Transcript: ECF Staffroom S01E03
Taking risks: ECTs trying something new and not being afraid of it.
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Elaine Long
Welcome to the ECF Staffroom I'm Elaine Long.
Mark Quinn
And I am Mark Quinn.
Elaine Long
We are programme leaders for the UCL Early Career Teacher Development Programme. Why are we in the staffroom? We are here because this is where the best professional learning conversations always take place. This is where problems can be aired bluntly and where solutions can be explored.
Mark Quinn
Over the course of this series, we will hear the voices of different colleagues as they come into the ECF staff room. We will hear from early career teachers themselves and from the mentors and induction tutors who support them. We will talk about all things ECF, the challenges and the joys. So why don't you enjoy a coffee with us? Perhaps even grab a biscuit and sit down to half an hour of ECF staffroom, chat. Welcome to the ECF staffroom. We've got Nathan and Mitchell and Daniel have all just walked into the staffroom. They've had a busy day. I can see. They need to take their seats. Make sure you are comfortable. Guys, take a good seat. Serve yourself a coffee. Put your feet up. Just one word on the subject of coffee. We always like to ask our guests what their hot drink is, what their hot drink favourite is. So, Nathan, what do you. How do you take your coffee?
Nathan
I'm more of a tea man, and to be honest, tea, two sugars and milk that would do me.
Mark Quinn
Two sugars and milk. You know it'll kill you, Nathan.
Nathan
I know my wife keeps saying that. Yeah.
Mark Quinn
What about you, Mitchell?
Mitchell
And for me, it's just plain espresso. And sometimes I refer to it as gasoline to keep me going throughout the day. Yeah. Plain black coffee.
Mark Quinn
One or several get you through the day?
Mitchell
Several, often.
Mark Quinn
Daniel?
Daniel
I am a coffee person myself. I was a barista before being a teacher, so I'm very particular on my coffee. I wait. I ground my own beans. I filter my coffee, like we do in Brazil. It's just the way I like it. Black and pure.
Mark Quinn
Well, we should have asked you the question first and not bothered with Nathan or Mitchell. I think we should just let you take the subject further.
Elaine Long
I'm sure there are teachers up and down the country now, Daniel, that really want me to be there to work best buddy. So they can benefit from their excellent coffees. Because I think everyone's coffee is starting to feel a bit inadequate now compared to the ones that you're serving up. But I'm a tea person as well, Nathan. So I'm pleased to hear that there's some there's some support for the tea drinkers out there because it shouldn't all be about the coffee drinkers. Can I just ask you to introduce yourselves for our listeners, please? So could you just tell us your name and your role and a bit about what you do, starting with Nathan?
Nathan
Yeah. So I'm Nathan Williams. I'm a teacher of drama, and I'm doing a little bit of geography for this year. And I teach Key State 3 on Key Stage 4 currently.
Mitchell
My name is Mitchell Scott. I'm a teacher of social sciences at the Blue Coat School. And within that includes politics, psychology, sociology and citizenship. And therefore, predominantly, I teach Key Stage 4 and Key Stage 5.
Daniel
I am Daniel Ruy Pereira. I am a science teacher, and I teach biology as well. But this is my job, my love science. Since I was a kid. And it's my pleasure to carry on teaching this.
Elaine Long
This seems like we've got a lot of experience and enthusiasm in the ECF Staffroom? And so we're very lucky. And Daniel, you've led me on to the next question, actually. And I'm going to ask Nathan to start us off with what made you become a teacher and what route have you taken to this point?
Nathan
I am interested in… I finished university and wanted to go into work, really get into the industry I did a theatre-based course at university and I moved to Manchester, wants to get into kind of theatre, TV and managed to get a job and kind of did work experience really worked for many years. And then part of my job took me into school. So I used to meet a lot of drama teachers and technicians, et cetera. And I went into funny enough, actually, I went into the Blue Coat School as one of my appointments. I got talking to the head of drama at the time on that. And yeah, she kind of went we just having a great chat. And I was like, you know what actual? The passion that she had and it just oozed from her. And I've throughout my years as I was younger, I used to dance and I used to teach dancing. I am so teaching and kind of working with kids of, of always I used to get, you know, a joy from it, shall I say. And I suppose what she did, she kind of reignited that joy and that kind of that passion that she had for teaching.
Mitchell
Yeah, I was an artist within your sort of anything on my own. And I equally finished university and was, you know, with the mindset of heading into the business world and you know, joining and career. For me it was a law degree. So and I was aiming for a career in law and I was fortunate enough to have done and quite vacation schemes during my degree in different law firms and I was coming out of uni I had a training contract all lined up and but what while I was in the legal environment and while I was in that sort of corporate world and I had a bit of a moment really where you know, I just felt like this isn't fulfilling the moral side of what I was looking for, you know. Yeah, it was great, money was great. And the, you know, the prospects were looking bright, but it just wasn't satisfying that sort of deeper desire that I had to contribute something to society in a meaningful way.
