Primary Teacher UK

SEN Teacher Resources

http://www.senteacher.org/ is a site that offers many free teaching resources for mainstream and SEN teachers.

One of the things that really impressed me about the site were the online customisable printable resources. Be sure to check out the customisable large dice printer, the certificate printer and two fan makers (the letter fan maker and the numeracy fan maker). There are, also, many other printables.

SEN Teacher Resources also offers free software downloads.

Be sure to visit this amazing site. It's really kind of teachers to make available resources that they have created for free.

Schools without heads

Taken from the TES:

Up to half a million children are in schools without permanent headteachers, research suggested today.  The National Association of Headteachers warned of a mounting crisis in recruiting school leaders. The NAHT, Britain's biggest headteachers' union, released a survey which showed more than one in four heads would consider quitting if their heavy workload does not fall.  The union also surveyed a fifth of local authorities and found 257 schools without permanent heads. If replicated across the country, this would mean up to half a million pupils in 1,200 schools without headteachers.

The report revealed that two-thirds of head who replied taught but four out of five did not receive any time for planning, preparation and assessment.  All those that replied said they provided cover for teachers, with over 20% covering between 41 and 100 hours a year. It also revealed that over a third of head teacher respondents did not receive any "dedicated headship" time, while just over 15% of deputy and assistant head respondents received no leadership and management time. A DfES spokesman said:

"It is important to keep this in context - vacancy rates for head teachers have fallen significantly with only 0.7% of posts now vacant compared to 1% in 1998.  But we are supporting heads further, including record pay, slashed the bureaucratic burden on them, key reforms to help them manage workloads better and changes to promote leadership so they have the skills needed.  Since 1997 the maximum head teachers can be paid has risen by more than 35% in real terms from £56,676 to £93,297, with over £102,000 available in inner London from this September.  Today's workforce statistics show there are more teachers and support staff in our schools than at anytime since 1981, up 36,200 since 1997, thanks to our commitments on pay and conditions."

The union is so annoyed with the Government that they have warned they would not rule out a boycott of national school tests, not that the Year 6 teachers would mind too much hey! :)

I'm guessing that most of this research is in Secondary schools, although I feel for all heads they do get paid a lot to take the pressure looking at those salaries!  We're looking for a new deputy at our school, which seems to be as difficult as getting a head looking at the number of adverts for Deputies in the TES last week.  So if fancy a challenge, apply!

Primary Resources Update

Gareth is back from Easter with an update to the Primary Resources website.  The update includes over 100 new resources and 54 new images in the photograph section.  The new updates are marked with a blue 'new'.  Updates include level descriptions in child speak for numeracy, literacy, science, history and geography.  Great to help with those reports which will soon need to be written!

Free resource: IWB labels

I've created a set of 47 Interactive Whiteboard (IWB) labels, four of which are shown below (click on them for full size image), that are designed to be used with PowerPoint or IWB software as a colourful way of enhancing information. For instance, instead of writing 'Learning objective' and 'Success criteria' on the IWB, use the images instead - it helps the presentation come alive. I've used the labels with a class before, and they work well. The full set includes the following labels...

Art and design, Assembly, Break, Circle time, Citizenship, Design and technology, Drama, French, Geography, German, Golden time, Groups, Guided reading, Guided writing, Handwriting, History, Homework, ICT, Important, Indoor PE, Language, Learning objective, Learning objectives, Literacy, Lunch, MFL, Music, Numeracy, Outdoor PE, PSHE, PSME, Reading, Religious education, Remember, Safety, Science, Spellings, Story, Success criteria, Swimming, Take ten, Today's timetable, Topic, Trip, Tutor, Walt and Wilf.

Download the full set here  Download IWBlabels.zip

 

 

 

Illegal class sizes?

According to figues that have been released today thousands more children are being taught in large primary school classes this year.    According to the data the BBC have analysed the figures show the number of classes of five to seven-year-olds with more than 30 pupils has risen from 740 to 910.  This suggests that about 29,000 pupils were in classes that broke the legal limit of 30 - 5,000 pupils more than last year.

How are your schools coping with the legal class sizes?  There was some interesting research earlier in the year that suggested that large class sizes didn't have any affect on the standards of the children. The report by the Institute of Education said that analysis pointed to "a clear conclusion":

"There was not found to be any evidence that the size of class had any impact on progress in maths or literacy in Year 4 or Year 5.  Nor was there any apparent effect on progress in maths or science in Year 6.  There was "a positive relationship" between class size and Year 6 literacy: pupils in larger classes made more progress."

