AND FINALLY FOR NOW!

I don't know about you but I need a rest and the time to think, to reflect and to recharge the batteries. So the blog is going quiet now for a few weeks and I'll see you again in September to continue to release the magic!

ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW!

"All I really need to know I learned in kindergarten.
ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW about how to live and what to do
and how to be I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not
at the top of the graduate-school mountain, but there in the
sandpile at Sunday School. 

"Life is too short to wake up in the morning with regrets...

"So love the people who treat you right, forget about the ones who don’t and believe that everything happens for a reason. If you get a chance, take it. If it changes your life, let it. Nobody said that it’d be easy, they just promised it would be worth it." Unknown

After another extraordinary year where I have learnt so much from so many talented people I still passionately believe that the answers to all the problems we face lie in developing learning organisations built on deep research, coaching, learning leadership, beautiful systems, intelligent accountability and the importance of discipline and character.

HAPPY SUNDAY... HAVE A GREAT BANK HOLIDAY MONDAY!

 I can't send you all flowers, here's the next best thing.

ENJOY A REST BUT PLAN FOR THE FUTURE!

It's the end of yet another academic year and I am sitting on another train heading off across the country. Exciting times ahead... especially for those of you heading off on holiday.... but we need to use the Summer to recharge the batteries and reflect, think and learn. Next year will see the pressure increase as we see another wave of new Academies opening alongside even more of Michael Gove's Free Schools. As always the changing landscape provides us all with opportunities as well as challenges.  We must ensure that all our provision continues to improve as we strive to create world class education not for some but for for every child in every community... whatever it takes!
Chris

THINK TEAM!

It's Saturday and I had another hot and sleepless night. And thinking about the challenges and the opportunities we face it's important to remember that we are all part of a team, part of a complex jig-saw puzzle where your piece of the action doesn't exist in isolation but connects to and creates something bigger and more important... a family, a community, a country, one world. I have worked with and been part of some great teams in Sheffield, Leeds, York, North Yorkshire, OFSTED, Wolverhampton, London Borough of Merton and Leicestershire and thinking about teamwork I found this story on the web and thought it might make you smile...

A VISION FOR LEARNING!

And finally we come to the end of another academic year and what a year it has been. Another year where we have faced an onslaught from our friends at OFSTED who are visiting our 'satisfactory schools' and ratcheting up the bar and rightly focusing on leadership, teaching, data, outcomes and progress. At times like this I often ask myself why do we do this and what are we trying to achieve together and I am constantly reminded that we should...

"Devote yourself to loving others,

devote yourself to your community around you,

and devote yourself to creating something 

that gives you purpose and meaning."

Morrie Schwarz

WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO BUILD BRILLIANT?

It has been another great year working in Sheffield, Nottingham and Guernsey and whatever happens next we must continue to tell and share our stories; success stories, learning stories, stories about developing understanding, stories about real people and real places.

A PASSIONATE ENTERPRISE!

Education is a passionate enterprise built on the interaction between human beings: teachers, students and parents. We know that we can't make anyone learn; learners, teachers, headteachers and schools have to be active in their own learning and unless they come to understand their own strengths and weaknesses, and how they might deal with them, they will never make progress.

SOME IMPORTANT LEARNING POINTS!

Spending time with colleagues recently made me think about the challenges we have faced and the difference we have made to children's lives. I have been so incredibly lucky and had some amazing adventures working in Wolverhampton, North Yorkshire, York, Leeds, Nottingham, Sheffield and Guernsey with some simply incredible people.

THIS SATURDAY BUY SOME MARBLES!

It's a glorious sunny Saturday here in York with soaring temperatures and blue skies. In the hurly, burly chaos that is our day to day existence, where we constantly rush from here to there not noticing the important things, we all need to be reminded about the things that really matter. Remember that Saturdays should be special days spent with the people you love and care about.

I found this Saturday story in my night-time searches across cyberspace. It made me stop and think and I thought you might like it...

"Let me tell you something, something that has helped me keep a good perspective on my own priorities." And that's when he began to explain his theory of "a thousand marbles."...

WE CAN ALL MAKE A DIFFERENCE!

I love this story...
"While walking along a beach, a man saw in the distance what looked like a boy dancing....

TOM PETERS 'SEVEN STEPS TO SUSTAINING SUCCESS'!

Here’s the way I like to put it, which I label “Seven Steps to Sustaining Success”:

• You take care of the people.
• The people take care of the service.
• The service takes care of the customer.
• The customer takes care of the profit.
• The profit takes care of the re-investment.
• The re-investment takes care of the re-invention. 
• The re-invention takes care of the future.

(And at every step the only measure is EXCELLENCE.)

The obvious point: Developing people comes first.
It is the “That without which there is nothing ...”

TAKE FIVE STEPS!

If we are really serious about changing the culture and creating a culture of excellence we must incentivise and reward co-operation, teamwork, collaboration, networking and partnering. Here are five steps that help to release the magic!

THE THINGS THAT REALLY MATTER!

This great story reminds us all about the things that really matter...

"A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was...

THESE ARE THE SKILLS THAT MATTER!

Tony Wagner suggests that these are the skills we need to help students develop to equip them for adult life and the world of work:

1. Critical thinking and problem-solving
2. Collaboration across networks and leading by influence
3. Agility and adaptability
4. Initiative and entrepreneurialism
5. Effective oral and written communication
6. Accessing and analyzing information
7. Curiosity and imagination

A CURRICULUM FOR EXCELLENCE!

We need to develop a curriculum for excellence and where best to look but Scotland. The Scottish Government education strategy, and the curriculum frameworks that deliver it, recognise that learning is lifelong, and are designed to help learners develop the skills they need for learning, life and work. The Curriculum for Excellence aims to achieve a transformation in education in Scotland by providing a coherent, more flexible and enriched curriculum from 3 to 18.

FEEDBACK ON "CUTLERS' AMBASSADORS AT THE BLUE SHED!"

Young people need to develop skills, character and knowledge to be equipped for the world of work and I received this wonderful feedback from Deborah Egan who helped us deliver part of the programme this year. It was great to hear such positive comments about the Cutlers' "Made in Sheffield" Ambassadors programme...

HOLD HANDS AND STICK TOGETHER!

Everyone should have this pinned up at work and at home to remind them about the things that really matter and the importance of teamwork!

HAPPY SUNNY SUNDAY

CULTURE MATTERS!

The culture of an organisation is so important and shapes and controls almost everything that happens.

HOW DO YOU EAT AN ELEPHANT?

It's interesting that in so many places people create hugely complex problems so that anyone looking to change things is discouraged by the enormity of the challenges they might face. I am always reminded of the line about how you might eat an elephant... one bite at a time! The real challenge we face is to break problems down into manageable bite-size chunks.

BELIEVE!

People constantly tell me that things are impossible and the more I visit brilliant learning places the more I realise what is possible. These are some of the things I've learned...

SKILLS MATTER!

"The principal goal of education... 

should be creating men and women who are capable of doing new things... 

men and women who are creative, inventive and discoverers."

There seems to me to be a huge contradiction between the freedom and empowerment for headteachers and schools and the command and control mentality the DfE is imposing on schools and particularly primary schools.

SKILLS, CHARACTER AND KNOWLEDGE MATTER!

Research from DfE, OFSTED, OECD, PISA suggests that we need to develop a new approach to learning to create world class outcomes for our children. Everything points to the fact that to help young people achieve and succeed we must recognise that character is at least as important as intelligence and in a conceptual age where we are surrounded by information young people need skills, character and knowledge to succeed!