I recently finished Jeffrey Ostler’s new book, Surviving Genocide: Native Nations and the United States from the American Revolution to Bleeding Kansas, and it’s excellent, in my opinion. Just like the research I did for the “women in the West” blog, reading Surviving Genocide drove home just how essential it is to find the time to read around the topic. In the first instance, this is in the interests of sewing together an accurate, historical picture, but it is also important to ensure that within that scheme of work the history is inclusive and representative. Ostler presents the Indigenous as powerful and resilient in the face of constant and deliberate persecution; the racial dynamic, particularly surrounding slavery, is complex and evidence-based, and he incorporates male and female actors seamlessly and without hierarchy. I will be aiming to model the language and approach of this book in the delivery of my lessons. 

Surviving Genocide opens in the 1500s but the bulk of it focuses on the Eastern tribes, c.1750-1860, as the first of two volumes analysing whether or not US actions against the Native Americans could be defined as genocide. It follows the spread of US expansionism towards the Mississippi and the impact that it had on the demographics of Native tribes. Defining these actions as genocide is not common in scholarship of the West and even among those who broach the topic, some would argue that a label of Ethnic Cleansing is more appropriate (Gary Clayton Anderson). Ostler’s position is that to classify the atrocity as genocidal is simplistic but, throughout, he uses documents, statistics, and oral histories to evidence consistent genocidal potential in the motivation for removal and a clear understanding within the US government of its genocidal consequences. What I see as one of the most pertinent reasons for teachers of the Plains to read this is that for hundreds of years, even before the point of removal was reached, Native action and reactions were shaped by a belief in the sustained genocidal intentions of the US.

Ostler argues that the level of violence in the 1700s at the hands of American militias, sometimes directed by the Government, can help us understand the tension and decision-making of the 1800s. This was also a stand-out moment of Kerry Apps’ session at the “Understanding Conflict on the Plains” virtual conference hosted by SHP in June, and one of the reasons that I chose this book rather than one which strengthened my knowledge of the core content, such as domestic policies of individual presidents. It is only the (400 page) tip of the iceberg for a course on the Plains but it’s 400 pages of essential hinterland knowledge. A stronger sense of the tribes’ immediate history across the continent will help students contextualise the decision-making process, view the Indian negotiators as autonomous, and allow students to form more accurate, nuanced links between narrative events.  

This post is an informal review of the book, structured by the key takeaways I will be using to inform and adapt my teaching of the American West. They can be summarised as: 

1. Modernise my presentation of indigenous tribes
2. Help students understand that negotiation for the Plains is the next chapter in a long fight 
3. Use the language and legacy of genocide and genocidal intent to frame students’ understanding of decision-making 

1: Beliefs and survival of the tribes themselves

As I said above, Ostler paints a picture of communities that are resilient, strategic, and flexible in the face of persecution when no-one could, or should, have expected them to be. I didn’t appreciate the extent to which the Eastern tribes had fought and adapted for such a long time before removal from the East c.1830. They consciously and cleverly crafted survival strategies, such as forming alliances with other tribes, cultivating their relationship with the British in Canada, maintaining their population by adopting outsiders or marriage with traders, and, crucially, adapting their cultural traditions and economic models (Chapter 4). The Oneidas, for example, sold fish, the Senecas logged pines, the Creek took on spinning and cotton trading, and the Cherokee even owned 1, 600 wheels and 467 looms by 1809. Their mixed subsistence economies were key to their survival and whilst they should never have been forced into that position, I think it’s right to acknowledge the way that their communities had adapted by 1830. Every time they were pushed to the brink, they came back. The Cherokee even went so far as to have a codified constitution, paternalism, an education system based on Euro-American values and curriculums, and a static capital city (Chapter 6). 

I realise that there is a significant difference in the extent of exposure that Eastern tribes had to white culture, compared to the Plains tribes in 1830, but I still think you could describe Ostler’s tribes as modern and progressive (with a few exceptions, such as the adoption of Victorian gender roles), whereas the textbook seems quite stereotypical and trapped in time. There is little to no discussion of trading relationships with white communities (and the women engineering them) or the extent to which settlers were already penetrating the Removal Zone and the Plains in 1830. It seems implausible to me that at least some of this culture, resistance, or shared oral history had not permeated the Plains. I would argue that even if the specifics changed, this was a spirit that was intrinsic in the Indigenous people and not created by proximity to the US. Students need an accurate understanding of these people if they are going to analyse them.

It reminds me of the misguided narrative that the Jews of 1940s Europe “went to their deaths willingly” – we must contextualise Indigenous cooperation at events such as the signing of destructive treaties and show that they took calculated decisions, rather than meekly submitting, blind, to America’s glaringly obvious precedent for reneging. Whilst I’m sure that the presentation of tribes is taking centre stage in the exam board revisions going on at the moment, it’s still worth saying that the specification is in need of a rethink. 

2: Already West of the Mississippi (mostly Chapter 10)

One thing that my teaching could benefit from is to make it clearer that some white migrants had already settled West of the Mississippi before 1830. More people crossed the Missouri river between 1815-1819 than any other point in history and the non-Indian population of the West was up from 20, 000 in 1812 to 60, 000 in 1820. Even the Indigenous relocating from the East (4000-6000 Cherokee living and fighting on Osage land by the 1820s) would have had a significant impact on certain Plains tribes, if simply because the Osage would therefore have an understanding of migration, its causes, and consequences (the Osage lost 30-40% of their population by 1860, which Ostler links to western migration of the Eastern indigenous). 

Further, the bison herds were already diminishing because of pressure on the grasslands for the Comanche’s horses and Creek livestock coming over in the removals. Suspicion and tension on the Plains were increasing, whether that was between tribes or settlers and tribes, and the smaller tribes who remained dependent on hunting after relocation came into conflict with Plains Indians. This might not have amounted to significant population losses in the short-term, but it does mean that they would have been aware of migrating tribes. The Osage even relocated to Kansas because of Cherokee migrants to Oklahoma. Plains Indians were at least engaging in trade, Ostler points out, and beginning to experience land cession and military presence. This is not something that the textbooks generally acknowledge.

Additionally, some of the tribes “asked” to cede their land to the US from the 1830s onwards had already been forcibly removed from their ancestral homelands in the East. For example, when Kansas was opened to white settlement in 1854 it was filled with Plains and migrant tribes. More than 10, 000 migrants such as the Potawatomi, Kickapoo, and Delaware had faced removal already; they had been forced off their land and given space in Kansas because it was deemed to be unsuitable for white settlement. Many of these had experienced starvation, disease, and murder on the removal journeys. This would impact their predictions of success or futility in the negotiation of treaties, and as a result their compliance or resistance. Their consciousness of American intentions within their own history or reality is therefore too important to neglect. If students are to sew a narrative together, to understand what moves the story on, then they need to grasp what is motivating decision-making on both sides. 

