Tips for Teachers

Former English teacher and now best-selling author, Alex Quigley, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Ask students to make a pre-topic mind map (02:55)

2. Focus on developing keystone vocabulary (17:58)

3. Try using a collage collection to stimulate ideas (32:24)

4. Play "Just a minute!" (44:32)

5. Support your students using sentence expanding (1:00:30)

Teacher and author David Goodwin, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Provide opportunities for students to read in lessons (04:23)

2. Develop vocabulary (16:45)

3. Rebrand homework as practice (25:08)

4. How to improve students' ability to write (33:33)

5. How to make retrieval practice work (45:53)

Five tips to improve the Do Now at the start of your lesson

Five tips to improve the use of Silent Teacher in the classroom.

Five tips to improve checking for understanding in the classroom.

Five tips to improve the use of mini-whiteboards in the classroom.

Five tips to improve student paired discussions in the classroom.

Teacher, author and podcaster, Ollie Lovell, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. How to overcome the limits of working memory (03:39)

2. Backwards plan. ALWAYS backwards plan! (22:16)

3. Check for understanding (34:03)

4. Inquire into mechanisms (44:25)

5. You can learn something from everybody (57:43)

Head of English and author, Sarah Donarski, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Know how to effectively assess (03:31)

2. Choose the right feedback type (17:00)

3. Be aware of student bias (29:59)

4. Use, where possible, dialogic teaching (46:25)

5. Ignite the CPD culture (1:04:15)

Assistant headteacher, Jade Pearce, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Use explicit instruction for novice learners (02:39)

2. How to ensure questioning involves all pupils (14:20)

3. Understand the active ingredients of retrieval practice (25:45)

4. How to improve feedback (38:45)

5. The power of teachers reading research (49:50)

This special edition of the Tips for Teachers podcast comes live from Manchester Piccadilly station following MathsConf30. Jo Morgan and I discuss our takeaways from the workshops we saw, including:

Jo:

1. Assess pre-requisites

2. Use a variety of techniques for differentiation 

3. Plan a curriculum suitable for the group you’re teaching

4. Explore boundary examples to deepen understanding of a concept

5. Pay attention to how students write their answers (we need a reciprocal symbol!). 

Craig:

1. Make sure students are good at units

2. Don't forget the old classics

3. Adapt off-the-shelf resources 

4. Make use of the power of interweaving

5. Interweave out by using questions that all have the same underlying concept

Maths teacher, Craig Latimir, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Explicitly teach the skills an expert in your domain uses (03:29)

2. Leave a legacy (23:21)

3. The principles of Cog Sci apply to humans (not just students) (39:24)

4. Learning doesn’t start in Year 7 (55:10)

5. The secret to a happy life (1:09:13)

Curriculum expert, Mary Myatt, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. We should all be focussing on doing fewer things and greater depth (04:06)

2. Focus on the concepts and the Big Ideas in our curriculum (13:03)

3. We know more and remember more when we've heard it in a story (23:54)

4. Provoke curiosity in our students (47:57)

5. Ask "who is this for?" (1:00:00)

Primary expert, Kieran Mackle, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Leave space between reading and implementation (04:04)

2. Treat the act of teacher development like teaching (10:09)

3. Be explicit when modelling for colleagues (19:36)

4. Some behaviours are more important than others (28:33)

5. Nobody really knows what they are doing (40:37)

Maths teacher, Femi Adeniran, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Teach behaviour lesson one by making ‘developing the right classroom culture’ your objective for the early lessons (02:56)

2. Focus on explanations not resources (14:17)

3. Teach in small chunks and fool kids into doing lots of work initially (23:17)

4. Have your coffee whilst sitting in the classrooms of effective teachers (31:28)

5. Provide answers so pupils can check their work in real-time (42:16)

Maths teacher and author, Michael Pershan, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Begin your explanations as a series of questions that everyone can answer (03:12)

2. The best feedback is a learning activity, and it’s much better than written feedback on the page (16:28)

3. Get used to asking “what if” after explaining something (31:02)

4. Use partner work as a chance to recruit quiet kids to share their thinking (42:05)

5. End every conversation with the student saying something smart (51:21)

Maths teacher and computer-whizz, Jake Gordon, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Share photos of students' work (04:11)

2. Reduce clutter from everything students see and hear (18:53)

3. Try teaching from anywhere in the room (29:37)

4. Modify your lessons as you go (39:07)

5. Give worked examples with retrieval starters (45:20)

English Teacher, author and Director of Research, Mark Roberts joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Use Post-it notes to find out what they don't understand (02:54)

2. Use non-verbal gestures for better behaviour management (08:06)

3. Don't give negative managerial feedback (14:14)

4. Stop talking about grades (23:34)

5. Rephrase to amaze (34:48)

Former English Teacher, and now author and head of education at No More Marking, Daisy Christodoulou, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Review every lesson plan in terms of what the student is thinking about (02:58)

2. Ask a question at the end of every lesson that every student should be able to get right (11:22)

3. Don’t do written comments (17:36)

4. Use examples, not definitions, when teaching & assessing (29:24)

5. Get your pupils to spell their name backwards (45:20)

Former headteacher and now Head of Education Improvement in Guernsey, Clare Sealy, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Every teacher should make the teaching of literacy a high priority (03:02)

2. Be super clear about what you want children to learn (14:13)

3. Always check for understanding (27:22)

4. No feedback, more teaching (35:56)

5. Have a robust culture of retrieval (46:30)

Primary teacher and author Emma Turner joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Use talk cubes to encourage students to contribute (02:48)

