Putting this learning support mantra into practice is the best way to meet an increasing range of post-covid needs, according to Krystle Flack, Head of Learning Support at Cranleigh School.
Through their friendship and shared love of music Dr. Winston Wuttunee and Jordan Laidlaw feel that they have been able to contribute to the process of reconciliation in Canada.
Wherever your school is with the issue of equity, this well-informed, down-to-earth conversation between Nunana Nyomi and Clare Ives, two of the most experienced educators responsible for establishing a culture of equity in a school, is a must-listen.
Holly B.F. Warren reflects on how teachers and parents can collaborate to explore and celebrate the role of imagination in schools.
Matthew Savage considers the importance of symbols and flags for young people as they develop their own sense of belonging and identity in their school.
Katherine Beith Director of Studies at Alleyn’s Junior School considers the reading journey the school has recently experienced. According to Year 4, things are on the right track!
Gavin English, Deputy Head Pastoral at Alleyn’s School in London, considers whether the pursuit of ‘greatness’ is overrated.Could good be better?
Clare Brokenshire reminds us that frequent examples of good pastoral practice within a positive school culture can make a big difference to a student’s day.
Thomas Kelley and Kathy Marshall propose that if we are to address the issue of poor wellbeing and mental stress in our schools, we must grasp a sufficient understanding of the way every person’s psychological life is created from the “inside-out”.
Despite the huge benefits of an international education, we know there can be a downside for ‘third culture kids’. Tanya Crossman looks at awareness and risk mitigation in schools.
Can the social and emotional state of our students be tracked to enable early intervention? Jonathan Taylor and Simon Antwis think so.
Matthew Savage looks at why students in international schools might choose to mask their real self and the consequences for student wellbeing.
Do you suffer from risk assessment anxiety? According to David Gregory, you are not alone but you can master your fears!
Eva Coddington of Sevenoaks School presents the case for the active practice of Yoga in schools as time very well spent.
Lorna Conroy describes how Bangkok Patana school has developed a two-track approach to monitor and support secondary student wellbeing.
It seems we are now constantly dealing with the effects of local and global uncertainty. Milena Prodanić Tišma describes how one school in Zagreb helped children to cope after two earthquakes during lockdown.
For Nicholas Chaddock, just talking about wellbeing in the classroom achieves little. Doing rather than talking is the key.
According to Jim Knight, Rt Hon Lord Knight of Weymouth, dealing with Covid has come at a cost, but significant ways to improve teacher wellbeing are also at hand this side of the pandemic.
The wait has been a long one, but their needs are not the same. Simon Dunford looks at the gaps in social learning that needs to be closed in different ways on returning to learning on-campus.
Safeguarding is a high priority in any good school, but Huma Shah wonders if we are doing enough to protect children’s data when using well-known online learning resources.
Do failure and trauma really toughen you up? Not without a process of healing, argues social psycholgist Dr. Helen Street.
A recent study by the OECD strikingly confirms the importance of holistic education. Andreas Schleicher looks at the outcomes of their 2018-20 global Survey of Social and Emotional Skills.
Do ‘inclusive’ leadership styles in teachers motivate students? A study by Paul Parham and Gloria Moss at Sevenoaks School suggests there is a significant correlation.
Charley Openshaw, IB teacher and Head of Art at Sevenoaks School recommends the virtues of careful observation and drawing as useful techniques for wider learning.
Claire Sewell looks at a new Post Graduate diploma course for 2021 which will help schools – including international schools – become more self-reliant in making a range of positive interventions.
Careers and Universities Counsellor, Paul Yap, looks at how graduating students can ‘win the wait’ imposed on them as they plan for the future during lockdown.
Set up to provide a great education in self-supporting schools, HUGS is a model for the development of low-cost, sustainable learning, as Dr. Richard Bircher reports.
Covid has brought home the value of getting outside. Nicholas Chaddock looks at why reevaluating the importance of outdoor education is so important for all of us in 2021.
Far from being marginalised, sport moved centre stage at this UK day and boarding school during a difficult year, as Ed Buck, Director of Sport reports.
As a result of frequent relocations and long periods of family separation, the children of military personnel need empathetic support in school, writes Louise Fetigan.
Whatever you teach, argues Richard Evans, helping students know themselves is equally important. Acquiring emotional literacy transforms lives – yours and theirs.
