Ideas, Practices & Personal Insights

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Cyber-bullying in schools: Who will guard the guards?

Given the importance of teachers being secure in their working lives, it’s vital that schools take into account the effect of social media and technology. Elliot Simmonds of VoicED examines how teachers can take care of themselves in a digital world. We have covered cyber-bullying a lot on the our blog recently, along with other technology-influenced issues such as ‘sexting’ and the specific impact on SEN students. However, two ...

Who's responsible for education innovation: teachers or suppliers?

After Rory Gallagher’s recent piece on the meaning of education-innovation, Nicole Ponsford looks at the current state of affairs between schools and suppliers, and how both parties can work together for exciting progress. With a background in marketing preceding my time in schools, I find this question of great interest. Schools and business are in the marketing game – schools to illustrate and celebrate the hard work and success of ...

What kind of Twitter animal are you?

One pleasing outcome of Innovate My School’s ‘30 great British education-innovators to follow on Twitter’ article was that it got some of our followers talking about the use of Twitter by educators. Sue Dixon of Thinking Child is particularly interested in the different kind of tweeters that education offers. While it’s a humorous topic, it’s interesting to examine the different characters to whom we’re all now accustomed. ...

Judgement without action is thinking without doing

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.

How to develop an effective e-safety policy

How can a school safely and simply go about creating a solid e-safety policy? Expert Alan Mackenzie, the man behind Esafety Adviser, explains how to have a policy that is strong, clear and not overly-complicated. Nobody enjoys writing, reviewing or reading policies, but it is a necessary evil. The e-Safety Policy is important in school for a number of reasons, including:

Great tips on innovative ways to teach film

Given that most people enjoy watching movies, it’s often tempting to just ‘put on’ a film. However, while the age of pupils will restrict screening opportunities (Junior schools will likely continue to miss out on Goodfellas), there are still a huge amount of films that students can really sink their teeth into. What is the moral subtext of The Iron Giant? What can Casablanca tell us about narrative? Trained ...

What will the classroom of 2017 look like?

Given that huge innovations are being made in edtech each week, it’s exciting to speculate on what devices the average British school will be using in a few years. Dominic Norrish, Group Director for Technology at United Learning, looks at what developments are likely to take place, making three main predictions. If you are looking for a quick way to destroy your credibility and give people an additional opportunity ...

What is innovation? The current relationship between educators and technologies

What is innovation, exactly? Teacher of French and Japanese Rory Gallagher discusses how teachers and companies affect education-innovation. We are already 14 years into the 21st century, and most of us are just catching up with existing technology – like the internet, social media, touchscreens, digital files etc. We are starting to discover the applications of these inventions in our lives, and realising which are the important innovations, which are simply gimmicks, ...

Inspiring international pupils in The Hague with paintings and music

I have recently returned from Junior School Leidschenveen, the British school in the Netherlands. It is an international school with a huge diversity of children from all over the world, and has an incredibly creative ethos. Myself and my colleague Laura Brown have had the pleasure of running 3 one week long creative projects over the last 18 months. The most recent demonstrated a core belief of mine: Real learning needs to ...

1:1 in the wild: Using tablets in outdoor education

Mobile learning devices are great for classroom use, but to get the most out of them, lots of educators believe in taking tablets outside. With British weather now entertaining the idea of being pleasant, teacher and outdoor learning-expert Juliet Robertson gives her thoughts on how best to get the most out of this field. The idea of using digital technology outdoors continues to produce an interesting array of feelings from ...

Learning to walk as a digital strategist

Jane Basnett has written articles previously on how she’d go about implementing digital strategist position. In her third article on the subject, she discusses how to best get the position rolling effectively. So what next in my hypothetical journey as a school's digital strategist? As a school we are beginning to embrace our TeachMeets and increasingly more staff are beginning to contribute to the meetings. The time slots have ...

Top tips for helping dyslexic students revise for exams

It’s evident that being a sufferer of dyslexia can mean taking on a huge amount of hard work, particularly when it comes to revising for exams. That’s why it’s important for teachers of dyslexic students to be well prepared to help with learning needs. With this in mind, Glasgow teacher David Imrie gives his best advice on the matter. With GCSEs starting in May, it’s important ...