As we approach the introduction of the new Ofsted framework, we’re still missing a bigger conversation about what schools actually are. In the pandemic, we picked up lots of extra jobs when services shut down. And we’re still holding them. Some services never came back. Very few returned fully.

Fair play to Sadiq Khan. To live rent-free inside the head of the president of the USA is a massive achievement for any Mayor of London.

Reform are now coming after people with permanent residency. It'll be citizens next. No one is safe from authoritarian governments.

NEW BLOG: It is OK to be Nervous www.emaths.co.uk/blog/general...

If you don't already, why not try Teacher Tapp and help raise money for a good cause in the process refer.teachertapp.com/c/00a47ffad6...

My occasional post to say that if you haven't watched Mum on the BBC, you're missing out on a fantastic, hilarious, sweet, familiar comedy. (And in my view, there aren't enough things in 30-minute episodes these days)

Very good observation by @ejjiott: the phrase "Where are you?" only started to make sense once mobile phones entered the picture.

The main story on BBC 6 Music News this morning is that a ‘boat carrying migrants is on its way to France’ Delivered in the same upbeat tone as England winning the women’s Euros. The migration ‘debate’ in this country is unmoored from reality, and the media-political complex is feeding it

6-year-old has a reading book about ambulances and asked why they had the word written backwards on the front, so I showed him the picture and mirror. Me: who do you think might read the word in a mirror like that? Him: Leonardo da Vinci?

It's quite an achievement in a way, that Bromcom can muster satisfaction levels no higher than SIMS! thekeygroup.com/news-insight...

Anyone who has been using the Primary Assessment Gateway to get SATs scores for their Year 7 arrivals, there's a new website in town! But you won't be allowed on until next June. So download this year's results now before it's too late!

Has anyone read this article? I'm trying to imagine what the SoS is getting at, but can't just from the headline. (If, indeed, it refers to anything real)

What a mess we are in when it's headline news that a few kids didn't stay up all night scrolling YouTube... for a week. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Do you recognise any of these people? Wanted by the Met after the violence on Saturday news.met.police.uk/news/appeal-...

Every now and then something just stuns me. Learned today when the boy asked me what the prefix "fe-" meant.

To be honest, if I'd spent years insisting that a capital city was a no-go area for people like me as there were too many 'other sorts' who'd attack us, I wouldn't organise a mass public gathering of people like me in that exact city, because it would reveal I'd been talking bollocks the whole time

It’s the politicisation of the midlife crisis and I’m only half joking. Loneliness, divorce, redundancy/not getting the deference they feel is due at work, loss of power + seeing that decline reflected in your town. What’s more startling in a way is the over-50 female reform shift

Worth noting for schools or LAs who are looking at changing MIS. Bromcom have happily bullied schools in the past, but seem to struggle with providing a basic service schoolsweek.co.uk/mis-outage-l...

I don't understand the new Ofsted nominee thing. Surely heads could already delegate pretty much all of this to anyone on their team - apart from those bits that surely no head would want to delegate? Is this more useful in secondary/very large schools?

Ofsted: we're introducing "a new 5-point grading scale to set high expectations" The Gillette model of school improvement.

Who is Bridget Phillipson talking about here?

I'm super-excited to see the DfE is planning to launch online School Profiles. I wonder if they'll be orange again, like last time this was the big new idea? Maybe we'll even get the rainbow back from the DCSF days...

I'd like to imagine Ofsted putting up one of those "You said; We did" boards you sometimes see in supermarkets. You said: using four single-word judgements is far too simplistic and raises stakes We did: added a couple of extra elements so there are more ways to fail. Oh and made them two words.

What has the ECHR ever done for us? Watch. www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptfm...

And if you’re on there you’re putting money in a racist’s pocket, enabling him to do more & more damage to Britain.

Latest in the DfE Sport Premium online form chaos: 1. We know the form's not really working, and we don't know when we'll fix it 2. But you still have to meet the deadline. Screw your work-life balance.

Obviously I like a good rant here, but signing up to @teachertapp.bsky.social is probably a better way of having your voice heard! Sign up now and they'll donate to Education Support refer.teachertapp.com/c/00a47ffad6...

Latest in the DfE Sport Premium online form chaos: 1. We know the form's not really working, and we don't know when we'll fix it 2. But you still have to meet the deadline. Screw your work-life balance.

I've finally completed the cursed PE & Sport Premium report (I think), and am very much looking forward to seeing the results of this particular survey!

Latest cock-up with the PE & Sport Premium reporting. Wow, DfE, you really do spoil us with complexity! Lucky there's not a deadline or anything 🙄

I’m looking at our Y6 today and thinking is an argument for a MAT to go with a middle school model in more deprived areas. Just not ready developmentally for a big secondary yet. They need that interim step. I get it’s more expense - but our area of full of Infant and Junior - still 3 phases

It's interesting that 75% passing Reading tests is a sign of a great success in phonics and reading teaching, but 72% passing Writing is a sign that we need a "first step towards transforming" writing teaching

It seems that in the Writing Framework, the DfE is admitting to feel the same as the rest of us: The GPS test exists. It's not a very good guide to writing ability. I wonder if they might also reach the same conclusion as the rest of us as to its value?

National Curriculum for Y3/4 English: "Pupils should be taught to use the first 2 or 3 letters of a word to check its spelling in a dictionary" New DfE Writing Framework: "Pupils should not be asked to correct the spelling themselves by looking it up in a dictionary"

The Education Secretary says the next generation should be "as good at putting pen to paper as they are posting on TikTok" Mostly they post shit on TikTok so it's not a high bar really.

I've never been involved in buying tickets for the next big gig, but I should imagine this is very much the same vibe...

Presumably there's someone waiting at the DfE this morning ready to press the button... that makes you reset your PAG password 😂

Does this mean infant/junior inspection teams will include inspectors with relevant experience? And middle schools? www.gov.uk/government/n...

The farce continues...

The Year 5/6 teacher Facebook groups are so depressing when it comes to writing assessment. So many teachers are essentially being forced to cheat by their SLTs.

Seems about right. Taken from the latest 'Working lives of teachers and leaders' survey. www.gov.uk/government/p...

What's your instinctive reading of this headline? I think I got it wrong.

It's still not clear to me what he thinks the injustice is, other than, "I didn't get my own way." www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

I cannot tell you how delighted I am that they have managed to make the sport premium reporting tool so complex. What a feat!

Somebody should have shut down Jamie Oliver's involvement in schools back at Turkey Twizzlers.

I see Ofsted are sticking with their "parents like it" like for the new framework. Did anyone tell the parents that the judgements would likely be very unreliable? It's like asking if folk approve if speed cameras that only catch 'bad drivers' who are speeding. Popular but unachievable.

Magnifique!

“British politics is increasingly a nature reserve of the aged. A country defined by boomers, for boomers, by boomers: an old folks home with a government attached, call it, if you like, the Nanny State.”

The 6yo has expressed an interest in Dr Who - about which we know nothing really. So can folk help me: 1. Is it reliably appropriate for that age - watching with parents? 2. Where would be a good place to start?

cinema usher: I’m sorry sir, this is for the Trump/Musk falling out. The reform party clusterfuck is being shown on screen 2.