Janet Clark is an education policy adviser at ATL The government recently published the latest guidance for the Review of Post-16 Education and Training (known as the area reviews). At 60 pages…Read more…
Primary school teachers go above and beyond to give their children the best
If the recent media coverage of the new primary school assessment and testing arrangements are anything to go by you would think that primary schools are pretty horrible places to be right now….Read more…
Disrespectful baseline steals children’s creative and imaginative expression
By Dr Guy Roberts-Holmes In all the arguments about whether or not reception baseline assessment is accurate or not, what is not discussed is that it is deeply disrespectful to young children and…Read more…
Should I stay or should I go?
By Deborah Parren, ATL policy officer. Trainee and newly qualified teachers are full of energy and good intentions to be the best teacher they can be for their pupils. Will this enthusiasm be…Read more…
Unhelpful scaremongering?
This post originally appeared on the TES. I hope all the teachers reading this column had a relaxing half term, busy doing nothing, and certainly not ticking pupil progress data boxes. The…Read more…
Counting the other costs of baseline assessment
Who knew that a test for four-year-olds could be so expensive? The “basic” cost of administering the baseline assessment has been reimbursed by the DfE in this academic year 2015/2016…Read more…
It’s like coming home with a poor school report and the admonishment ‘must try harder’
One of AMiE’s goals is to highlight what effective leadership looks like, to help raise the standard of leadership and management practice. We believe that the profession itself is able to be…Read more…
Gardening on the curriculum
By Anne Heavey, Education Policy Adviser at ATL. On Friday afternoon I had the pleasure of visiting Grassmoor Primary School in Chesterfield and I wanted to share some of what I saw. Grassmoor have a…Read more…
Times tables tests – as easy as 1, 2, 3?
By Anne Heavey, Education Policy Adviser at ATL. Happy New Year! Yesterday Nicky Morgan announced that in 2017 every 11 year old child will take an online test to check that they know their times…Read more…
Workload on the front line
By Ralph Surman, ATL policy officer. Workload and work life balance is a prominent issue of discussion among educational professionals. The government seems to have taken very little notice of their…Read more…
Control + Delete: why the government shouldn’t get rid of ICT
By Jill Stokoe, Education Policy Advisor at ATL. The Department for Education (DfE) recently sneaked out an announcement (hidden in a consultation), that GCSE and A level ICT will be axed. Teachers…Read more…
How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time
The workload elephant has always been with us, but it just seems to keep growing, and it’s increasingly out of control. It’s time to stop. ATL’s It’s about time campaign is about helping the…Read more…
The Reading Race
As part of ATL’s Union Learning Fund project, ATL Midlands have organized their first English and maths week. This week we’ll feature three blogs from Joanne Miles about embedding…Read more…
How teachers can use learners’ errors to develop their accuracy with language through a classroom activity
As part of ATL’s Union Learning Fund project, ATL Midlands have organized their first English and maths week. This week we’ll feature three blogs from Joanne Miles about embedding…Read more…
Embedding English: From Classroom to Common Inspection Framework
As part of ATL’s Union Learning Fund project, ATL Midlands have organized their first English and maths week. This week we’ll feature three blogs from Joanne Miles about embedding…Read more…
YoungMinds says make a noise about bullying this anti-bullying week
Lucie Russell, Director of Campaigns and Media at Young Minds explains what you can do to tackle bullying (originally posted on Safer Schools). The theme of Anti-Bullying Week 2015, coordinated by…Read more…
Training teachers to tackle homophobia, biphobia and transphobia with Stonewall.
By Alex Newton, Programmes Manager at Stonewall (originally posted on Safer Schools). A few days ago I received three emails from teachers in different schools, all with various issues. One was…Read more…
Don’t tell me I have low expectations
By Mary Bousted (first published in Schools Week) Teachers care passionately about their pupils and strive to close the education achievement gap, but their job becomes more difficult as inequality…Read more…
School improvement is too important not to put parents in the driving seat
By James Croft Are parents really irrelevant to school improvement? You might think so, given the present behaviour of our political masters, but without them we’re not likely to get the education we…Read more…
Every childhood is worth fighting for
By John Cameron, NSPCC Head of Helplines Everyday our ChildLine volunteers are contacted by children desperate for someone to talk to about the growing pressures in their lives. Sadly they often feel…Read more…