uked magazine jul 2016
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ukedchat.com/magazine July 2016 Issue 31
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OlympicIdeas
Putting Our Best Foot
Forward With
Active Learning
4
Infant to Junior
TransitionMaverick
Pupils
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4 Infant to Junior TransitionRoy Souter explores a range of issues and ideas to keep the transition from infant and junior school as stress free for everyone as possible.
ContributorsRoy Souter @Exe_HeadAaliya Khan @Miss_Khan868Sarah Bedwell @FlyMyGeekFlagMichelle JohnstonBukky Yusuf @rondelle10_b@naeemullahswatNicole Brown @ncjbrownLiam Murphy @ThisIsLiamM @PrimaryIdeasIan Eagleton @ieconsultancyJulie Hunter @MsHMFL@MsGlynn2014Paul Kesselring @kesselpa@ArtyTeach79Nina Williams @MissNina1983Andrew Byrne @musingsofmrb@JSchwartz100
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From the EditorSome people live for it. Others loath it. It has the power
to inspire millions of people and can put fear in the hearts of those who feel they cannot participate. It unifies us and divides us. It is, of course, sport.
With the Olympics in Rio starting soon, schools across the UK and around the world will celebrate ‘the greatest show on Earth’ with their own sporting triumphs, their own traditions, and national stereotype filled opening ceremonies which should make the inclusion coordinator blush... but it’s all part of the fun.
In this edition of UKEd Magazine we share ideas to get your class moving, to celebrate sport and the Olympics across the curriculum, and a few ideas about how to engage your reluctant sports people.
So lace up your trainers and let’s get going!Martin Burrett @ICTmagic- Editor
5 Finding the Right QuestionsMartin Burrett shares a great primary resource with questions and more for English, maths and science lessons.
6 Maverick PupilsAaliya Khan discusses how to identify maverick pupils and argues that these pupils should be encouraged and nurtured.
10 The changing face of P.E. in schoolsMichelle Johnston argues that the theory driven direction of the PE curriculum is wrong and needs to change.
Issue 31: July 2016
8 Olympic IdeasSarah Bedwell shares a range of Olympic ideas from her own subject of English, as well as many other cross-curricular activities.
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25 UKEd Resource Great Expectations Knowledge Organiser
16 Courageous Leadership and Rock ClimbingBukky Yusuf explores the leadership lessons she has learnt and takes us with her on a journey to become a courageous leader.
24 Assessing Without Levels: 12 Months OnAndrew Byrne describes his school’s journey to assess after the abolition of levels in England with lessons for all of us.
15 ICTmagic Edtech Resources
19 Bookshelf Doing research in education – Theory and practiceReview written by Nicole Brown
20 Base RoundersRounders is a much loved game, but Liam Murphy explains a unique take on this classic summer time pursuit.
12 User’s guide to the UKEdChat App
23 Active TechMartin Burrett discusses ways in which technology can improve learning opportunities in PE keeping pupils motivated and engaged.
By Roy Souter
Infant to Junior Transition
04 UKED Magazine
Roy Souter has been a headteacher in Devon since 1996, and in his current school since 2000. He has supported other schools as a LLE and new head teacher mentor. Find him on Twitter @Exe_Head.
I work in a three form entry Junior School. We work really hard to make the transition from our partner infant school a positive and enjoyable process for families and children, and have refined our practice over the years to design an approach that we get very positive feedback about. A group of staff from across both schools came up with our Transition Plan – this is what we do and the order we do things in:
We keep everyone informed about what is happening, including all the key dates. We have a calendar of transition activities that is shared with the staff of both schools as early in the year as possible. The dates are put into the school diary and don’t change – all the other things that happen in a busy school are planned around them. The dates are shared repeatedly with parents and carers so that they know what to expect.
We make transition booklets for targeted children. These include pictures and information about the school and key people. They are made with the children, who often make repeated visits to take photos, meet staff and become familiar with the setting.
Our SENCo meets the parents and carers of SEN children to discuss how we will make the transition process work for them.
Face to face handovers. We allocate two staff meetings for teachers to spend time talking to the teacher of their new class – one to listen and one to tell. This happens across the whole school, and includes sharing any information about EAL and low level safeguarding issues.
