National KS4 Subject Database + 5 Pastoral blogs
Everything we do at We Are In Beta hinges on two core ideas:
Data can help us find great work in school.
You can learn how to get even better if we share it.
Trouble is both are really hard to do.
To fully understand national data sets, it needs to be your full time job.
To know who to follow, reach out to and learn from is nigh on impossible when you’ve got double year 10, lunch duty, parent meetings and 60 year 11 mocks to mark.
This week’s highlights from the community will:
give you more data about making curriculum choices than anyone has ever had before and
help you get under the skin of others’ pastoral success.
We - schools - Are In Beta - always learning (when we use data and read blogs)
📊 Learn what (and how many) subjects successful schools like yours offer.
🥣 We Are In Beta-bits: 5 pastoral articles you may have missed.
💼🔎 Jobs with We Are In Beta community members.
📊National KS4 Subject Database
Choosing what subjects you offer at KS4 is one of the biggest decisions you have make in school leadership. It impacts staff experience, student outcomes and school performance metrics.
Only this week I spoke to MAT leader whose top priority was researching high performing schools, looking at their websites and making note of which subjects they do to help them make curriculum choices.
The trouble is there is no single database let’s you look up schools like yours, who are doing a good job to see what subjects they offer and why.
Except, that’s not true any more.
Play this video, if you don’t believe me👇
With this KS4 Subject Database you can - for the first time - find, filter and interrogate every school in England on...
#️⃣ the number of KS4 subjects offered that count in DfE performance tables
📚 the names of subjects and qualifications
📈headline progress and attainment data, as well as broken down by P8 element and prior attainment
and more.
All subjects? Every school in England?
Yes, really. All entries, for all subjects in EVERY school in one place. 🏫🎓📊🤯
🥣 We Are In Beta-bits: 5 pastoral resources you may have missed.
We can learn a lot from others’ experiences. But finding them takes ages. I’ve spent a few hours reading the internet, so you don’t have to.
Here are 5 pastoral blogs in the latest We Are In Beta-bits:
“What do inclusive classrooms look like?” An excellent piece of myth busting about what inclusive classrooms look like from Ben Newmark
“We truly believe in restorative conversations” - a sanction and rewards chart that might surprise you by Eddie Aylett and Janet Anderson
“10 things I’ve gained from being in a disruption-free school” - benefits every single teacher in the land would want to be able to say about behaviour in the scchool by Laura Webb
“Here’s to pastoral teams!” An articulation and celebration of work that led a Progress improvement of +0.78 from -0.05 in 2019 to +0.73 in 2023 by Louis Everett
“The mobile phone ban in schools is the solution to the wrong problem” - as school leader saying how it is - Mike Baxter.
💼🔎 Jobs with We Are In Beta community members
📊Deputy Head of Maths (Colchester Academy).
📊Mathematics - Les Quennevais School (Jersey).
🎭Dance & Drama - Brakenhale School (Bracknell).
📚English - Noel Baker Academy (Derby).
English Teacher (Colchester Academy).
🏑PE - Noel Baker Academy (Derby).
🇫🇷MFL - Noel Baker Academy (Derby).
On a personal note
I’m fascinated by questions and the effects different questions can have on the conversations you have. Some questions open them up. Others close them down.
This one question might be the most illuminating thing you can ask anyone - whether they be a student, a colleague or a parent.
Unlike more open ended and evaluative questions:
It narrows the pool of possible answers - making it easy to answer.
It doesn’t require the person you’re asking to offer any kind of evaluation, which can feel really intimidating - creating psychological safety.
It gives you something concrete and relevant to explore from the off - creating immediate value for both parties.
What is it?
“What are you working on at the moment?”
Almost none of the work we do inside the community would have come about had we not asked it.
The National KS4 Subjects Directory is a classic example. I asked a member of the Curriculum SLT Group what they are working on. They told us that navigating options choices was a big challenge. We offered some ideas. France Ling spent several days building the database..
So, I have one question for you:
“What are you working on at the moment?”
I would love to hear from you and explore how we can help. As always, hit reply.
Thanks for reading.
@NiallAlcock and the We Are In Beta team
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