This week Steve Baugh, Assistant Headteacher at Bishop Vesey’s Grammar School, shares the effect Building Learning Power has had on his students and his school more widely. “I have now been involved with developing a programme of ‘Building Learning Power’ (BLP) at my school for about 20 months. In that time I believe that I have […]
There is much talk of the flipped classroom and of flipped learning – some of you may have attended FlipCon UK this week (Twitter was positively alive with it!). The terms, which are frequently used interchangeably, concern, at a basic level, what would have otherwise been covered in class being covered at home and in […]
Hallbankgate Village school opened it’s doors to teachers from across the country who were eager to discover how the school grows curious, independent and resilient learners. Here’s the first of a short series of blogs uncovering what we experienced. In June 2014 Hallbankgate Village Primary school was awarded the Gold Standard through the Learning Quality […]
When working with teachers I often mention Carol Dweck and her work on developing a growth mindset. Most teachers nod knowingly and say they have heard of it. When pressed, many fewer have actually read much of her work, such as her excellent book ‘Mindset: The New Psychology of Success’. Nonetheless, teachers across the country […]
It was interesting to read The Chief Inspector of Schools referring to Key Stage 3 as the Wasted Years in his address to the ASCL conference on Friday. For many years, Y8 – usually the second year of secondary education – has been called the dip year; when learners’ initial enthusiasm for their new teachers and varied […]
Here’s a workshop activity that I have been using recently that seems to go down well with students and their teachers. As learners enter the room, they find this image waiting for them with the instruction: What’s going on here…what questions are you asking yourself? I then harvest comments: Some numbers are going up…some are […]
Over the years, when I ask teachers in secondary schools to Tell me what your students are like as learners, they invariably respond in the same way: They do expect to be spoon-fed and for their teachers to do the thinking for them. I find this strange since I know that this is the last […]
I was working only last week with a school that provides education for secondary aged children with social, emotional and behavioural needs, on full and part time placements. Additionally it offers support for primary aged pupils on a similar basis. We had already completed 2 days of BLP training together in November, and I had set the 12 […]
Today’s blog is brought to us by Building Learning Power teacher Tracy Goodyear. Having worked with Building Learning Power from early in her career, she considers its practicalities, pros and cons, impact, and importance. ‘I was first introduced to ‘Building Learning Power’ shortly after my NQT year; I was teaching in a mixed comprehensive school […]
This week I explore why learners need to be collaborators, and how we can help them to do so effectively. I had the great good fortune to spend some time yesterday – with Guy Claxton and others – in Becky Carlzon’s Y1/2 Bristol classroom. A splendid group of small children showed just what five and six year […]
I have been a parent – and now a grandparent – for over 35 years and have probably just attended my last parents’ evening: my youngest son Tom’s Masters degree ceremony. Looking back, I often asked myself whether the experience of talking to teachers about my children’s progress really answered the right questions. I remember […]
The Early Years curriculum, mercifully lacking too much ‘stuff they need to know’, has long focussed on developing positive attitudes to learning through a blend of play and adult-led learning. These ‘positive attitudes’ have now been named the Characteristics of Effective Learning, a section of the EYFS that is too frequently overlooked as it runs […]
According to some research that I came across recently, the average 5 year old asks 274 in the course of a day. This has made me curious and want to know a bit more: Who is being asked these questions? Are these questions being asked of other five year olds? How do we measure the […]
As a headteacher, I used to say that one of the most significant outcomes we should aim for in our students was open-mindedness. That is to say the capacity to see things from other people’s point view and to approach their relationships with empathy and understanding. It is interesting to note that – in the […]
There’s no escaping one simple truth: teachers are in the habit forming business. The only problem is that – the older they get – students are in the habit of manipulating their teachers to provide them with answers and solutions rather than helping them build understanding for themselves. Teachers – in many schools – comply […]
I’ve worked with – and had the pleasure of observing – some great teachers throughout my career and I’m beginning to understand what makes them stand out as outstanding – better than good. These are the teachers that make a difference and who have long-term impact on student learning and achievement. All headteachers with whom […]
Learning habits are the routine ways in which we think and act when faced with new experiences and challenges. Very often they are second nature to us. Sometimes they make us very productive and efficient, for example, helping us know how to get started with something when we’re stuck. At other times, our well-honed habits […]
There seems to be a bit of a buzz around about perseverance, resilience and grit, especially since Character has gained a prominent place in the national debate. Sorting out the differences between them, if you need to, rather depends on what and who you read. But however you distinguish these three terms they all boil […]
How do pupils get better at learning? The idea of building pupils’ learning power has been around for several years now and hundreds of schools proclaim on their website that their school is using the ideas to enable their children to learn better. One of those three powerful words….Building Learning Power…. is the word ‘Building’. It is […]
Molly Coffey – a recent A-level student at Landau Forte College, Derby – talks about her experience of Building Learning Power in school and how it helped her learn more effectively. Big thanks to Molly for making this video.
It’s not every day you get to listen to an internationally renowned professor, learn about a highly significant research project, and laugh till your sides split at the tales of a Bradford headteacher. These three elements threaded their way through a special day for schools in the western shadow of the Pennines. The North-west is […]
When pupils at Thameside Primary school in Abingdon were introduced to their learning power, little did they know they were destined for a muddy morning. Christmas had come and gone, the weather was wet and cold, and the children wanted to be warm and dry in school. But no, staff had spied out some lovely […]
We are built to learn by imitation. Evolution has equipped us with brains that are designed from the moment of birth to do what people around us are doing. When a baby sees you make a fist or a smile the neurons in her brain make her ready to do the same thing. It’s through this […]
Published by Oneworld, August 2008 The main arguments of the book Teacher in inner-city school: ‘Adele, how many legs does a grasshopper have?’ Adele: ‘Oh man, I wish I had your problems.’ Education is, above all, a preparation for life. That means: helping to give all young people the knowledge, skills, dispositions, and values they […]
Here at Building Learning Power towers we have long been firmly of the belief that learning is learnable – to oversimplify, one aspect of Learning Power is an extension of Carol Dweck’s outstanding and well-accepted work on growth mindsets. But after you have accepted that the mind is a balloon, capable of expansion and lift, […]
And so the school summer holidays reach their tipping point: heads return to their offices in readiness for the examination results and the ubiquitous Back to School signs appear in all retail outlets. The countdown begins and late summer distractions are welcome before the onset of the new year’s anxieties and opportunities hold sway. Notwithstanding […]
How children were empowered to take control of their learning, through investigating effective strategies for collaboration. Some time ago I caught up with some of our learning powered schools, and this gem of a tale was shared with me by the head of a primary school in Cumbria. Children there were taken out to build […]
North Shore Academy opened in September 2010 following the closure of two failing schools in Stockton-on-Tees. The students from these two schools – along with existing staff – were amalgamated on the site of one of the previous schools. A new building was scheduled for completion on a brown field site for early 2013. Vice-principal, […]
BLP has a clear social, moral and philosophical rationale. It puts at the heart of education the development of psychological characteristics that are judged to be of the highest value to young people growing up in a turbulent and demanding world. And it has a robust scientific rationale for suggesting what some of these characteristics […]
Building Learning Power is about: Helping young people become better learners Developing their portable learning power Preparing young people for a lifetime of learning What is BLP based on? An extensive body of research into learning and the brain Recent research into the key dimensions of learning power Practical trials in schools across the country […]
International research into how the mind works shows that we are all capable of becoming better learners. Building Learning Power applies this research directly to the work of teachers in classrooms, to provide a practical framework for fostering lifelong learning in all young people. It is the job of education not to assume that learning will […]