Our Year 3 teachers spend a morning in the Year 2 classes observing the provision for SEN children, and to meet with all relevant staff.
Year 2 children have an afternoon orientation visit. They come up to the Junior School to learn where everything is and what the routines are. At the same time the Year 3 children return to the Infant School for Memory Lane visit. They make a ‘Welcome to the Junior School’ booklet to leave for the Y2 children to read when they return to their class.
Sampling Day. All children spend the whole day in their new class. We have a shared assembly with all the children from both schools (quite an experience) where we sing our Federation Song. The children spend a playtime together, and then the Infant School children go back down the hill. We then carry out the same shared activities during the day:
Share the timetable for the day
Share a video that the current class have made to introduce the children to their new year group
Share pen portraits of all adults that work in the class and year group
Complete English and maths focussed activities that link to the curriculum for the new year group
Have a circle time to share aspirations and to allow the teacher to et to know the children
Following this plan has made sure the children, staff and families are all ready for the new school year.
Image credits: flickr.com/photos/wildreturn/9438023791 by Andy Reago & Chrissy McClarren used under Commercial Creative Commons 2.0 License.
TitleAs a primary school teacher, I know that finding the right questions is just as
important as discovering the right answers. A question has the power to unlock a child’s understanding, create awe and wonder, and help someone push into new and uncharted knowledge and thinking.
Yet finding suitable and relevant written questions from treasured, yet outdated SATs papers, tired and yellowing textbooks or barely readable repeatedly photocopied black pages of smudges is not ideal and can create problems for teachers and barriers to learning for pupils.
Now Rising Stars has produced an online bank of cross-curricular questions for the whole school to use in lessons and beyond. With a growing collection of over 5,200 questions for every aspect of grammar, punctuation, spelling, maths and science, plus ready-made test, there is something for everyone. The questions are designed not just for Year 6 as they brush up on their exam technique. There are questions for Years 1 to 6, each easily searchable by suggested age group, topic and keywords. You can even search by the widely used Rising Stars Progression Framework statements.
In my own class, I have been using the questions as starters to my lessons by displaying a main question on the class whiteboard, while setting up some extension questions at ‘stations’ around the class on tablets or printed out from the bank. This has been a wonderful way to push forward my most able children as semi-independent learners while I give additional support to those who need it. The questions are designed so they appear large on the screen, meaning that they are easy to annotate using my whiteboard software.
Building and sharing more substantial tests and quizzes is easy. Simply search for your desired questions, preview them and then add them by clicking the plus button. You can choose to organise and reorder the questions. One great feature is that similar questions automatically merge together to reduce the amount of explanation text the children have to read and to use less space. Once completed, just press ‘Save and Share’ to name the document and then choose how to share it. You can download your question booklet as a PDF or Word document and customise the cover to add or remove your school logo, a place for the child’s name, and more. You can share the booklet with your colleagues in the digital storage bank, or share the document with anyone using a web link, complete with a custom countdown timer.
Each question shows the number of marks available and a Progression Framework Statement describing where the question fits into the curriculum. You can also access the mark scheme below each of the questions, but hidden from view as a drop-down section to keep answers secret, yet close at hand. This is ideal if you are sharing questions with independent learners, support staff or parents who may be unsure of the correct answer.
Using Rising Stars Assessment Bank has made testing so much easier for me, and made our class ‘quizzes’ more engaging and accessible for pupils and for those who support them.
Finding the Right Questionsby Martin Burrett
Mathematics SPaG Science
Search, select and save from over
5,200 questions.
Search
Rising Stars is currently offering a free 30-day trial via
risingstars-uk.com/bank
+Questions for a range of Primary Curriculum subjects.
+Easy to display on a class whiteboard.
+Add questions to a test at the click of a button.
+Create tests as PDFs or Word documents to save locally on your device and print.
+Share created tests with the rest of the school centrally.
+Share tests via a web link for homework.
+Easy access to the mark scheme for independent learners and homework.