2. Encourage students to say "stop!" if they are confused during an explanation (08:45)

3. Ask students "What was the most useful thing I did today?" (16:11)

4. Plan for error (20:22)

5. Keep spare mini-whiteboard pen lids (26:55)

Primary teacher and reading expert Chris Such joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Learn about reading development (03:31)

2. Analyse words using morphology and etymology (19:21)

3. Assess reading difficulties and respond (26:53)

4. Feign enthusiasm when necessary (38:54)

5. Depressurise learning (48:17)

6. BONUS: 7 micro-tips (1:04:37)

English teacher and author, Jamie Thom, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Remember the tortoise and the hare (04:34)

2. Tackle the negativity radio (15:01)

3. Beware the distraction addiction (28:28)

4. Hone your public speaking (45:56)

5. Validate introverts (56:30)

The queen of GCSE maths re-sit teaching, Julia Smith, joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Practice, practice, practice…not until you can get it right but until you cannot get it wrong (04:24)

2. Revision should start from day one of a course, not at the end (12:57)

3. It ain’t what you do, it’s the way that you do it…and that’s what gets results (23:13)

4. Fluency in the four operations is a cornerstone of developing mathematical understanding (33:27)

5. How to deal with students who say they hate maths or are no good at maths (44:28)

Primary Headteacher Sonia Thompson joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Read for pleasure and read for progress (03:30)

2. Be clear about your career pathway (12:42)

3.  Make use of the NPQs (23:03)

4. Go out and visit other schools (28:43)

5. Think about implementation (40:22)

Teacher trainer and former teacher Sarah Cottingham joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Use tips when they act as solutions to problems you face (04:16)

2. Always build from what they know (17:21)

3. Beware the curse of knowledge (30:14)

4. Use research on learning not as a prescription but as a compass (38:56)

5. Retrieval practice is worth investing time to understand and use (48:51)

Psychologist and former teacher Bradley Busch joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Consider lengthening wait times to maximise retrieval (03:16)

2. To develop resilience you need both high challenge and high support (13:22)

3. Challenge students on what they like versus what's best for them (21:56)

4. Ban mobile phones (29:05)

5. Ask yourself "what evidence would change your mind?" (39:11)

Behaviour adviser and researchEd founder Tom Bennett joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Use the school behaviour policy (02:56)

2. Teach students what to do when they are stuck (08:27)

3. Teach students how to behave in a supply or cover lesson (15:05)

4. Teach students how to have the right equipment (20:23)

5. Students need to know you are in charge of the classroom (27:48)

Languages teacher Jon Mumford joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Consider the impact of audio feedback (04:57)

2. Think creatively when attempting to improve engagement/performance of boys (22:06)

3. Use D.I.R.T. as a post-assessment formative tool (44:11)

4. How to get students peer-assessing with group critique (57:03)

5. How to organise the disorganised (1:08:52)

Kate Jones joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Sometimes it is better to review than retrieve (03:33) 

2. Make use of the Encoding specificity principle (19:46)

3. Take a low effort, high impact approach to task and question design (34:28)

4. How to make the best use of technology for retrieval practice (48:34)

5. How to design good multiple choice questions (1:06:21)

Charlie Burkitt joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Be clear and follow through (04:20)

2. Enjoy the kids' company (23:40)

3. Ask the whole class questions (38:35)

4. Develop systematic revision (55:09)

5. Study the teachers you respect (1:04:32)

Sammy Kempner joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Pick the student least likely to know (03:50)

2. When doing group work, make clear the group is responsible (21:20)

3. Use the same questions, with different numbers (47:36)

4. Question, don’t tell (1:04:04)

5. Trick your students to test if they really understand (1:14:59)

Dylan Wiliam joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Make feedback into detective work (3:27)

2. Make detention work fit the crime (9:40)

3. Make question planning part of lesson planning (13:40)

4. We have little insight into our learning (20:02)

5. Don't let "Don't know" be the end of the conversation (28:19)

Harry Fletcher-Wood joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Do less, but better (4:04)

2. Find a tool that tells you what's really happening (14:38)

3. Build habits, not one-off things (21:25)

4. Work out why things work (32:57)

5. Maintain perspective (39:05)

Jemma Sherwood joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Plan sequences not lessons (3:58)

2. Doing maths is not the same as teaching maths (16:07)

3. What you say matters (25:48)

4. What you don’t say matters (34:37)

5. Teach what you mean to teach (41:10)

Tom Sherrington joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. Set out the big picture (3:57)

2. Provide explicit scaffolds for verbal responses (10:38)

3. Start with whoever got 8 out of 10 (14:05)

4. Foster cross-class accountability (16:40)

5. Set occasional open-response tasks (22:11)

Jo Morgan joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share her 5 tips:

1. Model techniques live (4:21)
2. Make sure students know whether thy are right or wrong, and don’t wait until it’s too late (17:07)
3. Use calculators with students from the earliest opportunity (23:43)
4. Use visual aids, including props and online tools to bring explanations alive (41:28)
5. Don’t forget the "respond" part of responsive teaching (53:17)

Adam Boxer joins us on the Tips for Teacher podcast to share his 5 tips:

1. To make sure your students are ready to practise, use mini-whiteboards (2:43)
2. To lower workload and build a better team ethic, make culture explicit (27:09)
3. To reduce “choppy time” in lessons, use a Front Loaded Means of Participation and wait for Golden Silence (43:10)
4. To make good use of data, compare to other subjects (54:53)
5. To make homework more effective, integrate it with classwork (1:01:03)

Hello! I’m Craig Barton, and welcome to a trailer about the Tips for Teachers Podcast.

Each episode a teacher, educator or academic will join me to share 5 tips to help improve teachers’ lives. They may be tips about pedagogy, marking, well-being, routines, dealing with parents, memory - anything that can help teachers do their job better.