Teaching Like A Pirate? Really?

I have always thought I was a bit mad. I mean take one look in my classroom (or the blog), and you’re likely to see me running round pretending to be a goat, jumping of a cliff (my desk), throwing bits of sweet corn around, acting out a part or pretending we’re somewhere totally different than we really are. Yes, really. Behind the closed door of a classroom you can get away with all those things. What’s more the students love it. I mean sure, mine think I’m totally crazy. But as we say in our room; who would want to be ‘normal’ anyway? Normal is boring. It is dull. And in our room, it is definitely never dull.

Why? Because learning should be fun. And well, if it wasn’t fun, none of us would learn very much. The fact that all of the permanent unit staff have the capacity to be crazy is the very essence of what makes our students successful. It distracts them, makes them forget they are learning and therefore they become less anxious, less scared and more prepared to have a go, make mistakes and therefore to learn.

Today however, I found out a secret. Shhhhh listen very carefully and I’ll tell you in a whisper. I am not mad; I am a pirate.

You see after having loved ‘Learn Like a Pirate’ so much that I have worked every waking hour (and some sleeping ones) since I read it, because there are so many ideas buzzing round my head that I can’t wait to activate them, I decided I had better read the first of the pirate books ‘Teach Like A Pirate’. So in the last 24 hours I have. And well, hence my discovery. There are others out there as crazy as me. My methods are justified and validated, there are others out there spending hours researching their students’ interests and running crazily round their room to illustrate a point; what’s more anyone can learn them.

When teaching students with autism, there are so many things competing for their attention (the rustle of a tree in the wind, a favourite episode playing on loop in their mind, the sound of a word they like, the fear that they have failed before and might again) that if you want to keep that attention, you have to do everything in your power to keep it; to engage them; to enable them to learn.

‘Teach Like a Pirate’ teaches you how to do just that. What’s more it proves once again, that good autism teaching is good everyone teaching. This is a book written by a mainstream teacher for mainstream teachers. It’s full of checklists of hooks to get your students involved, ideas that can be incorporated into any lesson by any teacher. Ideas that are guaranteed to win over not only your students with autism but everyone.

It isn’t a book about differentiation. It’s a book about engagement. But it’s that engagement, that trust, that willingness to go beyond the boundaries that will take your differentiation to another level. So channel your inner craziness and use it, and if you’re not sure you have any (or enough) of your own craziness read Dave Burgess’ ‘Teach Like a Pirate’ and he’ll make you believe you can find it, however deeply you have it hidden.

Go on, what are you waiting for? Start differentiating like a pirate…. Arrgggh!

If In Doubt Make A List

I don’t know about you, but I love lists. In fact I would make a list for just about anything. I’m not sure if my love of lists emanates from my love of nice stationery (I mean after all I need somewhere to make my lists), from the fact that I have a terrible memory (and would therefore forget what I was supposed to be doing without one), or whether it’s simply because they give me a sense of direction and accomplishment when I tick them off. But whatever the reason, I wouldn’t be without them.

Lists however, aren’t just for teachers. They can be great for students too. Lists help them to organise their thoughts, plan work, give them a sense of what’s happening next and even to make sure that they’ve covered everything they need to in order to complete a task.

Lists can be useful for all students, but they’re particularly useful for students with autism. Many students with Autism have a weak central coherence which means it can be difficult for them to see the wider picture. This can mean that students focus in on a particular element of what you’ve said rather than on the whole task. Most students with autism also like structure and certainty. A list of what’s going to happen in the lesson or over the term can really help them to feel more confident and less anxious because they are able to predict what will happen next.

For students who haven’t used lists before you might need to model this approach first. You can start by writing checklists on the board for students to use when completing assignments, or by giving individualised post it note checklists to students on the front of their book. Whether it’s the steps of how to work out a mathematical equation or the things to include in an essay; pretty much everything we do has a list of steps we need to follow.

As students become used to the format even very young students will become increasingly confident at making their own lists. Students can therefore start to write down the steps themselves, allowing you to go and check the steps before the student starts working. It’s a really quick way of checking understanding and helps greatly to lesson the anxiety of students before starting work.