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When I say Maverick, I’m not talking about Tom Cruise’s character in Top Gun, although elements of that personality will be evident in what I will go on to discuss. I’ve heard a lot recently about maverick teachers being ones that innovate and don’t follow the same traditions as the “average teacher”, (although I believe there’s no such thing as an average teacher). Well, what about the maverick student? If Ofsted’s chief Sir Michael Wilshaw is saying we need more maverick teachers to breathe life into the education system, why are we so afraid of those pupils who embody that? These are the ones who drive you crazy at times. Their unorthodox ways can often result in them being sanctioned or labelled as “challenging” or “disobedient”. I’m challenging teachers to pay more attention to those types of pupils. I’m not talking about the “naughty” attention-seeking ones who just do something silly for a laugh or who can’t be bothered to complete class or homework. I’m talking about the ones who challenge the norm, come up with ideas that may not necessarily be what you want or expect, but are, nonetheless, smart... clever...entertaining, outside the box thinkers.
How to spot and deal with Mavericks
Maverick pupils are a bit more difficult to spot than maverick teachers; there are a whole mix of personalities in any one class. How do you distinguish between the maverick pupil and the disobedient one?
Let me give you an example; a pupil in a class about acids and alkalis takes out
some bottled water to test against tap water or takes out some of their lunch. Normally that would be frowned upon; health and safety, but look at what they’re doing.
They’ve taken what you’ve told them and extended
it. Testing something else and contrasting, working further up Bloom’s thinking. Another example would be in electricity, the pupil who doesn’t make that 2-bulb parallel circuit, but instead constructs a huge and complicated circuit that still, by some miracle, works. They may not be able to explain it yet but give them some time and maybe they will; or the pupil who, instead of making a poster about Hooke’s law, has actually made a video presentation and wants to present it. That’s a Maverick; unorthodox, unafraid to challenge the work they’ve been given and extend it, or
change elements of it. They may even change the outcomes of the task. This is in contrast to pupils who aren’t learning or engaging with the content in any meaningful way.
We as teachers shouldn’t be afraid of maverick students. To me, they
show higher level thinking and may even be gifted and talented. It shows a passion for a subject. Don’t get me wrong, the pupils who do everything by the book, can produce some amazing work and make excellent progress. I’m not knocking them, as they’re brilliant! I just think there is scope to look at pupils who are a bit unorthodox, not view them as trouble makers, but encourage and nurture their talents within the boundaries of your time and lesson.
Engage with such pupils, ask them to explain, use Socratic questioning techniques to probe out their thinking behind what they’ve done. Ask them to question themselves! Foster an atmosphere of engagement and those ‘Eureka’ moments by letting them have a bit more freedom to explore those thought processes themselves.
06 UKED Magazine
by Aaliya Khan
Maverick Pupils
06 UKED Magazine
Aaliya Khan is a science teacher at St Anne’s Catholic School for Girls, after graduating from Imperial College London, she embarked into a teaching career. She loves bringing fresh ideas into the classroom and has presented at #TMEnfield. @Miss_Khan868 follow on Twitter and read her blog at staffrm.io/@misskhan.
Final thoughts
We as teachers can be cuckolded into thinking all our students must be silently learning and engaged all the time, when all we need to do is look at a an end of day staff meeting or inset day and watch us transform into children. It’s natural human behaviour to want to talk and interact, test boundaries and explore things we’re curious about. I don’t believe in silent learning for a whole lesson (parts of it, yes, but not a whole lesson). We need to move away from the fear, discipline and
classroom management is easier when pupils know what they’re doing and feel comfortable. We also need to feel comfortable enough to let them breathe a little more than perhaps we
do sometimes. Test our boundaries too, if something doesn’t work, come back to
the drawing board.
So if we are now encouraging maverick teachers then we should also welcome maverick pupils. Surely at the end of the day they help us improve our practice, and hey, if they shake up pedagogy and make us better teachers, even better!
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08 UKED Magazine
There’s a certain feeling that creeps around every four years, a feeling of inevitability when you’re told to ‘do the Olympics’. If you’re a PE teacher, you’re probably celebrating the chance to bring a little new competition into your lessons and play a bit more sport. If you’re a Geography teacher, you might be relishing the idea of using the Opening Ceremony as a lesson in obscure flags and national dress. If you’re an English teacher… oh dear!
Trying to fit global events such as the Olympics into a specific curriculum area can be like trying to teach bottom set Year 9 on the last Friday of school: not impossible, but there are certainly easier things in life. It’s one thing to tell staff to ‘do the Olympics’, and quite another to successfully integrate that into existing plans across all subjects.