3: Links with the slave trade

In Chapter 9 Ostler explains the differences between genocidal atrocity or levels of intent in the North and South. Whilst the slave trade and the ramifications of slave ownership in any culture, moral or practical, are not the focus of this book, it does highlight a few important points concerning the links between the plantations and removal. Cotton had a boom in production from £85 million in 1810 to £331 million in 1830. Removal meant that plantation owners could access more cotton fields, expand their markets, sell more slaves, and accelerate the South’s economic and political power. They also wanted to stop escaped slaves being assisted or given refuge with the tribes. Pressure was growing from Southern slave owners who wanted the land for plantations and the appointment of Andrew Jackson, a staunch Virginian, meant that the Removal Policy was formalised in 1830. By 1850, the South was producing £1 billion of cotton on their new land, which was three times the amount generated before removal. 

Students may be able to better understand the relentless and escalating policy of land seizure if they could link it to American economic priorities. Alternatively, it might be helpful to make the link at KS3, to support schematic knowledge of the American West later. 

4: The complexity of the Trail of Tears

The Trail of Tears and the 1830 Removals Act is such a poignant moment and essential precedent for the events of the 1800s. It’s frustrating to me that justice is not done to the causes, events, or consequences of this moment in our course. There is no time to analyse the lengths to which the Cherokee went to overturn removal through the Supreme Court and it would be a fantastic opportunity to discuss the political power of women in the activism of people like Nancy Ward, Catherine Beecher, and Margaret Anna Scott. Personally, I would happily sacrifice enough elements of farming, cattle, and lawlessness that would let us do the clash between Indians and settlers in more depth. However, Ostler describes the removals and the trails as a pivot point in the tension, so begrudgingly I understand why the exam board sidelines it in favour of later content. However, I still think it’s essential that students have a more nuanced understanding of the Removals Act and the events that led to it, so that they can more fully understand its short-term and long-term consequences. 

Between 1830-1850, 88, 000 Natives were evicted westward to reservations in places such as Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska. 12, 000 -17, 000 died, which was approximately 14-19% (it’s worth saying that Ostler puts a heavy emphasis on the percentages of population decline because the figures, when compared to other instances of genocidal atrocity, do seem small and not overtly genocidal). It was presented as a war to prevent genocide, in light of the conflict that had “regrettably” come before. However, Ostler goes to great lengths to show that the Native Communities had not been driven into the ground by this conflict and, in some areas, populations were stable or growing: “the mythology of the vanishing Indian” (Chapter 6: non-vanishing Indians on the eve of removal). The population of the Cherokee had grown from 8500 in 1775 to 18-20, 000 in the 1820s, including the 4-6000 that had migrated West already. The population of Creeks had grown from 14, 000 to 20, 000 in the same time, even with the Creek War. The total number of Indians living East of the Mississippi before the American Revolution was 88, 000 – 95, 000 and by the 1820s this was 112, 000 – 121, 000. Therefore, despite the best efforts of some American Presidents, if the Indians remained in the East then genocide was not inevitable and removal did not qualify as just. Conflict on the Plains began with this duplicity.

5: The history of genocidal intent 

I will be writing a different blog on the topic of genocide in the West because I could talk for days on this subject so I will try to be brief here. However, Surviving Genocide has a fantastic appendix about debates on the classification of genocide and ultimately Ostler concludes, as I said above, that whilst classifying these events as genocide is too simplistic (because it was not present at all times) there was (at least) ‘genocidal potential’ in the steps taken by the government to ensure successful expansion and the consequences that these actions had on the demographics of so many tribes. Ostler shows that consistent and sustained threats of violence against Indigenous communities were present over hundreds of years, through different political and military environments, and throughout all levels of interaction: federal, state, and individual. The fact that the classification of genocide is even debatable is because of the determination of tribes to survive, not any kind of benevolence from the Americans. 

As with the nature of atrocities committed in the interests of territorial expansion and settlement, this is a genocide that happens over time, with ebbs and flows, but a consistent current of potential. Policies of westernisation, assimilation, and removal were temporary and changing between administration or threat that the US faced, but what did not change, for hundreds of years, was the danger of bodily harm if the government’s set schemes were not followed (and, in the case of assimilation, as Ostler evidences with the hybrid practises of the Cherokee before removal, even when they were). This matches the language of the 1948 UN Convention on the crime of genocide in its “intent to destroy” and Raphael Lemkin’s “destruction of the national pattern of the oppressed, and the imposition of the national pattern of the oppressor”; the traditional way of life for Native Americans was first made hybrid by the arrival and imposition of white culture in trading relationships, and then destroyed by removal or settlement. 

Chapter 1 begins with the tribes caught in the crosshairs of imperial conflict, at which point Ostler evidences genocidal intent shaped by differing models of colonialism. Chapter Two, on the Wars of Revolution and Independence, shows in more detail the similarities and differences between British and American settler colonialism and, whilst this is not to let the British off the hook, Ostler argues that the Americans were more aggressive in the nature and extent of their actions against Indians specifically. The intent to kill all Indians came mostly “from below”, from local militias and the individual soldiers who believed in their own racial superiority and the right to dominate others. To evidence this, Ostler includes a number of instances from both those who were subject to genocidal policies and those in charge of enforcing them, including the smallpox blankets, but particularly the Paxton Boys massacre of Susequehannoc in Conestoga Town, 1763, and the Gnadenhutten massacre of 96 Christian Delaware people by a US militia in 1782. However, the consistency of extirpation across time was state-sponsored. Ostler cites the toll of American killing in the Revolutionary War (the US killed between 2-4 times the number of Indigenous people than the British in any conflict previously), and the Ottawa war Chief, Eugushawa, foretelling “the systematic destruction of most Indian people” in 1791. In 1854 John Quinney, a Mahican, addressed a crowd in New York and said that “the extinction … of [his] tribe was inevitable.” Both these men saw consistent intent in the actions of successive American governments. (Conclusion). 

When the Cherokees were facing removal, General Winfeld Scott (1838) said: “the President has sent me with a … powerful army … to resist would … result in the destruction of the Cherokee”. I don’t think it’s a strong enough argument to say that this was not genocidal simply because the Cherokee chose not to be destroyed and eventually complied with removal; those that did not move faced massacre, such as Black Hawk’s band at Bad Axe, 1832, and the Creeks murdered by the Alabama militia in 1837. The number of different removals undertaken, each with genocidal consequences, meant that the government knew exactly how damaging their policy was and did nothing to stop identical atrocities in the future, whether that was by affording the Natives the necessary support or stopping the journeys altogether (Chapter 11). This, I would argue, is deliberately neglectful. The conditions of the removal journeys were “calculated to bring about physical destruction in whole or part” (1948 UN Convention). In one convoy of Creeks in 1939, 1000 died on the way and 3500 died in the conditions upon arrival in a place with no infrastructure and purposefully inadequate land. 

A truly humane America would have protected Native Communities in place, but under the guise of saving them, the United States now threatened their destruction” p213

OStler, p213

Consequently, it’s important to use the term in lessons, if not to say that it was genocide but to introduce the debate. The significance of this definition for the legacy of American expansionism is another conversation entirely, but from the perspective of providing accurate analysis, it helps students develop their discussions of the forces driving narrative change. The target of these genocidal intentions were the Eastern tribes, but the awareness of this intent would have been taken West by the relocated tribes, and it was certainly something that the Plains Indians would become horrendously familiar with. Genocidal intent shapes the actions of the US Government or military, and belief in their genocidal intentions impacts any Indigenous reactions and subsequent action. Therefore, the impact of pre-1800s genocidal atrocity and the legacy of removal with genocidal intent are undercurrent in all aspects of the 19th Century. 