Daniel
With me, I started this was kind of I never wanted to be a teacher when I was doing my university degree in Brazil doing life sciences, but biology in Brazil each just in 2003. And I wanted to be a palaeontologist but when I was going around digging up fossils and things like that. I was the thing I was really going for. But on the last year of university, my friends told me there was I was really good at explaining things to them to revise for the exams and say, all right, I think I think I can see what this is going I decided to take up teaching in Brazil in 2008 was a supply teacher then I got my first job as a teacher worked simultaneously in state schools in private schools as it is the educational system in Brazil. But then I, I lost the passion for it because it was a tough life. The salary was not great working from 7 a.m. to sometimes 11 p.m. working three shifts. It was really something we decided to move abroad and I worked as a barista and funnily enough as a secondary school cleaner in Dublin when I was learning how to speak English. And then it was one of the moments that was really fascinating because I was, I was just chilling at home watching a documentary. It was the remake of Cosmos by Carl Sagan, but it was the remake by deGrasse Tyson. And there was a moment in the first episode when he starts talking about how Carl Sagan inspired him to become an astrophysicist and things like that. And literally that moved me to tears. I said, Right, I miss teaching. I want to go back and I'm really OK and inspired. The next generation of scientists are whatever they want to be. I just want to be for them.
Mark Quinn
That's fabulous. I love listening to teachers talk about their route into the profession when I was when I was working with teachers right directly when I was in schools, I always asked him that question. I called it their self-sustaining story. The story they keep having to remind themselves that would enable them to come back the next day. If you have a bad day today, you have to remind yourself to come back the next day. And what is it? And you know, and it might be, you know, crying over Carl Sagan or it might be memories of making coffee in Dublin or whatever it might be. But you do need I think it's really important, actually. You have to keep reminding yourself of the reasons why it might be. Being inspired by another teacher is a very common experience for four teachers. Obviously, a big shout out for Blue Coat School here. They've got lots to answer for, haven't they?
Nathan
Certainly. Definitely.
Mark Quinn
But we feel like we just crowded out our staffroom with palaeontologists and lawyers and dramatists and all sorts, but that's all to the good. No experience is wasted in the classroom. I always say. We've gathered you here in the staffroom because actually you're in a quite a privileged position from our point of view because it's now the end of May. You're the it's the year too of the programme for you. You've been experiencing the early rollout version of this programme, which means you've been working on practitioner inquiries. And we are fascinated, Elaine and I really, really interested to hear what that's been like for you. So you probably still doing your inquiry at the moment. You are they are your third inquiry form for module eight. So really want to know what it is you're working on right now. What that inquiry is? Maybe just what your question is even and what are you finding out? What are you finding out is working or is not working for that matter?
Nathan
And yes, so mine this year, although it's my second year teaching, it is actually a whole new first year teaching GCSE I'm so what I wanted to kind of focus on was kind of perhaps my year ten students and how I can really help them through that GCSE programme. So my question that I was looking to explore and originally was is the feedback I'm giving to my year ten GCSE students on their assessments, allowing them to act accordingly to increase their grades. Now that was the initial question itself. And what I found from that is that I am it through help and from the UCL, from my mentor, from group sessions that we did. And actually, my exploration of this was my question was far too wide and it needed to be a bit more specific. And also as well I needed to be able to measure and you know, what does that success criteria look like? So we between myself and my mentor, we kind of changed the question slightly. To what extent is the feedback I'm giving to my students on their assessments allowing them to progress individually to increase their grades? I am similarly, I think my focus was I wanted my students to be able to I suppose I wanted my feedback to be meaningful. I didn't want it to be lip service or supposed and I wanted them to take it from me. I wanted them to then do something with it and hopefully see that progression in their work. So a whole school approach, a whole school of CPD we've been doing is looking at a tier two and say three language. How students can access subject specific, higher level language, but also subject specific language so I've made a real focus on talking, making sure that that the language I use, it is all drama skills and drama techniques related so that actually can they then recall that information when they're answering a question, for example, if not a why. Why are they not doing that? And I was able to measure that, first of all by asking them a question and seeing if they could answer it back and give me some drama terminology through verbal and then what I wanted them to do then is then be able to take that verbal conversation and put it down on paper. So when they're asking answering a GCSE question, they I will see that content written down. So I looked at my year ten students. We focused, we narrowed chopping and changing. We narrowed it down again to I was looking at three specific students and outlined not necessarily boys or girls. It just so happens that two were girls. One was a boy, but a high, high ability, a middle ability to low ability student. Just try and get a bit of a range of data and only towards getting towards the end now, in terms of my inquiry and I found out loads of things. The reason I mentioned to two girls, one was a boy because actually I found that the girls have actually seemed to excel more in my inquiry, whereas the boy is still struggling a little bit with I'm writing it down. He can, he can answer my questions, but he's struggling to write it down. So, you know, if I was to continue this inquiry further or to explore it perhaps next year, I'd perhaps look at is it an issue where boys are struggling more with it than they are with girls? So again, I can kind of refine my inquiry and take it further. And I suppose for me that's what I've learned from doing this inquiry. Actually, I started off with question A it turned into question B into the question C, but actually my results and what I've come out with at the end of the day is that there's so many more questions that I could I can answer as well after I've done a lot of I've got a lot of results and I've kind of got answers to questions. But then that's also led to all the questions. And to be honest, quite enjoyed it. And I think being my first GCSE cohort this year, it's really focused my teaching. I don't feel like it's been any kind of additional work. If anything, it's kind of focused my, it's channelled me to in my planning, in the delivery of how I'm delivering my lessons. And then also kind of what do I want to get from those lessons as well. So I think as a, as a whole, whole rounded approach, I think it's worked for me this inquiry.
