Reflections of an ex-head teacher

It is essential that head teachers (and ex-heads, too!) regularly take time out to focus on their own mental health and well-being. A lovely sunny spring morning like today seems like an ideal time to do just that. I have written elsewhere about my five ways to  wellbeing that I use as an alternative to the ones suggested by the NHS. This is not because I disagree with their choices; it is just that I find them a little too 'aspirational, ' and nothing is more disheartening than setting targets for yourself and falling at the first hurdle (see 'couch to 5k' 2022). So, let's do a bit of an audit, shall we? My first 'way to wellbeing' is the act of being nostalgic. Very briefly, the thinking is that by engaging with nostalgia, we are getting in touch with a more innocent version of ourselves, one that is also further away from death. God, that looks bleak when written down in black and white! In the nostalgia column, two things immediately come to mind; firstl...

Firstly, despite what the social media controversy vampires would have you believe, she didn't 'ban' Easter. If any of these ridiculous publications bothered to read the fine print, they would see that the decision was made not to hold an Easter Bonnet Parade or Easter Service this year.  Unlike many of the 'experts' who have commented on this decision, as an ex-head of a primary school who made the same decision a few years ago, I am writing from a position of knowledge. This head teacher has made the right decision, and I will try to explain why. As the more balanced BBC reported in its coverage of the story, the children will still learn about Easter in R.E. (hint: it stands for Religious Education), but that doesn't make a good headline, does it? They will learn about all religions and their cultural practices as schools have a curriculum that we have to follow to ensure that all schools celebrate the diversity of our country. If we have to 'teach' r...

Quite a few of my posts have been about things I passionately believe should be part of the modern classroom experience for our children, but today, I want to tackle something that should be banned from this day forward. It is something that we have all used, me included, and I bet that on World Poetry Day last week, there were quite a few of them produced up and down the country. If I were a contestant in the brilliant TV show 'Room 101', the dreaded Acrostic would be near the top of my list, and here's why... Absolutely pointless Creatively restrictive Really boring to write Only given as busy work Spelling focused and not 'poetic' in any way Task completion is the focus and not the quality of the poem I hate writing them Challenging, in no way whatsoever! Can you see what I did there? I think I proved how boring acrostics can be! Samuel Taylor Coleridge described poetry as "the best words in the best order", which is the quote I would always share with ...

This is my 66th blog post. I have been doing this for a few months now, and I think I am slowly getting better at it. So, I thought it might be fun to revisit some of the first posts I wrote back in November last year, re-edit them, and hopefully improve them. I have chosen to start with the post I wrote about attendance because I feel like I am now better able to explain my position on this sensitive issue more clearly. I also have some new information to add to what I originally wrote, which adds weight to my argument. I won't delete the original post, though, just in case anybody wants to read it to compare the two. School attendance is what you would call a 'hot button issue' at the moment, and quite rightly, it has been in focus since the end of the pandemic. Ofsted identified it as a priority in their annual report at the end of last year, and no one would argue that schools are right to continue to aim for the highest possible level of attendance. It seems to me, tho...

How many of us can honestly say that we have never used some version of the phrase 'look at me when I am talking to you', either as teachers or as head teachers? I know I have done so in moments of frustration, but I have always regretted it. As an introvert, I find it difficult to make eye contact with others, particularly when I am talking, although I do it when I am listening too. It is not a conscious decision to look away, my brain simply cannot process thoughts without doing it. This is typical of introverts, and there are actually quite a lot of us out there. Believe it or not, around 50% of the population of the UK identifies as having that personality type! Being an introvert or an extrovert is not a binary choice. It is more of a spectrum with introversion at one end and extroversion at the other. Most of us are nearer to one end than the other, and those smack in the middle are called ambiverts.  So, in a typical class of children or in a room full of adults, we are ...

Around five years ago, I was sitting quietly in my office, probably dealing with another boring email from county, or writing another pointless policy, when I was interrupted by a knock on the door. It was my Key Stage 1 teacher who had come to share an exciting idea for a school trip for their class. The children were in the middle of a unit all about how chocolate is made, and as you might expect, they were very engaged in their learning. Their teacher proposed that a great way to finish the unit of work would be to visit a chocolate factory, and they found out about one within driving distance from the school who would be happy to give us a tour! Their enthusiasm persuaded me that this was a good idea, with one condition: they had to take me with them! So, it was arranged. The children were extremely excited, wondering whether we would get a chance to taste the chocolate, whether it would be churned in a waterfall, whether we would see any little orange men, etc. When the day finall...

Is it just me, or are policemen, head teachers, and teachers getting younger? Well, we can find out by investigating the school workforce census data, which goes back to 2010/11, on the .gov website. School workforce in England, Reporting year 2023 - Explore education statistics - GOV.UK This is the first time I have used the data after participating in the workforce census for many years.  I was considering holding this post back for fear of coming across like a grumpy old man, but this subject appeals to a stats nerd like me, so let's do it! As I was most recently part of this data as a head teacher, I am going to start with heads. For the purposes of this post, we are going to look at the following groups: ages 25-29 ages 30-39 ages 40-49 ages 50-59 There is an under-25 category, but the numbers within it are, as you would suspect, very low, so we will ignore it for this exercise. I am also only going to look at heads of the following types of schools: LA Maintained Primar...