The discussion today was prompted by a listener question about students being late to lessons, so Matt and Femi each give their take on that. They discuss what they think the relevant psychology is and how they each handle this situation. They talk about whole-school policies and dealing with a culture of lateness as middle and senior leaders – and different ways that schools approach the starts and ends of lessons, as well as transitions. Femi and Matt also muse on some of the interesting situa...
Apr 14, 2024•39 min•Ep 54•Transcript available on Metacast The topic of today’s discussion is Matt's visit to Ark Soane Academy, and in particular the impressive whole-school culture and the remarkable impact of that on student behaviours, attitudes and learning. Femi and Matt talk about the best science lesson Matt has ever seen, and wider discussion about starting and running schools and embedding shared routines across the school. As always, all questions or comments welcome: @beyondgoodpod on X.
Mar 31, 2024•55 min•Ep 53•Transcript available on Metacast The topic of discussion this week is warning systems – so very much a behaviour-based episode rather than a maths one. Matt and Femi cover a fair bit of ground: from classrooms with names written on the board and hundreds of warnings being issued each day through to classrooms with no warnings and students absorbed in their work. And from supporting colleagues with behaviour issues through to the prospect of creating a school-wide culture around behaviour that leaves deleterious learning behavio...
Mar 24, 2024•43 min•Ep 52•Transcript available on Metacast This week Femi and Matt debate the pros and cons of homework - a particularly slippery beast to nail down. They get into some general principles and challenges of setting good homework, and what they have tried and each do now, among other things. By all means let us know if you think you have this one cracked: @beyondgoodpod on X.
Mar 10, 2024•41 min•Ep 51•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode Femi and Matt talk about modelling - in all it’s various forms from leading on behaviour through to explicit teaching strategies. In particular they discuss pre-made teacher models and explanations vs modelling live, in real time, and explore some really interesting nooks and crannies of that facet. X: @BeyondGoodPod
Mar 03, 2024•53 min•Ep 50•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode Femi and Matt discuss setting, the term ‘bottom set’, attitudes towards, and working with students who have low prior attainment. As you’ll hear both advocates of ensuring that those students get the highest possible quality education, that we meet them where they are, and that we work hard, carefully and mindfully as a community to ensure that we divorce that honest recognition of differing starting points from any judgements of value or personal worth. Contact us @BeyondGoodPod...
Feb 25, 2024•48 min•Ep 49•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode Matt and Femi talk about Adam Boxer’s Book: How to Teach Secondary Science. In particular, they discuss Adam’s concept of ‘Directions of travel’, which provides a nice framework for characterising the way that we move through explanations. Both feel that many teachers could spend more time thinking about and planning explanations than they tend to, so Adam's conceptualisation is useful because it enables us to expand our vocabulary and add nuance to our discussions and refle...
Feb 17, 2024•50 min•Ep 48•Transcript available on Metacast Today’s topic is Year 11 mock examinations. Matt and Femi discuss: - Holding 2 or 3 sets of mocks vs just 1. - That mocks should not be the main means by which we discover what students can and cannot do. - Conditions for students to learn and improve on knowledge gaps exposed by tests, the implications for ‘going through’ the test in lessons, and why that is rarely effective - Best practice for giving feedback from mocks, and some examples of poor practice. - Issues with question level analysis...
Jan 21, 2024•44 min•Ep 47•Transcript available on Metacast Femi and Matt speak to Dave Taylor on the topic of the maths curriculum. Dave is a maths specialist and lead practioner, well known in maths circles for his ‘increasingly difficult questions’ and ‘backward faded maths’. Dave has thought long and hard about curriculum issues such as sequencing and mastery, and has experience of creating maths curricula, so the trio go deep on the considerations, nuances and complexities of developing and implementing an effective maths curriculum. Topics covered ...
Jan 14, 2024•1 hr•Ep 46•Transcript available on Metacast Today’s discussion is prompted by the Bill Rogers interview that recently appeared in the TES titled: ‘Bill Rogers: Where we are going wrong on behaviour’. Matt and Femi discuss: - The problem of COVID and re-victimising students - Teacher’s being inclined to appease students rather than lead on behaviour. - If you’re not in control it’s not a safe environment - Relationships and how to respond and relate to students - How do things change when you know the causative pathology for the a student’...
Jan 07, 2024•47 min•Ep 44•Transcript available on Metacast ‘Passive passengers!’ - students who are not especially engaged in lessons. Matt and Femi discuss some of the indicators and consequences of passive behaviours, how we might think about that as teachers in terms of tackling it vs accepting it, some causes of passivity, and how we might tackle it.