Mitchell
Yeah, great. Ahead on Nathan and actually again, some ideas cropping up there is sort of a feedback because my inquiry and my most recent inquiry has also been focused on coffee but and it sounds like with similar ideas going into and come up with these questions because my question was also focusing primarily on how can I get my students to act on the feedback and bind them in lessons? Because while it might be in your first year teaching GCSE this year, I've been teaching A-level classes due to the nature of my subjects ever since I was training. So some of the early lessons I took during my training, you were with your 13 year old classes. So from the very get go, I've had masses of experience with formative and summative assessment and specifically with assessments where feedback is needed and students need to act on that. And it's always been an area that I've observed in my own practice and in other colleagues practice. This seems to be a missing link somewhere, and my department as a whole this year has been focusing on what can be done to improve our feedback strategies. So I took the opportunity of this inquiry and the opportunity at the time I got given on the ECT and of course to use that time to try and bring some benefit to the department by exploring the question of what can I do to improve students outcomes by using feedback effectively and again, my core focus on that ended up being after a few tweaks and changes, what can I do to help my students act on the feedback successfully? And a little bit like yourself, Nathan as well. It sort of seems like my questions started in one place and sort of has deviated and, and sometimes all over the place a little bit. But when it comes to how the students respond to that feedback, a key thing that I have to ask myself is, well, what are they getting is effective feedback, you know, and we my school contacts like to use a whole class feedback quite often as a useful strategy. And I think there are lots of benefit to do that. But if you're asking students to act on that feedback and it's all very general, then students are going to struggle to attach themselves to it. So alongside that whole class feedback and those techniques which are really effective in the classroom, I also want to ask myself, what individual feedback were students getting? And for me that led me down this metacognition, metacognitive strategies. And because I realized that I need students to be able to pick out their own targets from their assessments if I'm spending time to mark a piece of work and provide them with some feedback all over it, they need to then look at that work and come up with their own targets that they can act upon before they start to actually make any progress. So a lot of my focus this time in the inquiry has been on teaching those metacognitive self-regulation strategies that they can implement themselves into their own work. And any time they get given a piece of assessed work back now they are able to look at it, use the strategies we have told them to pick out the areas of development and the areas of strength too. It's important for them to recognize what they're doing well and using those targets they can now, implement and identify what the errors of judgment are. And again, I've also been very explicit modelling strategies they can use to make the gaps and bridge the areas that their assessments have been previously lacking. And so again, it's very similar to yourself and I was focusing on a very small cohort of students to make this manageable and make this something I could deal with so I can focus on five year 12 students and using year 12 because I will see them again next year. I can actually extend this beyond just the time frame of the, you know, the module and rather than at year 13 so that they have now all disappeared. I focus on five year 12 students and again up in getting them to set themselves targets. I've been modelling what can they do to improve that. And now I'm at the point towards the end of this module where I'm looking for the impact. So I'm looking at well what impact has that actually had on the outcomes and have they truly made progress against those targets? And I'm actually going to present my findings to the rest of my department and after half-term. And so hopefully I'll get share with my colleagues what I've found useful from that: Things that haven't worked, because there's been a lot of things I tried and they haven't had any impacts or very little impact so there wouldn't be things I would recommend and, you know, using in the future, or at least if I did use them again upon tweaking you know adapting further. And again, that's the beauty of this process it allows you to experiment. It gives you that time to innovate. And I'm not everything’s going to work. You know, sometimes it's a case of throwing things until something sticks and I've got some things that stuck, which is fantastic. But not everything's worked. And again, I can share them in my feedback with my colleagues, because they might be doing something similar and that might get them to think, Oh, well, I do that, and it's not going to impact maybe I need to change it. So I'll have the opportunity after half term to share this with my department, and what strategies I found effective in helping students accept the response feedback .
Daniel
I have two questions that I've been working on: A smaller one and a big one that, that was the orientation we had from the courses that we had. So in science we have a problem that is equations. Now, we have many problems in science teaching, but one of them is teaching equations. How, do pupils solve equations? How do they approach equations? And I have by talking to my mentor, we came to a question a specific question that I was going to explore, which was I found a worksheet online which I found useful and we were having, curiously, we were having in our school a kind of direction for CPD which was pretty similar to Nathan's, what they were exploring. How would you actually streamline the vocabulary and reduce scaffolding to the children so they can develop more independence? So my research question, was this one, the first one: How can I develop my use of the reduced scaffolding sheet, that's how we called it, implemented for the topic of energy to improve pupils equation skills in science? The small sample of year 7 students, so I've decided to work like we learning in the ECT module to work with six pupils so I chose six pupils to work with. We applied the equation sheet and adapted it. So the equation pretty much works like that. The has five questions the first one is completely solved. Then we take away the unit for the second question. Then we take away the part of solving the equation for the third question. Then we take away something else and then it's an empty space. So pupils work with it. Now, after the first application pupils struggle a lot with answering the questions. I didn't know why, so I looked for input from a physics teacher because I'm a biologist. So I said Right, OK, Mr. Physics Teacher, how am I? What am I doing wrong here? I want to change that. So funnily enough, the first thing he pointed out was the layout of the worksheet because as we do in Brazil, we solve equations top to bottom. So I because we tend to solve equations top to bottom, I will thinking that way. Where is? He pointed out to me that it was easier for the pupils if they solved left to right because that's how they would answer in a paper so I said, Alright, I get the logic. So I adapted the layout of the worksheet, added a few tweaks, the equation triangle we used to help them to rearrange equations. And then on that second application I noticed that the pupils were way better in answering those questions. They responded really well to that and also that they started developing their