This one has taken me a while to write and is probably one that many will disagree with 🤷

Understanding: Science is Told, Not Found In my time as a teacher, I have been repeatedly urged to adopt generic one size fits all methods which fundamentally collapse when applied to the rigour of science.

New Blog Post 📝

Science is formed through recall of knowledge of people long since passed.

Creating classrooms that allow pupils to deeply 'understand' and discover science does not make a scientist. Allowing them to recall it does.
open.substack.com/pub/joel1201...

I love these! I remember reading them years ago, I will have to pop the link at the bottom of my post.

Stories from Physics The story of physics is intertwined with the stories of people. We are delighted to be able to share this collection of amazing, amusing and enlightening stories from Richard Brock, a former physics t...

Are you familiar with the collated _Stories from Physics_ on the IOP Spark website, from Richard Brock at KCL? No registration or paywall. spark.iop.org/stories-phys...

Hinterland: Teaching Beyond the Curriculum Science is more than bunch of dry facts. Using Hinterland can help us to develop understanding, create conversations and build science as a world of creativity, exploration and even deceit.

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Using stories in your science lessons can help build a students understanding of science, even if its not on the curriculum.

This is Hinterland.

Here I discuss some examples in science and how to implement them into your lessons.
open.substack.com/pub/joel1201...

Building a Reading Culture: Starting with Why? How diagnosing the real literacy problem led to a whole-school reading culture at Dixons Croxteth.

First blog post from an amazing colleague on the hard work needed to build the literacy of our pupils.

A great read on how implementing a strategy and changing culture takes time and effort.
researchschool.org.uk/bradford/new...

Education and Motivation: Will AI Change Education? Having access to information does not make us learn more, what matters more is the motivation to learn more. AI will both do absolutely nothing to education and everything to society.

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Did the internet change education? I don't think it did.

Will AI change education? I don't think so.

The internet and AI do not change the motivation to learn. We have access to more info now than ever before but that doesn't make us smarter.

open.substack.com/pub/joel1201...

Education and Motivation: Will AI Change Education? Having access to information does not make us learn more, what matters more is the motivation to learn more. AI will both do absolutely nothing to education and everything to society.

New Blog Post 📝

Did the internet change education? I don't think it did.

Will AI change education? I don't think so.

The internet and AI do not change the motivation to learn. We have access to more info now than ever before but that doesn't make us smarter.

open.substack.com/pub/joel1201...

Stand Still, Narrate and Stop: Small Classroom Changes with Big Impacts Forget the lentils and stopwatches. From frontloading to the power of 'we,' here are some tiny, intentional changes that can transform classroom culture.

New Blog Post 📝

Over the years I have received a lot of terrible teaching advice, but I have also had some brilliant pointers.

Some of the best advice I have had has been seemingly insignificant changes to my practice. Here are five examples.
open.substack.com/pub/joel1201...

Struggling is a part of learning, if we teach pupils that the struggle is never needed and we go over to help them, then we aren't teaching them resilience.

Never take a pencil out of the student's hand, I like that!

Stand Still, Narrate and Stop: Small Classroom Changes with Big Impacts Forget the lentils and stopwatches. From frontloading to the power of 'we,' here are some tiny, intentional changes that can transform classroom culture.

New Blog Post 📝

Over the years I have received a lot of terrible teaching advice, but I have also had some brilliant pointers.

Some of the best advice I have had has been seemingly insignificant changes to my practice. Here are five examples.
open.substack.com/pub/joel1201...

Great teaching starts with great subject knowledge -
@joel120193.substack.com shares how brushing up on electrolysis made him a better educator and why you should dedicate time to improving your chemistry knowledge 👇
edu.rsc.org/endpoint/kno...
#iteachchem #chemed

Chlorine is Green, Zoos Have Life and Kings are Killed: Using Etymology in Science Stop dumbing down vocabulary. When I taught the structure of the ear, I had a choice. I could teach: Hammer, Anvil, and Stirrup. Or I could teach Latin. Not to be pretentious, but to give them a tool.

Really good blog by @joel120193.substack.com on etymology as a tool for learning complex scientific vocabulary in science lessons (not just a one-off photosynthesis filler/explainer).

open.substack.com/pub/joel1201...

Thank you!

I think it went well, I ended up with a much bigger crowd than I expected so was a tad nervous.

Got to do it for the first time once haven't you 🤷

I enjoyed writing this post.

Subject knowledge is such an important factor into becoming an effective teacher.

There should be much more of a focus on this when designing CPD.

Take into account your individual departments when planning.

School threatened with closure now making 'rapid improvements' Dixons Academies Trust took over De La Salle in Croxteth in 2022

Sometimes local press isn't always a school's best friend, but this post about our recent Ofsted is such a lovely read.

Really goes into the journey we have been on as a school.

www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpo...

Are our results where they need to be? No, they aren't.

But in the first year, our P8 results where the third most improved in the country.

There is still a lot of hard work to do, but our staff and pupils welcome it with open arms.

When I came for my interview in March 2024, I wanted to work with pupils with a similar background to myself and improve their life chances.

Every single member of staff at Dixons Croxteth knows why we get up every day: to improve the education of every pupil.

I am incredibly proud to work here.

This is my favourite part of the report.

The school when I joined just over two years ago is not the same one I work in today.

The school was given a closure notice after two Inadequate reports and today we have a school where pupils feel valued and safe.

This is something I am incredibly proud of.

Working in a turnaround school is tough and whilst we do not work for Ofsted, it is amazing to have our hard work recognised.

Every single member of the school community has worked so hard over the past three years to achieve this.

It's ironic isn't it that we strive to do all this amazing teaching and learning but when the end of the specification comes, we know that Using Resources can be done in 2 lessons, 5 if it is Triple.

There is not a method in the world that teaches science in less time.

There is Too Much to Learn in GCSE Science The National Curriculum in science has become far too large. In order to have a population of those who are scientifically literate, we must reduce the amount of content.

The AQA specification is currently 200 pages long. English Lang is 26, Maths is 44, Geography 40, Art 42 pages.

Yes, these subjects are not the same, but there is a difference in the expectation of knowledge in science when compared with other subjects.

joel120193.substack.com/p/science-na...

Fingers crossed it doesn't take us another 15 years before we ban AI from the classrooms and under 16s too.

Battleships, Blind Spots and Bandwagons: Educational Fallacies An exploration of how logical fallacies like sunk costs and tradition shape our schools, plus practical ways to outsmart these biases for better teaching and leadership.

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With the sheer amount of decisions a teacher has to process in a day, our brain often relies on fallacies.

This is a look at 10 educational fallacies that often take place in school, what they manifest into, and what we can do to avoid them.
open.substack.com/pub/joel1201...

If you're still inputting QLA data onto a spreadsheet or worse, making your colleagues do it - read this!

Excellent from @joel120193.bsky.social

Do you throw darts? It's the only way I can think that would make it worse 😅

We've all done it, let's be honest.

The football is so turgid that im sat here laughing at @joel120193.bsky.social blog in what feels like a masochistic manner. Like sorry what is this and why have we all had to do it?

I do sometimes think that leaders think every teacher is some sort of Nostradamus like figure able to predict the future.

It's all so baffling isn't it 😅

The student loan graduate system is a tax in all but name.

A 30 year tax at that. For new graduates, it is 40.

In the future we will have people paying their student loans, but being too told to pay NI because they're over 60.

It is unfair.

On that, if you had one nurse, trained in the UK on a Plan 2 loan, top of band 6, they will pay around £150 a month for their student loan.

Another nurse, who did not train in the UK, top of band 6, will take home £150 more every month.

Only because they didn't study in the UK.