Dec 10, 2023•46 min•Ep 43•Transcript available on Metacast Today's guest is American Educator, Coach and Podcast host Dr Zach Groshell for a fascinating discussion about his work in US government funded schools and his drive for an increasingly evidence-based pedagogy. Matt and Femi talk to Zach about his role as an instructional coach, more and less directive coaching methodologies, the configuration of coaching within US public schools, characteristics of more effective teachers, implementing whole-school changes, high expectations, and structura...
Nov 19, 2023•59 min•Ep 43•Transcript available on Metacast Today’s episode is prompted by a recent post on X which posed the following question: “What do you do with your mathematics teachers while you do your whole school professional learning on literacy, reading or writing?” Femi and Matt discuss the two main failure modes for students on ‘worded’ maths questions – noting that the more common and critical failure mode is one that won’t be addressed in a whole-school context. They talk about the rarely considered element of ‘opportunity cost’, optimum...
Nov 12, 2023•1 hr 12 min•Ep 42•Transcript available on Metacast In today’s episode, Femi and Matt discuss differentiation! They talk about adaptive learning, differentiation as an advanced teaching skill that relies on solid foundations of strong learning behaviour and pedagogical subject knowledge and the botheredness to actually go and do it (especially when classes are compliant.) They talk about prioritising differentiating to support weaker students first, priority learners, and really knowing who needs your help. The amount of one to one interactions i...
Nov 05, 2023•51 min•Ep 41•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode Matt and Femi discuss culture - particularly from the perspective of heads of department trying to shape the culture of teaching staff in their corner of the school. This one is not maths-specific – the discussion is relevent to colleagues from any subject area or team. They consider the fact that culture exists – whether you actively seek to shape it, or not, the characteristics of good culture, shaping and maintaining culture, so called toxic environments: and how incongruence,...
Oct 29, 2023•51 min•Ep 40•Transcript available on Metacast Today Femi and Matt are speaking about lesson observations and related activities such as lesson visits, coaching and feedback. They talk about being clear on why the observation is happening; good and less good reasons for doing lesson observations and some of the issues around lesson observations as part of the performance management process. On lesson visits i.e. ‘walking the shop floor’, they discuss culture, feedback and follow up and then get into coaching observations and feedback: 3 comm...
Oct 01, 2023•1 hr 6 min•Ep 39•Transcript available on Metacast Today's episode is about mistakes, disappointment and failure – with the discussion ranging from 'recognising that my last lesson didn’t go as well as I wanted', through to acknowledging and responding to under-performance at the level of the whole school. Matt and Femi discuss the importance of recognising and admitting when things aren’t good enough and taking responsibility for the outcomes, how to identify when outcomes haven’t been good enough, and also reflecting on when and...
Sep 17, 2023•43 min•Ep 38•Transcript available on Metacast Today’s episode is about 'hit and run' CPD, which Femi and Matt approach with an attitude of constructive criticism and attempting to offer a vision of positive alternatives. 'Hit and run' CPD is really just any so called ‘training’ which is a singular, stand-alone event, with no follow up. All too often these sessions will involve all staff in the hall, with no attempt to evaluate prior knowledge, and no differentiation for the widely varying contexts and levels of expertise...
Sep 10, 2023•50 min•Ep 37•Transcript available on Metacast Today's episode starts with Matt and Femi chatting about Femi’s observations of coaches at his 6 year old's summer tennis camp, which turns out to be a fascinating lens through which to discuss the characteristics of great teachers as it is all about the ‘how’ of what is being done, and not the ‘what’ – which is so often the focus of discussions in teaching. They discuss the critical importance of enthusiasm and passion; Steven Kotler’s model of motivation for flow; the ability to diff...
Sep 03, 2023•1 hr 2 min•Ep 36•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode of the podcast Femi and Matt share their thoughts on four different topics selected from X (formerly twitter): 'textbooks', 'locking the toilets', 'group work' and 'moving schools'. They discuss what the ideal textbook looks like, mixed revision, and workbooks. The pros and cons of locking the toilets during lesson time, mobile phones, and managing students asking to go to the toilet during your lessons. Group work, independent practise, co...
Aug 27, 2023•44 min•Ep 35•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode Femi and Matt discuss Line management! The duo get into what good practise might look like; things line managers should do and should avoid, regularity of meetings, line management as a partnership – so a collaborative process, and approaching line management outside of your specialism with genuine humility and curiosity. They discuss the importance of looking at material in advance of the meeting (when applicable), minimising admin, getting to know the subject and department tha...