That may well be the case, but smaller class sizes make a big difference in the how easy the classes are too manage.  I'm all for 30 being the legal limit for class sizes in KS2 as well! 

Top Marks Website

If you are looking for useful teaching and resource sites then try visiting Topmarks.  What's great about this site is that all the links are checked regularly to see if they are still valid so as to avoid the frustration of 'site not found' messages. The site is also searchable by keyword or by subject and age group.

Link: http://www.topmarks.co.uk/

Pied Piper of Hamelin Planning

After the SATS my class are going to be leading the KS2 end-of-year performance with the Pied Piper of Hamelin. Rather than having the performance as a stand alone, I'm going to be teaching a topic based SMART approach to the Pied Piper and linking in all the other subjects.

As such I've planned my Numeracy and Literacy around the Pied Piper until the last week of Summer 2 and created a 'How are you SMART book' for all the other subjects.  I'm pleased with finished products and thought that I'd share them with you on the site.  I'm not saying they are perfect, and don't know how well it will work, but I'm looking forward to giving it a go!

Numeracy Plan - This is a medium term Numeracy plan from the week after the SATS until the week before we break up for Summer.  Download Numeracy Plan

Literacy Plan - This is a medium term Literacy plan from the week after the SATS until the week before we break up for Summer.  If covers most genres of writing.   Download Literacy Plan

Pied Piper activity booklet.  I plan to allow the children to pick the activities they wish from this booklet and work either independently or with a partner.  This booklet covers all the foundation stage subjects except RE and PSHCE.  Each activity contains:

1. The task
2. What I expect the children to complete
3. The SMARTS that they will use to complete the task
4. How I will assess each piece of work they complete.

Finally on the back page is a grid for the children to colour in the smarts as they complete them.  I'm going to ask my children to try and develop the SMARTS that they have identified themselves as being weaker at.  As the booklet is a Publisher document I have uploaded two versions: The Publisher version if you wish to alter it, or the PDF version to just print out. 

I hope that you find these useful, please leave your comments and questions and I'll get back to you if I can help further.  May I also take the time to thank my wife for her time in helping to compile this booklet - she hates being mentioned on the site! :)

New targets for 5 year olds

Ruth Kelly announced today new targets to assess five-year-old children in England in the Childcare Bill.  She said an extra 30,000 children must be "reaching a good level of development" every year but promised that the targets didn't mean formal assessments.  She also noted that "parents don't want their toddlers sitting exams or undergoing any form of assessment." According to the BBC:

"Instead teachers and childcare professionals simply observe children - looking, for example, for enthusiasm for learning and good communication skills.  We want to see an increase from 48% of children reaching a good level of development at age five to 53% by 2008.  It may not sound much put like that but it means an extra 30,000 more children ready to learn at age five every year."

The education secretary added that the government also wanted to see "faster gains in our most deprived communities".  So there's not going to be any exams for the children, but I guess we'll see nursery schools going into special measures soon because 'children arn't reaching a good level of attainment, especially in the deprived area.'

 

Henry Walpole's back

Henry Walpole's primary teaching blog has returned for the summer term. If you haven't read Henry's blog before, you're missing out. Check out the quote below from his first post of the new term.

For example, long addition in year 4 involves about twelve columns and breaking down numbers into even more basic numbers before carrying out the sum. The result is that in order to add the cost of a chocolate bar and an ice cream, pupils need to use a large tablecloth-sized piece of paper and perform thirteen separate additions before arriving at the solution (“It’s 25p, Sir. Shall I do question two now?” “No, David, the cleaners are just arriving to do the rooms. I think we’ll pack up and go home.”).

Crocodile keeps children safe

This is a little article that I found in the Times Online Newspaper:

A teacher has designed a contraption to keep children safe during school outings. Elaine Stephen, 42, who teaches five-year-olds at Buchanhaven Primary School in Peterhead, Aberdeenshire, came up with the Walkodile, which links children by harness to a flexible central spine, after spending years ferrying groups in rambling crocodiles. She said: “It is so hard to protect young children, so I thought it would be great to have something that would make them stand out.”

In the original article you can see a picture of the crocodile.  Our school is considering starting a walking bus - maybe we should be having a walking crocodile!