21 February 2021

Image of Spring Term - 22nd February 2021

WoW – qualitative CPD Focus – Reading for understanding

READING	WRITING	ORACY
Reading widely Reading for pleasure	Spelling of subject-specific vocabulary Use of WAGOLLs to model/scaffold (visualisers, mini-whiteboards)	Purposeful and structured communication with others

THIS WEEK

Reading Quick Wins – as our CPD focus re-centres back onto reading this half-term, I will be attaching ‘Reading Quick Wins’ (adapted from Alex Quigley’s work) for you to paste into your lesson slides where appropriate. Feedback welcomed.
Updated CPD application form and follow-up questionnaire – this will be circulated by LHO and is attached to this TLD. It will form a crucial part of strategic planning and evaluation of CPD moving forward. Please ask if you have any questions.
Study Groups – please remember to work on these projects, for which you have five hours (disaggregated INSET day in November is pay-back). These projects will be even more relevant and important as students return.
Reminder: CPD – Teams support from DTU, LCH, MRI and JMJ during highlighted KWV sessions. Please call/contact them via Teams during this time will all things ICT related. Many thanks to them for their continued support (and video tutorials for students and staff).
PTSA – our trainee is in school Monday to Thursday this week.
Trainee/new staff induction CPD – this week JWI (details to follow)
HoDs – launching Reciprocal Reading (Reading Warriors) with departments this week

REFLECT

Feedback - Plan - Teach

Link to this term’s CPD focus – Improving reading for understanding by increasing independence

Key Priorities

Delivering effective remote learning
Promoting wider reading within your subjects and reading for pleasure

Our ethos of inclusion emanates throughout everything that we do as classroom practitioners. It directs every decision that we make in terms of sequencing, resources, approaches and even dialogue shared with our students. During periods of remote learning, this ethos is even more important.

This week, spend a few minutes reflecting on the following questions in your drive to ‘include’ all learners in these difficult times:

Are you aware of your students’ individual profiles? What do these profiles mean for remote learning in the context of their subject and the curriculum they're covering?
What additional information has been provided (SENCO or other) to add to the profile of individual students?
Are you aware of the home learning circumstances? How much and what kind of family support would be available at home? Would parents be helping with remote learning, or maybe siblings? Are parents working from home and therefore less available to help?
Are you planning a lesson as if the students were in front of you? If this is the case, you may need to rethink your approach as many are accessing, asynchronously.

The DfE suggested ‘keeping it simple’ in their latest remote learning guidance - sounds obvious. This week, make your watchword ‘differentiation’. As we all empathise with the different students within our classes – imagining their reactions to our lesson materials – let’s try to ensure that ALL learners are able to access the work.

Top Tips for an Inclusive Virtual Classroom:

Use very clear language
Keep words on the page to a minimum
Break activities down into numbered steps or bullet points
Use symbols or pictures to support understanding
Use easy to read fonts and avoid underlining and italics
Use buff coloured background
Have online resources in an editable format (e.g. a PowerPoint or word document, not PDF) so that pupils can increase text size or change the background colour
If children have severe reading difficulties or are visually impaired, record someone reading the resources and have these recordings available with the resources
Apply the government’s dos and don'ts on designing for accessibility when designing resources (these aren’t education-specific, but they’re good accessibility rules for all contexts)
Use Microsoft accessibility features such as picture dictionary and text to speech through Immersive Reader
Communicate with JMA and her team if more support is needed

ASPIRE CPD! If you would like to learn more, try this 57 minutes webinar with the National College: Remote Learning Provision for SEND students

Useful references:

Remote Learning Policy (to be updated to reflect recent changes – by the end of this week)

Teaching and Learning Policy (containing blended learning approach)

WLD planning template (updated December 2020)

British Educational Suppliers Association’s LendED platform also provides a searchable list of resources for remote education