Like many educators I speak to, we have a little go at getting fitter at this time of year. That said, I’ve come to learn something about my relationship with physical exertion. It requires DISTRACTION. This summer, I’ve been distracting myself with podcasts and have found that I can endure a treadmill session more effectively…
At time of writing to you, there are only FOUR places left in the very first intake of The Inner Circle, commencing on February 1st 2020. So, essentially, this Newsletter is a rather not-so-subtle hint to submit an immediate Expression Of Interest at this link – https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/rstheinnercircle The Inner Circle is a 12-month Mentoring Program designed…
Today, I’d like to introduce you to The Inner Circle. In a nutshell, The Inner Circle is a 12-month Mentoring Program designed to meaningfully support school leaders who: are looking to establish Restorative Practices as the foundation of their School Culture. are existing Real Schools Partners looking for greater implementation support. are former Real Schools…
Jayden is one of my favourite success stories from a career of practicing restoratively – but that success didn’t come easily or instantly. Battling Tourette’s Syndrome and a healthy appettite for general playing up, Jayden always ensured that I, as AP in charge of Behaviour & Wellbeing, had something to chat with him about. Mostly…
The below is a photo of me working in a rather unusual classroom position with a Prep student at Dorset PS, one of our valued Partner Schools. Well, that’s what most people see anyway. I don’t. I see at least twelve students, half of those participating in this particular whole class activity, fully engaged in…
If you are reading this article, it’s probably because you are the working in a school or have an interest in education so I don’t need to waste your time telling you how busy the school environment can be. If you’re in education, you get it. It’s crazy and fast paced. What I am on…
If you’ve not watched Brene Brown’s “The Call to Courage” amidst a recent Netflix binge, then I recommend giving it an hour of your time. Brown is under my skin in a way that isn’t comfortable. She makes me think about who I purport to be and how I live that every day … and also when…
For all of our efforts, for all of our policy re-writes and for all the PD we’ve booked – why are we still struggling with student behaviour challenges? For all of the programs we’ve implemented, for all of the matrices we’ve built and for all of the values we’ve defined – why are our teachers still struggling…
I know the time of School Leaders is ridiculously scarce – I’ve had enough of that. I know much of it is spent following up student behavioural infractions or launching pointless investigations – I’ve had enough of that too. I know you spend oodles of time and money on behaviour programs that leave you looking…
There’s a reason that most schools, and even whole jurisdictions of schools, are running new, positively marketed, behaviour management programs these days. It’s because the last one didn’t work. On the other side of that program implementation, things just didn’t change between real people. Did they? And, right now – as you plan for…
A Teacher’s job used to be far more simple. Roughly, it could be seen as content distribution. I often refer to the ‘old school teacher’ as being a knowledge sprinkler who stands at the front of the room spraying information across the crowd, hoping that some of it sticks. And while I know (I’ve seen the memes)…
We all want to make a great start to the school term as there is this underlying belief that it sets us up for the rest of the term to be great. As we well know, this doesn’t always happen and it was only last week I had a principal talk to me about the…
We’ve had a rather enormous reaction to our recent “Leading Whole School Behaviour Improvement” events in Melbourne and Sydney … mostly from Queenslanders who weren’t there! And so we’re bringing this ground-breaking FREE opportunity to Brisbane on Friday 15th November at 10am. Click above to check out Adam’s video invitation to all of Queensland’s School…
Would you continue to use a Phillips head screwdriver on a standard screw if it didn’t get the job done? You wouldn’t would you? You’d change tools. Right? So, when exactly do we start questioning our obsession with Behaviour Management programs? Countless times now, we in schools, have spent enormous tracts of time and buckets…
This Friday in Melbourne we’ll be running our FREE 2-hour “Leading Whole School Behaviour Improvement” seminar at 8am. We’re following up in Sydney next Friday as well. Each School Leader in attendance will receive a White Paper titled “Improving Student Behaviour … Made Slightly Less Difficult” that will outline the thinking, the practices, the language and the…
We’ve seen them come down the pike before, these behaviour management programs. Haven’t we? Whenever issues of student behaviour have been highlighted and whenever key school stakeholders come into conflict about the way we conduct ourselves, their creators seize the opportunity. You see, edu-companies who market to schools are good at pitching just when the…
Just like a change in the weather, the media have changed their focus again to re-examine an old issue in education that allows them to compare our performance against other OECD countries. This time it’s to look at the impact of resourcing on our schools and more specifically, class sizes and teacher-student ratios. Like nearly…
For all of our efforts, for all of our policy re-writes and for all the PD we’ve booked – why are we still struggling with student behaviour challenges? For all of the programs we’ve implemented, for all of the matrices we’ve built and for all of the values we’ve defined – why are our teachers still struggling…
The overwhelming reaction that we’ve had to our FREE 2-hour Melbourne event titled “Leading Whole School Behaviour Improvement” wasn’t just about the crazy number of leaders who’ve already registered. It was also about the NSW School Leaders who screamed back at us “Why can’t we have this?!” You northern types really need to get…
I’ve just registered to be a marshall at the Melbourne incarnation of the School Strike 4 Climate on Friday 20th September. And, at Real Schools, we’d like to encourage all of our partner, member and network schools to support their students in taking part. I’m not helping out because I’m some ‘bleeding heart leftie’ who’s…
We have a problem with student behaviour in Australian schools and the ways we’ve been tackling it have failed miserably. The program dependent approach to improving student behaviour has exhausted our teachers, stunted the emotional growth of our students and befuddled parents. And so, rather than flog you another program, I’ve decided to do something…
Since starting at Real Schools, the three most common questions that people ask me are; What do you do? Do you love it? Why did you step away from a job you loved? The first two questions are relatively straight forward to answer, I partner with schools to bring about long term cultural change and…
I have the privilege of meeting dozens of Australia’s outstanding Principals in my travels to visit our Real Schools Partner Schools. Occasionally, one of these remarkable people says something that gets right under my skin. And so it was last week when I was chatting with Grovedale College Principal, Janet Matthews. We were discussing the…
It’s come to my attention that I can occasionally freak people out with what I write about deep, important topics in the field of education. So, I’m going to keep doing it! Put bluntly, I think our best decisions are often made when we’re a little freaked out. We could do with more freak out,…
I spoke with a school recently who had an admirable ambition – consistency. In order to achieve this, they were trying to categorise the likely behaviours into four categories. Level 1 was for minor infractions like calling out in class or teasing and are to be dealt with according to minor consequences, like missing a…