I hope that is helpful!

@RidleyHistory

P.S. I thought this was a really useful fact for the westward migration of white settlers: 10, 000 died on the Oregon and California overland trails between 1840-1860 but only 4% of those were killed by Indians. 

References: 

Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the crime of genocide: https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.1_Convention%20on%20the%20Prevention%20and%20Punishment%20of%20the%20Crime%20of%20Genocide.pdf

Gary Clayton Anderson, Ethnic Cleansing and the Indian: The Crime That Should Haunt America, (2014)

Raphael Lemkin, Axis Rule in Occupied Europe, 1944

Jeffrey Ostler, Surviving Genocide: Native Nations and the United States from the American Revolution to Bleeding Kansas, (2019)

I am always on the lookout for films, documentaries and clips that can explain historical events better than I can, or offer different perspectives and convey a message. With that in mind, I thought it would be useful to share a collection of my favourite ones with an explanation of how I use them and how they work for me (you can find part 1 here). In this edition, there is an entry that relates specifically to my A-Level teaching (Edexcel Route G, Germany 1918 – 1989 and Italy 1911 – 1946). One of the entries on this list unfortunately doesn’t have a link as it’s fairly new and I can’t find it on Youtube, but it is on Clickview, which you can get a free trial to use or buy a subscription (which I recommend).

1: The Children Who Built Victorian Britain

I will admit to a potentially unpopular opinion: I hate teaching the Industrial Revolution … It’s my least favourite topic to teach (we’ve all got one). However, since finding this BBC 4 documentary I’ve changed my enquiry a little to focus on the changes it made to the lives of children and this documentary is perfect. It includes animation of actual recorded testimony from the children themselves so it really helps the children in the classroom empathise with their experiences. It brilliantly explains the significance of children for the revolution, as well as discussing notions of ‘childhood’, which has given rise to some really nuanced discussions with the students.

2: Bloody Britain – Siege of Rochester Castle

The lessons on the Siege of Rochester Castle are in my top ten favourites in the school year. They sit in an enquiry about King John’s reputation and shifts in power. The documentary uses computer animation to help gain a more in-depth understanding. Rory McGrath gets quite involved, which is fun. He has a go with a trebuchet and even tries his hand at shooting a crossbow! It is a truly enjoyable watch. The only thing to note with this documentary is it includes quite a lot of key words and tricky vocab so you do have to make sure these are addressed beforehand or pause the video. I use a mix of both; I would explain ‘mercenary’ beforehand but only explain ‘pitch’/’greek fire’/’trebuchet’ when it comes up in the video.

3: Rise of the Nazis, episode 1

This three-part documentary series examines how Germany went from democracy to dictatorship in the years 1930-1934. It is packed full of historians and experts (including my absolute fave, Professor Sir Richard Evans), and is told through dramatic reconstruction and archive footage. I love how it shows that it was as much about ruthless personal political ambition and a desire to hold onto power by more moderate politicians than it was about extreme ideology. I’m sure quite a lot of us in the History community are familiar with this BBC series – it caused quite a buzz. I was, of course, thinking the entire time I was watching it ‘how can I use this in my teaching’, as we all do! 

I only use episode 1 and only with my A-Level students. Episode 1 focuses specifically on politics and the collapse of the Weimar in the years 1930-1933. I find this area is quite tricky for the pupils to grasp initially, with so many intricate political maneuverings and different factors at play, so they really benefit from this as a starting point. We then go over the narrative and develop the depth of their knowledge, hooked onto that initial base. I have created a sheet for the pupils that goes along with the video, you can find it here or on our tea&learning Google Drive

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1ZMFwS5B5qwEiKToIr7sLTBdRBoMG2EQY?usp=sharing

4: Children of the Holocaust

This is a set of short clips created for effective Holocaust education by the BBC. The voices and stories of survivors are layered over an animation, which I think is a fantastic way of scaffolding such an emotive topic for KS3. The one I use the most is Arek Hersh’s experience of Auschwitz, as a way of explaining the arrival and selection process – it’s simple, it’s not horribly graphic, but still very powerful and human. I do make it clear that Auschwitz is unique among camps and has many functions beyond extermination – we look at a variety of camps independently and so by this point we are able to have a good discussion about the similarities and differences between Auschwitz and others. Heinz Skyte’s testimony is also useful for exploring the realities of persecution, Kristallnacht, and the extent to which Jewish individuals felt forced to leave their homes before 1939. There is an opportunity with this to begin discussing the role that Britain played – or did not play – but only in a preliminary way. If you follow this link, there are also video interviews with the survivors themselves: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01zx5g7/clips

Hope that’s helpful!

@MissHBHistory

Q1: How has your classroom management developed since the start of NQT? 

J: The thing that I think is really important to acknowledge when it comes to behaviour management in NQT, and moving forward, is that you start off quite defensive. You go into your NQT year being told that students will test you, it will be difficult, you might have a rough ride of it – the whole ‘don’t smile ‘til christmas’ – and I definitely went into my NQT year so straight-laced. I reacted to things, maybe not emotionally, but definitely too harshly, sometimes, to try and stamp out bad behaviour. I certainly found that as my NQT year went on and certainly into RQT, you relax and find your natural routines… things like, do you line them up? Have them standing behind your chairs? We have a thing about posture where we ask students to sit up straight during lessons, little things where you find your natural rhythm and routines that help to facilitate that good behaviour. 

N: Yeah I agree. I definitely … I don’t know about overreacted … but I was definitely surprised how I had a bit of a temper …

J: … yeah, I found myself quite reactive …

N: … and whilst their behaviour was completely out of line, my reaction also didn’t help. I think I am a lot more measured and effective in my response now. 

H: It’s also important to realise that it’s not going to happen over night. You set up these routines and are consistent with them … but after two lessons when they’re not doing what you want them to do, don’t be disheartened. I always have a starter on the board, they start working in the back of their book straight away, and some still come in and don’t do it … you have to prompt them … but what helped me is to just stop being annoyed about it. At the end of the day, they’re kids, and all you have to do is prompt and they’ll do it. 

J: Absolutely. It’s picking your battles sometimes – you should definitely challenge behaviour and be consistent, but if a child forgets a pen you could stand there and tell them why it’s not acceptable, or you could just give them a pen and at the end of the lesson reinforce your expectations. It’s knowing what to challenge and when to challenge. 

N: And as an NQT you’re hypersensitive to anything that’s going to undermine you or make you seem less authoritative. It’s difficult to know what those things are going to be in the individual school contexts so you have to just reflect on your experiences and figure it out as you go along.

Q2: What has been your experience of genuinely bad behaviour? 