At my school both Year 7 and Year 8 students are doing units on Shakespeare in English. He wasn’t exactly renowned for his sporting prowess, and, having lived before the modern era Olympics, isn’t easy to link to Rio 2016. Short of channelling my inner Hywel Roberts (@Hywel_Roberts) and launching into an imagineering task (which would be something I’d attempt if I didn’t have my students for an hour at a time with several days between lessons), or simply dumping the Shakespeare unit in favour of non-fiction writing so that we could do tasks such as writing to the International Olympic Committee to persuade them to bring the Games back to England, nothing obvious springs to mind.
Luckily I’ve done the thinking in advance, so here’s a few non-traditional (not so obvious?) ideas to allow you to ‘do the Olympics’ with ease:
• Write a sonnet describing one of the events or describing the fans. For bonus points, write it in iambic pentameter.
• Translate a few scenes from one of Shakespeare’s plays to make it about an event. For example, “A shuttlecock! A shuttlecock! My kingdom for a shuttlecock!”
• Given the Greek origins of the Olympics, write a play that sees the events undertaken by various Greek gods and goddesses. Up the competition by adding in the Romans.
• Hold a debate on any number of topics: the inclusion or exclusion of various events (if I’d known that BMX racing would become an Olympic event, I’d have taken it much more seriously back in the days of being a BMX Bandit); athlete match ups (for example, who would be the better rhythmic gymnast - a cyclist or a tennis player?); or who has the best national costume.
Olympic IdeasBy Sarah Bedwell
Sarah Bedwell @FlyMyGeekFlag is an Aussie teaching English and other things in North West England. She loves using technology in new ways to engage and excite learning - though pedagogy will always come before technology. Sarah is currently Lead Learner for using New Technologies to Enhance Teaching and Learning. Read her blog at flyingmygeekflag.wordpress.com.
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• Use images from the Games as writing prompts for stories, diary entries etc. For example, this image of Derek Redmond from the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona bit.ly/uked16jul01.
There’s plenty for other subjects to sink their teeth into as well:
• Study the different diets and training programmes of athletes in various disciplines.
• Examine the effects on the body of various drugs used to enhance performance.
• Study various training methods, such as altitude training and ice baths, focusing on their impact on the body and why they are used.
• Take an in-depth look at the zika virus - what it is, how it spreads, and why it’s of such concern for Rio 2016.
• Look at the issue of child poverty, and link it to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.
• How religion can impact on athletes - for example, when the Games coincide with Ramadan or how uniforms reflect different religious requirements.
• A discussion on the ethics of displacing people from their homes in order to build infrastructure for the Olympics.
• Sponsorship - is it right that a sporting event is sponsored by junk food companies such as Coca Cola and McDonald’s?
• Should the Olympics and Paralympics be one event? There could be a range of writing tasks around this, including campaign materials or a
debate.
• Examine how technology has changed the world of sport - from kit such as the full bodysuits that swimmers wear and new materials for making equipment lighter, such as in cycling, to how it’s impacted refereeing and judging.
It’s not an exhaustive list, clearly, but with luck some of these ideas might help to move you away from the usual
timelines, word searches and posters.
10 UKED Magazine
The changing face of
P.E. in schools
'On your marks, get set, go!' As the students race to record their answers to the exam style questions, their PE teacher glances wistfully out of the window at the empty school field. Instead of recording personal best track times, the students are being timed completing questions about the muscular contractions they would be using if there were more time on the course for practical sport.
I have been fortunate to work in a school which values Physical Education, the facilities are excellent and students are offered a wide breadth of sports, such as climbing and trampolining, which were not offered when I was studying. There seems to be greater opportunity for innovation in lessons, including exciting technology and sporting experiences which I would have valued as a student. However, examination courses in P.E are busy giving it a facelift whilst setting the subject up to become more biased towards theory and cognitive skills with changes to the GCSE which mean that students practical performance is less weighted than their ability to write about it. In our own school, GCSE students timetables include more classroom lessons than practical ones, where, despite the best efforts of their teachers to engage and motivate them, they dream of football glory and the chance to take part in the sports they love.