skills. They were asking fewer questions and they were able to solve more questions as we progress. As a result, I adapted the equations used for all the topics of physics in Key Stage three, and I started using with my top set Year eight. And this week we had the last time that we use, which was in the topic of electromagnetism, and pupils were really confident in answering the questions. And then I added another level of it, which was giving our whole classroom feedback by using a visualizer and solving the equations in front of them in silence. So I use the silence mode to solve the equations. They were looking at me, looking actually at the board seeing, the teacher, solving the equations and thinking about it. So I was covering the equation triangle, finding how to rearrange equations and then asking them for feedback. Do you see what I'm doing here, kids? And then there were the Oh yes sir, I get it. How many of you got the I mean, I made a mistake here. They would say also you mistaken the unit is not ohms. It’s ampere. Alright, yeah, you got it kids. So it was really good. It was really fun to do and I really enjoyed that. And then in parallel with that, and that was the big research question that I was working on, and I am still working on that. It has to do with my professional development because in the in the lockdown, when the lockdown started, I, I don't know why or how it happened, but I started a master, a master's degree in Brazil, a master's in education. Don't ask guys. It just happened. It happened. I got an invitation from a professor I knew from before I applied for the process got the position, started doing the masters. It was online because it couldn't be presentational because of the lockdown in both countries. So. Right. So I said I said to myself when in Christmas 2001 we had the task of getting a bigger inquiry practice I said, right, I'm going to go back and revisit some of the things I was working before. And what happened was doing lockdown, we had to rewrite all the units for science for the key stage three curriculum. My task was to rewrite the unit for health and lifestyle for year 8. Now I've used that using Bloom's taxonomy because he was the framework I was familiar with from when I arrived in England I didn't know that in Brazil. So I said, I want to know whether this thing really works for me because some teachers were saying Bloom's taxonomy doesn't work. Others say it does. And I was curious, I was really curious, and I said, right, this is what I'm going to do. And then I wrote my second research question. It was this: Does my use of Bloom's revised taxonomy for planning, implemented for the topic of before in health and lifestyle improves questioning in my lessons. So I wanted to reflect on my own practice by doing that. So what I've done is I got the unit together and then I put it into an a content analysis software, and by doing that I discovered that I was actually planning lessons that was they were reach in retrieval questions and they were really rich in conceptual questions, but there was not a very… there was not an opportunity for the pupils to develop creativity in that topic. Inside the inside the topic so this is my next question that I'm going to explore next year: If that was the case for my practice, how can I see that pupils are learning in that same unit? So now I analyzed my practice, my questioning, and I discover some things about my questioning practice that I really I'm developing now, but now I want to see what impact that has in my pupils learning. So that's my next stage of this inquiry. So as Mitch was saying it was a question that led to more questions that led to more questions, and the whole process is really enjoyable. I'm really enjoying this. I mean, it is seems like a lot when you first hear about it, it seems like you're going to do a lot of work, but actually it's not that bad. I don't feel like he was really bad. I took it upon myself to put in a software analysis, a content analysis software, just because I am like that. But I didn't have to do it, but I was really curious in how to do it. And he worked really, really, really well for me. So I am looking forward to the answers and the questions I'm going to develop next year.
Elaine Long
It's so pleasing to say, to hear Daniel, that you really enjoyed it because one of the ambitions we had when we set out to write the programme was that we really wanted people to enjoy developing it as a profession. We sometimes don't use that word in education. It's almost like teachers have to be masters and then they're not allowed to enjoy things. But one of the things that really one of the many things that struck me as you three were talking about your practitioner inquiries was a sense of enjoyment in doing it and also a sense that you're not afraid to fail. But, you know, you could definitely tweak your question. You evolved your question. You recognized that some stuff would fail and that was absolutely fine and that there's a real determination from the three of you as well for this to have an impact on student outcomes. And I think that that's where the enjoyment really comes from because linking back to your sense of purpose earlier. And the other thing I was thinking was it's a good job. Daniel knows how to make a cup of coffee. That's how he manages to do all of these things at once .You've already kind of touched on how this has affected your development as a professional, but I wanted to ask you a bit more about that because again, one of our ambitions for the practitioner inquiry approach is not only does it improve your knowledge of the ECF and that research base, not only does it mean that you're able to apply the knowledge to your school, to your students, to your classroom, but also that it becomes a habit, a mindset and attitude that you take with you throughout your career. And I wonder if starting with Nathan, I could just ask you what practitioner inquiries taught you about the importance of developing as a professional.
Nathan
Yeah, I think for me, I think it definitely helped, I think, in my confidence, but confidence in my ability to teach I'm you know, anyone can kind of come in and take a scheme of work and kind of run with the scheme of work. But actually, when you, you know, when I'm coming in, looking at GCSE and I'm being a bit more subject specific and these are high, you know, these are students that, you know, looking to me to gain that knowledge and understanding of what drama is all about actually giving me the confidence, this inquiry and for the ability to teach and to be able to deliver, you know, high level and rich curriculum that, you know, we all kind of strive for. And because what the inquiry's allowed me to do is to teach a lesson, you know, do look at those kind of Tier two, tier three level words. Think about my questioning. So in terms of my planning, then my delivery. But then actually when I'm looking at the data and I'm assessing their work when we're at a formative or summative point, well, actually, let's reflect on how they achieve what I wanted them to achieve. Yes, great. If they have, how can I push them further? But I suppose the question is, how can I push them all further, whether they've achieved or not, how can I move them along in that journey? So that's where I think my inquiry kind of pushed me in terms of personal development because it really made me think, right, what do I need to do? Or How can what can I do to help them? Well, actually, feedback give them meaningful feedback, give them something they can work with and not something that they're going to use to put their tea or coffee on. And, you know, can I being inspirational, cannot give them what they need to help them to improve. So I think for me it's been personal development in terms of improving my classroom, my confidence and ability to teach.
