Coaching — PD to transform leaders

When we think of coaching, sporting metaphors often spring to mind. We think of players being ‘coached from the sidelines’. They are supported by someone who is pushing them to do their best, sharing tips and advice. Coaches often stay with players for years, forming strong relationships and helping them grow as professionals. They meet […]

Critical Pedagogy: How to respond to ‘future-focused’ discourse

“So it was an instrument of radical change, that’s what they thought it was. And then around about the middle of the 1980s …this computer got into the hands of school administrations and the ministries and the commissioners of education, state education departments. And now look what they did with them … The establishment pulls […]

Keep the fear off the set

Do you remember the actor/director John Cusack? He of ‘High Fidelity’ and ‘Being John Malkovich’ fame? I recently heard about ‘The John Cusack Rule’. When asked in an interview how he saw his role as film producer, he said his main job was, ”To keep the set free from fear.” This ‘rule’ was offered to […]

Can we create conditions for transformation?

Apparently, I once taught a ‘Grade A’ lesson. I know this because it said so, on a slip of paper in the small, brown envelope that appeared in my staffroom pigeonhole following a UK school inspection (because that is how we received feedback in those days). I therefore assumed that my careful grouping of students […]

Transforming learning

This post originally appeared on the CORE Education blog (Feb 2016)] toka kāhuarau: (noun) metamorphic rock. Ko te toka kāhuarau: Ko te momo toka ka hua mai ina huri te hanga me te āhua o tētahi atu o ngā toka mā te pā mai o te wera me te pēhanga i roto i takanga o […]

Belonging starts in the brain

It’s not news that stories grab us emotionally and help anchor ideas in our minds more than lists of facts do. Anyone who has sat through interminable slides – or a powerful keynote – will know this. The ‘right brain’ movement has been around for a while and I enjoyed Daniel Pink’s A Whole New […]