Oh Martin, how lovely to hear your voice through this passage. I can honestly say that the penny only dropped for me, when I worked so closely with you and Ann. It made me completely review all I had done and was doing in both leadership and school development. It also made the teaching and learning seem more ‘real’. So excited to read your next pieces! Great idea and great forum! ❤️
Lovely to hear from you. You - and your joyous skeptism (one of the best qualities, in my view) - were so important in helping frame everything that is going to appearing all of these posts, as was the experience of examining it all through the lens of what we actually saw happening in real classrooms. I'm looking forward to more joyous skepticism from you!
Hi Martin, you know what I am going to say...the penny dropped for me when we started to work together a few years ago :) as an educator and leader...it all started to make sense! I have been waiting for this 'book' for so long and super excited that it is here in a creative and interactive way. Very happy to be part of this journey... and revisiting learning as the hedgehog concept!
Hi Martin, enjoyed it and good to see some of your expereinces in writing. As you know I love feedback both ways. My main observation ( in my view...if you want to capture readers) is can you leave this on more of a cliff hanger, what we will get that is different to other books and can this excite the reader. I see the bullets at the end but could this be a USP to other books/passages out there!
As someone who has not been a parent, school governor or worked in education, I'm especially looking forward to discovering how your valuable insights can apply to non-educational settings too.
Hi. I really hope it will. Given that learning goes on in every place I think that these posts should be transferable. I'm really interested to know the extent to which they do transfer or what needs to be done to help them transfer.
Oh my. That would be amazing. But how could we make this work; there's going to lots of it. Perhaps if I put each post through Google translate and you review that version? Let me know what you think. Despite three years of learning, I'm pretty sure my Duolingo Spanish isn't going to cut it. M
"It took me five years and one more school before, on a cold day in an oil-fired overheated classroom during another February when I looked up at my class, the penny dropped."
I hope that story is coming! This is fantastic - love the conversational tone. Excited to come along on this journey.
Great to hear the Skelton 'voice' again - thoughts in the great tradition of Ted Wragg, and something to keep us on our toes! Always needed and much appreciated.
Hi. Thanks so much. Really appreciate it. (Not everyone, especially in my own house, is as pleased to hear the voice again!) Hope all is as good as possible.
I hope you were better by the time you were my head teacher!
Regarding John's point about a definition, I always liked yours, 'Getting better at the things that matter.' When I rewrote the IEYC dimensions (which have not yet been released, I think), myself and the CSC really focused on creating statements to scaffold learning-focused dialogue. I thought they were pretty good, time will tell! 😁
Good read, Martin, thanks! Lookingg forward to the next.
Thanks! Was definitely better by the time I arrived at CH but still learning. I learned so much at CH every day, in every which way. Good wishes to everyone. M
Really enjoyed this read . You are correct that there still isn’t enough focus on learning, particularly in the UK system. Learning should be the main thing that teachers, children , parents and school leaders talk about ; but it isn’t. In my experience not many teachers can give you their definition of what learning actually is and even fewer schools have had a discussion to reach a collective view for their school on what learning is backed up by evidence. So if the ‘main thing is learning’ how do we get that message out there?
Thanks, John. I've already amended Post 2 to include your last sentence and question. Exactly why I love Substack and what I hope will happen all the time. Martin
Nice to reconnect in this way - I miss hearing your thoughts on learning!
Oh Martin, how lovely to hear your voice through this passage. I can honestly say that the penny only dropped for me, when I worked so closely with you and Ann. It made me completely review all I had done and was doing in both leadership and school development. It also made the teaching and learning seem more ‘real’. So excited to read your next pieces! Great idea and great forum! ❤️
Emma
Lovely to hear from you. You - and your joyous skeptism (one of the best qualities, in my view) - were so important in helping frame everything that is going to appearing all of these posts, as was the experience of examining it all through the lens of what we actually saw happening in real classrooms. I'm looking forward to more joyous skepticism from you!
