06.13.10
Posted in Uncategorized tagged blog, Headteacher, heathfieldcps.net, teachmeetBlackpool at 9:15 pm by headteacher
This next few weeks are going to be extremely busy at school. We are just in the process of organising all of our schedules and timetables for next year. Even in a small school such as ours, organising ICT, PE and Hall times is not easy. Some teachers will be changing year groups, Teaching Assistants also have to be allocated to classes and resources and equipment are being audited. Allocating the Teaching Assistant timetable is becoming an increasingly complex activity, we have a wealth of statistical and contextual data from which to draw and it is important that we make the best possible use of our “Human Resources”. How we can ensure that all of our children receive their educational entitlement is a huge priority, so many children have so many “special needs”.
Teachers are also busy writing reports and I have stacks of paper work to complete, The School Profile, the SEF, Governor Reports and evaluation of the School Development Plan (plus a few more bits and pieces).
On Wednesday I have been asked to attend a Teachmeet, this would mean leaving school at 3.30pm in order to drive up to Blackpool. However if I stay at work until 6.00pm as I usually do on a Wednesday I could get lots and lots of paper work done. Paper work is very important and we are all accountable but……
“BUSY IN THE THICK OF COMPLETING VERY THIN TASKS?”
However, if I am truly honest with myself I know that the reason that I don’t want to go to the Teachmeet is because I know that the teachers presenting and attending will make me feel like a dinosaur!!! The technology and the ideas that are being discussed on twitter are so beyond me that I think I will be overwhelmed! How do I understand it all? What if I look dumb? How do I keep up?
More importantly, what if I don’t attend? It’s hard enough keeping up with the children already! Avoidance is not the answer.
So I guess that it is time for me to be very brave and “FACE MY FEARS” – attend Teachmeet at Blackpool and meet all the lovely (and slightly scarily clever) tweeps that I have been talking to for so long…….
Take a deep breath…what is life but a leap of faith after all…….
AFTERTHOUGHT:
I really am such a selfish person. It didn’t occur to me that all of the very clever ICT bods on twitter might actually be nervous about presenting! I am so dumb at times!!
Good luck and thank you to Jan, Colin, Nicola, David and all the other good folk/presenters who are going to be helping me to be better at my job.
THANKS!
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06.10.10
Posted in Uncategorized tagged Bernadette Ballezza, blog, Headteacher, heathfieldcps.net at 2:24 pm by headteacher
Some weeks ago I published a lovely short story written by a lady called Bernadette Ballezza. Today I was absolutely thrilled to get an email from Bernadette, who lives in the USA. I am constantly amazed by the power of blogging and how quickly messages travel from one continent to another. Bernadette has kindly given me permission to share some more of her ideas with you- I wonder how quickly my PLN can share this truly positive message and I wonder how many countries and continents we can influence for the better by just a few well chosen thoughts and comments?
KINDNESS by Bernadette Ballezza
We don’t always have to be brave.
Sometimes we lack valor.
We don’t always have to be fearless.
Sometimes we get lost in despair.
We don’t always have to be trusting.
Sometimes we have doubts.
We don’t always have to be right.
Sometimes we are to blame.
We don’t always have to be happy.
Sometimes we become disheartened.
We don’t always have to be the winner.
Sometimes we feel conquered.
We don’t always have to be infallible.
Sometimes we make mistakes.
We don’t always have to be grounded.
Sometimes we lose our way.
We don’t always have to be strong.
Sometimes we are fragile.
But we must always try to be kind.
Bernadette Ballezza
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06.09.10
Posted in Uncategorized tagged blog, blogging, global learning, Headteacher, heathfieldcps.net, stimulating learning, year 3, Year 4 at 8:48 pm by headteacher
Half term has just finished and once again at Heathfield we are back in the swing of things. New terms never start at a comfortable pace do they? You land in school at 8.00a.m.( if you are lazy like me!) and from there everything hits you at a superfast pace!
So much of what we do seems to be about creating and subsequently chasing a paper trail to evidence that we have completed certain mundane tasks. But this won’t inspire children and it certainly won’t develop within them a passion for learning.