Aug 20, 2023•52 min•Ep 34•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode of the podcast Femi and Matt discuss the ideas of Mastery and 'Conceptual Understanding' in teaching and learning. The conversation covers: - Mastery - Layers of understanding - A pragmatic definition of understanding - Common issues in the classroom - ‘rich’ activities vs repetition - Chunking and isolating skills - aha moments - Knowledge is power - Mastery takes time - Traps for enthusiastic teachers - Split classes - Extending top end students in the classroom - The...
Jul 30, 2023•46 min•Ep 33•Transcript available on Metacast Welcome to this bonus episode of the Beyond Good podcast! The idea here was just to offer a little insight into what goes on behind the scenes at Beyond Good HQ in a very casual chat between Matt and Femi. They share reflections on how the podcast has evolved, a few thoughts on Edutwitter, discuss Matt's view that we don’t need any more 'maps of the territory'; and talk about teacher training, school visits and podcast guests. Nothing too deep here, we just want to say a big thank...
Jul 26, 2023•27 min•Ep 32•Transcript available on Metacast In today’s podcast Femi and Matt discuss Wellbeing. After making the important distinction between wellbeing and workload they discuss - Attitudes to work - Being present – finding engagement with the task at hand - Meditation - Spiritual practice and gratitude - The effects of being asked to do meaningless or supercilious work - Socialising and social factors - Sport and the importance of physical activity - Truly meaningful relationships with colleagues and students: - Community and comradery ...
Jul 23, 2023•1 hr 3 min•Ep 31•Transcript available on Metacast In today’s podcast Matt and Femi discuss two main topics which are 'setting', and 'de-escalation'. In both cases the points raised should be of interest to colleagues from all subjects. In the long-overdue chat on setting the duo touch on streaming vs mixed attainment; some reasons why different approaches might be more or less suited to different contexts; Why year 7 is not ‘the start’; sink groups; setting by ability not behaviour; tackling attitudes and historic mindsets a...
Jul 09, 2023•57 min•Ep 30•Transcript available on Metacast In today’s podcast Femi and Matt dissect the recently published findings of the DFE national behaviour survey. This is another conversation which is not at all subject-specific and should be of interest to all colleagues. In this episode the duo discuss the challenges with collecting and reporting the data; the student perspective; the gap between what leaders are saying and what teachers and students are saying; walking the shop floor; wilful blindness and false praise; the importance of accept...
Jun 25, 2023•57 min•Ep 29•Transcript available on Metacast Today Femi and Matt discuss teacher effectiveness vs years of service and some issues with the word ‘ experience’ which is generally used as a proxy for competence . As is increasingly the case the discussion is pertinent to all subjects and is not by any means maths-specific. There’s a lot of thinking out loud here and, unusually(!), the boys actually managed to land some insight and conclusions that both found helpful. The conversation covers: - The will-skill matrix - Possible reasons why som...
Jun 11, 2023•59 min•Ep 28•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode Matt and Femi dig into the dilemma that is ‘homework’! Reflecting on their experiences over the years they ask; how effective is it (academically)?, weigh the costs and benefits, and highlight the demands on teachers. They discuss the different approaches to homework they have tried over the years, the problems each approach threw up and the strategies used to overcome them. They talk about the social pressures at play for students, setting homework for the benefit of parents, Ma...
Jun 04, 2023•48 min•Ep 27•Transcript available on Metacast Today Femi and Matt discuss their approaches to handling complaints. None of this is specific to maths and so the conversation should be relevent for colleagues from a wide range of backgrounds. The pair talk about - Receiving complaints well - Prioritising responding to parents and acting promptly - The importance for people of simply being heard - The pros and cons of different approaches to investigating complaints about a colleague. - Avoiding big surprises by knowing what is going on in you...
May 21, 2023•52 min•Ep 26•Transcript available on Metacast Today Femi and Matt discuss an article by Dylan Wiliam titled ‘Teacher Quality: why it matters, and how to get more of it’. In addition to this central theme the pair touch on the failures of policy initiatives to raise standards, teacher learning communities, considerations of the alignment of personal professional development with the school priorities, the learning cycle of teacher improvement, the common failings of school leaders to be strategic and to prioritise effectively, and the forces...
May 14, 2023•44 min•Ep 25•Transcript available on Metacast 