Mitchell
Yeah. And I completely agree with your sort of reflection there, Nathan, in terms of building the confidence. I think that's been a massive sort of impact on myself as well through these engagement with these inquiry projects. And then for me and, you know, thinking you know what as it sort of taught me, you know, the importance of being, you know, constantly developing my practice I truly have found the benefit from having the opportunity to innovate in the classroom because especially with COVID and the disruption to, you know, students learning up and down the country as teachers, and as ECTs we were put into this whole new realm of, you know, what does teaching look like? What does learning look like? And we were planning with a variety of different obstacles and barriers to overcome in our in our own practice. And for many people, it really was, you know, wiping the slate clean and thinking right back to basics. What do I know works and how can I change that? And tweak that for, you know, this new method of delivery. And thinking about sort my own reflections and, you know, I really tried to take that opportunity of the COVID and break things back to basics as an opportunity to rebuild and, you know, being an ECT build my practice for the very first time and having the opportunity to innovate as part of these inquiry projects really does, you know, allow me to you know, to try new things and, you know, and explore new methods to teach you know parts of content. And my mentor in particular, and which I'm sure won’t mind me sharing took a step back and reflected on his own practice through the discussions we've been having in our mentor meetings. You know, he constantly consistently saying to me, you know, you're making me step back from my established career that you had and think, you know, again, back to the basics. Well, I could be doing that better or I really like the sound of what you've tried there. And so having that room to innovate really does allow, you know, not just me to try new things and develop my own practice, but then be able to share it with my mentor, allows them to sort of really gain from, you know, the opportunity to innovate and try new ideas because I think for a lot of established practitioners, you know, they don't get that opportunity or at least they feel like they don't have the opportunity to try new things, you know, they find things that work and they've got 1,000,001 of the responsibilities to attend to so they stick with that thing that they know that's going to work, even if it's not the most effective or even if it's not, you know, maximizing student's capabilities and the opportunities that they have. So, you know, I think as far as possible, all, you know, members of staff in the schools should be involved in the ECT project to some degree whether that's being an ECT yourself, whether it's being a mentor, whether it's hearing feedback from ECTs you have done these inquiry projects just to allow them to reflect on, you know, their own practice and really, you know, take that benefit of having the time to innovate and change and try and change things in a classroom that we get because again, that not every teacher has that and it's certainly something moving forward, you know, next year after the end of the ECT course and so to speak and I'm going to try and make sure I make time in my own routine to try these new things, you know, the course might end there in terms of, you know, the guideline. But for me, I'm going to find it extended beyond its two year limit and really I approach every year with some, you know, some sort of project, some sort of inquiry that I can develop my own practice on and linking to what you were saying, Daniel, earlier. You know, it's not about making oneself some extra workload. It's about doing things you're already doing and tweaking and refining it. And I think every member of staff in the school, every teacher can make time for that, even if, you know, it doesn't seem to present themselves in their own current routine.
Daniel
Teaching. I've been teaching for more than ten years in my particular journey from Brazil to England, teaching is very demanding, is a very demanding career. We mark books, we plan lessons, we replan lessons, we tweak lessons that we had planned, that we planned again. And we keep doing that all the time. And we have to manage a classroom. We have to go to meetings. We do all this kind of stuff. And we have our lives to live outside of school as well. So we don't have much time as teachers, as classroom teachers to read a lot of research I mean, there are organizations that break this down for you, and it's so it's very good. But as a teacher yourself, you are faced with problems that researchers in universities are not facing. So have some specific set of pupils with a specific set of backgrounds and a specific set of difficulties that only you can sort out. And I think this is the whole process of the participating in the ECT and especially learning how to do this kind of action research, this inquiry practitioner it helped me to develop so much, not only as a as a confident teacher, but as a teacher that can reinvent himself in the classroom. Over and over. Because now I feel like after ten years of trial and error, I finally have a method that I can follow and this is really, really valuable to teachers, to me, to myself personally, because I can now because I have a method to ask questions in my classroom. I can see the questions now that I previously couldn't see. So a question about this question about the reduced scaffolding sheet that I was working on, it was something that I wouldn't have read, you know, research in a paper in an article it came out of the classroom. And the other question about planning my own lessons based on a single taxonomy of learning taxonomy, this came from my journey as a practitioner. It came from my set of difficulties, and it was really valuable to learn insights from that experience. So I do agree with you guys. I think this process of being this kind of reflective practitioner that that does its own risk research. I mean, as a teacher, you do your own research with the methods that you've been given with the workload that you have, and it's not more than to do these so valuable. We can finally, finally, in from my perspective, I can finally approach problems in my classroom that I am confident to deal with. And this is going to help me for years to come. And I mean, as you learn more and more about the process and you refine that, the pupils that are going to be in your class tomorrow are going to be really, really been benefited from that. Because if you are a good teacher, that that reflects on your own practice and you and you reinvent yourself good for the kids, right.
