Top Teaching Tips e book by SCCBQuality

TOP TEACHING TIPS

A QUALITY GUIDE

CONTENTS EMBEDDING EQUALITY AND DIVERSITY

DIFFERENTIATING YOUR LESSON

POSITIVE STUDENT RELATIONSHIPS

BEING AN EFFECTIVE PERSONAL TUTOR

USING ETRACKER TO IMPROVE SUCCESS

DEVELOPING ICT

PERSONALISING YOUR WORKSHOP

PROMOTING ACTIVE LEARNING

IMPROVING LESSON PLANNING

EMBEDDING MATHS

EMBEDDING ENGLISH

BEHAVIOUR MANAGEMENT

MOODLE

TARGET SETTING

EMBEDDING EQUALITY AND DIVERSITY Is diversity included within your teaching methods? Do you make reference and use examples from a variety of cultures, religions and traditions? Do you challenge stereotypes? Here are a few classroom activities and ideas that you can use and adapt to help promote multiculturalism in your lessons: Themed weeks Host ‘African week’, ‘Islam week’ or ‘Disability week’ and teach your students all about the chosen topic. You could try different foods, listen to music, play games, learn facts and watch videos. Try and incorporate the theme into your tutorial lessons to reinforce the topic and maintain interest. Use diverse images in resources When you pick books, posters and activities for your students, make sure that they include people from different backgrounds or with disabilities to show that these differences are ‘normal’. Avoid resources where stereotypes are used. Make use of current news events Promote debate and discussion by raising current issues and seeing what your students understand about the situation. For example, find a story where someone was fired for being too old – what do your students think about this? How would they challenge it? Quizzes Host weekly quizzes on a set theme and learn how much your students know about different cultures, religions, disabilities etc. You could even assign the task of writing the quiz to 2 students each week so that they are involved in doing the research.

List things that come from abroad A quick activity you can do at the start of a lesson to introduce the theme of multiculturalism. Ask your students to create a list of everything in their life that comes from a country outside of the UK. Go through their responses as a class – are they surprised by the results? Male or female? Explore the idea of stereotypes – provide each student with a list of 10 professions and ask them to decide whether each is a ‘man’s job’ or a ‘woman’s job’. Go through their answers as a class and see what stereotypes people have. Is it fair that these stereotypes exist? How would they suggest these stereotypes are challenged? True or false? Present the class with some facts about people with disabilities, another culture or based on the protected characteristics and ask them to decide whether the facts are true or false. Are they surprised by the correct answers? Hold debates and discussions Divide your class into 2 teams. Provide one team with a statement, e.g. ‘I’m a woman working in an office and have been told I can no longer work there because I recently became pregnant’. This team must defend this statement. Ask the other team to give advice and challenge the statement. How do both teams feel afterwards? Which team would they prefer to have been on and why? Hearing/sight/physical impairment games Play games to raise awareness of different physical disabilities. Can your students put on a jumper with just one hand? Can they guide a friend around the classroom with a blindfold on? Can they lip-read what the characters on TV are saying with the sound off? Use these activities to show the difficulties that people face and explain how these people learn to overcome them.

Jigsaws Make your own jigsaws whereby facts need to match up with their country etc. You could also do this with different flags, national dresses or languages. Play music Listen to music from around the world or create your own using percussion instruments. Introduce your class to instruments from other cultures that they may not have seen before and to different styles of music. If you have students with diverse cultural backgrounds in your class, perhaps they could do a show-and-tell?

There is a new font installed on the college system called ‘Open Dyslexic’. This is a free font which is available for staff and students to use and has been developed for people with Dyslexia to help them read more easily. To use this font, simply open a program such as Microsoft Word, navigate to the font selection box and scroll down to ‘Open Dyslexic’.

5 TIPS TO DIFFERENTIATING YOUR LESSON 1. Differentiate expectations- set a range of different learning objectives for the topic aimed and learner needs and ability. 2. Incorporate problem-solving activities on the same topic but aimed at different levels of learner ability to challenge all learners. 3. Consider the product of the task, what are you asking the learners to produce? You can differentiate the product to suit or meet the learnerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s needs and personality. This will help them to engage in the task and enjoy it! 4. Prepare questions that challenge each learner. You can write a bank of questions on the session topic to check for learning and attach a few learners to each bank of questions based on their ability. 5. If you know your learners well, set an individual learning objective for each learner based upon: thinking skill, content, resource used and product, e.g.

