are and why they are needed? 2 Do you monitor, evaluate and review the
resources that you provide? What impact do they make? When is the best time to review them?
3 Do you ask your students for their opinions about the interventions you provide? Do you ask your students’ parents?
4 How much do you plan your interventions? 5 How do you decide who needs an
intervention? How often do they happen?
To be vigilant requires an astute mind but not a great deal of time. By using the questions opposite, you will guarantee that each of the intervention strategies that you deploy are systematically evaluated for the benefit of your students.
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IDEA 37
Incite
“What did your parents really think about you as a child?”
Sharing your own achievements, difficulties, hopes and dreams can build and reinforce your relationships with your students and encourage and motivate them to achieve.
Every teacher has their own history and their own circumstances. ‘Incite’ is designed to foster relationships in the classroom. Relationships between students and teachers need to be cultivated in order to work through issues that might affect attendance, behaviour, attitudes to learning and ability.
Students are not interested in a show off; nor are they interested in your sob stories. But, as time gradually passes by and relationships flounder or grow, a natural opportunity will arise to offer students your words of wisdom. These may include some ‘show off’ stories, as well as those that would make us feel more grateful, or others that would have your class crying with laughter. Incite is your life story used to encourage and motivate your students. Consider sharing the following:
1 Describe your school behaviour.
2 Talk about a time when you let your parents down.
3 Consider sharing parts of a bereavement, an emergency or another major event.
4 Share your dreams. Even if you teach until you’re 68, what will you do next?
5 Talk about a chore that you have found difficult, maybe paying the utility bills, finding a job, planning a family celebration. 6 Share a heart-to-heart about how you dealt
with problems in your worst school subjects. When sharing stories with
your students always uphold public trust in the profession and maintain high standards of ethics and behaviour. Always be professional.
Teaching tip
If the students have worked hard, and it’s the end of the week, share your favourite joke!
Taking it further
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