Having been lucky enough to have had a week away on holiday it was lovely to arrive in school to see some beautiful new 3D displays in the entrance foyer. Year 3 have been learning about the Native American Indians and have been experimenting with Voicethread: Native American Indians
Year 4 have been learning about Australian life. We even have a “special visitor” coming into school to talk to the children this month, an Australian chap with Aborigine heritage! Fantastic! Year 4 have also been talking to a school in Australia and have recorded their learning on Voicethread.
Will this matter a year from now? Yes I think it will. Our staff are working so hard to create a stimulating and exciting learning environment for the children. The children will move on to their next class feeling enthused, positive and actively engaged in the learning process. Our children are learning to grapple with challenging concepts and they are gaining a global understanding of the world – not from text books but from real children in other continents. Fab!
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05.25.10
Posted in Uncategorized tagged blog, blogging, Headteacher, heathfieldcps.net, middle leaders, senior leaders at 9:04 pm by headteacher
Nothing is as unequal as the equal treatment of unequal individuals.
From our college days we all know about the philosophy of providing equal opportunities for our students. We also know that when we look at the inequalities of home life, background experience, innate ability, capacity to learn and readiness for school that children come to our schools with a vast array of personal experiences that directly and indirectly affect their capacity to achieve in and enjoy school life.
In short we try to treat children unequally in order to give them all a “more” fair starting point in the journey of life. Any child who has difficulties needs to be supported to ensure that they can access all elements of the wider curriculum. Most students have some form of “special need” at some point in their school career. This model of *special needs* can at times be very fluid, it can be very serious or it can be a minor intervention. External factors weigh heavily on the capacity of the child to cope with school life and we, as teachers, make decisions every day about the fragility and the capacity of our children. Our corresponding “teacher” behaviour thus reflects our amazing and HUGE capacity to bend and sway like willow trees encompassing our children in the care of our ever widening branches.
Good teachers have always recognised that pupils require flexible, individual care, and have acted on it; recently it has become re labelled as the “personalised curriculum.”
Why then do we assume that so many members of our staff need the same levels of support and challenge? How many times have we all been subjected to the one size fits all model of teacher training? Please do not misunderstand me. There will always be a requirement for staff to learn more content, be given new up-to-date information and to receive data. That’s the common sense/ pragmatic element of professional training that we all expect to undertake. However it seems to me that in some schools sadly this is the full range of CPD that the staff experience.
I’m thinking more about the sustainable opportunities that we can provide our staff with, in house, on a day to day basis, based on the NCSL models of peer mentoring and coaching. How can we, as individuals, be enabled to support each other in school through non threatening models of staff development? Can I (humbly) suggest, that when you embark on your next round of CPD you ask your line manager about the opportunities for developing peer mentoring and coaching throughout your school? As a middle leader, possibly aspiring senior leader, what skills and characteristics do you have that might just help to move another teacher from “satisfactory” to “good” or even from “good” to “outstanding”?
I am so lucky; I am being “coached” by a Local Leader in Education (experienced Headteacher) who has promised me that in turn her DHT will coach my DHT and so on through the school. This is a non invasive and non threatening model which helps the “coachee” to resolve their own issues thus becoming a SUSTAINABLE model which aims to develop transferrable skills and independent problem solving capabilities. This situational leadership support model is highly personalised – being based on real school issues and the needs of the individual at different times in their career.
Ooh hang on, where have I heard that before? Isn’t that the learning model we want for our children?
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05.21.10
Posted in Uncategorized tagged blog, blogging, Headteacher, learning, primary school at 3:50 pm by headteacher
I was reading through some old notes the other day whilst tidying my office and I found this gem on a scrap of paper. I have tried to identify the author of the story, (it is copyright, I hope I have acknowledged the author properly) please take time to read and enjoy as I did.
The Road Less Travelled, 12 April 2004
Some of us stroll gently through life with our chosen paths clearly mapped out, including breath-taking views, serene rest stops and cheerfully infrequent roadblocks. The scenery is full of hand-painted signs that say, “Welcome” and “Have a Lovely Day.” Classical music plays softly in the background.