BONUS TIP: Explaining point five We can differentiate learning objectives by the required: CONTENT: we can ask students to look at more than one thing or even link in other features/related topics. THINKING SKILL: Level of depth and thinking skill can be manipulated by the use of Bloomâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Taxonomy. RESOURCE: What resource(s) the learner should use. PRODUCT: What the learner will produce.

FIVE TIPS ON DEVELOPING POSITIVE STUDENT RELATIONSHIPS 1. Be consistent

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Often you may be the only consistent adult in your learner’s life, so if you say you are going to do something – ensure it is done. Be consistent with praise, sanctions (if required) and promises. In order to gain trust you must first be reliable! 2. Have regular one to ones with your learners

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Set targets, allow learners to see what they have achieved and get to know them! Place causes for celebration on Etracker/ Pro Monitor. 3. Take an interest in them as an individual This will provide you both with a better understanding of your learner – they are not only your student but they are also a ‘person’ with lives, difficulties and their own challenges. Show them empathy and understanding. 4. Set high expectations Set your expectations and – remain consistent! Allow learners to have an input into the curriculum – they could set themselves rules and produce a class charter. They could also outline their expectations of you as a teacher – it is a two way process. 5. Celebrate their success This can be done in a number of ways – reward visits, parties or an awards ceremony – often learners may have had a chaotic educational life so restore their faith in Education. Example – Golden Globes Award Ceremony – Travel and Tourism – Black Tie Event. Or star of the Week – box of chocolates. Let them know you care.

5 TIPS ON BEING AN EFFECTIVE PERSONAL TUTOR 1. Ensure your tutees know what their target minimum grades are for their programme of study. This should be done in the first two weeks of induction and ideally in your first tutorial session. This will enable you to monitor the progress of your tutees and ensure they are on track to achieve. 2. Have at least one 1-1 meeting with each of your tutees every term. Not only does it give your learners an opportunity to speak to you about any concerns and issues, it also provides you with time to set and review targets and look at goals that will allow your tutees to be successful. 3. Access your dashboard on a weekly basis; this will keep you up to date with attendance and punctuality issues (particularly if your learners are studying English and Maths qualifications). If you see a decline then speak to your group/tutees quickly and get in touch with parents/guardians/carers if tutees are under 18. If your group have a strong and consistent attendance and punctuality pattern then celebrate it and encourage the group to maintain. 4. Dedicate one tutorial slot every term to focus on employability, work experience, and work-readiness. Employers want skilled people who can work with others, use their time effectively and have strong communication skills. You could invite an employer in to talk to your tutees about what is expected of them in the workplace. You could work on CVs and completing applications. You could also use this slot to work on study skills such as public speaking/presentations, or have mock interviews. Your tutees can then update ProMonitor/E-Tracker to record what they have done. 5. Have a good and open dialogue with other staff teaching your tutees. If there are issues with students in English and Maths, it is vital that you are aware of this so that you can deal appropriately with the situation. Ask for regular updates to be added to ProMonitor/E-Tracker so that you are made aware of issues that could potentially affect the success of your tutees.

FIVE TIPS ON EFFECTIVE USE OF ETRACKER TO IMPROVE SUCCESS 1. Every learner needs Aspirational Action plans

2. Learners should write their own targets

3. CFCS: Causes for Celebration

4. Raise ambition with the CV Generator

5. Stay on target with a Review

https://etracker.sccb.ac.uk/

5 TIPS TO DEVELOP ICT WITHIN YOUR SESSION 1. Encourage learners to create resources that can support their learning later. Try out Padlet - learners can add notes, links, images and videos straight from their phones to a shared board and then use them again later to inform their assignment writing. Works brilliantly as a plenary activity. 2. Assess smarter and use online applications that provide evidence of a student's learning journey: Try Plickers - an easy to use set of cards that learners use to answer questions. The teacher scans the cards with their own phone, meaning that unlike Kahoot, learners don't need their own phones, computer or data/Wi-Fi to participate. A full breakdown of learner answers are provided in Excel format, which can be used to inform differentiation and planning. 3. Turn your PowerPoint presentation into a video that learners can access from any device: Try Office Mix - you can add voice-overs, screen clippings, quizzes and polls to a presentation you already use and publish it as a web video that learners access via a link. Look out for the Mix tab in your PowerPoint ribbon to give it a go. 4. Get your phone out: Use the camera on your own phone to capture evidence of learning. Take pictures of group work, posters and anything else your learners create and use them as assessment evidence. You can also use pictures in lessons, during recaps, starter activities and to build on prior learning. 5. Aim for collaboration: Learners learn better when they work with and support each other. OneNote Class Notebooks provide learners with space for them to work collaboratively on projects, as well as a personal space for each learners work and it can marked online by the teacher. Worksheets and class activities can be typed in or uploaded directly and shared with each individual or group. Download the OneNote Class Notebook add-in and access the support videos to get started.