Of course, as lists won’t just help students with Autism, they can be used with the whole class. They will however make the biggest difference to those students in your class who struggle with organisation, short term memory, central coherence and self belief. They will provide those students with a much better chance of success in their final product and thus help to raise their self esteem.

Often however, those students most likely to benefit from lists are the ones most reluctant to use them. For those students, making lists cool can be a crucial step in the process. So why not use the notes section of smartphones? Or even better a free app called Trello which I found today courtesy of ‘Learn Like a Pirate’ which allows you to organise your lists into sections and even add pictures and websites to them to make them even more interesting.

So there you go, easy peasy. Differentiation really is as simple as making a list! So next time you set your students a new task, why not give it a try? What have you got to lose?

Show Me How

Most of my students are worried about making mistakes. And I don’t mean worried in the sense that their worry may cause them to write a word they are confident in spelling rather than a more challenging word they can’t. I’m talking about fear so paralysing that even putting a pen on a piece of paper can feel like a challenge that is to great.

For many it’s this anxiety which has meant they struggled too much in mainstream. It’s easier to act out and display difficult behaviours than to admit you’re too frightened to start. So when we set a piece of work we have to think carefully. We have to make the difficult feel simple. We have to take away the fear.

One of the ways we do this is through modelling. We do the whole class modelling of collating ideas, sharing them, writing on the board etc. But we also simply sit and do the work ourselves. We become fully involved in the lesson. Sometimes we even get stuck. There is nothing more enabling than helping the teacher or member of support staff working with you fix the problem. On the days you’re finding things hard it’s exactly the kick-start in motivation you need.

So whatever it is we’re doing, there are always spare copies or resources. It’s amazing how contagious writing can be, when the person sat next to you is obviously excited about what they’re doing; when they talk to you about their ideas; when they show you there’s nothing to be afraid of.

When fear comes into play, you can’t tackle the problem head on. You can’t tell a student to do the task. You can’t tell them it’s not scary. But you can show them. For those students who come to lesson with support this is easy to do, all you have to do is give out an extra sheet of paper and encourage the member of Support Staff that you’d love to see their work too.

For those that don’t have support it isn’t insurmountable. Think carefully about your seating plan. Place your confident excited writers near those who find it harder and encourage talking in the first ten minutes of the process. Encourage students to share their ideas as they start and even more so, encourage other students to magpie those ideas.

This one is really easy to implement; differentiation that’s as easy as handing out an extra sheet of paper. So go on, what are you waiting for make sure you’re stocked up for September…

Support The Support Staff

The job of secondary learning support assistants is incredibly difficult. How many of you would feel you could support a child in Maths, English, Science, Music, Art, French, ICT and more? I know I couldn’t, at least not without considerable help from the classroom teacher.

Although not all students with ASD get additional support in class, many do – at least for some part of their timetable. Teachers are given very limited training about how to work with them, and at least at first it can be nerve wracking to have an extra adult in the room. Learning Support Assistants are dedicated professionals who work incredibly hard to ensure success for the student(s) they work with and can often appear more expert at managing the child with SEN than the teacher feels that they are. As a consequence of these things many teachers leave the LSA to manage (and often teach) the student with very little input.

As teachers we need to be responsible for effecting a change. There are lots of ways that we as teachers can help support staff and therefore help the students. What’s more every single one of the support staff I work with would welcome more teacher input. So here I’ve tried to sum up the top five ways that you can be part of that change and make a difference. What’s more, it’s all really easily achievable:

• Say hello to the member of support staff when they come into the room. It sets a tone of respect for the other students and shows the LSA that you value them being in your lesson.
• Give LSAs materials that you are studying in advance, so they have more time to think how to support the student in the lesson.
• Check in regularly with the student and their LSA, to make sure they both understand what you are teaching. It’s impossible for an LSA to be an expert in every subject they work in.
• Reassure the LSA that your priority is that the student learns, not that they complete the task. Encourage them to let you know if they feel the task is too hard for the student to complete, rather than over prompting them. (This one is in bold because it’s the one that I know worries support staff the most)
• Ask the LSA to write – either directly in the student’s book or on a post it note – the level of prompting they gave the student to complete the task. This will benefit the student because you can plan more effectively for them, but it will also benefit you because you will know what they can do and what they can’t.