J: in the three schools that I’ve been in – training and in my school – I’ve seen fights, smoking, drugs, swearing … and I think out of all of that, the truly bad behaviour stems from their attitude: when they don’t care. I worked with a couple of students last year, mentoring, and what I found is that when you have apathetic students who are pressing self-destruct, you get truly bad behaviour because whatever consequences come, they don’t care. The good thing to do then is to get to the root of why and work with them as individuals. My tip for an NQT would be to get to know your pupils as individuals, ask them what they’re doing on a Friday and try to remember at least one of those things on Monday … ask if they run or play football … get to know them and care about them as individuals. Getting them onside is generally more successful when they feel like the adults care about them. 

H: Relationships are so incredibly important. My learning curve was that children’s behaviour towards you at any point is not personal. Sometimes I would find myself getting annoyed because I’d spent hours planning a lesson and then these teenagers would sulk into my classroom and throw their bags down … but then I’d find out that they were struggling with young love or some other teenage problem which affected their mood … it’s not that they don’t like me or don’t like my lessons, but in their world they have so many other problems that I don’t understand. 

You also can’t be terrified to show your own personality. When I first started I wanted to be “the teacher, Miss Betts”, but now I’m a bit goofy, have a laugh, I run a Disney Club where we sing as loud and terribly as possible … it’s just fun … and then even if you don’t teach them they see you around the school and you have jokes that you can use to manage behaviour when they’re tempted to test you. 

N: My takeaway from the behaviour of my NQT year is that they know exactly what they’re doing when they’re trying to test you or distract you – they know that they’re pushing your buttons. I found that once I understood that and stopped getting angry about it, I was able to rise above it. 

My worst example of behaviour was when a Year 9 had worked their way up through the behaviour system and I’d asked them to leave the room. They were one of a group of 3 that clubbed together to cause a problem every lesson. They were getting angry and shouting and swearing, and I offered them a pencil so that they’d be able to complete their work in the displacement classroom … they slapped it out of my hand, whirled around like a drama queen, and threw their book in the air but they hadn’t stuck any sheets in so they came twirling down like giant snowflakes (very Elsa), and stormed out. But by this point I’d worked out that they were just trying to make me angry – I had made the mistake of engaging in a shouting match with them before – so this time I kept calm, went through the steps, and then re-set when they’d left the room and tried to be really positive with the other two. It seemed like they appreciated that because they knew how terribly the first student had acted and respected the way I had responded.

H: And it’s important to make sure you put the behaviour onto the child. It’s the idea that we’re not punishing, or branding them with a naughty brush, but making it clear that the student has chosen to do this and the consequences of that are this … in the future, they can choose something different … they don’t have to do that again, they are not a bad person. That’s very effective at my school.

J: It’s not being emotive in your response which is something, as an NQT, is quite easy to get trapped in – thinking it’s about you and your lesson – but it’s not, it’s behaviour: the choice they’ve made and the consequences of that choice. They can twirl and throw books around but it’s about not giving them what they want, which is shouting. There are some pupils who, very sadly, don’t receive much attention and so look for it in a negative sense because at least it’s something. You need to say that it’s not going to work, and that you’ll invest time and effort in them as a young person, but on the terms of the school’s policy. 

H: Plus, you can pick up lots of helpful advice from speaking to as many teachers as you can that know the student. It’s little tricks that might give you a helping hand, like where to seat them, but don’t be terrified of making mistakes because you’re going to make them. Sometimes I’ll walk out of the class and think well, I didn’t handle that very well! 

J: Definitely. One of the most valuable things I did in my NQT was going to see challenging pupils in other contexts. We have a system of learning walks so they didn’t think it was unusual, and it allowed me to see how they behaved in that lesson, how that teacher managed it, and using that NQT time effectively helped me make gains in behaviour.  

N: It is really important to find behaviour support that works for you – it might not be the most obvious avenue, but if you have a mentor or someone you find inspiring, it can be helpful. I had a handful of tricky classes in NQT (if a handful is around 5), got lots of advice from different avenues and it felt like nothing was working even though I was trying my absolute best to follow everyone’s (very good) advice. I eventually worked with someone who helped me get to the other side of it although I’m not sure why it was that advice that worked. 

J – But that’s important advice for NQTs. You’ll be given tons of pieces of advice (including this…) and at the end of the day, you have to pick what works for you. We’re not all the super strict teacher at the front, we’re not all Mr and Mrs Jokey, we have individual personalities and you have to sift through to find what does and doesn’t work for you. 

Also, get to know the pastoral people in your school! Know them, be nice to them, they will be so helpful. I had an incident, maybe three days into a school, where I was taking some boys who’d been climbing a fence and slapping each other, to their head of house but I didn’t know where the office was, and he led me on a wild goose chase to find it. It was the worst experience. 

H: Name drop them too. If you don’t know the kids very well, you can talk about the pastoral lead who they are familiar with. 

Q3: How do you try to tackle low-level disruption? 

H: I had one pupil who would secretly – but not really – sneak sweets out their blazer to eat in lesson. We didn’t have the most positive relationship because I had to tell them off for lots of little things quite regularly, so one day I decided I would make a joke about it. Next time they tried to get sweets out I asked for one and ate it, and said that every time they brought sweets into the classroom then they had to share them with me. Quite quickly, they stopped bringing sweets! I changed my approach and it changed their behaviour in all aspects. Because they thought it was quite funny, they’d have a bit of a laugh with me, and then they started getting on and doing work. 

J: Using humour in the classroom to tackle low level disruption is very effective. My Year 11 class (the class I’d taught on my interview!) turned out to be my favourite – it was a fairly small class size, I picked them up from the chap that I replaced, and our first lesson was painful because they did not say a word. I went to talk to my HOD and he said that I should spend 5 minutes, when I had it, talking to them about something that wasn’t history. They completely came out of their shell and we ended up having a really lovely relationship. They were hilarious and we learnt, but we also had a bit of a laugh. I don’t think teaching should be entertaining, always, but there’s nothing wrong with having a laugh or a joke. 

H: If you can have a laugh, it helps your relationship as a class. I had a Year 10 class that were really tricky because the relationship just wasn’t quite right, and I was slightly deflecting my insecurities about being able to teach GCSE. My NQT mentor said that my job was to turn them into my favourite class. I decided that I was going to be over the top, embarrassingly positive, every lesson, until they started to warm up to me, and we managed to have a laugh. My HOD came in and jokingly poked fun at me, but then they all defended me, like we’d turned into a little pack, and I knew I’d got them on side. Just have a laugh and be nice. It means that when it gets to the boring stuff, they will work for you. 

N: I had a Year 7 class like that, who were particularly dogged with their typical Year 7 questions: “Can I write on the next page?”, “Can I use my pen?”, over and over again. They would take such a long time to pack up because they couldn’t decided whether they needed to stick or fold sheets, etc, so we developed a story (a true story) where I had to get to the staffroom on time on “Cake Friday” because otherwise everyone else would eat the battenburg … on a Friday, and only on a Friday, they ran around like headless chickens to pack up on time so that Miss Ridley could get her cake. 

J: Year 7 do come out with some cracking questions: “Do I write the long date or the short date?”, “Do I stick it in landscape or portrait?”, because they’re moving from that primary to secondary environment. One of the best things that I was told in my training year was “you don’t have to answer every question” – let them work it out, build that resilience, and build an environment where it’s safe for them to make a mistake. 

