Rachel Ball
@MrsBallAP
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Coaching Development Lead @steplab_co Former Ass. Principal i/c T&L, SLE, FCCT, History teacher. All views my own.
North West, England
Joined July 2017
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Pinned Tweet
Updated google drive with any resources I've tweeted about or shared.
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One of the bits of CPD this year which has had the most positive feedback is our T and L briefings where each week I remind staff of one strategy which feeds into our Great Teaching principles. None of these are my own ideas but I add any I hear in podcasts or in my reading 1/
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Last ever Teaching and Learning tip in Staff Briefing today! I've updated the PowerPoint I use every week if it's useful to anyone. Special mention to the brilliant Tips for Teachers podcast where many tips came from. It's in my Google drive here
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This might not mean much to some but I am over the moon tonight to get home to this: my first ever article in
@tes
Thanks to everyone who's been so kind about it and thanks to
@Helen_Amass
and
@heymrshallahan
😊
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Thanks for all the interest. I must repeat - these are not my ideas, all I've done is collated others brilliant tips. This is a copy of what I'm sure will be a growing document! You can find it in my google drive linked in my pinned post or here
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Have been thinking about helpful ways to show different ways and approaches to scaffolding across school, and to help teachers know how to reduce support. I adapted a broader school document into much more depth for History and the main tasks used in the subject
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Absolutely delighted with our CPD journals for staff which arrived today. Thank you
@doodle_ed
!
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*NEW BLOG POST* Teach to the Top, where I discuss differentiated learning objectives and high expectations.
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*NEW BLOG POST* How my retrieval practice has changed this year, with some examples.
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Thanks for all the interest. I must repeat - these are not my ideas, all I've done is collated others brilliant tips. This is a copy of what I'm sure will be a growing document! You can find it in my google drive linked in my pinned post or here
One of the bits of CPD this year which has had the most positive feedback is our T and L briefings where each week I remind staff of one strategy which feeds into our Great Teaching principles. None of these are my own ideas but I add any I hear in podcasts or in my reading 1/
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This is such an excellent podcast with
@dylanwiliam
! Had to stop listening in the car and get a pen and paper because it is just SO good. Here are some of my key takeaways in a 🧵in case it's helpful!
1. Teaching is very complicated - so much can go wrong!
In case you missed it.. Listen to "Designing Teaching & Understanding Learners with
@dylanwiliam
for Mind the Gap, Ep. 55 (S3E11)" with me and
@Emma_Turner75
on the podcast platform you prefer: ⚓
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I read a lot of education books but I'd go so far as to say this is one of the best I've read. It's utterly packed with brilliant practical wisdom like the useful phrases glossary and covers everything from de-personalising behaviour to subject knowledge 5⭐
@teachgratitude1
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This retrieval practice worked really well today. 1 minute for each section. The red is points they missed.
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Delighted to share that I’ll soon be joining
@Steplab_co
as Coaching Development Lead helping schools effectively implement Instructional Coaching and PD. The impact of Steplab in my school has been huge & I can’t wait to work with more schools who are on a similar journey😀
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Together with
@lamb_heart_tea
in Oxford ready for
@researchED1
tomorrow.
Perfect time to announce - ✨ WE MADE A BOOK✨
“What is History Teaching, Now?”
A research informed handbook, which we are SO proud of!
Massively indebted to this stellar line up of incredible authors 1/
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Quick reminder for those of you thinking about form times next year about my idioms presentation here - enough for 2 years if you use one a week!
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*NEW BLOG POST* - How to fail. Inspired by the brilliant book by
@elizabday
I write frankly about failure in teaching and leadership and what it's taught me. I'd love you to read and let me know what you think. This was a hard but cathartic piece to write.
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Full document here, thanks for the suggestions so far!
Have been thinking about helpful ways to show different ways and approaches to scaffolding across school, and to help teachers know how to reduce support. I adapted a broader school document into much more depth for History and the main tasks used in the subject
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This retrieval exercise really made Year 11 think this morning!
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A year since our Professional Development Google classroom was created and I'm so proud of how it's taken shape and how it is being used. All our CPD in one place including breakfast sessions, webinar links, podcasts, links to articles and blogs. All staff have access to this.
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Excellent webinar with
@ProfCoe
so many useful points about what assessments should and shouldn't be used for.