But for the rest of us, the path we stumble along is often the “road less travelled” unmarked and unpaved. Our scenery is full of garish yellow metal signs that read; “caution – bump ahead” and “danger – watch for falling rocks”. Static plays in the background of our minds. Often without warning, we are hurled off the path, getting tangled in the underbrush and ending up with agonizing bruises.
It is easy to begrudge those around us that don’t seem to struggle, but we need to remind ourselves that wisdom comes from discord. This is our opportunity to reacquaint ourselves with our own courage, to learn profound lessons and to heal.
Jose Stevens writes in “Earth to Tao”,
“…The truth is, that you learn the most about yourself and about life on earth from falling off balance, then finding your way back to balance again. Healing, then, is the balance or the neutral position of acceptance. We could therefore say that all of life is truly an attempt at healing…”
Let us journey together on the “road less travelled” towards wellness and balance and healing.
Copyright © 2004 Bernadette Ballezza
This is a wonderful little piece of wisdom which beautifully illustrates the journey of being in a job that we are passionate about.
Teaching IS a vocation; sometimes aspects of the job can break your heart.
Some days it can be the WORST job in the entire world.
Some days it can be the BEST job in the entire world.
I couldn’t even begin to imagine any other job that I could do that could bring me such a deep sense of satisfaction and pride.
Can you?
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05.19.10
Posted in Uncategorized tagged blog, blogging, CPD, Headteacher, heathfieldcps.net, learning, primary school, strategic leadership at 6:03 pm by headteacher
TODAY HAS BEEN BRILLIANT!
THE BEST CPD I’VE HAD FOR AGES!
I organised a Strategic Leadership Planning Day for today. David Mitchell has been my Deputy Headteacher now for almost one year and I felt it was time for us to have some reflection time together. There are lots of things that we do really well as a school but there will always be room for improvement and this year I really wanted the School Development Plan to reflect the needs of the school and to be extremely focused and well planned. I also wanted David to have the opportunity to look back at the impact that he has had on the school learning environment and to project forward what his next actions will be and the impact of these actions.
Sometimes we can be very busy “in the thick of doing thin things”.
Reflection time matters.
My first objective was to ensure that my DHT and myself were very clear and in complete agreement about the next steps forward for the school. I wanted us to have a shared vision for school success. We have an amazing staff team and now that we have the right people “On Our Bus” it’s time to strategically plan for the future. One of our first jobs will be to take the school Mission Statement and the School Aims back to the school community to be updated so that they are meaningful and relevant.
Using flipcharts and big pens we wrote down all of the areas that we were particularly interested in developing. I am a very visual learner and using coloured pens and mind mapping helps me to organise my thoughts and priorities. We then turned this into the beginnings of an Action Plan that will be developed next week. Absolutely key to this planning was a discussion about which staff work best in which classes and what the overall strengths of the school are.
By four o’clock today David and I had the basics of an Action Plan in place which will directly feed into our School Development Plan. What we need to do next is to organise the who, when and the intended impact of the actions.
The day was SO productive and I can honestly say that David and I are now completely clear about the direction that the school is moving in. As I drove home I began thinking about the CPD opportunities that are available to staff and how useful / or not CPD could be.
The school CPD programme will be looking very different this next year, David and I have decided that we want CPD to be much more personalised and linked to the needs of each staff member. We are very lucky because we have support from another headteacher, who is a Local Leader in Education. This will ensure that I can access training for all my staff at all levels, whether it be lesson observations, planning ideas or just by creating “link “ teachers across the two schools.
Exciting times at Heathfield Primary School?
Oh yes, I think so!
Other similar blogs that might be of interest to you:
Heathfield SEF Tagxedo
5 Key Leadership Skills
Magic Dust
The Learning Walk
I Am An Air Traffic Controller
The 5 Levels of Leadership
SAT Week
You can follow me on twitter.com:
DianneSpencer
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05.17.10
Posted in Uncategorized tagged blog, blogging, children, Headteacher, heathfieldcps.net, primary school at 8:31 pm by headteacher
Yesterday I was saddened to get a phone call from our Security Services Callout Centre to say that our school had been broken into over the weekend. Teenage thieves had broken into school on Saturday and had been frightened off by Security and then had come back on Sunday and got away with two apple macs. Our school is in a lovely area but sadly break-ins are just a part of everyday life. As I drove up to school on Sunday teatime to survey the damage I just felt so sad. The thieves had ripped the worktops apart to get the apple macs out and as the joiner repaired the broken window in the external door I wondered what I would tell the children in Assembly on Monday morning.
