HWRK Magazine: Creative Writing and Self-Regulation
I wrote this article for HWRK Magazine in January 2023 to walk through my process for teaching creative writing using reflection and self-regulation. You can read the whole piece here.
writing
Grammar for (academic) writing: sentences working hard…
This post is based on my part of a conference talk with Marcello Giovanelli at ResearchEd Warrington in April 2022 based on the work we have been doing for our forthcoming book, Essential Grammar, which will be released by Routledge in 2023. In our book, we argue that grammar is the foundation of language. Grammar …
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Re-thinking Dual Coding: Visuospatial Modelling in English
I think we’ve lost the way with dual coding. Something isn’t working. Lethal mutations have taken hold of our practice in many places and I think that we’ve lost sight of why and how it works because we are so set on the simple idea that: words + pictures = better learning, because SCIENCE. I’ve …
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‘Finding my Lane’ – an imposter syndrome tale
Alison Lister Ali Lister is an Associate Assistant Principal at an inner city Leeds secondary academy serving an area of high deprivation. She leads English as well as Literacy Across the Curriculum. Ali is passionate about making education accessible for all through the empowering facets of literacy, especially reading and oracy. When not in the …
Teaching Writing: Reflections from a Head of Faculty
Leila is an English Literature graduate with no real experience in teaching writing, or, indeed, writing creatively herself. She started her teaching career with little knowledge or understanding of how to help pupils write well. In my experience, most English teachers are those who have studied English (be it linguistics or literature), rather than those …
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The Power of Simplicity: Supporting Reluctant Writers at Key Stage 4
It is the first week in December, and as I stand at the front of my classroom I can feel the rainwater in my shoes: it is a bleak day to do duty, and I realise I am still absent-mindedly carrying the bottles that I have confiscated on the yard. My Year 10 class observe …
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‘Becoming a Writer’.
“If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lotand write a lot.” Stephen King The thought of reading and writing “a lot” to be a writer might dismay some students, and if you asked a student, ‘Why do you write?’ their response might be, “Because I …
Talk for Writing
Why is effective talk important? On attending my first Oracy Pioneers session with Voice 21 I was astounded to discover the profound impact which talk, or lack thereof, can have on students. Of course, in preparation for attending the course I had begun to reflect on this: What opportunities for talk did I provide in …
Improving Non-Fiction Writing
“In my writing life, I seem to have navigated an odd course between fiction and its negation, always half-wishing when I’m immersed in one that I were embarked on the other. I want the free flight of story when I’m hunkered down in facts and wish for a character who could offer a statement contradicted …
The Writing Revolution Resources – An Early Career Perspective
I retrained as an English teacher at the age after spending the previous 15 years in the classroom teaching horticulture. I had then had a 10 year spell doing various types of teacher training and various teaching and learning manager posts, and I decided to retrain as I had begun to feel very far away …
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