There was a man called David Morrison in the Australian Army who was attempting to stamp out gender inequality and sexism in the army and there’s quite a famous speech that he gave where he said: “The standard you walk past is the standard you accept” – if you walk past sexism and ignore it then you are accepting and legitimising it, which is a really useful concept for school because with low level disruption you tell them that they can get away with it if you ignore it …. it’s not about coming down too harshly, but having consistent routines and reminders … I think great schools, like Michaela, do it across the school, and the children know that there is a standard, the Michaela standard, and that is what they have to meet. I try to keep that in my head, although I don’t always take my own advice, and when I see something in the corridor, like a phone or coat, I challenge it. They’re watching you to see what you’re going to allow. 

The standard you walk past is the standard you accept. It is up to us to make a difference.

Lieutenant General david morrison

N: I don’t know if you watched the Last Dance documentary on Michael Jordan … it blew my mind, he’s amazing … but there’s a similar quote: “you have to expect things of yourself before you can do them”. They expect you to give them everything – answers or even good behaviour, like they’re not responsible for it – but actually they need to put in the work and meet these expectations themselves.

H: I think one useful thing for classroom culture is calling it out in the most productive way – I hate pen tapping or messing around …

J – … building towers with gluesticks …

H – … so when I’m talking and they are messing, I won’t say “you stop doing this”, I’ll phrase it as “remember, we don’t do that …” and it’s less that I’m directing it at them but including them in the team or whole group expectations. You don’t want to embarrass some kids too much because it could damage your relationship, but you do insist on the expectations in a subtle, calm and non-disruptive way. 

J – I like that. There’s that culture of “we don’t do things like that here.” Students that pack away a minute early does my head in. I like to just look, raise an eyebrow, or feign disbelief … I think that’s better than getting angry. When you challenge a pupil it doesn’t have to be in a confrontational way. One of my favourite methods for getting students to take coats off indoors is to say: “Blimey, that’s a lovely coat! My gosh, it must have cost you loads. It’s stunning … take it off for me.” but because you’ve spent 30 seconds telling them that they look really nice, they’re like fair enough and take it off. That doesn’t mean being drawn into protracted conversations, though. Maybe one reason you’d feel like you’re not going to challenge something is that you think it’s going to take so much time when you’re busy, but if you present them with their options and they choose to fight, then move them up a step and follow through with that – end of conversation. 

H – Yeah, don’t get into a conversation where you debate the validity of the rules because you won’t get anywhere. You have to make it clear that they chose this activity, they knew it was against the rules, and therefore these are the consequences. 

J – They’re just playing for time and, as teachers, we don’t have any anyway. You’re trying to encourage them to take responsibility and if they’re debating it, then they’re not. 

A clean slate is also really important – try not to go into the lesson with any preconceived notions about what’s going to happen. I really like this idea of a team culture. We’ve just instigated a house system this year, and working together to achieve things is really important. 

Q4: What one piece of advice would you give to people about to start their NQT year? 

H: Relax! Be kind to yourself – I was quite mean to myself when anything seemed like it wasn’t going well. Don’t worry about perfection, although it’s easier said than done, especially this year because trainees lost a lot of time in the classroom. Remember that it takes time and you will get there. By now, going into third year, I’m not so worried about behaviour because I know the kids and they know me. 

J: Starting NQT is almost like a bad horror story – you’re told “this is it, you’re going to the battlefield, I hope you’re prepared”. 

My piece of advice is: have high expectations and have those expectations from the beginning. You don’t have to be angry when students don’t meet them, but hold them to account and make sure that you set your stall out. As they’re your standards, you have to hold yourself to account too: “the standard you walk past is the standard you accept.” You develop a reputation around a school and you want to set yourself up on the road as the teacher who has standards, rather than the one that they remember because they could get away with anything. I remember one student tried to argue with me and his friend said “don’t bother, it’s Milne, you’re not going to win” – they have to know that rules are rules and they’re the rules of the school. 

There are many conversations happening at the moment regarding the state of diverse and representative curricula. We are both very firmly of the belief that history is not accurate unless it is representative and that every scheme of work should meet this standard. It would be quite surprising if there were any history teachers who were of a radically different opinion. We’ve also been very lucky to come into the profession when we did; from the start of our training year, diversity has been a focus of the training we received and on edu-twitter. At this point in time, the history teaching community is incredibly reflective and proactive, so we’ve been able to learn a huge amount in a short space of time from the discussions and resources on offer. 

Like most teachers at the moment, we’ve been thinking about how educators can contribute to the fight against systemic racism and what is within or outside our control as history specialists. For example, we could lobby the exams boards for a change in the topics we deliver or the specifics of the content within them (looking at you, American West) but there are clear barriers to this being a complete solution. We can’t cover every topic in the depth it deserves because we’re already struggling to manage. At KS3 if students get (say) three hours a fortnight, we have only got so much time to cover thousands of years of history. Added to that, we can’t control what students see or hear at home, on the street, or in popular culture – there are so many factors external to the classroom, or even school, that we’re always going to struggle to override. Then they leave school and the only influence we have over them post-16/18 is the hope that the lessons we are trying to instil actually stick. For some they will, for some they won’t. 

It’s the last two points that sent us down a slight tangent. Hannah pointed out that we had had a lot of discussions about our curriculum content but not a lot about skills and critical analysis. It’s the bread and butter of historians but it’s also essential in equipping students with the ability to critique what they see and hear in the wider world. Students need to be able to do this independently, post-school, and to have a clear understanding of when and why it’s important to analyse. An English colleague pointed out that, for example, their students struggle to comprehend the power of owning a newspaper, and the significance of a few personal agendas for the information that we read. The toolbox of historical skills is packed full of advice for this – using your own knowledge; critiquing the usefulness and limitations of sources; considering purpose, author, context, tone, or any other acronym. With so much rhetoric in the world designed to undermine the kind of societies we’re trying to achieve, it’s essential that students can analyse without instruction. 

We therefore started to consider source skills under a lens of representativeness. When are we introducing students to the purpose of a source? Are we doing it well? Can they accurately measure the power of propaganda, for good or ill? Do they know why people lie? Can they see something poisonous behind ostensibly positive words? 

These are a few things we came up with: 

1. We wanted to recognise that history teachers are well-placed but can’t do everything. A developed citizenship programme (or something similar) would better reinforce the historical context that we give these modern-day problems. Plus, whole-school approaches always have more impact. 

2. We could prioritise interpretations earlier in KS3. This would give them more time in school to practise source skills and make the use of critical analysis more ingrained. 

3. At KS4 we can ensure that we don’t neglect provenance as a more difficult part of the questions, and we retain a tight focus on author and purpose. 

4. The interpretations and sources we focus on at any point should come from a wide range of people – not just historians but politicians, media bosses, large businesses owners, small business owners, different genders, different races, etc. This would help us explore the position of people in society and how that affects what we take in and put back out. 

5. After Rachel Ball’s presentation at the TMHI and Seneca virtual conference, we started thinking about what she called “dangerous” history. We could explicitly point to places where history has been consciously manipulated in order to support ideologies that are negative or harmful, and discuss the reasons and ramifications of that. 