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Here we go: 2022 Book Thread - a mixture of Fiction, Education, History books and everything else!
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Did my first bit of But, Because, So today as retrieval. Worked really well!
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Finally getting to celebrate publication day and feeling quite emotional! Thank you to all our fabulous authors, reviewers and brilliant publishers
@JohnCattEd
. I am so proud of this book and hopeful for the contribution it may make to the history community 1/2
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"Every woman who helps another woman to progress is making a change for the better." Brilliant article.
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*NEW BLOG POST* Poor proxies for learning prompted by The Dropout.
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*NEW BLOG POST* Instructional Coaching - a reflection on the last year of our whole school implementation.
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The Split - incredible. Rare to get a programme so well acted and that is heartbreaking and funny and warm and hopeful all at once. So sad it's over.
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I just told Year 11 that Stalin and Churchill met in Costco instead of Moscow - how's your Friday going? 😂
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Don't forget if you'd like to see the lessons I spoke about this morning, they are all available in my Google drive on my pinned tweet as well as the presentation from this morning.
#senecacpd
#TMHI
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*NEW BLOG POST* Part 1 of a 2 part blog post on how we implemented a no written feedback policy at my school. Part 2 coming soon. I know many schools are looking at changing their approach and I thought it might be helpful to share what we did.
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So happy to finally share our professional development Google classroom with staff last week and chuffed with the feedback already. CPD is broken down into topics with videos, links to podcasts,
@SenecaLearn
courses, Blue sky courses and of course the fantastic
@WALKTHRUs_5
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Finally sat down to absorb my last day (and the classroom for now) after an amazing 22 years. The messages and kindness from staff and students have moved me so much and I feel so grateful to have worked with many many brilliant people. Excited about the next step though!
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A week later! It's not perfect but couldn't be happier with my own little area to work 😍
After spending the last year working at the dining table amongst the kids toys and packing away every night, I'm feeling so excited to be picking this up tomorrow! Managed to carve out a little nook for myself to work. Probably still amongst toys though 😂
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The best lesson with my Year 11s today discussing 19c surgery and reading extracts like this from
@DrLindseyFitz
The Butchering Art. Students sat open-mouthed in shock 🤣 one of the best things about teaching History is telling a story like this.
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Slides from my session here
Thanks all who came to my
@researchED1
session and a very public thank you to
@MrSmithRE
and
@HughesHaili
for saving me with the tech 🤣
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Love doing this with new groups to GCSE, an oldie but a goodie to remind them of the importance of reading questions and sources carefully!
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🧵At the beginning of the summer I hadn't run for 3 years-ish and set myself the challenge of couch25k again (having done it several times before). One thing I've learnt about myself at 44 is once I commit to a challenge I'm there and this morning I did it! 1/
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Love the last week of term when I share our Teaching and Learning newsletter! Jam-packed with interviews, good practice and recommendations.
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If ever I needed a reminder about having a challenging curriculum...my son's Year 3 book. A few years ago I would have done this in Yr 8.
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One of those times when I'm grateful for a busy day in school. We lost my mother in law this morning after a rapid decline in health exacerbated by covid. She will be missed.
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It's been amazing to have so many people get in touch to say they are using ideas from my What is History lessons for year 7 when they go back. Don't forget they're here if you want to have a look!
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I thought this was excellent
@meganmansworth
! Fits so well with my ethos of high expectations and I'll be using the scaffolding examples and chapter on subject knowledge especially with staff. Thank you!
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When you're celebrating a second Christmas with your family and so you make biscoff cheesecake!
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So I spent some time this week creating 2 new lessons for a year 7 introduction to History with help from
@HistoryKelly
and
@KatieAmery
. I tried to use the ideas from
@TMHistoryIcons
conference in the lessons. L1 is focused on the etymology of history and what a historian does1/2
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Created this parents guide to GCSE History today with help and and inspiration from
@MrClassics3
and
@HecticTeacher
thank you! Really hope it helps!
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Breakfast Bite on formative assessment this morning and what to do after a Retrieval Do Now activity - with lots of reference to
@teacherhead
@Inner_Drive
@MrThorntonTeach
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*New blog post* Motivational Leadership. Nothing new but hopefully a useful reminder, with thanks to
@MaryMyatt
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Loved leading whole staff training tonight on questioning strategies. Wonderful to hear so many conversations afterwards about the one strategy staff are committing to working on. Really useful videos from Dylan William and
@TeachLikeAChamp
too
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A thread for my 2021 reads in case people are interested. A mixture of fiction, history, education and autobiographies.
