How to use stories to make knowledge stick.
Plus a dozen great things you don't want to miss from our members
Hello everyone,
Community member Jonathan Mounstevens said it best (again) this week
“When the milk tastes slightly off in your tea but you're so knackered that the benefits vastly outweigh the costs and you drink it anyway.”
Fresh milk and tasty tea on the horizon, Jonathan. Half term is soon.
We - schools - Are In Beta - always learning.
This week:
🎥 How to use stories to make knowledge stick
📰 We Are In Beta Community news - a dozen great things you’re up to.
🎥 How to use stories to make knowledge stick (part 1) - The singular tale
Direct instruction and knowledge rich curricula can be dry if done badly. But we know children learn better from them. That is a really difficult paradox you need to handle.
Telling stories helps you navigate that paradox.
Join Josh Vallance (National Lead Practitioner, Oasis Academies) to learn:
What the role of narrative in the classroom is.
What the telling of a great story (in the context of a History unit) looks like and sounds like.
Why narrative holds psychologically privileged status.
How to construct and tell brilliant stories so your students remember them.
📅 Tues 25th May
🕕 6.00-7.15pm
📰 We Are In Beta Community news
We Are In Beta exists to helps schools learn from each other. Here are a dozen things community members are up to that well worth checking out.
🎧 Listen
Joe Ambrose has turned the National INSET Day We Are In Beta hosted in December into podcasts. Listen to the sessions over 5,000 registered for here.
📚 Read
Manny Botwe expertly uses what he’s learned about check lists from his leadership reading to solve an all too common problem you probably face in his headteachers notes to his community.
Josh Vallance asks: “Core and hinterland: what are we really talking about?”
🐦 Tweet
Jack Tavassoly-Marsh gathered scores of opinions on “How do you assess the quality of teaching across a school?”
Ann Donaghy shows us how to simultaneously celebrate your team and make you want to work at her school with this weekly thread.
📊 (TA)Grade
Ben Newmark explains how his school, Lodge Park Academy, are approaching TAGs.
Jonathan Mountstevens explains why blind marking on its own does not provide an effective defence against bias in TAGs.
🎫 Attend (in person!)
Claire Hill is organising ResearchEd Kent. Get your tickets here.
🎥 Watch
Sallie Stanton and Stuart Lock ran “Preparing for Ofsted: Online Seminar”. Watch the recording here.
Emma Turner, Thahmina Begum and Abby Bayford are presenting in the return of #LDeduchat put on by the Chiltern Learning Trust.
😂 Laugh
Lee Northern quite rightly doffed his cap to this response to Ben Newmark’s tweet about Dylan covers.
XCurtis wins the internet with “The #CAGs version of Line of Duty.”
What are you working on you want to tell the community about?
Hit reply to this email to let me know and we’ll include next time or click…
Thanks for reading.
Speak soon.
@NiallAlcock and the We Are In Beta team
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