6. We could include a scheme of work, or at least a focus on, memorialisation and the politics of memory. This could include an increased emphasis on history being created, possibly by looking at how historiography changes over time. This should be linked to the opinions of the general public to make it clearer that interpretations rarely occur naturally, but are always shaped by someone or something. 

Finally, we want students to know that the study of history has an immediate benefit for the present and future, for people in all walks of life, and that source skills can and should be used in real time. By doing so, we can extend the benefits of historical study beyond purely content, and ingrain critical thinking that is fundamental to challenging underlying prejudices and racial bias. Curriculum change is important, but we must think more broadly in order to tackle a problem so deeply rooted and coming from so many angles.

@MissHBHistory @RidleyHistory

N: So, what was your experience of applying for jobs?

N: Do you want to go first? Yours is simpler than mine. 

H: Okay, so, I applied for … lots of different jobs. I’m not sure how many but I think it was around 6 or 7. I wrote the applications, which were really draining and took forever … and didn’t get one single interview, never even any sort of response. Then I applied for the job I have now, got an interview, and got the job.

N: Whereas I applied for … 4? Maybe? The first one I didn’t hear anything back from, and then I got two interviews and didn’t get them, and then I got the third.

H: But you were much later weren’t you? 

N: Yeah, I didn’t get my job until June. I was second … second to last on our course? Or our group of friends?

H: Yeah, and I didn’t get mine until April which at the time felt really really late but it’s not, really, not for trainees. 

N: I had a conversation with my mentor at the time and he said if you don’t have a job yet, don’t stress, because he didn’t get his until June either, and then he stayed at that school from his NQT year all the way to being Head of Department.

N: How did you prepare for interviews? 

H: Well, I just had the one! The first thing I did was check the brief of everything they wanted and immediately sent that information to my … what would you call Helen? 

N: Tutor? 

H: Curriculum …? 

N: Lady that takes care of you? 

H: Ha, second mother! Well, I sent it to the history lead on our PGCE and asked advice from the teachers of the school that I was in at the time. I mainly focused on the lesson and what it was going to look like – I decided on a lesson enquiry, the tasks, and how it would work. I made the resources and put it together, and then started thinking about the actual interview. I went on the school’s website and read what I could about the school … I think at university we had a shared document of past interview questions so I went down the list and practised an answer for them … although they didn’t ask a single question that I’d prepared for in the actual interview! It does help you to feel more confident though. 

N: Um, for the job I got, I’d seen that it was on TES and I wanted to apply but it was the deadline of our assignment 3 so I hadn’t done anything about it … and just as I finished the assignment a friend rang me to say they’d moved the deadline and I had to apply straightaway. I was like … “Vicky, I’m really tired, I’ve just finished the assignment, I’d like to go shopping” and she said “absolutely NOT.” So I had a quick look at the school and established that it was somewhere I wanted to apply to, but not having a lot of time meant that I answered the questions really simply and sent it in … I had less than 24 hours to make the resources and cram questions … and then I was there.

N: What kind of questions did you get asked?

H: Urrrrm … okay. Like I said, I’d prepared loads and they didn’t ask any. I had a lot of history specific questions which I wasn’t expecting and I think is really good. Things like what elements would you want to see in an outstanding history lesson, erm, what period of history do you enjoy teaching … I think in their mind it was about getting to know my character. 

N: Did you say the French Revolution?

H: I did not! Plus my Head of Department – the only other person in the department – is a Medieval/Tudor specialist, and so I was coming in as a modernist, and I love the Cold War, and that helped to see how I’d fit in. Oh, there was another one and I wish I could remember how it was phrased, but it was basically “where do you take your history teaching influence from?” “What kind of literature?” They wanted to check that you were well-read and up to date. I basically said Christine Counsell … Ian Dawson … the Historical Association … and they did a little high five .. not then but they genuinely did later in the interview.

N: Teaching History. I don’t think I got history specific stuff. I remember talking about the Holocaust scheme of work that I’d done for one of my assignments and how I’d been reflective and improved my practice … I don’t remember any other history specific ones … but maybe that’s because Germany is the only thing I talk about … 

H: The only other questions I could have predicted were the classic safeguarding ones … 

N: Yeah, what’s the difference between safeguarding and child protection … 

H: … oh, I didn’t have that. Mine was “a child wants to tell you a secret, what do you do?” Don’t promise confidentiality. But I was surprised because I was expecting loads of questions about the school, like “how can you add to our activities programme”, but I had questions about assessment and marking, which I remember thinking were difficult because you don’t have much experience, so I just said “on placement this is what I have done”. 

N: I had a question about marking as well. I think my answer was along the lines of “I think individual feedback is very important” … so maybe it was priorities in marking? What generates the most progress? 

H: I definitely talked about literacy codes .. but I was far too nervous to remember it now.

N: Yeah it was a blurry day. I don’t remember much … except that they mixed all the different flavour chips in one bowl … and the rest of the candidates were really miserable (edit: except my fantastic buddy from geography @geographedo. We come as a pair).

H: I was really intimidated by the rest of the candidates because they had so much experience. They set you up in a little room and this one candidate was straight up and shaking hands with SLT and schmoozing … but that didn’t make a difference because now I know that confidence doesn’t translate to performing well.

H: How did you select the schools to apply for? … I think this question is really hard. 

N: Yeah, because if we were being honest, we didn’t … we just wanted a job. 

H: But that’s the danger though. It feels like on the PGCE that as soon as the first person gets a job it becomes a race and you just want secure employment, no matter where it is, and it’s really easy for people to tell you to make sure the school’s a right fit for you but at that point, do you even really know that? Mainly, my thing was making sure it was within proximity to where I lived, but even some of them I applied to would have been really hard to get to. It was the insecurity that I didn’t have a job and other people were getting them. 

N: I think the only conscious decision I made was not applying to the private school because I wanted to be state … and the special measures one, actually, because I was worried about the … quality, shall we say … of my behaviour management. 

H: I don’t know what I thought about applying for the private school … I think I’d not really thought about it that much. I think it was more that it looked really nice and the way that the job was brought to our attention led me to believe that a trainee was what they wanted which gave me more confidence, but it wasn’t necessarily a conscious decision. I just liked the look of it and thought I had a shot. 

H: What advice would you give to a trainee applying for jobs?

N: … just keep swimming! For me … I went up against friends in the first two interviews I had and it wasn’t difficult, as such, because we were a good group and we did support each other, but there was the temptation to be really down in the dumps about it … and obviously it being as late as June was worrying … but you get the job you get for a reason, and the job I got was much better for me. 

H: Yeah just chill out, it’ll happen. I know it’s easy for us to say on the other side, and I remember people saying this to me, but you will get there … I was feeling so disheartened by the fact I wasn’t even getting to the interview stage but I know those jobs weren’t right for me. One of them was in Knaresborough – as if I’d want to drive to Knaresborough every day! – but now I’m really happy in the school that I’m in and I love it there. I think it’s just a matter of … don’t worry … it’ll happen … everything happens for a reason.