FIVE TIPS TO ENSURE YOUR WORKSHOP IS MORE PERSONALISED Learner work & Achievements: It is essential to recognise and display learners work and achievements. There are a number of ways to do this. Competition pieces, photographs / statement letters and examples of completed work”WAGOLL” (What A Good One Looks Like) Rapport: The first six weeks are the most important, as it develops the “normin & stormin” within the group’s development. Once you have identified key characters in the group, a limit can be agreed, banter and humour can be used positively and effectively to make learning more enjoyable in a workshop environment. Always smile and welcome learners. Happy staffroom, happy classroom. Teamwork: It is important that learners are familiar with all members of the department and vice versa. Try to involve other tutors, support staff and work based assessors where possible. This can be possibly be done through tutorials. This is vital for learner progression, work placements and apprenticeships. Targets: Start each session with a clear aim and achievable objectives. From this, more personalised learning targets can be self-set and maybe used for peer assessment. This can also reinforce progression and be linked to e tracker.

Resource Materials: Most trade suppliers are keen to support tomorrows trade people. Huge discounts are often offered with regards to teaching & learning. Suppliers usually provide posters, literature and displays to promote their products, as well as student prizes and guest speakers relating to industry.

5 TIPS TO PROMOTE ACTIVE LEARNING IN THE CLASSROOM. 1. Blog construction: Have students make blogs about what theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re learning. 2. Peer to peer teaching: Having students teach each other can help them learn. Besides making students more confident in their ability to present information and work collaboratively. 3. Active learning outside the classroom: KWL An effective pre-learning strategy that will help the participant focus on the application of the material is to have them informally and briefly list their personal KWL. K = what the participant already KNOWS about the subject W = what they WANT to know L = How they want to use what they LEARN 4. Smartphones: Technology can be a useful tool for promoting active learning. Examples Socrative and Kahoot. 5. Design a space for active learning: Reconfigure the classroom environment and move away from the traditional settings. These classrooms engage and inspire by putting control of the learning space in the hands of students and instructors. Here you will find learning spaces that can easily morph from lecture mode to teamwork to group presentation, discussion and back again.

What I hear, I forget. What I see, I remember. What I do, I understand.

5 TIPS TO HELP IMPROVE LESSON PLANNING 1. Task - Use a single worksheet comprised of tasks, which get progressively harder. The more advanced students will quickly progress to the later questions whilst the less able can concentrate on grasping the essentials. Graduate tasks, e.g. from easy to hard on a worksheet. Use Andersons Taxonomy 2. Log books - At the very beginning of the year introduce “log books” students spend 5 minutes at the end of each session and write down what they have achieved. They then write an ndividual goal for the next session. What Went Well /Even Better If. 3. Grouping - Collaborative learning has many well-documented benefits such as enabling shy students to participate more confidently in class, but it’s also a useful personalisation method. Small, mixed-ability groups allow lower achievers to take advantage of peer support whilst higher achievers gain the opportunity to organise and voice their thoughts for the benefit of the whole group (known as peer modelling). Grouping also allows roles to be allocated within the team, which cater for each member’s skill set and learning needs. 4. Outcome - personalisation by outcome is a technique whereby all students undertake the same task but a variety of results is expected and acceptable. For example, the teacher sets a task but instead of working towards a single ‘right’ answer, the students arrive at a personalised outcome depending on their level of ability. 5. Resources - In this method, it’s important to recognise that some students can work with more advanced resources than others, and that it is possible to use multiple materials in order to approach a topic from different angles. Personalisation of this kind allows a wide spectrum of materials to be used to attain a single learning outcome. It’s a method that is greatly assisted by advances in technology. Students can also produce their own resources.

