There is no such thing ..

We had year 11 parents evening Thursday  and for this, I’d prepared a letter for each student, showing how many marks away from the next grade boundary they were 12 months ago and how many they were in their most recent assessment, and what they could be doing to prepare for their mock exams in January. I didn’t get to see all the students I would have liked,  so whilst my students were doing self and peer assessment of their recent work in Fridays lessons, I spent time, on a one-to-one basis, with those students I didn’t get to speak to the previous night. This worked really well – I have never done it before and I have no idea why – the students were really keen, and really responsive about the actions they need to take to exceed their targets. It’s something I will definitely make the time to do again.

Today I’ve written (well! I say written … I mean drafted) a couple of posts. One of them is about what we’re doing now that we have formal “mock exams” and I’ve collated the ideas from other teachers too … that’ll be finished later today or tomorrow. I’ve also put together another logic starter worksheet (here). This time I’ve done them with two to a page, as I think the students engage better with it when they are given something to write on, rather than just on the board. My gaffer at work (Seager!) is a tight git (that’s not just at work though) and we are always conscious of the cost of photocopying stuff. The yellow car comes 3rd, the silver 2nd, the red 4th, the green 5th and the blue car comes 1st.

I also continue to be overwhelmed by how much people are prepared to share of ideas and resources. The ResultsPlus template in January (for the November exams) will have a funky new “print all” function button (fingers crossed) thanks to Paul Pavlou (@UKMathsTeacher) and Graeme Sanderson, from Kingsmeadow School, Gateshead sent me the attached Connect 4 for Upper and Lower Bounds. Spooky as I’ve just done this with one of my year 11 groups, so that’s the starter sorted for one of their lessons next week. 

Off to finish some of these other posts … possibly! Enjoy your weekend.