This emphasis has an impact which cascades down into KS3 - where we are already preparing them for the knowledge, skills and understanding needed for a qualification in three years time. There is always a pressure to perform at Ks4 and this means students need to be equipped at the earliest stage possible, from the moment they walk into the sports hall on their first day and are questioned about their knowledge of fitness components. In an age where 1 in 3 year six children are categorised as obese or overweight (Public Health, 2015) this shift away from active learning and sporting performance is a concerning and confusing one.
Other changes to GCSE courses include a narrowing of the sports which can be offered as part of the practical element. Popular school sports such as Rounders, which has long been a part of the curriculum in English Schools, will no longer be an option. Whether or not this will affect the curriculum time it is given lower down the school is yet to be seen.
The changes to the subject are, to some extent, understandable. It has struggled to achieve the status of more 'academic' subjects in schools and take pride of place on the podium of school priorities. By its very nature it is a subject which often appeals to the students who prefer moving and doing over those who are suited to sitting and studying, but these students are equally deserving of experiences which enthuse them and promote a love of learning.
We are also constantly battling against the age of technology – with lessons fighting to compete with the excitement of computer games, where students are constantly bombarded with changing images, sound effects, backing tracks and constant action. They are hyper-alert when playing their console in their leisure time, where they cannot lose focus without facing the in game consequences, sometimes as severe as death or injury to their character, and this level of stimulation is hard to reproduce in a classroom environment. In the meantime, the PE team in school continue to strive to provide a breadth of sporting experiences, remembering their own priorities for physical education. Firstly to introduce students to sports, offering them the chance to develop the skills and concepts involved in participation. Secondly to capitalise on the wider social, mental and physical benefits of sport and exercise, including the ever important skills of teamwork, problem solving, communication and leadership, and finally to nurture sporting talent and encourage life long participation.
In my own experience, it is the teachers who inspired me, who were my role models and whose lessons I remember, rather than the exams I studied for and therefore I remain positive that it is the teachers of today who will make a student's experiences memorable and enjoyable and hopefully ignite a life long passion for sport and exercise, regardless of the expectations set upon schools through examination courses.
Michelle trained as a teacher of Physical Education at Brunel University and has been teaching the subject for eight years. She completed her Masters in Education in 2015. She is now teaching Physical Education and English in a secondary comprehensive in Kent.
By Michelle Johnston
12 UKED Magazine12 UKED Magazine
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With each passing academic year, preparing students for the globally connected world is becoming more and more important. Providing students with the necessary 21st century skills to be active, responsible members of the online
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Courageous Leadership and rock climbing.
by Bukky Yusuf
Bukky Yusuf @rondelle10_b is a London based Associate Assistant Head Teacher in charge of the NQT/ITT development programme and IT to enhance teaching & learning. She is also a Secondary Science Consultant, qualified coach and registered as a leadership coach as part of a pilot run by the Department for Education.
During this academic year, I was fortunate enough to sign on to a Courageous Leadership Programme which was devised by Diana Osagie via the National College of School Leadership. It was co-organised with the educational consultant Ankhara Lloyd Hunte and head teachers, Nicola Haynes and Chinye Jibunoh. It is the second year of the programme, which has been designed to develop more Black Minority Ethnic women into leadership roles.
The course took place between October 2015 to June 2016 and was primarily ran as a series of twilight or weekend sessions which covered a number of different aspects to develop our collective leadership qualities. What I loved most about the programme was the practical nature of it. Everything we explored was then carried out in practice. This included mock interview practices, presentation developments and games to identify how we would operate as leaders.
One of the most significant experiences during the programme was the 2 day residential in October. At the time, I was distracted by a number of events outside of school. This meant that I neglected to ask the myriad of questions which I usually do and just turned up at the designated location. In my mind, I assumed that being a ‘leadership residential’ meant that the most we would do is stand outside on the grass playing team games… How wrong I was! We did play team games on the grass but that was only to warm up us during the afternoon of the first day.
I wasn’t forewarned about any activity. Perhaps that was the best approach since I have a fear of heights, a dislike of trekking in the dark and can lose patience when I am not sure what is going on. What I did not realise, was that I would repeatedly experience all of these things.
To highlight the leadership qualities that were developed during the residential, I will review some of the ’10 traits of Courageous Leaders’ bit.ly/uked16jul10 by Susan Tardanico (@susantardanico) to outline the significant aspects that I had learnt during the weekend.