1: It’s a really encouraging, supportive environment for an early career teacher. What you have to say is still valued and respected.

2: History teachers are a fantastic bunch of people and you don’t need to sit at the bar on your own for hours before plucking up the courage to join them (oops).

3: You don’t need to translate/butcher sources for them to be accessible. We should have the same high expectations of source work as we have of anything else.

4: There is more scope for creativity in the curriculum than we realise. For example, why don’t we teach the struggle for Civil Rights in Britain, rather than America?

5: We need to remember that history is complex, difficult, and requires practise, but that we should still introduce different historical methodologies in the classroom because the students deserve to experience all aspects of disciplinary history.

Late and highly unwelcome entry: bring extra coats just in case your car breaks down on the M62 and you have to wait in the freezing wind for the RAC man to come and rescue you. Happy International Women’s Day.

@MissHBHistory @RidleyHistory

This week we’ve had a very nice lady (@amalsayala) in the department to see if she wanted to embark on a teaching career, or not. She asked some really tough questions and we’ve tried to answer them honestly! We both trained with a schools direct programme, very closely supported by the University PGCE course, but hopefully it will apply to any way into teaching.

What do you wish you’d known before you applied? 

RidleyHistory – I didn’t realise that teaching is more than just being in the classroom with the kids. There are so many different avenues that you can go down – different careers – whether you’re interested in research, training, pedagogy, or subject knowledge. You could move into working for the exam board, the council, Ofsted, or trust-level positions. I think I would have applied for teaching earlier in my life if I’d understood the scope of opportunities available once you have that initial experience of classroom teaching. (P.S. Subject knowledge is really important so spend your summer reading as much history as you can).

MissHBHistory – I wish I’d known that however hard my PGCE was going to get and however low I was going to feel, that it would get better and it won’t always be like that when you’re your own teacher. I had moments on my PGCE where I would stay up until 4am trying to make things ‘perfect’ and during the school day I would go to the toilets and cry. I wish I’d known in those moments that there wasn’t anything wrong with me, that I was capable, and fast-forward to NQT I would be singing my own little concert in the car on the way to start another day at my school that I love.

How do you stay true to history when you have to simplify it so much? 

RidleyHistory – It’s difficult and frustrating sometimes, but the more confident and skilled you get as a teacher, the more possible it becomes to have challenging, disciplinary discussions, even at KS3. When you’re in tune with the class, you know how to support them, then you can frame academic debate in a language that they can access. I definitely do not have it right yet but I’ve seen a huge difference in my confidence between NQT and RQT, and that’s encouraging me to take more risks with the questions I’m posing. 

MissHBHistory – I don’t actually see it as ‘simplifying’ – in my view we are just selective with the material and make sure it is appropriate/accessible for the age group . If we didn’t do this, what would the pupils learn? If we taught Y7s with the same depth and scope of A-Level, they wouldn’t be able to cope and they’d probably come away with a very limited understanding – and we just don’t have the time! That being said, I don’t think I ‘simplify’ topics too much at KS3 – if you approach topics with high expectations and layers of challenge, you’ll be amazed at what the little ones can do.

Plug: The Historical Association is a fantastic resource and it’s 100% worth paying the membership.

How do you maintain the work-life balance? 

RidleyHistory – This is slightly hypocritical as I don’t take my own advice, but you have to learn how to say no to yourself, especially on a weekend. You need to be prepared for Monday but anything else can wait  – marking, behaviour reports, emails, clubs – they are not worth burning out for, and nobody teaches well who teaches tired. 

MissHBHistory – I’m not really that good at this but I do try and stick to some of my rules. For example, I don’t do any work on a Friday night or Saturday. However, if I’m experiencing a particularly high volume of work, I’ll break that rule to stay on top of things. The way I see it is that the work peaks and troughs – sometimes I can come home pretty much every night during the week and not do any work, other times I have to work every single night and over the weekend to stay on top. In my whole teaching career so far, I have only had 1 weekend where I haven’t done one single bit of work, but I don’t want this to put anyone off – it takes practise to get the balance right. I know that I don’t always work in the most efficient way and there are definitely ways to cut the time down, but I love my job and I choose to dedicate this much time to it. 

How do you forge positive relationships when you’re new to a school? 

RidleyHistory – Smiling! It’s on my list of things to improve. Relationships have been a difficult one for me because it took a long time to find some common ground. In the end, what made the biggest difference was just sticking it out – I came back in September (as an RQT) and suddenly they were on my side. I wouldn’t be able to put my finger on a helpful trick you could use (sorry!) but I’d say that if you consistently teach quality lessons then the students respect that. I also fall over things a lot though, so maybe they’re just laughing at me. 

MissHBHistory – This is a hard one because I don’t really know. It happens over time I guess – my main thing is just to be nice. I’m not saying I flout any behavioural rules because that certainly isn’t the way to forge positive relationships – you have to treat everybody fairly and act in the way they expect, which is to follow the behaviour policy. I like to show the pupils that I like them, I respect them, and I’m passionate about my subject, but I won’t stand for any nonsense because I am there to help them succeed. Be able to have a laugh, especially at yourself.

What is your idea of a perfect lesson structure? 

RidleyHistory – We were taught a very clear and specific lesson structure when we trained (by very brilliant people) and it is one that we would have fought and died for at the time. If you are not sure what to do, this could be a good starting point for you: a starter that is retrieval practice, like a quiz; title and learning objectives; first activity based on content; check their understanding on an individual or class-level; activity two that involves higher order thinking; check understanding; third activity that involves extended writing or exam skills. Depending on your time keeping skills, you could throw in a plenary, exam wrapper, or moment of metacognitive self-assessment at the end. 

BUT … 

MissHBHistory – I don’t even know – I don’t think I have ever taught a lesson that is ‘perfect’. In practice, it is so hard to have a recipe for a perfect lesson because lessons should be varied, should respond to the pupils, and not every lesson should do the same thing. Some might be preparing the pupils for an assessment, some might be for revision, and some might be for an entirely new concept and introducing new knowledge – they can’t/shouldn’t follow the same structure. The danger of this, I think, is that when you’re training it puts pressure on you to get to all these elements of the lesson you’ve planned – I remember one observer saying to me ‘why did you cut that activity short?’ and I replied ‘so I had enough time to get such and such done and get to the plenary’ and they said ‘but they needed more time with that task, they were getting into it and it was a chunky task, don’t be afraid to chuck out the lesson plan if it’s clear they need more time’. That really resonated with me because, as trainees, you’re terrified of deviating from the plans. Believe me, I know that there are many mentors that would take the view that not completing your lesson plan and getting to the plenary is a failure, but being able to adapt and respond to the developments in the classroom is the sign of a good teacher.

How do you manage the jump from training to NQT? 

RidleyHistory – The planning was manageable but the marking caught me off guard. @KKNTeachLearn has a marking timetable that I cannot be without. I’d also take time before you start to make a list of all the Heads of House, SEN contacts etc, in your planner because I found the little jobs outside the classroom were really intimidating. How do you put something in the post? Who do you email when your projector is only showing half the screen, half way through the lesson? Where do you go when paper from the printer runs out? I didn’t think to ask these questions and felt really stupid for encountering them late (but if I could give myself some advice, I would say that you’re new and it’s completely okay to ask these questions – no-one expects you to know the answers.)