5 TIPS FOR EMBEDDING MATHS 1. Know your learners and adapt your planning to suit their individual needs. This does not mean creating a lesson plan for each individual learner, but understanding who will need support with the maths topic you are covering, and who would be good mentors for those who are struggling. You will need their BKSB results for their maths and English to see where their strengths and areas for improvements are. Contact the maths and English tutors, as they should be able to provide you with a group breakdown of the learners’ results, rather than printing each learner’s results off individually. 2. Link with Maths and English tutors to: • Identify any issues • Ensure you have an understanding of when and how they are teaching topics. They will have specific resources that you can also use in your sessions, keeping that link between vocational and maths/English sessions • Also let them know what you are doing within your sessions and the topics most relevant to that level. For example ratios, percentages, areas etc • Time to do this on a regular basis is very important. 3. Keep the maths language alive and relevant. Let learners know they are doing maths within your sessions. This may need to be at the end of the session -"This is the maths we have done today", or at the beginning, "This is the maths you will be doing today". You will know the learners you have and their confidence or resilience to maths now. If they are resistant tell them what they have done afterwards. Continue to explain the link with employers’ wants and expectations, as we do around the college.

4. For learners, the method they use for their maths is as important as getting the correct answer. When revisiting calculations on the board, or when learners complete calculations, encourage them to show their working out as much as possible. Showing their steps allows for peer and tutor assessment and feedback, and highlights where mistakes are happening. 5. Key skills around maths, apart from showing and understanding methods and processes, are being able to problem solve and reason out their answers. Give learners the opportunity to explain why they have found the answer they have, and what that means.

EMBEDDING ENGLISH: 5 TOP TIPS • Word wall Routinely create a space on your board for recording words during the lesson which students need but can’t either spell, say, read, remember, understand or use. Review the SUM (Spelling, Use Meaning) at any time in the lesson. Example activities are: crossword puzzles, making glossaries, gap fills, correction starter activities, matching exercises, quizzes, Triptico/ Kahoot/Socrative activities, wordsearches. Further activities are: a) covering the list, instructing students to say it from memory, write it down in pairs, then checking the spelling; b) dictating the list slowly, so a student from each of 2 teams can run and write in turn a sentence on the board using each word; c) students describing or giving examples of one of the words for others to guess the word. • Prior knowledge When introducing a new topic or text, encourage students to predict (from titles, headings, visuals) the key words they expect to find. This pooled knowledge, recorded on the board or flipchart paper, can be added to during the lesson. This ‘priming’ process gives students more confidence and more strategies for tackling new reading material and new topic areas. • SPAG Develop a workable feedback routine. For example, ask the writer to read their work carefully – with a short list of priorities or prompt questions and the SPAG key in front of them. Then they swap with a peer and do the same again with post-its to make comments, so they aren’t writing on their partner’s work. Finally, use SPAG selectively: don’t SPAG to death if the student is unlikely to notice or act on it. Make a very brief summary of positives and action points at the end.

• Moodle Include links in Moodle to simple, straightforward video tutorials, on-line dictionaries and exercises for punctuation, spelling rules, writing tips and grammar. Refer to these links in e-tracker targets and feedback if students are struggling with written assignments. • Talk Include speaking & listening in your embedding. Give ‘how to’ advice and feedback for discussions, debates and presentations. Give all students opportunities in pairs or small groups to explain, summarise, ask and answer questions. This is a good plenary activity before self-evaluations.

BEHAVIOUR MANAGEMENT TIPS: 1. Meet and greet at the door - smile and shake hands with the learners. 2. Set late arrival routines in the lesson - the 3 Step approach when they enter late 1) they write their name on a prepared piece of paper 2) they sit down and join the lesson 3) at the end of lesson you talk to them and ask why they were late. 3. Proximity, use this to subtly prompt learners, they may be talking or on phones, usually by just being near them they will stop and refocus. This also removes the need to say their name, which only serves to give them status. Use a remote presenter as this frees you from the computer and allows you to move freely around the classroom. 4. Focus on the good learners and those doing what is expected, give them the first attention. 95% vs 5% - always give recognition to those who deserve it. 5. Hot Spot - choose a place in your classroom which is not at the front of the room, when any behaviour issues arise, move to your hotspot and highlight the behaviours you want in the lesson. Also thank others for following what is expected in the lesson.