Demonstrating leadership courage.
Susan describes this as ‘communicating when you don’t have all the answers since this kind of behaviour fosters trust and sets a crucial example for others to follow’ during challenging times. I relate this to one particular group activity that I chose to lead even though I didn’t have any of the answers to help the group. It was an ‘avoid the river fire’ version of the farmer, chicken, fox and grain puzzle. I stepped forward in order to challenge myself and think out of the box. One group member was a whizz at solving these type of puzzles. So I left her in charge of noting what we had to do in order to get safely across the ‘burning river’. It was an uncomfortable feeling as I was the leader with a specific outcome yet no answers to achieve it. However, this allowed me to manage the team as they generated ideas of how we could collectively solve the puzzle. This experience shifted my paradigm, of having to be the one with all the answers. Later on, I recognised that this presented an opportunity for me to develop more of my own problem solving and analytical skills so that I can gain more confidence in this regard.
Key learning: listen, use the talents within your team and keep up regular communications to chart progress even when you don’t have all the answers.
Seek feedback and listen.
This brings me to the rock climbing experience. To put this into context, I have absolutely no head for heights. All my previous rock wall climbing experiences have failed miserably!
I managed to keep the sheer panic from my face as we were shown how to remain safe as we climbed. However internally, the doubts were setting in.
None the less, I decided to give it a go and push my own boundaries.
What became immediately clear was that my trainers were unsuitable for rock climbing as they lacked the necessary grip required to secure my footing. The higher I climbed up the rocks, the harder it became to see where I should place my hands and feet in order to continue. This is where the rest of the group were invaluable. Initially I could not focus as I was focusing on what I needed to do and trying to avoid being overwhelmed with panic. Team members who were
closest to me got my attention by calling my name, and then provided one piece of feedback that helped me progress onto the next steps. There was one part of the rock face in which there seemed to be no way forward. After several minutes of wondering what to do then placing my hands and feet in different positions, it was with sheer grit, determinations and shouting that I hauled myself out of the crevice. By this point, Ankhara had walked to the summit and was calling out encouragement from above. This helped as a guiding voice and provided the motivation I needed to complete the climb. I felt ridiculously pleased until I looked down and then felt shaken. However, with the collective support of my team, I had successfully completed a rock climb for the first time in my life.
Key learning: avoid being put off by previous failures, use the correct equipment to reach your goal, get team members to give you feedback, act on the feedback and have someone in place to give you encouragement.
Say what needs to be said.
We all took turns to lead different activities and demonstrated different leadership styles.
I remember one activity where we had to use ropes as levers to place a small container of liquid into a larger container and then move it to a ‘secure area’. That was a tough challenge for a variety of reasons. Many of us had different ideas about what should be done and sometimes simultaneously shared our ideas! However it was important to remember who was actually leading the challenge and should therefore direct us all. This particular activity helped me voice what I felt should be said so that we could successfully complete the challenge.
Key learning: Choose the right moment to say what needs to be said and say it clearly enough for all to hear.
Make decisions and move forward.
Time constraints for all activities gave us the impetus to complete each challenge as quickly as we could. Whenever we experienced any issues that were holding us back, it was up to us as a team to resolve it and then move on. This sometimes meant that we had to look at things from different perspectives. For example, once we have navigated our way around a low rope walking assault course, we then had to resolve how we would all carry a tray of water from one end to the other without spilling a single drop…
Key Learning: assign roles on the course we felt most comfortable with, remember we are all dependent upon each other and occasionally we have to work collaboratively to cross the most challenging parts of the course.
Give credit to others.
I think that this is what helped to mould the group as a unit by the end of the residential.
We were able to recognise strengths in each other that were previously unknown.
Praise allowed us to openly acknowledge the skills we each brought to the team.
Key Learning: never underestimate the impact of genuine praise.