The key is to remember the LSA is not the differentiation, nor is it their responsibility to differentiate the work. Students with SEN (even those who come to class with specialist support) are the responsibility of the teacher. Having an LSA in the room can be a massive asset both to you as a teacher and to the student being supported, but in order to maximise their impact we as teachers need to take responsibility. We need to enable LSAs to have the impact they want to have. We need to enable our students to be the best they can be.

So what are you waiting for? There’s a whole lot of ‘Hellos’ to be said…

Rome Wasn’t Built In A Day

It took me six years and five attempts at my driving test to lean to drive. In fact humiliation of all humiliation my baby brother passed before I did, about a month after his seventeenth birthday. I wasn’t exactly what you would call a natural!

I mean, don’t get me wrong, I aced the theory test – twice in fact! The first one ran out before I passed the practical. I knew exactly how I was supposed to drive but my body wouldn’t comply. To make matters worse, I did insist on continuously driving on the wrong side of the road (which didn’t go down well with the first driving instructor who lasted only a very short time before he gave up on me). I didn’t, and still don’t, know my left from my right and that made things more than a little tricky.

Luckily, I was both stubborn and resilient. I decided that no one was going to tell me I couldn’t learn to drive and I persevered. But this time, I wasn’t leaving it in the hands of a driving instructor. I knew that somehow I had to learn which side of the road I should be driving on, but that I needed to do it in a way that would be safe and would give me time to think. So, I rode a push bike. For three whole years whilst I was at university I rode my bike everywhere, I still got confused about which side of the road I should be on but on a bike it was safer. I could stop when I needed to, put my bike and myself on the pavement and give myself time to think. Gradually over time, I had to think a bit less and then a bit less until it became almost natural to me which side of the road I should be on. And at that point, I braved the world of driving instructors again…

Sometimes our students test us. We work so hard planning our lessons, preparing learning opportunities for them and yet still they don’t seem to make progress. It’s frustrating because we’re at a loss of what else we can try that will make a difference. Sometimes (not always), but sometimes the answer is we need to do more of the same. We need to provide opportunities for repetition, we need to allow students time to practice those skills until they become natural to them. But most of all, we need to not give up. We need to believe that all of our students are capable of learning and we need to persevere. We need to persevere so that they can.

Of course, we need to do this for all students, not just those with SEN. But perhaps for those who don’t find it easy, for those to whom learning doesn’t come naturally, it matters all the more. The students who challenge us the most are often the ones that need us the most. So next time you feel like throwing your hands in the air and giving up, stop a moment and think, maybe you just need to persevere that little bit longer…

Braving The Technology

So this summer, my technical knowledge has been progressing. It was my mission and I’m on route to conquer it. I do feel a bit like a soldier heading to battle, because this is one area of teaching that is taking me way out of my comfort zone. But at the same time I’m crazily excited about each new stride into the world of the unknown I make.

The differentiation possibilities with technology are endless. In fact the more I learn, the more I see possibilities that I hadn’t even dreamt of. Take OneNote Class Notebook for instance. That had been sitting on my computer as part of Office365 since well, probably forever without me even knowing it existed. Without me realising it, I had an amazing differentiation tool right at my fingertips, totally free of charge and ready for me to exploit it.

So, what does it do? Well, it enables you to create a NoteBook for your class. Within your NoteBook you have a library section that you can fill with notes, questions and resources. You can also include links to webpages and videos, as well as record yourself talking to your students. Students can see things in this section and copy and paste them into their own NoteBooks but they can’t edit them, so you know your original content is secure.

Next is the ‘Collaboration Space’ where students can work together on various projects. They can type simultaneously with each other, or they can use it as a space to peer assess work. It’s hard for me to get my head around this properly (in the absence of students to test it on) but I’m really excited about the possibilities and I know it’s something that’s going to make group work and collaboration a lot easier for students.

Thirdly are students’ individual NoteBooks, here they can complete work which only they and you as the teacher can see. Even better it saves automatically, no more panicking when they turn the laptop off when saving or lose their memory stick; both of which last year were monumental meltdown inducing problems for us. This next part I’m really excited about: I can post individual tasks for students here, I can post links to websites that relate directly to that student and I can even read pages of novels aloud and post them on the page. There are times we all wish we could clone ourselves. And well, this looks about as close as that is possible to get! I can be on every person’s screen, giving individualised instructions at the same time – no more waiting until I get round to each student to give instructions. (Admittedly the thought of my voice in stereo all around the room is a frightening prospect, but well, that’s what headphones were made for!)

