Fascinating to hear lessons learned by a headteacher from the new Ofsted inspection system.

Please repost 🙏 Older teachers are at the bottom of the list when waiting to find out their pension details. Please sign this petition to help raise awareness! petition.parliament.uk/petitions/72...

Have you ever heard of academic press? New blog! peerreviewededucationblog.com/2025/06/14/t...

How great to see it said that there is no ‘right’ answer for all schools, teachers and pupils but - to quote- “As always, the right answer is not in tribalism, in all of one idea and none of another, but a sophisticated blend of both worlds.”

Have you ever heard of academic press? New blog! peerreviewededucationblog.com/2025/06/14/t...

Interesting to read Ofsted inspectors clearly favouring purchased schemes of work over those developed by a school.

Predictions yes. But also pupils viewing ‘how to do questions’ videos where they’d be better revising content, revising using generic sites like Seneca which don’t cover our exact syllabus but sound plausible, study skills YouTubers… surprised this year how much kids want to rely on online not me

TikTokTipsters profiteering on the high stakes gambling nature of GCSE exams is where we are now in 2025. Read my comments in The Observer.

An extra push for our fascinating survey into how Year 11s have revised for their exams. Early results are truly astounding. If you could share, we would most appreciate it. 🙏

👀We have an ethically approved survey for Year 11s who are revising for GCSEs doing the rounds.👀 If you have a Year 11 or would like to share with your revision class please pass the link on. The early results are already quite staggering. Retweets 🙏 forms.office.com/pages/respon...

New post⤵️ ▸The fad's purpose is what it does◂ ...and not what its authors thought it would do Educational fads seen through systems theory (AKA cybernetics). Please share (tough for bloggers recently) #UKEd #EduSky #EruditePedagogy #Cybernetics cmooreanderson.wixsite.com/teachingbiol...

For my secondary school crew…

👀We have an ethically approved survey for Year 11s who are revising for GCSEs doing the rounds.👀 If you have a Year 11 or would like to share with your revision class please pass the link on. The early results are already quite staggering. Retweets 🙏 forms.office.com/pages/respon...

🔥80% of teachers reteach content if pupils don't know the answers during a cycle of retrieval practice.🔥 Why bother using retrieval practice to elicit the testing effect if you then waste the gained time reteaching the answers? Read more here 👇 onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Bridget Phillipson speech to set out need for more male teachers in school. Will she announce sweeping reform of the bursary system & allow primary, & subjects like drama, to access funds that enable more deprived/career changers to become teachers? www.tes.com/magazine/new...

Primary tests in the future will be replaced by AI, NHS-style, 'screening' which checks for dyslexia, discalcula & other difficulties as part of evaluation of their reading & maths. Will we still over prep for these screening checks? Check lexplore.com/en-gb/ for starters.

I’ve taken my children through 16 different GCSE specs so far and every one of them needs a slightly different interpretation and focus. And my experience suggests that how well you understand each one can be a bigger factor in grading than subject understanding.

I have a colleague who teaches 4 subjects across GCSE and A-Level, and told me recently how the word 'evaluate' means something slightly different in each of those contexts...

Having to learning ten GCSE exam cultures is inefficient use of curriculum time. Homogenize the individual exam systems and drive more learning of new content.

Whether you are for or against institutions spending money on preparing senior leaders for the risk of Ofsted, there's no escaping it's big business.

🔥🔥 Hot take: are we wrong about revision? This time of year we see the focus shift for Y11 towards revision and there is lots out there talking about effective strategies based on cognitive psychology. However, things may not be as they seem..... 🧵 #UKEd

Join us for an AWP offsite reading with @blackoceanbooks.bsky.social and Saturnalia Books on Thursday 3/27 @barhenryla in Echo Park! 📖🎤🗣️ ➡️ News | Burnside Review #awp #awp2025 #losangeles #awpoffsitereading

I really enjoyed doing this podcast talking about my research on retrieval practice in schools. I outline some top tips but also my concerns. When it comes to retrieval practice, we need to remember it is ultimately an outcome of a highly controlled experiment, which has implications 🧵 #UKEd

🔥Warning: repeated quizzing can dull students' ability to transfer taught knowledge to unseen exam questions.🔥 journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1...

More details of new Ofsted inspection process revealed* 😱Re-inspection within months if any area deemed in need of improvement 😱 🏃‍♂🏃‍♂ 😨Someone in your provision will be given the 'Ofsted wants' power 😨 🙊🙉🙈 What could possibly go wrong? www.tes.com/magazine/ana...

