DISCIPLINE MATTERS!

We have been working on the Cutlers' 'Made in Sheffield' programme for over three years and we are clearer now than ever, that these are the skills you need to be successful and that at the heart of success is discipline and particularly self-discipline. 

COLLABORATION MATTERS!

We know what works, from the Sutton Trust and EEF toolkits, EPPI studies, John Hattie, Michael Fullan and Andy Hargreaves, and importantly we know what doesn’t work! 

EMPLOYERS SAY THAT SKILLS MATTER!

Employers continue to argue that we can only realise and release the potential of our children and young people if they are better prepared for life and work in the twenty first century. In recent years we have made considerable progress in raising standards and in improving the educational attainment of our children and young people, but the pace of change remains insufficient and the focus on skills has been limited.

HAPPY SUNDAY!

THIS WEEKEND... KEEP IT SIMPLE!

Why is there is so much negativity, criticism and unpleasantness around. Education, schools, teachers and colleagues, some working in some of the most challenging contexts, are constantly criticised in the media, by OFSTED and by the DfE. We need to change the culture surrounding education and learning to create a more positive, reflective and supportive framework and critically we all need a rule book to help us live our lives. Interestingly, I re-read Dale Carnegie’s “How to Win Friends and Influence People” recently. It’s a great book, first published in 1937, and things don’t get any clearer than this:

SKILLS FOR LIFE AND WORK MATTER!

This review by the early Intervention Foundation looks at the evidence of links between social and emotional skills in children and how they fare as adults. It find that there are many programmes across the UK that have set out to improve social and emotional skills; we also find that some of them have rigorous evidence to prove their effectiveness, and that many do not.

THE CHARACTERISTICS OF SUCCESS!

Over the last twenty years I have seen so many extraordinary places and learned so much about success and achievement. It seems to me that successful organisations, successful schools and successful teams, all have the following characteristics...

HARD TIMES AND TOUGH ISSUES REQUIRE BOLD, BIG AND BRILLIANT SOLUTIONS!!

Whether it is care for the elderly, unemployment in young people, concerns about special educational needs and inclusion or the underachievement of looked after children; hard times and tough issues require bold, big and brilliant solutions... anything to shake things upand challenge the status quo. 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.

IT'S NATIONAL WOMEN IN ENGINEERING DAY!

  The aim is to celebrate the work that women do in engineering, and to showcase the great engineering careers that are available for girls.

LEADERSHIP MATTERS!

It's a struggle to recruit and retain leaders in many organisations and the lack of leadership skills means that we are finding it harder and harder to fill headships. The challenge of course is that leadership demands a very different set of skills to management so the really strong and highly effective managers don't have the skills needed to lead, shape and drive culture and practice.

PLEASE READ THIS: WHAT WORKS BEST IN EDUCATION: THE POLITICS OF COLLABORATIVE EXPERTISE

In the previous paper, 'What Doesn’t Work in Education: The Politics of Distraction', John Hattie argued that the aim of schooling is for every student to gain at least a year’s worth of learning for a year’s input. He further argued that many policy-makers and systems are persistently drawn to the wrong kind of education interventions – distractions that do not help us realise this ambitious aim. Hattie argues here that we need instead is a defensible and compelling narrative that leads to long-term, coherent and focused system-wide attention on student learning. He calls this territory ‘the politics of collaborative expertise’. Its premise is that there is differential expertise across our schooling system and that there can be wide variation within schools. At the same time, there is a remarkable spread of expertise that can be identified, nurtured, esteemed and brought together to reduce this variance. The aim of this paper is to begin describing what a model of collaborative expertise would look like and what we need to get done to make it a reality. 

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!

