Summary: | At Lampton School Hounslow, science NQT John Duggan has been working hard on his lesson plans, but he worries that he's not reaching every pupil in his mixed ability Year 8 class. John Bayley watches as he organizes the class into groups so that they can teach each other about the digestive system. Whilst Bayley is impressed by the structure of the lesson, he's noticed that some students can drift off task. He suggests new strategies to engage the whole class in learning: - Allocate roles for group work to ensure that all students participate. - More frequent plenaries during the lesson. - Hands on activities to engage the easily distracted students - Be more generous with praise.John Duggan is shocked to realize how little praise he's giving and resolves to put Bayley's advice into practice. Two weeks later, Bayley returns and is encouraged by John's new approach: generous praise and more classroom activities have generated some excellent work. John Bayley works with science NQT Jim Weiss at Lampton School, Hounslow. A former youth worker, Jim came to teaching late. He's an experienced public speaker, and is aware that his reliance on rhetoric can sometimes lead to under-planning his lessons. Bayley watches him teach a top set Year 9 double lesson. Jim's a great entertainer, but the students are under-stretched and could learn more if Jim could learn to talk less. By planning a stronger framework to his lessons, and introducing a variety of activities to encourage independent learning, John believes that Jim could become an effective guide by the side , holding back his storytelling skills for only the most important moments. Two weeks later John returns to discover an improvement - a far better structure to the lesson and Jim is carefully monitoring his talking.
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