Detention Diaries
Exploring Education, building a community
recent posts
- “Context Matters”… Does It Though?
- Will All Schools Join a Trust? …Pull the Other One.
- When SEND Funding Gets “Swallowed”: Who Actually Sees the Money?
- Questions and more questions. The white paper after some digestion… or lack thereof.
- Every Child Achieving and Thriving – Vision, Reality, and the Gap Between the Two
about
Category: Uncategorised
-
This week I had the absolute pleasure (read: emotional exhaustion wrapped in admin) of attending my daughter’s EHCP meeting.As any parent of a SEND child knows, these meetings are more stressful than OFSTED, job interviews, or trying to teach Year 9 last period on a windy Friday. Enter the SALT team — “Speech and Language…
-
Every Monday morning in briefing, it happens.Our deputy stands at the front, coffee in hand, PowerPoint glowing, and says the same thing: “Attendance is a whole-school target. We need to drive attendance. We all need to push attendance to bring up the numbers.” Cue the staffroom nodding. The silent agreement that yes, attendance is indeed…
-
If you spend any amount of time in a school, you’ll hear phrases like “We’re a reading school,” “Reading is at the heart of everything we do,” and “Don’t forget to Drop Everything And Read.” Lovely stuff.Very wholesome.Children surrounded by books like tiny, chaotic librarians. But here’s something we don’t talk about nearly enough:How on…
-
Department of Educational Survival StudiesBy: A Tired Teacher, PhD (Partially Half-Dead) Abstract This week, our long-term observational study into teacher behaviour during the Christmas term has yielded critical new data. Findings indicate a direct correlation between (a) how far we are into the term, and (b) the speed, size, and frequency of family multipack biscuit…
-
So, the new curriculum reform guidance has finally been published this week — and, to be fair, there’s a lot to like.There’s talk of citizenship education, AI literacy, even understanding mortgages (which, frankly, would’ve been handy before I recently signed up for one). Finally, it feels like someone in the Department for Education has realised…
-
🧑🎨 The Unsung Artists of Education There’s a certain type of hero in every school.Not the caped kind. Not even the “I’ve got a stapler that actually works” kind. I’m talking about the SENDCO. You know — the person who somehow juggles inclusion plans, legal paperwork, staff training, broken printers, and seventeen half-written emails that…
-
By The Disgruntled Teacher It’s Sunday night. Your stomach has begun its weekly interpretive dance routine. The mysterious rock you swallowed sometime around 4pm has now settled just under your ribcage. Your bowels are whispering, “Monday is coming…” Tomorrow… school. But breathe. You’re not alone. And more importantly — you’ve survived every other Sunday before…
-
Are we asleep at the wheel? Right, colleagues. Gather round the metaphorical staffroom table. Because I’ve just read something that makes me wonder if we’ve all gone completely numb. The Department for Education has announced a recommended 6.5% pay increase over the next three years for teachers. Lovely headline. Almost warm and fuzzy. Except —…
-
It’s half term. We’ve made it. Just about. Eight long weeks of teaching, marking, data drops, detentions, and detangling headphone wires from confiscated phones. We’ve crawled to the finish line, our souls held together by caffeine and passive aggression, and now… here we are. Half term. The calm between storms. The briefest of respites before…
-
CPD: The Endless Cycle of “Learning to Learn” I’ve lost count of how many CPD articles I’ve seen lately.Apparently, teachers must now learn how to learn, learn what to learn, and occasionally learn why we’re learning what we’re learning — all while learning to reflect on the learning we’ve just learned. Don’t get me wrong…
