I love getting into other schools – which is a good job really as I’ve been into lots recently either doing collaborative network meetings or general support visits (I never profess to have all the answers and if people get only 1 golden nugget then its worth the visit!). I also love it because I always come away with at least an idea or two and this week was no different!
You’ll know I’m an advocate for the Edexcel collaborative network meetings – we were one of the original “trial” centres nearly five (I think!) years ago and its a buzz seeing them go from strength to strength. Each network is different both in terms of the personalities involved, their local focus but also the more mundane things like where the meetings are held. I’m gonna be honest here and say that I love it when the meetings are held in “actual” classrooms … seeing how different maths rooms look is just brilliant. I even joked this week that looking at displays etc is a little like teacher “porn” … I know there is a whole school of thought that displays etc are distracting and if I could have a blank canvas in any room I taught in I’d go for white boards everywhere that the students could use when instructed but most schools don’t have that luxury and so I’d rather see something on the pinboards rather than nothing. However, I don’t have my own room and teach in what is called the “learning hub” which is a massive room that is very funky looking but it has no displays … it is also used for other stuff so isn’t maths specific (we do need a number line sorting out somewhere though (NOTE TO SELF!!). What we ( I mean the amazingly organised Matt Fox who keeps it up to date!) have is a massive table of results for our year 11 supergroup on one of the “wheely” whiteboards and yes the students do go and have a look at the results … it gets used and that’s what displays should be about in my mind. At this point I should say DON’T tell me how we shouldn’t be sharing results in such a public way … I like it. You have your opinion and I have mine!
Anyway, I digress (surprise, surprise!).
This week was the inaugural network meeting at Lostock Hall and we were in Helen Archibalds‘ room … on the back of her chairs she had a load of formula. It reminded me of the motivational quotes I put on the back of my classroom chairs at Alcester a few years ago BUT more useful!! Anyway I’ve adapted the formula I used in the formula bunting and added a few more things, ready for when I get my own classroom again and the result is …. 32 “cards” that can be printed, laminated and stuck to the back of your chairs to emulate this idea. The file can be found here ->Â Back of chairs formula
As always, may or may not be useful! If you do use it be sure to send me photos … I’d love to see how it turns out!!
The below shows the first of the chairs we have in the learning hub at work being done … they look ace!!