Mark Quinn
Well, I think we Nathan Mitchell and Daniel, I think we should remind the listener of this programme, of this podcast that we haven't paid you to say any of this. In fact, actually, because of you, your experience of this particular version of the programme. Your schools aren't even being paid for you to do this. You are you are the volunteers. You are the pioneers, really, of this programme. And there's just so much so much richness in what you said. Absolutely. Daniel, your whole point about we really do want this form of practitioner inquiry to help our teachers to connect what might be existing in the research base with what is real for their own classrooms, to see those connections, to see those overlaps, but to find something new. But you're absolutely right. There are thousands and thousands of academic researchers, and they've written thousands and thousands of papers, but not a single one of them has ever written a paper on your classroom. And only you can do that. Absolutely. Only you can do that. And therefore, only you and Mitchell, thank you for reminding us of the benefits of involving other members of staff with this, particularly in your case, your mentor. And you remind us earlier that you were you're going to present your findings to your to your wider department and hopefully enrich what the conversation that takes place there as well. But you are all working in unique circumstances. You know, very specific pupils, are teaching very specific subjects are very specific moments and an only teacher inquiry, action research call it what you will only that can get to the detail, the specifics of what you might need to do in order to improve your own practice. And it's just lovely to hear you talk about it in your own words. It really is. So I'm going to ask you about how changed you think you feel. You are right near the end of the two years of this programme, Daniel is reminded as more than once that he's very old and he's been teaching for a very long time. So he might answer the question this way. That's up to him. So I want to know how changed you feel you are at this point of the programme as you reach the end of it? And if you can shine a light on it for us, what do you think has made that difference? What has led to that change? And, you know, as you speak, you might respond to each other as well. But, Nathan, can you pick that up first?
Nathan
Yeah. So I think from when I started to now, I would say that I'm I've definitely changed. And I think it's just an accumulation of just a bit of everything really in terms of my school have been very good in terms of CPD and kind of helping in whole school CPD and giving a bit of a direction and focus about how to develop. Because actually, I think one of the one of the scary prospects is that you kind of go through your training year and you're looking at this, you're looking at that, you're looking at practitioners, you're looking at inquiry, you're looking at you’re reading and you’re doing so much to help you to be the best teacher you can be. And then suddenly you get giving your classroom, your classes and you schemes of work and then you having to teach. And I think Daniel makes a good point that you kind of perhaps we don't get time to do that anymore or we don't get time to look at those things anymore. So I certainly for me, I would say the support of a mentor is being massive. You know, without her help, or her guidance and going through the programme the UCL programme, I don’t want to say I would have struggled, but it gave us a focus, you know, I'd read some of the inquiries that you put on some of the case studies. And I've been able to relate to it and be like, brilliant. That's what that was, you know, and more than anything, having that conversation with a mentor, that dedicated time to help me was massive. And I think that really helped me just having that conversation, you know, because we read the case study to say, right, put yourself in the shoes. You know, how can you relate that to your teaching practice? What are you going to do next? And it helped me just to reflect and to think, OK, what am I going to do? And so definitely say my mentor I work in a fantastic department being drama, and I'm one of three now, at my school as it's growing. So we're quite, you know, quite close. We're always sharing ideas, resources, and we're always supporting each other. And I think that's massive. And I've been looking over the years to teach English and then this year looks at geography. So I get to see the flip side of that and working bigger departments as well. If I think back to last year, I would think I was one of maybe 14, 15, which is completely different to drama in terms of English. So but again, the support was there and what was nice actually is you can go and ask other people and other teachers and you can see how other people are doing things and how they’re teaching and dropping in on their lessons. And so I think having that department support has been massive for me, certainly in my drama be my course subject. And then finally, just like I said before, the whole school approach this year, I've really enjoyed looking at we've looked at metacognition, metacognition, but also as well this idea of language. And that's really helped me aim and that's really helped me are thinking in my delivery of my subject consents to the students and actually as well doing geography and doing English, it's also helped me looking at the language of those subjects and you know, what are the key words that I need to be getting across the students? What do they need to know and, and being conscious of what I need to get across to them as well. So, yes, for me for that three, three prong attack definitely my mentor and being able to reflect on my practice and how I'm getting on being in a really great department where it's supportive and we can lean on each other for help and guidance and advice and that subject, people that are teaching in what I'm teaching, obviously my mentor is not necessarily that. So again, it's nice to have that perspective. And then finally having that whole school approach where I'm able to kind of this is what we're attacking as a school and being part of. Well, actually, I know that across the school we are looking at metacognition, we are looking at retrieval practice, we are looking at Tier two and Tier three language, you know, based on your subjects and being part of that team that seems to definitely that journey has been great. And I think it's really helped my confidence in terms if I'm not being left now. Now I'm a teacher and I have done my teacher training, I'm not being left to be. But actually that support is going to continue and it's just in a different way. And I'm perhaps I've got to have the confidence to put my hand up and say I can ask you a question or, you know, because someone helped me and I've got the confidence to do that like you say, everyone's busy and time’s precious. Time is key. But actually, being able to reflect and ask for that help and support can sometimes be massive.
