David Rogers

Disclaimer: I was provided two copies of the GA's KS3 geography Teachers' Toolkit for free in return for an honest review. I've wrote back in 2009 that textbooks are everyone's guilty pleasure. The fashion at the time was for textbook bashing, especially amongst members of the Geographical Association  (The GA) which was a bit strange as they are also a publisher. Now I have a confession to make: I write textbooks. There, get over it. The problem with the discourse around textbooks is that they focus on the artefact and publisher rather than their use in the classroom. In my view, the appropriate use of textbooks is just like using an anemometer, a bunsen burner or a computer: a tool in the shed of the great teacher. Yes, textbooks have limitations and the department I led even used textbooks to create bunting, but used well they are a timesaver. I'm also neither in the progressive nor traditional camp (not that I'm entirely sure what each one actually is...

‘Have no fear of perfection – you’ll never reach it.’ Salvador Dali. You can find my Nurture 13/14 post here and what a difference a year makes.  When I read it, it seemed like a decade had passed rather than twelve months.  So, five highlights of 2014: Running Yesterday, I ran 18miles from my house, to the summit of the South Downs and back which took me to just over 1,200 miles run in 2014.  I also completed some races: 10k Virtual Race Longman 18.8 Miles Portsmouth Coastal Half Marathon Virtual half marathon x2 Brighton Marathon Bristol 10k Trailblazer Bedgebury Forest Half Marathon Worthing 10k Lakeland Trails Marathon Littlehampton 10k RAB Mountain Marathon Great South Run Worthing seafront 10k St Barnabas Santa Dash Portsmouth Coastal Marathon Boxing Day Virtual 10k Running has helped me connect with friends; taken me to wild and wonderful places that I wouldn’t have bothered with otherwise and challenged me.  In addition, and this is the...

I’ve just finished Teacher Proof and enjoyed Tom Bennett’s writing and his points. Indeed, I recommend it to any teacher, especially those about to start out on classroom adventures for the first time.  The book aligns with my belief that teachers should never stop learning and engage with educational research (by which I mean reading critically).  I enjoyed Tom’s style of debunking many of the educational fashions of recent (ish) years, and it’s made me reflect upon my own practice, what and how I write on this blog and my own approach. As a former Fasttrack teacher I can identify with Tom’s experience of NLP (I have to admit to reading the course bumph and writing it off. I chose to go on a project management thing instead).  As someone who looked after whole school CPD, I can also attest to the power of Headteachers and Inset.  You know the deal, the whole school gives over a whole day to a certain strategy.  A speaker is invited in, you aren’t allowed t...

Soon I start at Patcham High School and I was asked to glance over some books in preparation.  A couple of these have been around for a while, but it’s always good to refresh the memory.  My overall impression is that there’s no real ‘the way’ to teach or treat young people.  Much of the research falls within psychology and other realms, research in its nature is reductionist and is prone to generalisation, but many of the stories presented link to some of my experience in the classroom and leadership.  These books tend to cite similar sources of information and even each other. For example, all of these books focus on the fact that measures of intelligence were designed so that interventions could be put into place to get children back on track.  All four also focus on the role of teacher feedback.  They are also written in a populist way, something that works better for the journalists rather than the researchers.  I’m not considering the validit...

I’ve been reading a lot this summer.  The more I read, the more I realise that I’m right to assume that there is no ‘ the’ way to teach.  I spotted Tom Barrett’s book on the No Tosh Facebook feed and ordered a copy having seen Tom speak at a couple of events and having read his blogs. Can Computers Keep Secrets explores the links between curiosity and creativity. The book (more of an extended essay) is quick and enjoyable to read that struck a chord with me as both a father, school leader and a geographer.  There are some clear links to other books such as Mindset , The Elephant in the Classroom and How Children Succeed .  That is to say, teachers need to move away from delivering knowledge toward allowing children to ask questions and driving their own enquiries.  This links clearly to the geographical enquiry process that we used at Priory Geography: Enquiry poster from David Rogers The idea being that young people access the process at di...

I'm writing this, like the past six or seven posts, using Posts for iPad. Personally, nothing beats Microsoft's Livewriter   for writing blog posts and that won't change (remember that I'm not really that tech savvy and like things to just work.) However, to avoid carting around a laptop I've been on the look out for a blogging app for iPad for some time. Here are some brief thoughts. Pleae bear in mind that I like things to be intuitive; that I don't ever go looking long for answers and that I have no patience.... The start up screen is a nice layout and, contrary to some reviews, Posts connected to and import by blogger setup without a problem. I can view and edit all existing posts, although there's some differences in the layout of posts on line.  In particular, I would like to be able to crop and perform basic editing of photos within the app and like hem to stay centred when published as they do in the editor.  However, these are minor bugs when postin...