OAK holding back growth in UK educational resources market says BESA. www.tes.com/magazine/new...

Tory then Labour led DfE reaps reward for sustained defunding of arts subjects. Stark contrast in DfE bursaries by Labour government in next post. www.tes.com/magazine/tea...

Every single theme needs to be led by an SLT member, metrics collated, plans coordinated, risk reduced. The workload spend is absolutely massive. I'm SLT and it's made me look at my pension forecast...

Ofsted proposes to triple down on high stakes regulation of sector. Every category is a high risk area that will require a designated SLT, oodles of money to be spent and bags of stress splashed across a profession stampeding for the door. schoolsweek.co.uk/ofsted-schoo...

SEND is a political decision. If 20%+ of children have SEND then either there's something very concerning about how children are developing in the 21st century OR there's something wrong with the system. What value is a system where 20% are outliers?

Exactly this! Our whole funding system depends of identification and proving “standard interventions” are not enough.

Stop labelling children as SEND. All children have barriers to learning, just some more than others - is the message from Tom Rees. (Pointedly sidestepping the debate that we have a system where funding depends on the award of labels). schoolsweek.co.uk/umbrella-sen...

Elective Home Education (EHE) in England has skyrocketed over the last 5 years: 2019/20: 78,000 ➡️2023/24: 153,300 What’s fueling this growth? SEN challenges, mental health, & school dissatisfaction for sure. Any others? www.gov.uk/government/p...

In the Early Years Assessment (75% of children to be school ready by 5), it measures being able to hold several ideas/actions at once. Even though WM is not fully developed in all children until they are 7. 🤔 Thoughts?

Beware when teaching primary pupils. 👊Children's hands are not developed enough for a tripod grip until the ossification of their bones reaches a specific stage of biological development. 👊Children's working memories aren't usually fully developed until they are 7 years old.

Why many summer born boys on FSM are knocking it out of the park and you probably won't even notice. Do we need to reduce deficit language around such pupils? schoolsweek.co.uk/eyfs-results...

DfE misses its target to recruit 6500 new teachers. 24/25 stats for this year show: 😱Primary applications down 17% 😱Secondary applications down 10%

Anyone else have an issue with the idea that highly effective leaders are mysteriously not found in large numbers in 'low attaining or disadvantaged schools'. Like the Ofsted framework, it finds if you measure effectiveness without context then... www.tes.com/magazine/new...

New to BlueSky and looking for education folks to folllow? This list is a good starting point. Please share with others. go.bsky.app/MErYF44

I'm hunting down every last one of you lovely ITE / ITT folk. I'm mainly relying on people's bios to determine who might want to be included here, so if I've missed you, let me know and I will update this list. Reposts appreciated 👍 go.bsky.app/FZXkStn

Working memory and teaching in Primary 🤔Does breaking things down into sequences work for all primary students? 🤔Can we use the same rehearsal and retrieval methods with everyone in a primary class? 🤔Can all in a primary class pay the same amount of attention? (Gathercole and Alloway)

Did you know that landmark studies into school interventions routinely exclude SEND and EAL pupil data? Fine for a study, but what problems do you see when a school implements it to all pupils? Example from Sweller:

#EducationalResearch @drgarethbates.bsky.social and @englishspecial.bsky.social have written a paper on retrieval practice. It’s Open Access so anyone can have a read: doi.org/10.1111/mbe....

Farewell Paul, Nigel and Bob. Goodbye Simon, Steve and Tony. Adieu Karen, Sharon and Carole. Arrivederci Jan, Donna and Pauline. One day your names will be hip and trendy again, but until then we will have to live with the Alfies, Georges and Olivias...

Why is the EEF still measuring interventions in obsolete 'flight path months of progress'? Haven't we kicked all that nonsense into touch now? Watch out for tomorrow's thought provoking X #sundaypoll on EEF’s flight path months.

What is going on with girls at the borderline of maths grade 4? FFTEduDatalab picks up a problem that hasn’t yet cut through to mainstream Ed news, but teachers will likely know the problem and potential causes. ffteducationdatalab.org.uk/2024/09/a-cl...

👀ITV BREAKING NEWS 👀 HEAD LETS TEACHERS MARK WORK AT HOME!

YOU WILL READ BOOKS!

What would your pet’s dating photo be? Here is Nero: “Likes walks in the countryside.” #petsofblueskyeducation

Males ascend the school senior leadership ladder with fewer years of teaching experience than females according to @TeacherTapp.bsky.social poll. What causes this and how can we bring more equity to the issue? (Interesting how few primary leaders are long served (11y+) teachers!) #womened