Opinion

How do you make teenagers care about learning?

One approach to interest students is to focus lessons on topics they are interested in – but this demands...

Harry Fletcher-Wood
HARRY FLETCHER-WOOD
Opinion

How to teach gender-blind careers education in primary

It’s never too early for children to start thinking about their future ambitions, says Karen Follows Developing an awareness...

Leanne Edwards
KAREN FOLLOWS
Opinion

Exclusion or poor mental health: which comes first?

Children excluded from school are more likely to have poor mental health than their peers, but the direction of...

Expert Contributor
TAMSIN FORD
Opinion

Don’t ditch internal data in inspections

School leaders will surely welcome Ofsted’s stated intention to ‘dial down’ the influence that data has on inspection outcomes...

Expert Contributor
IAN HARTWRIGHT
Opinion

No to cost-cutting, yes to optimisation

There is an important distinction between efficiency in the context of austerity and the optimisation of available resources, says...

Expert Contributor
STEPHEN MORALES
Opinion

Improving the oral language skills of disadvantaged pupils

One barrier common to disadvantaged pupils across our trust is poor oral language and communication skills on entry. Aspirer...

Expert Contributor
JO ASHCROFT
Opinion

These children need more than a system of escalating consequences

Ofsted’s new framework must recognise the enormous hurdles that some children have to overcome – and inspectors must make...

Expert Contributor
BECKY WHITE
Opinion

Secondary moderns can be really great schools too

“High scores” in school accountability measures does not always mean that grammars are better schools, says Ian Widdows The...

Expert Contributor
IAN WIDDOWS
Opinion

For richer, for poorer – should MATs have a joint bank account?

What are the pros and cons of pooling funds across a multi academy trust? Mat Smith takes a look…...

Expert Contributor
MAT SMITH