Another key learning point as a leader is that people watch you. Sometimes it is done to gauge how they themselves should respond to an event. This was demonstrated when others within my group watched me as a measure of how well they could do the high rope walking challenge. I am not ashamed to admit that I cried, squealed and yelped as I approached each part of the seemingly never ending challenge. In spite of this, I managed my anxiety levels with positive thoughts running through my mind, slowly tackling each part of the course and managing my breathing. The experience of such acute levels of anxiety made me able to immediately emphasise when one team member was too scared to cross one part of the same course. Everyone was shouting suggestions which made her even more panicked. Eventually, I was able to calmly and clearly explain what she should do as I guided her through the same techniques that I had used. When she froze, I suggested for her to return to the wooden post, gather her thoughts and take her time. I recognised that when a person is feeling anxious or scared, they can not hear any of the advice that is being shared. It is just one thing too many to deal with.
The experience was a humbling one and I came back a different person.
My colleagues and I were given many challenges to help us face our fears, which included rock climbing, low rope walking (with ropes and beams 10 feet above the ground) and high rope climbing activities approximately 30 feet in the air. I learnt that not being forewarned about any of activities until it was time to do them was the best course of action. I now think as a leader, not knowing everything in advance is not a hindrance as I would have over-thought the situation and not been as receptive as I was.
I am still scared of heights however, I was astounded to see how many of my self limiting beliefs were broken that weekend. In turn, has helped me to view challenges in a different way.
It highlighted that in many cases, the clichés are true. It is a case of ‘mind over matter’ and ‘what we believe we achieve’.
I think that I can now call myself a courageous leader.
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Terrorism And Girls EducationEducation plays a vital role in the socio-
economic development of a nation. Education can change the fate of a nation and it is one of the most important means to the intellectual, spiritual, economic, cultural and moral advancement of a nation. Education is the need and demand of the modern age. Access to education is a fundamental human right and a developmental necessity. It is obvious that education is necessary for female as much as for male.
@naeemullahswat Secondary school teacher in science - North-west Frontier, Pakistan
In B
rief
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Book review: Doing research in education – Theory and practiceBy Ioanna Palaiologou @IPalaiologouDavid NeedhamTrevor Male @MaleTrevor
The book
Within education nowadays there is a clear trend towards doing research in education and carrying out practice-based enquiries within schools as professional development and as part of degree courses. The paradox is, though, that many new and experienced teachers and students are asked to get involved in such researches, but at the same time there is the sentiment that such researches are not of huge value or not successful. This is the consequence of lack of training and guidance regarding carrying out research and practice-based enquiries. There are many research methodology and methods guidebooks available, but the editors Ioanna Palaiologou, David Needham and Trevor Male have succeeded in ways where other authors and editors fail: the book is slim and easy to read, which makes it an accessible and concise introduction into research.
The structure
The book is divided into twelve chapters, whereby each section deals with a different aspect related to educational research. The topics covered include the value, benefit and purpose of research, an introduction to methodology and methods, thoughts on ethical issues and collecting and analysing qualitative and quantitative data, and guidance on writing and reporting research findings. The individual chapters are also structured into several sections, so that the reader is reminded of key messages, but also pointed towards further readings, websites and resources. Practical tips and activities related to doing research mean that the book can also be used as a workbook and a resource for planning research.
The highs and lows
Due to its structure and the accessible style of writing, the book really is a great introduction to research, and as such should be part of any library in order to support teachers and post-graduate students with their first steps into practice-based enquiries. Obviously, due to the fact that the contents are quite condensed, this book cannot and should not be the only resource when planning research. It is a great introduction, but further reading and training will be required in order for the research process to be beneficial and successful. However, many teachers avoid carrying out researches because they feel they do not know enough, and this is where this publication could
View on Amazon atwww.bit.ly/doresearchedu
be a great resource within schools, in particular. At the end of each chapter there are references and links that will provide some more guidance, and once a teacher has gained confidence, then they may well want to tackle some of the more detailed research methodology and methods books. With the basic knowledge gained from “Doing research in education” any other research methodology or methods will seem less daunting and difficult to access.
What do I think?
I am very much in favour of teachers doing research to improve their practice and to keep learning within their own classrooms, and for that I believe training and courses are necessary. However, if for reasons such as lack of funds or lack of time, teachers cannot access training, then books like this one are a great starting point. The aspects covered in this guidebook are excellently explained and link to further reading for deeper engagement and understanding. The only issue I would raise is the lack of practical advice where reflexivity and reflective journaling are concerned. The importance of reflections is highlighted, but there is no real guidance on how to keep an effective journal and how to make good use of journaling. Many find this aspect difficult within their teaching practice, so would require more guidance and training on that. Overall, though, this is a fabulous resource and I strongly recommend having it in your library.