Hi Martin, you know what I am going to say...the penny dropped for me when we started to work together a few years ago :) as an educator and leader...it all started to make sense! I have been waiting for this 'book' for so long and super excited that it is here in a creative and interactive way. Very happy to be part of this journey... and revisiting learning as the hedgehog concept!
Thanks Susana, as ever. It's very exciting to try and make coherent everything we did and talked through together. M
Hi Martin, enjoyed it and good to see some of your expereinces in writing. As you know I love feedback both ways. My main observation ( in my view...if you want to capture readers) is can you leave this on more of a cliff hanger, what we will get that is different to other books and can this excite the reader. I see the bullets at the end but could this be a USP to other books/passages out there!
Thanks so much! Let me know whether the next one - due to drop in a couple of hours - is better. Really appreciate it. M
Chapeau, Martin!
As someone who has not been a parent, school governor or worked in education, I'm especially looking forward to discovering how your valuable insights can apply to non-educational settings too.
Thanks. Interestingly, Simon Harrison has written a note from what appears to be a non-educational perspective. I agree with his key point.
Hi. I really hope it will. Given that learning goes on in every place I think that these posts should be transferable. I'm really interested to know the extent to which they do transfer or what needs to be done to help them transfer.
Glad to be a part of this journey with you Martin, and the rest!.
Thanks. All lemon squeezing very welcome. M
Thank you for sharing! I’d love to help translate this to Spanish if you are open to it.
Oh my. That would be amazing. But how could we make this work; there's going to lots of it. Perhaps if I put each post through Google translate and you review that version? Let me know what you think. Despite three years of learning, I'm pretty sure my Duolingo Spanish isn't going to cut it. M
"It took me five years and one more school before, on a cold day in an oil-fired overheated classroom during another February when I looked up at my class, the penny dropped."
I hope that story is coming! This is fantastic - love the conversational tone. Excited to come along on this journey.
Great to hear the Skelton 'voice' again - thoughts in the great tradition of Ted Wragg, and something to keep us on our toes! Always needed and much appreciated.
Best wishes,
Andy
Hi. Thanks so much. Really appreciate it. (Not everyone, especially in my own house, is as pleased to hear the voice again!) Hope all is as good as possible.
All good with us, Martin. Busy one way and another! Not sure if you have seen International Teacher Magazine which we publish. The February edition has just come out - https://consiliumeducation.com/itm/2024/01/25/february-2024/
Might I tempt you further to write a distillation of your Substack column for ITM?
All best wishes,
Andy
PS Gillingham frustratingly inconsistent - as ever!
Hi Andrew. Thanks, again. I would happily write something for you. Do you have a word length that I can work to?
Can you drop me a line to ahomden@consiliumeducation.com, Martin, and I will send on the editorial guidelines. About 850 - 1,000 words is ideal.
Andy
I hope you were better by the time you were my head teacher!
Regarding John's point about a definition, I always liked yours, 'Getting better at the things that matter.' When I rewrote the IEYC dimensions (which have not yet been released, I think), myself and the CSC really focused on creating statements to scaffold learning-focused dialogue. I thought they were pretty good, time will tell! 😁
Good read, Martin, thanks! Lookingg forward to the next.
Thanks! Was definitely better by the time I arrived at CH but still learning. I learned so much at CH every day, in every which way. Good wishes to everyone. M
Really enjoyed this read . You are correct that there still isn’t enough focus on learning, particularly in the UK system. Learning should be the main thing that teachers, children , parents and school leaders talk about ; but it isn’t. In my experience not many teachers can give you their definition of what learning actually is and even fewer schools have had a discussion to reach a collective view for their school on what learning is backed up by evidence. So if the ‘main thing is learning’ how do we get that message out there?
Thanks, John. I've already amended Post 2 to include your last sentence and question. Exactly why I love Substack and what I hope will happen all the time. Martin
Looking forward to reading the rest!
Thanks. There’s so much to come.