How many times in a week do you tell children to “stop” doing something? How often do you find yourself in Joyce Grenfell mode: "George, don’t do that"? Or how often do you hear yourself giving a flat “no”? I am trying to make the answers to all those questions zero.

Video can be a powerful instrument for learning, but how to make the most of it? Video innovators Trilby have the ideal system for sharing movies from classroom to classroom.

A South Shields school has adopted an innovative teaching aid in order to inspire its pupils. Stanhope Primary School, who houses up to 210 pupils, has chosen to innovate its school with video-sharing app and online storage service TrilbyTV.

It’s May 2014, and the education world continues to atomise into a bewildering complexity of mini systems, school types and quasi-commercial support. As we begin another run up to a too-close-to-call general election, we education professionals must gird up for the inevitable hectoring. The wind tunnel of derision will blizzard the usual stuff about standards, quality and behaviour at us – it must not blow us off track.

While the beautiful San Diegan weather likely helps, it seems that the key to Kriscia Cabral’s cheerful outlook is fun, innovative teaching practices that really help her students. And what schoolchild doesn’t want to write on their desk?

Writeable furniture: the concept sounds silly. I agree. Of course, for those who are reading this, we are adults. We have forgotten about the little things in life. We have forgotten about how excited we used to get when we would bang the chalkboard erasers together. I remember being so amazed at my teacher when she used a crazy gadget that created five straight lines in a row with her chalk pieces, all at one time!

About four years ago I started the journey down the path of combination classes. Teaching two grades at one time has inspired me forever, but there was one big lesson I got out of it all.

There are many different schools and theories on how to hone one’s writing technique. To discuss this further, Innovate My School regular Shaun Allison discusses a method developed by his peer Gav McCusker.

[English teacher Gav McCusker] has been developing a writing technique with his students that he refers to as ‘layered writing’. The inspiration for this was from great painters. In order to come up with an excellent piece of art as an end product, they build the painting up in layers. This slowly increases the complexity and depth of the painting with each layer. The following video clip demonstrates this nicely:

So how does the technique work?

Firstly, a discussion with the students about every artist needing a palette, in order to create a painting.

During this discussion, stress the point that the artist, like any craftsman/craftswoman, works carefully and slowly to do this – with concentration, patience and perseverance.