MissHBHistory – I don’t actually feel as though it is a ‘jump’. I mean obviously there are some adjustments to be made – a full timetable is probably the one that gives trainees the most anxiety, but to be honest, the jump is nowhere near as big as you’re led to believe. A full timetable isn’t anything to worry about because on your PGCE already you’ll have most likely taught Y7, Y8, Y9 and Y10 and your timetable will be just made up of more of those classes – you’re planning the same lessons, but just teaching them to more classes. If you’re like me and you never taught A-Level before but then had an A-Level class on your NQT timetable, that can be a little scary but just do your research on the course, the content, and ask for advice where possible. 

Did you have an idea of the kind of teacher you wanted to be when you started? Have you achieved that? 

RidleyHistory – I did! It’s changed. Teachers exploit their personalities and so everyone you observe when training will have a different approach. On one of my placements there was a teacher who spoke extremely softly and the students mirrored that. It was incredibly impressive, but unfortunately not naturally me. You need to have an idea of what you want someone to see when they come into your classroom and then adapt what you’re doing until you get there comfortably. I’ve changed what I’m aiming for maybe four times over training, NQT, and RQT, probably because my personality has changed. It makes sense, then, that you never really achieve your ideal, but I hope I’m becoming more consistent with the various forms of “effective teaching” that are in my head. 

MissHBHistory – A good one? Whatever that looks like… I just want to teach well, be comfortable, and have good relationships with my classes. I don’t think I really had an idea of what I wanted to be like when I started, but I knew what I didn’t want to be like. I had ideas of teachers in my head from when I was at school and knew I didn’t want to be like them. I think that the nature of teaching means you are never really done learning, adapting, and growing… for me, now, I want to take more risks in the classroom.

My latest area of fascination within education is metacognition and I was very grateful to attend a course last term hosted by our trust associate research school. I came away with more ideas than minutes in the day and with a colleague from geography we put together a CPD session for the Humanities department. In this blog there is an overview of our take on metacognition, the action points that we decided on, and copies of any resources that we made for the training session or for implementing our plans afterwards. They are mostly history specific but have so far been tweaked and trialled in Geography and English.

The purpose of metacognition

We tagged this “understanding how to learn” because whilst “thinking about thinking” sounds great, it still needs further explanation. To be metacognitive is to understand how we learn and to do it in the most effective, efficient way possible. Metacognitive strategies aim to teach students effective methods of learning (particularly revision) and simultaneously increase their motivation and resilience in the face of difficult content. Perkins (1992) outlined 4 types of metacognitive learners and so successful teaching of metacognition would move a pupil from Level 1 to Level 4 in time for their exams. 

1. Tactic/passive – little understanding of how to revise or engagement with it (typically boys). 
2. Aware – they will know which kinds of activities they like to do but they don’t know why. Their revision doesn’t help them progress because they can’t identify what to change.
3. Strategic – they can learn and plan revision strategies that are specific to them and the things they need to learn but struggle to be flexible and change in the middle of a sequence.
4. Reflective – they monitor their own progress and can tweak what they are doing within an activity or schedule based upon their strengths, weaknesses, and progress. They can do their own marking.

We’re planning to introduce this from Year 7 so that by Year 11 they have had the opportunity to practice, move through the levels, and it is now automatic. Tom Sherrington wrote a great blog on turning revision strategy into habit so that it doesn’t add to the pressure of Year 11 (motivation, strategy, habit). 

Delivering metacognition

Typical metacognition strategies are dual coding, spaced learning, interleaving etc (see Dunlosky’s overview of T&L techniques), and lots of schools do that already, including mine. I want to focus on teaching metacognition explicitly, by which I mean teaching students what we were taught about activities and learning when we trained; we plan lessons so that activities build on each other and students should plan revision in the same way. Therefore, the resources focus on explaining the purpose of activities, how to create their own sequence of revision (like a recipe), and how to evaluate it for success or areas of weakness (the “plan, monitor, evaluate” aspect of learning). 

The 4 groups of activities that we settled on may be simplistic, but it’s working as an introduction. It is these that need adapting for each subject, particularly the third group “explanation”. For History, it means applying the facts that they’ve learnt to the question they’ve been asked but it doesn’t work for all mark schemes.

Resources: 

Metacognition & parents

Personally, I believe that training in metacognition should be extended to parents. Some parents are actively involved in helping their child revise, some want to help but don’t know about the subject/revision techniques, and some had a poor experience of school and so do not. Whichever it is, I believe that most parents would benefit and welcome first-hand experience of revision strategies so that they feel more comfortable steering their children through revision at home. Simply having encouragement and help with retrieval practice/low stakes testing would be beneficial for many students. In an ideal world we might hold open revision sessions, but practically it might be better just to send the booklet and a letter home.

Hope it’s helpful! @RidleyHistory

A short and not at all exhaustive list of interesting reading

Cambridge Assessment International Education, “Metacognition” https://www.cambridgeinternational.org/Images/272307-metacognition.pdf

D Perkins (1992) Smart Schools: Better Thinking and Learning for Every Child

EEF guidance report, Metacognition and Self-Regulated Learning – https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/tools/guidance-reports/metacognition-and-self-regulated-learning/

Huntington Research School, “Metacognition assisting revision” – https://researchschool.org.uk/huntington/blog/metacognition-assisting-revision

John Dunlosky, Katherine A. Rawson, Elizabeth J. Marsh, Mitchell J. Nathan and Daniel T. Willingham (2013) “Improving Students’ Learning With Effective Learning Techniques: Promising Directions From Cognitive and Educational Psychology”

Tom Sherrington, “Studying successfully: motivation + strategy + habit” – https://teacherhead.com/2019/05/19/studying-successfully-motivation-strategy-habit/

Happy New Year! 

We’ve written some short resolutions to give us focus and drive for 2020. They’re small, manageable things that we can do to progress, and therefore feel confident and motivated to tackle bigger opportunities that might come our way in the rest of the school year. 

@MissHBHistory

1: Use more historians at A Level. The pupils have to have an understanding of historiography for one section of their exam and I feel it would be more accessible if I integrated more historians into the other sections.

2: Go to the staffroom more. In an attempt to use every minute to my advantage I often isolate myself in my classroom but I want to make more of an effort to go to the staff room and speak to other teachers, and actually have a break in the school day!

3: Wave off my first full GCSE class. As an RQT, I started with a couple of Y10 classes last year and now they’re in Y11, I want to see off my first batch of Y11s (hopefully successfully prepared) to their GCSEs!

@RidleyHistory

1: Be less snappy with Year 7. They’re cute and they work hard so I should be more patient when, even in the Spring Term, I’m explaining why they definitely can continue their work on the next page. 

2: Get the Debate Club out to competitions. I had an emotional “proud teacher” moment last term when they smashed an interview with a local newspaper regarding the election. They work hard, they’re ready, they deserve the extra effort. 

3: I’ve never taught the American West, I’m very nervous, and I want to deliver it well. Simples (I hope!)