This programme is all of my differentiation dreams come true. I’ll still be very much hands on – I have no plans to become a virtual teacher, but this will allow for a much greater level of independence for my students. And that has to be a good thing! Even better, once I’d got over my initial terror, it was pretty easy to figure out. If you can work in Microsoft word, you can easily master this.

So, if you like me are new to this expanding possibilities of technology this seems like a really good place to start. For those of you that have Office365 email at school, all you need to do is click on the little squares in the top left corner and you get a whole range of apps. I haven’t played with the others yet, but give me chance and I’ll get there!

I’m still not exactly what you would call a whizz, and I have a zillion things I want to learn to do, but I’m pretty proud of how far I’ve come. And hey, I’ve still got four more weeks of the holidays left to learn lots of new things…. What are you going to try today?

The Obsession With Time

My students like things exact. They like structure, they like routine and they like me to say what I mean.

So when I say something will happen at a particular time I have to be clear. If I say in five minutes, then at exactly five minutes and one second someone will point out that I am late.

It can be infuriating and it can drive me crazy, but maybe that says more about my inability to stick to a particular time, than it does about my students. I have to take a moment and realise that my students are not doing it to be annoying, they are not trying to look smart and they are not trying to make me look bad. They are doing it because to them it matters. I said five minutes so I should take five minutes. I should say what I mean and stick to it.

So next time a ‘we’ll do it in five minutes’ is about to roll off your tongue, take a moment and think. Do I really mean five minutes? Or do I mean when I’ve finished what I’m doing? And if it’s the latter, say that. Say what you mean, and do it; to someone in your room that accuracy may just matter. And that’s about as easy as differentiation can get…

Inclusion or Exclusion?

With the latest news that exclusions are on the rise, we must consider the very real impact that exclusion has on students with autism. The figures from ambitious about autism suggest that in the last twelve months alone 40% of students with autism have experienced a period of exclusion from school. Government statistics show that overall students with SEN are six times more likely to be excluded than those with no special needs. These are frightening figures. I genuinely believe that the staff involved with those students have tried their best. But what we need to ask ourselves is is our best good enough?

Teachers receive very little training in dealing with students with SEN, and even less in identifying those students. In fact a recent article in ‘Young Minds’ reveals that over 20% of those diagnosed with autism are not diagnosed until after their 11^th birthday. Of those who are diagnosed many do not meet the threshold for an ECHP. The reality is that until a child fails they do not qualify for support. We (the teaching profession) are not allowed to be pre-emptive.

Over my teaching career, in both EBD and ASD specific settings I have been staggered by the number of students who arrive with me at 11 unable to read and write. Not because these students are unable to learn but because they have been unable to access the specialist support they need until they hit crisis point. It isn’t rocket science to realise that a student who hits puberty unable to do their work is more likely to act out than admit they can’t read. And yet, until they do act out, until they lose control again and again and a school feels they cannot cope they do not receive the help they need. The threshold for a CAMHs referral is increasingly high, waiting lists are increasingly long, social services will not offer families help (even when they ask for it) unless a child is at risk, and we are operating in an education system that values facts and figures over the needs of individuals.

So yes these teachers are doing their best, by the time they exclude I am in no doubt that they feel it is the only choice open to them. But are we as a society doing our best for the most vulnerable members of that society?

There needs to be change. There needs to be a shift. Support needs to be put in earlier before these students hit crisis point. All teachers need compulsory training in identifying and working with students with SEN. I believe in inclusion. The principles of it are everything I stand for. But in order for it to work, we cannot simply put students into mainstream schools and cross our fingers. We cannot have a system where our most vulnerable students continue to be taught primarily by LSAs. We cannot have a system where schools are forced to exclude because it is the only way of getting help for pupils.

So there you have it, my rant. Tomorrow I will return to the business at hand, tomorrow I will focus on differentiation, I will focus on the small ways I can make a difference to the lives of both my students and my daughter. But today I am angry; angry at a system not built to meet the needs of our children, angry at a society that allows it to be that way, angry at myself for not being able to make more of a difference.