Mitchell
Yeah. And it's great to hear so many things, you know, how you sort of reflected on your journey and so the things you've taken away from it. And again, as this seems to be the common theme here, I'm finding a lot of similarities between sort of your own journey and my experience as well. And I would actually say that when it comes to the change, I feel far more changed in my own practice and my approach to teaching now at the end of year two than I definitely did at the end of year one of the ECT scheme. And I was extremely fortunate to do my initial teacher training with Manchester Nexus SCITT, and they were very much research led and, you know, very much focusing on the academia and translating that to the classroom. So the year one programme very much to me almost felt like repetition, useful repetition and embedding those further into my own practice. But it was very repetitive to my initial teacher trainings experience, which again had been so supportive and fantastic that, you know, if you'd asked me that question a year ago I would not have known how to respond to, yes, I've changed I've got better and more confident, but there wouldn't have been a huge change in my approach to teaching. At the end of year two of this programme and, you know, going through this research inquiry project style of learning and, and developing my practice, the changes are night and day. You know, not only is my confidence growing within how I'm approaching teaching again, as I say, both naturally with time, but again, having that room to innovate and having that room to really think about what's going to benefit my learners in my classroom, and being able to design these inquiries and try out these new strategies to make an impact in that room with those students in front of you has been something that, you know, truly has and opened my eyes to, you know, again, not to be confident in my teaching, but being confident to try things and make mistakes. And, you know, especially doing that during covid year in year 1, it very much felt like if I got it wrong, it's going to be the end of the world because the students have already suffered so much and there's no room to make mistakes. But now and you know, I'm willing to try things, I'm willing to explore and, you know, really, you know, test the limits of my students and how they can learn and what works best for them. And so, you know, I really think the programme and again, especially year two, has just allowed me that freedom to try things, be confident with them, take really useful things and apply them as my teaching and get rid of other things which haven't had an impact. And again, without that second year of being able to choose for myself and direct my own experiences, I don't think I would had that and certainly wouldn't be as comfortable as I am in the classroom today. And, you know, also Nathan reflects on some of the people who are really had the impacts and, you know, getting me there and support me along these two years. And I completely agree my mentor and has been crucial to that development and I've actually changed schools in between year one and two. And so I've had two different mentors and both of both of them have been, you know, really supportive in helping me with the mentor sessions on the ECF. You know, help me, you know, especially this year. Think about my inquiries, tweet my questions, you know, give me strategies to try to in order to develop that and try and get the results I'm looking for. And so my mentor has been absolutely crucial and I’m certainly not going to be able to get there without them. But also, you know, I think it's only right. I mentioned the ECT facilitators in particular. Louise Aspera has been my associate for year one and year two, and I was super fortunate to actually work with Louise on my initial teacher training in my placement and on my placement school. So I've known Louise now for quite a number of years and extremely, you know, one of the ultimate sources of knowledge when it comes to, you know, classroom strategies, especially metacognition, I have to confess, was the metacognition god because she just blows my mind with, you know, her wealth of knowledge and all the all the strategies she can give to me. But the sessions that she's led on, you know, throughout year one and year two and have really allowed me that room to reflect on my own practice and she's guided me you know, to tweak my inquiry questions or give me that platform to discuss it with other trainees not trainees ECTs in other areas and in other schools. And those sessions really have a fantastic focus for, you know, again, allowing me to make the changes in my classroom. So I think, Louise, it's only right that she get some recognition from some of my experience. And last but not least, you know, again, what's really allowed me to engage this programme successfully and has, you know, ultimately being my school and my department, again, I'll be reflecting and feeding back to my team when it comes to and what I've found from this most recent inquiry projects. But throughout the whole process, they've always been there to, you know, again, offer me advice and suggestions beyond just be a soundboard for me to develop my train of thoughts and where I'm going with my inquiry projects and, you know, without them getting on board. And again, you know, allowing me to use this time to focus on the priority that I want to rather than saying oh, you should… You’ve got that time focus on this or you know, you're should be doing that giving me the freedom to really explore in a way I wanted to has just provided me and, you know, all the opportunities to really make and make a positive impact in my own classroom. Which again, Mark, you were saying earlier you wouldn't get that just from a journal just from reading an academic piece of literature. You have to have that chance to try it for yourself. So yeah, that's stuck in my journey that’s the people who have really helped me get to this confidence stage I am now.
Daniel
When I started the ECT programme, it was in the middle of the pandemic and everything was about lockdowns, difficulty no infrastructure. It was really, really difficult, really difficult. Both Mark, you said that I keep pointing out that I'm really old and I'm going to say it again to me this to me, I think it's important that we that are experienced teachers are not afraid to try something really new. And this for me was the thing that I was I was not expecting from the ECT programme. I was not honestly, when we started and I saw the handbook and I say, alright, we're going to go through this. You know, I had finished my training through the assessment route only. So most of the things were kind of fresh in my mind. Sarah, we're going to talk about this again. And we have conversations about this again. Alright. But then when we started doing the research and talking about it, I really felt something like that was a switch that was being turned on inside my teacher head. And I figured out, OK, this is something really new and exciting, which me this very old fella can try in the classroom. And when I when I realized that it was something that was easy to do, relatively easy, there was a little bit of a of a learning curve, but not really steep. And when I when I learned how'd you do it? When I learned how to do it, I really took it on board. And not only that, but as you guys have been saying, our mentor meetings, they have been so incredibly helpful. And it's just to learn with some like my meetings with much was they were amazing to learn with somebody’s experience. You might have an idea. And then I voiced my idea to my mentor and said, yeah, I've tried that before. It didn't work quite, quite well. And then say, alright, I'm going to try and get another approach because it's, as we say, it's pointless to try and reinvent the wheel. So my mentor was trying to guide me with this processes in learning. You have a good idea, Daniel, but I tried that before. It didn't work. So let's try this approach and then we try that approach. It kind of works better. And by doing that, I will say that when I started the programme was kind of afraid or not even afraid resistant, I would say, in trying something new because ten years teaching, I quite I've seen a lot of things and it was humbling actually to see that: No, not quite, Daniel. And you haven't seen the whole of it that there is a lot going on in teaching and it, it really kind of presented me with another part of the teaching career which I hadn't thought about, which was trying something new and not being afraid of it. And it was for me, it was the most valuable thing I'm going always remember from the ECT programme.