READ THIS: 'WHAT DOESN'T WORK IN EDUCATION: THE POLITICS OF DISTRACTION'

This report is the first of two linked papers by John Hattie on what doesn’t work in education, and then on what does. In this paper he describes the confused jargon and narratives that distract us from the most ambitious and vital aim of schooling: for every student to gain at least a year’s growth for a year’s input. He outlines the policy responses commonly used by systems aspiring to be in the world’s ‘top five’ for education and argues that these responses are ‘fixes’ that fail to address the important questions, and so are unlikely to make a difference, despite costing many billions of dollars. Such responses are part of what Hattie calls the ‘politics of distraction’.

EVIDENCE-BASED APPROACHES NEEDED!

It's strange how every great organisation, every great school and every great teacher asks themselves constantly...we all want answers to these questions...

• Is what we are doing working?
• Are we making a real difference?
• What else can we do? 
• What could we do differently?
• What can we learn from other people?
• What can we learn from other places? 

HAPPY SUNDAY... HOPE YOU HAVE A GREAT DAY!

To see a world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wild flower.

Hold infinity in the palms of your hand and eternity in an hour. 

William Blake

REMEMBER TO START EARLY!

As with most things in life, the earlier we start to learn the easier it is to succeed. 

FIVE STEPS TO RELEASE THE MAGIC!

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!

CULTURE BEATS STRATEGY EVERY TIME!

I am not sure why it is but a lifetime of working with schools has shown me time and time again, that culture beats strategy every time!

'RELEASING THE MAGIC' VISITORS THIS WEEK!

It's great to know that people all over the world still follow the blog...

Thank you for showing an interest!

THERE ARE NO SUPER-HEROES!

In a world where OFSTED strikes fear into the hearts of headteachers and teachers it is important to remember that the current short-term, quick fix interventionist approach led by super-heroes might have it's appeal but it doesn't work.

SKILLS MATTER!

We need to persuade the powers that be that the future is only going to be secured if we develop a 21st Century Learning Framework to drive our learning landscape. A framework built on 21st Century skills as well as subjects.

THINK TEAM!

I have visited some great schools over the last few years and each visit makes me realise that leadership, teaching and teamwork are what matters.

A PASSPORT TO EMPLOYMENT!

How do we equip our young people with what they will need to thrive and succeed in a world of work where the landscape is changing so rapidly that many if not most of the jobs they will be doing are new or haven't been invented yet!

HAPPY SUNDAY... HOPE THE SUN SHINES WHEREVER YOU ARE!

BETTER TOGETHER!

Striving for excellence and building world class provision is important

and requires us all to think team.

SCHOOL ACCOUNTABILITY - A BETTER WAY!

It is increasingly obvious that the current OFSTED inspection approach is toxic and not fit for purpose. I have argued for a long time that we need learning leadership, beautiful systems and intelligent accountability and, in this DEMOS report, James Park argues that we need a new model of accountability which would allow all children to achieve their potential, while ensuring the quality of education in schools is of a high standard.

IF OFSTED IS THE ANSWER, WE ARE ASKING THE WRONG QUESTION!

The danger, for schools in a simplistic and graded world where OFSTED rules, is that the model doesn't even come close to capturing the dynamic, organic and complex reality of any school and that there simply aren't the people talking about school improvement and developing and sharing a coherent vision for learning!

PLEASE SPONSOR ME IF YOU CAN!

I'm taking part in the Jane Tomlinson York 10K 2015 on 02/08/2015 to raise money for The Candlelighters Trust and I'd really appreciate your support. 

SHEFFIELD UTC

I visited the Sheffield University Technical College again yesterday afternoon. I was there, with my colleague Mike Garnock-Jones, to meet Nick Crew, Principal, and Brigidin Crowther, Assistant Principal, and talk to them about how the UTC might get involved in the Cutlers' "Better Learners, Better Workers' programme.

WESTFIELD SCHOOL AGAIN!

I visited Westfield Sports College in Sheffield again yesterday morning to see Andy Ireland, the headteacher, and Gary Simmons, the deputy head teacher to talk about the progress they were making and how we could continue to develop the Cutlers' 'Better Learners, Better Workers' programme.