Feature Image: Courtesy of Brian D’Cruz Hypno Plus https://www.briandcruzhypnoplus.com/
Holly Warren describes Think Tank, an innovative studio environment in which children learn to synthesise their learning experiences as new design and art pieces.
The Think Tank (Warren, 2015) is an immersive, interactive studio setting (atelier) designed by students and an atelierista (art studio teacher) to celebrate, stimulate, enhance, and develop creative thinking patterns that connect children with a range of other experiences, both inside and outside a school. The concept was initially inspired by the educational approaches of pedagogues Loris Malaguzzi, Maria Montessori, Rudolf Steiner and Kieran Egan, which allow a child to express ideas, interests, concepts and theories by creating visual narratives without restriction. This approach sets the ground for exploratory adventures that will tell the story of a child’s research and findings and has evolved into what the children have described as “the place where your ideas come true.”
The Think Tank never requests, it proposes, shares, presents, and inspires its community to create art pieces that are expressive of their own experience. A constant inter-action with the students’ environment allows an ongoing dialogue of the parts. Think Tank therefore embraces and celebrates the different environments in which the students work, whether at home or at school.
Designing and making activities in Think Tank draw on materials which are readily available and are sourced locally either at school or at home. Recycled, repurposed and natural materials are valued, while the language, movement, and sounds that are part of the materials are used to enhance, document, and create narratives.
Think Tank is also a research hub for children’s ideas, concepts, and interests. As a child-centred learning setting it documents the ever-changing processes and themes the children spontaneously engage in.
During Think Tank sessions, the mentor meets small groups of 6 to 8 children in a Pow Wow format to share ideas and thoughts. These can be experiences, recollections of past explorations or new proposals. If needed, a quiet moment of recollection/thinking is proposed as a way of linking with the students’ self. Then the group creates a dialogue and decides how to proceed. This is the three-step process of visible thinking that accompanies the experiences.
The environment is set up with a selection of materials that the Think Tank mentor proposes in different areas of the room. These could be glass bead on the light table, a video installation with sounds and an area for exploration with light such as light pebbles and fairy lights.
Having welcomed each other, participants start a conversation about a continuing project or make an initial exploration of something new. Beads can turn into spaghetti in a make-believe restaurant, the video installation might become a walk in the woods or the lights may turn into a fire requiring firefighters to design a new generation hose.
Recently, due to the requirements linked to the pandemic the students have been given working and exploration areas that are not shared with other classes but are still trampolines of inspiration.
The Think Tank is its own setting, created with the children’s input. It is dynamic and changes according to the moment, the situation and the projects involved. This requires a space that can morph and adapt easily, but its salient characteristic is the mental space needed to create it.
However, there are strong links to what children are learning elsewhere, and which they bring to the studio quite naturally. Think Tank enables them to talk about these ideas and skills in a new context, which is invaluable. Surface learning becomes embedded into deep learning as the children make connections that are meaningful to the projects. Think Tank discussions therefore involve personal know-how and knowledge acquired in class from all areas of learning. Literacy, numeracy, knowledge and understanding of the world, social and emotional skills and predispositions, fine and gross motor skills, creative thinking and problem solving meet in the Think Tank, demonstrating the uniqueness of each student that becomes a vital element in the creation of projects that celebrate multi-perspectives:
“Nothing of me is original, I am the combined effort of everyone I’ve known.” (Palahniuk, 1999)
Think Tank therefore celebrates and brings together the school as a learning community. Parents become partners in exhibitions and performance art pieces when everyone adds to the outcome. During the lockdown parents themselves became Think Tank mentors themselves by stepping inside the experiences and working with the children to produce family pieces in a process of incredible educational value.
The richness of the Think Tank experience is best expressed in the words of the children themselves, as in the poem spontaneously presented by a seven year old participant to her parents as a gift:
The Think Tank is full of ideas,
If you listen with your ears, just peer through here,
And maybe you will see a pear,
You will see oysters and monsters.
But don’t worry you don’t need to say sorry.
Now watch this film (Ripples) and you will be surprised
With what your child has learnt.
Holly Warren is an atelierista, or art studio teacher, working in an international school in Italy. She is the creator of Think Tank – a new project environment that links the creative process of art with Montessori, Steiner and Reggio Emilia educational methodologies.
To learn more about her ideas see:
Images kindly provided by Holly
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