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*NEW BLOG POST* The Writing Revolution - what I've taken away from this excellent book. With special mention to
@HistoryKss
@MrPattisonTeach
and
@MrThorntonTeach
.
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We made it! Our first holiday abroad for 7 years, and we feel so lucky ❤️
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What is History Teaching, Now is now available to pre-order!
Huge shout out to all of the incredible authors,
@JohnCattEd
for their efforts and expertise and of course the remarkable
@lamb_heart_tea
. We really hope you love this book as much as us!
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*NEW BLOG POST* Taking inspiration from the wonderful
@elizabday
and her article this weekend.
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Ah timehop...that time you went for an interview and talked for 4 minutes....😩
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It's always scary launching a new big initiative in school, even one I'm as passionate about as instructional coaching, but really pleased with the response and commitment from our volunteer cohort in our first training session tonight! Really believe this will be transformative.
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Could have heard a pin drop as year 10 listened to Kershaw describing the Night of the Long Knives today!
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*NEW BLOG POST* A simple blog on how we have implemented positive drop-ins using
@Steplab_co
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*New Blog Post* How reinforcing one word is improving the essays my students write.
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Planning a Berlin wall lesson. Name me a better Cold War quote...
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*NEW BLOG POST* - My thoughts on a lesson from James Clear's Atomic Habits on the dangers of goals.
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Wow, this is an exceptionally good issue! So much to unpack! Brilliant article from
@dylanwiliam
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Thinking a lot about the everyday language we use in school at the moment - this article in
@tes
is a great reminder.
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Introduced year 10 to Cornell notes this week - they said they found it really helpful. I modelled how to do it on the visualiser
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Car written off last week. Husband was talking to the 7 year old about maybe waiting a bit to get a new one when we'd saved up a bit more. He offered to give us his money box contents towards a new one 😭🥰
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It's that time of year when you may be turning to September planning. If you'd like a reminder of the 2 lessons I planned for a What is History unit for Year 7, you can find them here .
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One of the worst bits about online teaching is having to have a million tabs open. Absolutely hate it.
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Still no less powerful than when I first read this a few years ago. A message for all school leaders from
@dylanwiliam
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What a great day! Pleasure to present at
#rEDSurrey22
. My presentation is in my Google drive
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Had my first go at using a self-marking google quiz to check understanding on a longer exam question. Really looking forward to trying out! Can't remember who first shared the idea, but thank you.
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Over the moon to announce that
@lamb_heart_tea
and I are writing a book for this series on scaffolding. We are really excited about contributing to such a fantastic series edited by
@Inner_Drive
! We will be looking for contributions soon so watch this space! 🎉✍️
Each book will be accompanied by a module on our Teacher CPD Academy site ()
The 1st set of books is going to explore how cog sci can inform:
🔎 Attention
🪜 Scaffolding
🙇♂️ Independent Learners
⚖️ Mentoring
🗣 Oracy
🔬 Understanding research
🪄 Creativity
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Let's do this! I'll be speaking about building an evidence-informed CPD culture at 11.55. Excited and nervous!
#rEd22
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Finished this superb book by
@teachgratitude1
today. In what has been the hardest term in a long time for me the advice given here about managing stress, workload and anxiety is just brilliant. Made up to have my blog feature too. Thank you Jamie.
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*NEW BLOG POST* Teaching Idioms. After a conversation with
@fod3
, a post about our rationale for and how we are approaching the explicit teaching of idioms with resources. With special mention to
@HuntingEnglish
. Hope it helps!
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Pleased to share our Easter T&L newsletter with staff today signposting
@dnleslie
Becoming Educated and
@meganmansworth
brilliant book as part of this. We always link to an
@Inner_Drive
science of learning study too making research accessible to staff.
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Pleasure to present at the History SEND Teachmeet tonight on scaffolding - the presentation and document are in my Google Drive!
#Historyinspiringteachers
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"Effective feedback needs to be used as a windscreen rather than a rear-view mirror" - as a recipe for future action. Love this quote from
@dylanwiliam
in the
@EducEndowFoundn
feedback report.
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