Nearly 300 passionate NE schools’ educators gathered for the annual Schools North East Curriculum Conference yesterday, with delegates urged to develop the natural curiosity children have into effective and worthwhile learning. Delegates were joined by keynote speakers John Tomsett and Mick Waters and colleagues from NE schools delivering sessions on their curriculum.
Schools North East Director, Chris Zarraga, opened the event by reiterating that, despite what is stated outside of the teaching profession, ‘the pandemic is not over’, before thanking the education practitioners of the North East for all of the hard work they continue to do in unprecedented circumstances. By becoming ‘the fourth emergency service’ throughout the ongoing pandemic, school staff in every role and at every level have demonstrated the real strengths and civic missions of North East schools.
And it was this theme of making a difference that keynote speakers repeated throughout the day.
In his address, Author and Educational Consultant John Tomsett told delegates that, if they ‘teach students the content you want them to know, understand and do, you’ll have taught them a rich, challenging, ambitious curriculum’, before stating how important it is that those working in schools need to only collect data that is worthwhile.
Stressing that ‘data is not the substance of what is being taught’, John echoed Schools North East’s own manifesto by stating that the expertise and experience of teachers and subject leaders should be trusted when it comes to developing a curriculum that includes what students need to know, as well as some things that would be ‘good’ for them to know. John said ‘It should be in the hands of the subject specialists to decide what content they are going to deliver, how they are going to deliver it so that the students will learn it and how best to assess whether the students have learnt what I have taught them’.
This trust in the teaching profession was echoed further by second Keynote Speaker Mick Waters, who urged those working in schools to have the confidence to use the curiosity children naturally have for life to help them enjoy their education.
‘Pupils learn all the time,’ Mick said, ‘and a strong curriculum is one where teachers recognise that they are all in learning and specialise in some subjects,’ before informing delegates that there needs to be a shift from subject specialisms being seen as limitations, rather than as additional contributions.
‘The curriculum,’ Mick continued, ‘is about lessons and routines, but it is also about events, learning outside of the classroom and, indeed, outside of the school,’ echoing Schools North East’s own calls for all pupils to be able to access an appropriate curriculum – one that develops more than just academic skills and one that serves the needs of the pupils and not performance tables.
Mick then closed his speech by reminding delegates that in years to come, the children in front of them now will remember what they are learning in their lessons now and that, if school staff continue to do good things, then children will remember good things.
Delegates were inspired by both Mick and John’s calls for educators to take control of the curricula they deliver and for it to be the teaching professionals who decide what they intend to teach, how they will implement it and then measure what impact it will have on the children’s learning. This mirrors Schools North East’s own recommendations for the voice of the teaching profession to be ‘front and centre’ when education-changing policy is created.
Read the Schools North East Manifesto in full here