As I left the building some teenagers were playing football on the backstreet……I looked at them carefully….could they be the thieves?
As I drove down the main road another group of teenagers were drinking cola and laughing with their friends…..I looked again……could they be the thieves?
Driving through the centre of Bolton another group of teenagers…..?
When I got home I looked at my own lovely 14 year old teenage daughter and this very powerful Chinese Tale sprang to mind. I wanted to share it with you.
Traditional Chinese Tale
A man whose axe was missing suspected his neighbour’s son.
The boy walked like a thief, looked like a thief, and spoke like a thief.
But later the man found his axe while he was digging in the valley,
And the next time he saw his neighbour’s son
the boy walked, looked and spoke like any other child.
This morning the police phoned my school to tell us that they had recovered the apple macs. On the way home today the teenagers who were out and about looked again like harmless teenagers enjoying being with their friends.
A lesson learnt by me? I hope so.
Previous posts that might be of interest:
SATS Week
Do you ever wonder what the headteacher does whilst you are in class teaching?
The 5 Levels of Leadership
I am an Air Traffic Controller
Magic Dust
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05.15.10
Posted in Uncategorized tagged blog, blogging, climbing, Headteacher, heathfieldcps.net, heroes, primary school, Scotland at 10:09 pm by headteacher
One Man’s Mountains by Tom Patey pub. 1986
Born 1932 Died 1970
Throughout my life I have read many thousands of books, fiction, non-fiction and many biographies, some of which have had a huge impact on my thinking and my actions. I first read Tom Patey’s autobiography around about 1986 and have re-read it many times since then. No not Tom Petty (though he was a great Wilbury – I liked Tweeter and the Monkey Man best), Tom Patey was a great Scottish climber with a lot of courage and a big heart. Tom climbed with all the greats of the time including Chris Bonington, Joe Brown, Hamish MacInnes, Don Willans and of course many more. He was a part of the great British age of mountaineering before the lightweight crag monkeys began their ultra lightweight ascents and acrobatics.
I read Tom’s book which had been published posthumously. He had written all of the articles and songs himself, intending to complete the book one day. Sadly Tom died on May 27th 1970 at the age of thirty eight, abseiling down a sea stack in Scotland, before his book could be completed. At this time I was only three years old and it wasn’t until I, as a teenager started scrambling and climbing the local quarries and crags with my friends that I started picking up this kind of reading material. We began in the usual local places, Anglezarke, Brownstones, Wilton quarries and would often have a good day at Stanage, Trowbarrow or maybe head out to the Lakes or Wales.
Tom’s real passion was for serious winter climbing in his beloved Scotland and in the various chapters he describes just how technical and dangerous winter climbing really was in those days. Scottish climbers really were pioneers; the terrain was harsh, conditions were unreliable and the weather was and still is treacherous. Reading Tom’s book helped to foster in me a love of the outdoors and a capacity for dreaming about possibilities and opportunities. I never made it to winter climbing. After an exciting white-out with full blizzard conditions over Striding Edge, Helvellyn in deep deep snow one winters day I decided that ice climbing would never be for me. Striding Edge was hard enough – vertical ice wasn’t quite my cup of tea. When I had to warm my feet up by standing in a puddle of melted ice I knew that severe cold and Dianne don’t really go together.
My favourite chapters in the book were the ones that alluded to the “Great Unwashed”, whom Tom described as the mainly unemployed or unemployable Mancunians who adulated a certain “Joe Brown”. Being a Manchester girl myself such descriptions of Mancunians waiting for the “right” conditions to charge up to Scotland for a weekend of climbing and drinking hit the spot for me and I was completely fascinated by the contrasting bravery and foolhardiness of these guys.
