On Thursday 18th October I attended my first ever ‘Teach Meet’ at Clevedon School and what a truly inspirational evening it was!

I followed the the previous Clevedon TM on Twitter and was very excited to be attending Clevedon School’s 5th TM. The event was expertly organised and hosted by @ICTEvangelist (who deserves a lot of praise for his enthusiasm and professionalism!!). After some splendid food provided by a local sponsor, the evening was split into three main sections. First up was a keynote speech from @VicGoddard (Headteacher at Passmores Academy (stars of the channel 4 show ‘Educating Essex’)), followed by a selection of workshops and seminars,  finishing with micro-presentations from teachers wanting to share ideas and best practice. This post aims to highlight a few of the messages I took away from the evening…

Keynote speech from Vic Goddard

Vic Goddard was first to take to the stage to give a speech about his journey in education, vision for education and a stark reminder for why we have chosen the best job in the world. His speech was very honest, motivating and truly inspirational. I was moved by what Vic said and felt more motivated to try even harder to encourage young people to be more then they think they can be, to break down the barriers preventing them from being successful. Don’t just take my word for it, watch the videos below.

We have to be a ‘no fail’ organisation. Is that possible? I don’t know but I’m going to die trying and I expect that of my staff too.

Seminars: John Wells – Whole School Improvement

I signed up for John Wells seminar on whole school improvement and I wasn’t let down. My school has recently had a change of headship and SLT team, so we have had a lot of changes put in a place in a bid to improve the school. As such I was keen to get any ideas I could to feedback to the new leadership team.

John gave an extremely honest and revealing review of how Clevedon school were progressing towards becoming an outstanding school and certainly gave me food for thought! I was very impressed with the bold decisions John made as Head Teacher but even more so about how he communicated the bigger picture to his staff and gave them ownership of the vision. He identified road blocks and explained how he navigated these. He also shared some practical examples of changes he has made regarding uniform, non-negotiable’s in lessons (branded ‘The Clevedon Lesson’ – excellent idea!!) and how he had freed up department leaders to purely focus on teaching and learning. Please watch the videos below for more info…

Mirco – presentations

The last section of the evening revolved around 5 minute mirco presentations from teachers and educational professionals who had something to share. This was where my note pad went into overdrive!! Idea after idea after idea after idea… e.t.c. A few of the ‘nuggets’ I picked up on were:

• the grandad video
• assessment and feedback using Google Drive
• pop-up museums
• death by prezi
• Imaginarium
• SAMR framework to transform learning

To name but a few… For videos of all micro presentations please visit the Clevedon TM YouTube channel.

If you have yet to attend a Teach Meet I would strongly advise that you get yourself to one in your local area at the next available opportunity. I must admit it was the most enriching CPD event I have ever been to and look forward to attending more and hopefully presenting (something useful) in the future!!

#neverstoplearning