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#GAConf15 Workshop slides–How inspirational Geography can help raise standards

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Got back yesterday from the Geographical Association’s annual conference in Manchester.  This post is dedicated to the workshop session that I spoke about.  The slides are embedded below, and regular readers will spot nothing new here.  Although through a Geographical lens, I would expect that teachers and leaders of other subjects will find something of use also.

The main points of the talk were:
  • Act like the professional that you are and ask for forgiveness rather than permission.
  • A lack of vision is responsible for many of the issues found in departments, not SLT or Ofsted.
  • It’s not about putting together amazing one-off lessons but ensuring that the mundane becomes the highest quality that it can be.  Fantastic learning right from lesson one across all year groups.

Some of the activities would be of use to leaders when trying to develop a vision:

  • Ask your team to bring along three objects that represent what they want your department to be.  Make a video from them.
  • One from Google Teacher Academy – spent 15 minutes observing and sketching your learning area.  What does it say to you?

A couple of technical gremlins raised their head during the session which meant that I didn’t get around to the last few ideas – do get in touch if you’d like to know more.

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