Elaine Long
And thanks for sharing that with us. And it's really humbling to hear. And one of the things that really struck me was the recognition from all of you really that the good teaching really means constantly trying to be a better teacher. And none of you consider yourselves the finished article, but actually you're really excited about continuing to progress that. That was really humbling, and we're coming to the end of our time in the staffroom and the caretaker might be about to kick us out, but before the caretaker kicks us out, we like to give all our guests a Post-it note on which to write some advice on. It is your choice, what you want to write on the Post-it note and who you want to write the advice for or whether you would like to stick it for you. So, Nathan, can I ask you to tell me what you've written on your Post-it note and where you'd like to stick it?
Nathan
Yeah. So for me, I've said to be to be flexible and adaptable are some fantastic qualities because no two days in teaching are ever the same. So I try and take that approach every day to be flexible and to be adaptable and because, yeah, you just don't know what's going to happen. Who would give it to? Certainly top of my list would be like minded teachers like early career teachers like myself, certainly trainee teachers that I see sometimes come in like rabbit in headlights. And because they've been told they're going to teach a full day or for the first time, so certainly give that to the trainees and early career teachers. But you know what, actually, just staff in general.
Mitchell
Mine would be to always remember to try new things and celebrate your mistakes. And because again, for me, this year, the programme really has again allowed me to innovate, try new things. And again, mistakes have been made. It's not going to be a road from A to B with no bombs. You can make you are going to have a lesson when you try something brand new and the aim of your projects, and it just hasn't worked. And that's absolutely fine. And, you know, I really think if I was thinking, where am I going to stick that Post-it note I think it will be on every staffroom of every school up and down the country, because I think that should be a reminder to every member of staff that it's OK to make mistakes. And again, try and either find the opportunity or make the opportunity for yourself to try new things in the classroom. Like you were saying Elaine, no one is a finished product. No, we certainly not consider it ourselves. And, you know, I think the best teachers never consider themselves finished product. There's always a room to learn and develop in some way. And again, it goes with what I was saying earlier. I think everyone should try and get involved in the ECF programme to some degree, whether that is being a mentor or whether that's being, you know, somebody who holds the sessions or whether it is just speaking to the ECT to be engaging with the programme and hearing what they've got to say and listening to, you know, the findings of their inquiry project whether that’s staff briefings or CPD sessions giving ECTs a platform to share what they've explored and therefore, you know, more experienced members of staff will be able to reflect on it and think, oh, that's something I could try in my classroom or I can see it's been a while since I tried that strategy. It's certainly not about starting again and breaking down, you know, things at work. Because again, I work in a school with my older teachers. I'm certainly not in a position to tell them how to teach it. And, you know, I've seen I've experienced fantastic teaching in my own lifetime. But, you know, again, I think just helping and remind themselves that it's OK to try new things and make more mistakes along the way.
Daniel
My Post-it note reads like this: Your mentor will help you see the classroom with a set of lenses you don't have yet. And I would take a picture of it and I would change the background of my desktop. The ones I'm typing my ECT activities because I'm starting. I would make this my background image. So I write this for the ECTs that are starting. Remember we have to remember this. We've just got started and we have so much to learn. So much to learn. And teaching is fascinating every day. Because of that, we are not teachers. We don't decide to be teachers for the money because it's not there. We don't decide to be teachers for the prestige or no, we decide to be teachers because we really believe that we can impact the lives of young people and we can inspire the next generation. And we need somebody to guide us through that journey. And our mentors are there for that. So I will say talk to your mentor as often as you can. Have a laugh with your mentor and express your sadness sometimes too, to your mentor or just your frustrations. And remember that they have been there before and you are not alone. We are always learning that. I mean, for as long as we do this job, that's my advice.
Mark Quinn
That's just l lovely to hear, Daniel. I have just looked at the staffroom window, and I've noticed that the head teacher’s car is no longer in the car park. We've been here for quite a long time. Our coffee is going cold. I thought that we should all head around to Daniel's Brazilian coffee bar. Not anybody up for that? But as the bell rings. I think we need to clear out, pick up your bags on the way out, clean your coffee mug. Thank you so much, Nathan and Mitchell and Daniel, for your time, your insight, your energy, your humility, all of that, all of that. And you've inspired us. I know that. I speak for Elaine as well, so thank you. And I hope we see you on your travels at some point too.
Elaine Long
Thank you. It's been an absolute pleasure.
Please do get in touch with us. If you think you would like to chat about your ECF experience, in the meantime, do join us next time for a biscuit and a chat with another colleague in the ECF staffroom.
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