The First Winter Traverse of the Cuillin Ridge has to be one of my favourite chapters, climbing with the infamous Hamish MacInnes, a chapter full of completely disrespectful humour for the severity of the route and yet an all time climbing classic that sends shivers down any climbers’ spine. “The Winter Traverse of the Main Ridge will always retain its place as the greatest single adventure in British mountaineering.”
One Man’s Mountains is now an old book and may even be out of print – but if you do like adventure and humour, and if you want to remind yourself about the courage and the pioneering spirit of the previous generation- then do see if you can get hold of the book. It’s such a great read!
Two Tiny Figures
Two tiny figures on the ghastly north wall;
And a hungry great bergschrund, just right for a fall;
The avalanches roar, and the thunder-clouds boom,
And the black shiny rocks are like walls of a tomb.
There’s a crack in the distance and an ominous roar,
The leader looked up and he silently swore
As a hail of large boulders, all jagged and red
And his blood-crusted fingers were clasped on his head……
Tom Patey
Similar posts that might be of interest:
Amazing People – Lance Armstrong
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05.14.10
Posted in Uncategorized tagged blog, blogging, blogs, Headteacher, heathfieldcpsnet, learning, primary school, SATs, Year 6 at 8:54 pm by headteacher
This week has been extremely busy for me at Heathfield Primary School. I am the Headteacher of a small school, one form entry, nine teachers including myself.
On Monday I helped to organise and administer the Year 6 Reading SAT, which I didn’t think was too awful. Granted it was quite long and not all of the children coped with all of the tricky questions but all of the children were in good humour and had a jolly good try. (The pre SAT toast, juice and strange modern music put the children in a bit of a party mood which seemed to help!) Monday afternoon was spent madly phoning around for references so that on Wednesday I would be able to interview NQTs for the temporary position we have in September. @DeputyMitchell ran a staff meeting on ICT which went down very well.
The writing and spelling tasks were scheduled for Tuesday morning – this was a very long morning and it was a relief to get it over with, to be honest. Some of the spellings really were extremely hard but once again, my group tried their very best!
Wednesday hailed the first of the Maths papers, mental maths first and then paper A. I will be asking the staff to have a go at these soon in a staff meeting but it’s top secret so don’t tell them!
David, the Vice Chair of Governors and I then spent the afternoon interviewing NQT teachers for our one year position. Superb candidates, every one of them deserves to get a job soon. Good luck to them!
Thursday – Maths Paper B which to me did not seem quite so awful as Paper A.
I spent the rest of the day trying to catch up with all of the repair and maintenance work going on around school. I never realised when I became a headteacher that I would need my own tape measure - and I am now an absolute whizz at flicking out my tape measure just like builders do. AND I can now balance a pencil behind my ear and can convert mm into inches whilst muttering, “It’s gonna be tricky, and it’ll cost a lot.”
Today (Friday) I tried to resolve part of the paper mountain that is currently making my life miserable.I think I need to ban myself from using post-its. They just seem to increase the paperwork somehow and I can never remember why I have used them any way. I also managed to delete about 15 emails from, Annette (who is “single and wants a friend”), Nadia (who comes from “Russia and would like to meet her potential other half”), Agnetha (from Sweden,” just look at my photo”) and so on- quite funny but I daren’t open the links in case they have viruses and my pc self destructs in ten seconds.
This afternoon I had a very promising meeting with one of our LLEs (Local Leader in Education), she is a fantastic Headteacher and I’m hoping that over the next twelve months she will be able to coach myself and the staff so that we all improve our game. Hopefully the work that she does with us will be strategic and help me to reassess my vision and my direction for the school.
Having spent very little time this week in any class I decided this evening to lurk on the school blogs and see what is going on in the classes.
WHAT AN AMAZING WAY TO MONITOR THE QUALITY OF TEACHING AND LEARNING!!
I am so proud of my staff and my pupils. So much work has been going on this week. I am sorry that I have left the other classes up to their own devices but, WOW, they have really stepped up to the mark!
Take a look at some of the learning going on!
Every class is blogging!