The Devil Is In The Detail

Today started off with a sense of tranquillity. We had planned a day in. The new story building Lego was out and it was a chance to play. The Special Interest; currently all things ‘Harry Potter’ came into play. Given freedom, in my house all routes usually lead there. It was decided the world of Harry would be recreated…

Silence reigned. All was peaceful. Until… Meltdown. The only long Lego hair available was ‘girl hair’ and there was no way Hagrid could have girl hair. That would be unforgivable!

Both at home and at school, it is those tiny details, the things I haven’t thought of that derail things. The things that I haven’t given a thought to, because in my head they aren’t important are often the very things that to my students and my daughter are critically important to the success of whatever it is that we are doing. It’s why the lessons that I expect to be challenging often aren’t (because I’ve covered, double covered and triple covered all of my bases) whereas those I think will go swimmingly often end in disaster.

Unless I become psychic (and therefore can pre-empt these disasters before they happen), there has to be another plan (because these events are and will continue to be a part of my daily existence). Today we were saved by a book delivery through the post. Just as quickly as the disaster began, it ended. And this is so often the case.

Had I tackled the problem head on, and said of course Hagrid could have had girl hair, I would have exacerbated things further. Because whilst in my head that is the obvious solution, it is a battle I can’t win, I can’t win it because I simply don’t understand why it is so important in the eyes of my daughter. Distraction therefore, as is so often the case is my best course of action. It is my excuse for why I am so good at talking ‘random rubbish.’

In fact, I would go so far as to argue, that the art of distraction, the ability to intersect a conversation and take it in a random direction until the moment of potential crisis has passed, is one of the most crucial differentiation skills needed when working with students with high anxiety levels.

Once the moment has passed, the anxiety has dissipated; the original activity can more often than not be returned to and enjoyed. In the dining room here, mission build Harry’s world has once again resumed (I haven’t enquired as to the solution of Hagrid’s hair though I may risk a sneaky look later), just as I know that after a brief distraction my students will return to their work.

So next time a student has a moment that seems irrational to you, let it go, talk about something else for a few minutes. You might just be surprised at the results…

Change The Objective

Differentiation isn’t always about creating lots of different activities or worksheets. It can be, and in an ideal world in my classroom at least, I love it when circumstances allow for that. But the reality is that sometimes that can’t happen, and sometimes it doesn’t need to happen. In fact sometimes, it’s best if everyone does the same piece of work.

Most of my students find extended writing challenging, so much so that many come to me not being able or willing to even try them. So when I plan extended writing activities, I like it to be an all singing, all dancing kind of affair. I like to act things out, show films, read books, get out the Lego, make potions, or even throw Baby Corn in the air. And, yes as those of you who have been reading for a while will know – sometimes I even like to break the rules by standing on a chair on a table!

These kind of lessons, the ones with the real ‘wow’ factor, work best if the whole class is engaged in the same kind of activity. Apart from anything else, the craziness I embark upon to get everyone interested and engaged with what we’re going to write about, would make it far too distracting for anyone to concentrate on doing anything else!

So in these lessons, I have to think about differentiation in a different way. I have to think about outcomes rather than input. OK, so I want all of my students to produce an extended piece of writing, but what do I really want individuals to focus on? What do I want them to learn?

For me these learning outcomes are usually something different for everyone, but in a larger class it may be that groups of students have the same objective. For one of my students it might be, ‘I really want you to focus on using full stops and capital letters’, for another it may be ‘I want you to challenge yourself and see how many different connectives you can include’ and for another it may be content based ‘I want you to really think how you could create a surprise for your reader within the story.’

So whilst my class are all essentially writing the same piece, which allows me to make sure my input has been as engaging as possible, their individual focus is different. What they are working on and learning is personalised. The key to the success of it; is to find a way that works for you, of letting your students know what you want them to focus on; what you want them to learn. I use post-it notes, but you could stickers or even large pieces of paper in the middle of tables in larger classes.

This is really easy differentiation, but it’s differentiation that will make a difference. It will make a difference to how well your students learn but even more importantly it will make a difference to how they feel about themselves as learners. These small steps and an individual focus will make them realise that they can achieve. Go on, give it a go, personalise your objectives! What have you got to lose?