If I randomly appeared in your classroom and asked your students “How does your teacher deal with poor student choices and conflict?” what would they say? Actually, scratch that. What word would be more likely to appear in their reply –Might or Would? If they say s/he “might” do this or “might” do that, then…
When I train School Leaders around Educational Change Management, I’m always keen to address the elephant in the room. Let’s call that elephant Barry. “This is all well and good.” they tell me “But what about Barry? Barry is stuck in his ways and just wrecks everything we try to change as soon as we…
Tickets are continuing to sell rapidly for “Restorative Classrooms, Strong Classrooms” for both our Sydney (April 26th) and Melbourne (July 12th) events. What’s also a bit exciting is the plans we have “in the pipe” for Perth. So stick around for that news WA folk. We thought some people might want to know if they’ll…
Ever had conflicts occur in your classroom and then some significant difficulty in knowing who to believe about whose fault it was? One party seems highly emotional to the point of exaggeration while the other just flatly denies all involvement. Careful not to assume, we adopt the judicial process of “investigating” – because somehow we’ve…
This week, thousands of students around Australia will strike against government inactivity in regard to climate change. As a lifelong educator, it’s a wonderful thing to see. Despite being one of the vast majority of Australians who would support our governments taking more meaningful action about climactic demise, this isn’t the part that excites me…
Real Schools has undergone a period of rapid and sustained growth. It’s been so genuinely exciting to help so many schools transform through a focus on what really matters. We need some help with that. If you have Principal level experience and think you might like to put your hand up for the chance…
People often ask me why we can’t follow the lead of conservative politicians and just lead our education policy from a “get back to basics” point of view. “You know what’s wrong with education/kids these days,” they tell me, “they can’t read and write and they have no respect”. They belittle the so-called soft skills…
Bill Shorten is this week seeking to promote a voter friendly image when it comes to schools by announcing that under their governance $46million will be spent over four years to ensure that every Australian kid gets swimming lessons while at school. We can expect the Morrison government to announce a similar policy announcement in…
I second guess myself quite a bit. I find myself fretting over what I’m thinking about doing and whether it will work. And what it doesn’t? What will happen then? Since commencing Real Schools, I’ve come to learn that this thinking was actually engrained within me across my time as a Teacher and Principal. Doesn’t…
I went to my own kids’ annual school presentation ceremony last night. I love both of them dearly and I also value the wonderful contribution that their school makes to their growth. But here’s the truth – it isn’t exactly a riveting evening. And so, I kept myself occupied scoring the gender split when it…
I had the privilege of being in the audience for some staff presentations at Albanvale PS last week. These four PLCs have made commitments to challenge their practice through the work of our Real Schools Partnership in a variety of different ways in the first year of our collaboration. The Prep PLC looked at the…
I was speaking to a roomful of School Leaders in Sydney a couple of weeks ago and I said something that I hadn’t planned to. I like to be prepared for such keynote presentations but part of that planning is always to leave just a little room for ad libbing. Some would call it flexibility and creativity.…
Register here for this “don’t miss and completely FREE” opportunity on Tuesday 13th November at 3.30pm AEDT We know authentic collaboration within our schools makes massive impact on students…. and yet creating a culture where everyone is open to learning together and shifting practice is tricky! What are the elements of a staff learning culture that is…
The city of Boston has no law for jaywalking. You can just cross the road wherever you like and the expectation is that you’ll just have a good look around first and try not to cause a bingle (I’m quite sure use of the word ‘bingle’ in the US is somewhat limited though). You’d be…
Register here for this “don’t miss and completely FREE” opportunity on Thursday 18th October at 3.30pm AEDT There are dangers and perils to your school’s improvement agenda at every turn.I’d suggest that one of the most dangerous, and perhaps least spoken about, is what I refer to as Practice-Policy Gaps. Effectively, this is where you have…
Almost every educator that I speak to agrees that we have a national problem with teen depression and suicide. They’d also fervently like to contribute to solving that problem. I know also that teen suicide is a complex and distressing social phenomena with multiple contributing factors and it’s easy to get lost in case study…
During any day of Restorative Practices training, I regularly open up the floor for questions. Learning the RP Framework always requires some sense-making and contextualising of the key concepts … so we need to talk about that. Occasionally, somebody asks a question along the lines of “Well, this might work for some kids but there…
I’ve read and written a fair bit lately about Student Engagement. Being easily seduced by simplicity, I was determined to distil the volume of information about this subject down to something accessible and practical for educators. And so, my definition of engagement is just four visible pursuits. It’s students who are: Listening Speaking Thinking Doing…
I’m exceedingly proud of Monmia Primary School in Melbourne as one of our Real Schools Partners over the last 3-4 years. My pride comes partly through their determination to embed Restorative Practices as the fundamental underpinning of their School Culture. In a recent visit, I was able to present them with a variety of genuine,…
I’ll admit to a little frustration with the Australian vernacular since I returned from a wonderful 9-day ordeal traversing the Kokoda Track in Papua New Guniea last week. You see, people keep annoyingly asking me “How was the Track?”. It’s actually a very reasonable question and my frustration is borne mostly of just not having…
Whenever I finish a day of training with a school, I point them to the Real Schools Member Resources that they all have access to. I’ve established a healthy bias for implementation in my work and these serve as a genuine resource for so many educators as they look to embed the principles we’ve learned…
You may have noticed that this is my first Real Schools newsletter in a wee while. It’s been some time since my family and I took a ‘real’ holiday and the last couple of weeks that we spent exploring London have been filled with bucket list moments that will entwine our conversations for years. As…
As a Principal, I occassionally deployed the strategy of a Business Lunch. It wasn’t a reward. Luke knew that if he was called to share a sausage roll with me that there was something serious, something behavioural, on the agenda for that lunch. So was this an appropriate, or even effective, strategy? In the Restorative…
It always amazes me how early in the school year that schools commence to plan for the following year. I’ve spoken to several School Leaders lately who have fervently begun their 2019 strategic preparations. It really is a credit to their dedication and commitment to not only the students they teach now, but also the…
It’s a well know and ancient aphorism that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”. It’s a proverbial warning that our intentions might be sound, virtuous and even admirable but that they also represent the first steps on a path or journey. We need to make those first steps the right ones. So,…
