Beyond Good

Matt and Femi reflect on leading departments, the evolving process of implementing coaching and department meetings as colleagues' needs change over time, and turn their thoughts forward to leading culture change, teaching and learning and implementing coaching whole school.

Matt and Femi are joined by Josh Goodrich, author of 'Responsive Coaching', former teacher and senior leader and CEO of steplab.Responsive Coaching https://www.amazon.co.uk/Responsive-Coaching-Evidence-informed-instructional-coaching/dp/1036003213Steplabwww.steplab.co

Matt and Femi speak to former student Lily about school and learning from the other side of the desk.  Their discussion ranges from the impact that a great teacher can have on a student's choices and life, through to accounting for students who are struggling with pastoral issues and even to the teacher recruitment crisis and questions of how to get intelligent people like Lily into the profession.

In this episode Matt and Femi discuss various means and considerations around checking for understanding.

Femi and I have been visiting a lot of schools over the last few months - some are incredible and get some of the best results in the country and others are not so good!  In this episode we share things we've each seen that we thought were effective, and things that we noticed that were not.

Matt Burnage is one of the founding senior leaders of Ark Soane Academy, History teacher, and assistant principal leading on curriculum and assessment.  In this episode we do a deep dive into the subject of booklets - what they are, how they encapsulate the curriculum, impact on learning, the ways they are used in lessons, implications for whole school routines, how they are made and developed, implications for department meetings and much much more.

Matt debriefs Femi on his visit to The Michaela Community School.  They discuss teaching and learning, students, staff, family lunch and yard time, curriculum, routines, culture and much more.

Join Matt and Femi for the second part of their interview with Barry, as they talk about his leadership style, teaching, developing teachers, SLT and much much more.Barry Smith was a founding Deputy of Michaela School, Wembley.  The kids’ amazing French and his unique approach to MFL teaching created huge buzz at Michaela.  He went on to become head of Great Yarmouth Charter School - the tenth head in 10 years, at a school that was rated inadequate for a decade.  In 5 months, Ofsted declared Charter, ‘a miraculous turnaround’.  Barry went on to lead the turn around of inadequate Hackney New School.Barry now works freelance, mostly supporting headteachers with culture, behaviour, courtesy, teaching & learning, systems, and he has his own podcast: Barry Smith Education.

Join Matt and Femi as they talk to Barry Smith about his experience of taking over and turning around a failing school.Barry Smith was a founding Deputy of Michaela School, Wembley.  The kids’ amazing French and his unique approach to MFL teaching created huge buzz at Michaela.  He went on to become head of Great Yarmouth Charter School - the tenth head in 10 years, at a school that was rated inadequate for a decade.  In 5 months, Ofsted declared Charter, ‘a miraculous turnaround’.  Barry went on to lead the turn around of inadequate Hackney New School.Barry now works freelance, mostly supporting headteachers with culture, behaviour, courtesy, teaching & learning, systems, and he has his own podcast: Barry Smith Education.

In this episode Femi and Matt discuss what they've learnt and are discovering about coaching: how powerful it is, and how it's harder to do really well than it looks!In particular they dive into the ideas of sequencing/structuring teacher development, giving the coachee the opportunity to own and unpack what they've done well, and the importance of rehearsal, amongst other things.They reference the fantastic 'Responsive Coaching' by Josh Goodrich:https://amzn.eu/d/0bKPFOMq