Reception Class have used photopeach to create some lovely work on Life Cycles. Year 1 are using their class blog to practise their assembly. Year 2 are finding out their very favourite Viking names using wallwisher. Year 3 have carried out a science experiment and have recorded their results on photopeach. Year 4 have photographed themselves during a maths shape investigation. Year 5 are learning about the Ancient Greeks. Year 6 have been developing their creative writing skills using the theme of “volcanoes.”
I really cannot ask any more of my staff can I? Superstars every one of them. Lucky me.
Similar posts that might be of interest:
Do you ever wonder what the headteacher does whilst you are in your class teaching?
Blog Progress So Far
The 5 Levels of Leadership
I am an Air Traffic Controller
Magic Dust
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05.11.10
Posted in Uncategorized tagged blog, blogging, Headteacher, heathfieldcps.net, leadership, primary school, SATs, strategic, Year 6 at 9:13 pm by headteacher
This week has been so busy at Heathfield that I feel as if my feet have barely touched the ground. A mad mixture of finance, recruitment, paper work and SAT administration, I am really good at multi tasking but sometimes I feel as though I am just spinning one plate too many! I just keep waiting for that crashing sound… Not quite sure I have got the balance between admin and strategic leadership quite right this week!
First thing: MAKE A NICE CUP OF TEA.
I try to have a meander round school each morning, I like to say hello to everyone and just gain a sense of the “mood” of the day. The Before School Club children are always in and they always like to show me what they have made and tell me their news. I usually check my emails in the morning, I tend to get 20- 30 every day and if I don’t check them daily it can become a very daunting process. Opening my OWA to find 70 emails from over a few days is just not funny.
I try to keep my desk tidy but this is currently a failing task of mine because the new pieces of paper seem to land faster than I can Deny, Destroy, Delegate or Detonate them! (thanks for that @colport!) I now have a new system for my paperwork. There is a steadily filling up pigeon hole outside my room – I have sworn an oath to myself not to accept any more pieces of paper to my room until the current pieces on my desk have been detonated. I am also hoping that over time some will become naturally useless – the deadlines will have come and gone and the sun will still rise and the building will still be standing!
This morning from about 8.45am I was very busy administering Year 6 SATs with the Y6 teacher and the DHT. We plied the children with toast, juice and some very loud music! They loved it and thought they were having a party! It was the short writing task, spelling and long writing task today, and I sat with a group that I have been working with since Christmas. When they saw the writing task they were so pleased and excited! They just wanted to show how clever they really are!
Bizarrely, having spent so little time teaching over the last two years I was totally fascinated to see how quickly Year sixers can demolish four brand new rubbers. So now I know why the stationery budget is so huge. This is why I need to be experiencing school life at ground level. Do rubbers matter? Well, yes, the detail does matter.
My next job was to madly phone around for references for some NQTs that I am hoping to interview tomorrow afternoon. It’s a simple process and it goes something like this: I check out the Bolton NQT Talent pool, these are final year students who have passed an initial application and interview with the Bolton panel. I then phone their college to ask for a reference, and then get put on hold for 10 minutes or so whilst the referencing department is located. With all those students requiring references you would think it would be a straight forward task. The referencing department who cannot take details over the phone because they are too busy (name and DOB) then give me an email address so that I can email them to request the reference. I then email the references department for the reference and get my email bounced back at me because I have been given the wrong email address. I then phone the college main switchboard to find out the number of the referencing department…….Sigh……
This afternoon I tried to find £4250 that should have been placed in our school budget in April. Four phone calls and half an hour later, the money was located, in the wrong place but at least it was in our school and not in another school with a similar name. IMO that’s a result! My next job was to contact CPS to discuss some units that need to be constructed. I had shown my Key Stage 1 staff some lovely furniture catalogues but, “It just wasn’t quite what they wanted!” So instead of buying some nice simple furniture from YPO we spent an hour after school with tape measures attempting to design some bespoke fitted furniture! It was rather good fun actually!
So there you go! I don’t think I’ve captured all of my day but I think this is probably about 70% of my activities. Some days are very strategic, others are just “busy”, every day is different and I rarely go home thinking “Well today went just as I expected it to!”
Similar posts you might want to read:
Magic Dust
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