Priced at £21.59 (paperback) and £20.51 (Kindle) at time of publishing
Review by Nicole Brown @ncjbrown
ukedchat.com/magazine 19
20 UKED Magazine
Before I began teaching, I worked on a number of holiday playschemes. While on those playschemes, we often invented and adapted games to suit children, resources and of course the weather.
On one rainy summer’s day, we invented (or believe we invented) ‘Crash Mat Rounders’. Outside it was pouring down, the children wanted to play rounders and we had a sports hall at our disposal. We placed four crash mats out as bases, had a spot for the bowler and a place to bat from. We decided on some rules too. You were only out if caught, or if you were touching the sports hall floor while the ball was in the bowler’s hand. There could be as many children on a base as they wanted, batters could overtake while running and the teams swapped over when the batting team had no one available to bat.
The enjoyment of fewer rules, jumping on crash mats and quicker turn around of innings made the game a huge success and it being played (indoors) on even the sunniest days of that summer!
So, when I began teaching, I was looking for ways to cover ‘rounders skills’ but in a more enjoyable way, with more children involved more of the time. I adapted ‘Crash Mat Rounders’ to form ‘Base Rounders’. I have played it with every class I have taught, with each preferring it over various games of cricket and the traditional version of rounders.
I set up the pitch as shown below:
by Liam MurphyBase Rounders Liam is a Year 5 teacher and team leader
at a four form entry junior school. He is a computing subject leader and half of@PrimaryIdeas primaryideas.org and is in his tenth year of teaching. Find him on Twitter at @ThisIsLiamM.
Each base is made up of four cones. With a cone for where the bowler needs to stand and a cone for the batter.
As I said earlier, the rules are simple:Batter, hit the ball (or not) and run to a base. If you’re running
when the bowler gets the ball back you’re out.Fielder, catch the ball, or stop it and throw it back to the bowler.Swap over when there’s no on to bat. I usually get 4 - 5 innings
per team in a lesson!Hopefully that makes sense. Give it a go. I always explain it’s not
the ‘real’ rounders rules and do have games of rounders using those traditional rules too.
If anyone else has played similar or the same as this, I have not stolen your idea as my own - I have independently generated these rules.
August 2016Well Being (For teachers & pupils (PSHE))
Deadline: 4th July 2016
September 2016Classroom ManagementDeadline: 22th July 2016
Write for a future edition of the magazine on the theme topic or something else that interests you.Go to
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October 2016STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Maths)
Deadline: 19th August 2016
November 2016Reading & Books
Deadline: 26th August 2016
In B
rief
Tell me more...With an increasing focus on decoding, barking at print and
teaching English grammar as a closed, right or wrong system, teachers need to reclaim, and indeed are beginning to reclaim, the teaching of writing and put feelings, emotions and how to engage a reader at the centre of everything. Here are some tips to encourage worthwhile, engaging writing:
• Cover less genres with your children but cover them in greater depth
• Write for a purpose - the school newsletter, a blog about their favourite book etc
• Get rid of phrases like, “Brilliant, you’ve used a lot of wow words!”
• Dot on the spot and give feedback straight away - it shows their writing has value and is impacting on you there and then. A great phrase is, “When I read this part, it is making me feel.. because...”
• Allow them time to edit and improve and play with words
• Read, read, read - from XBox manuals to picture books
• Get your children to discuss their vocabulary choices and tell you what impact they were trying to have
• Get rid of pre-prepared Success Lists - let them choose how to engage their reader
• Model writing that inspires and triggers an emotional response to them
• Let them write with a child’s voice, as a child and for a child
• Read their work out loud and encourage them to listen to the music and rhythm of their writing
Writing is about making connections, not just being able to circle an adverb. Let’s continue to encourage our children to use their words and writing to ‘build bridges of understanding’ with their reader.
@ieconsultancy English consultant and teacher - Essex, UK
Wellbeing For AllThis academic year I was delighted
to see the following on our school development plan: trial and develop techniques to support staff and student wellbeing. I have worked alongside our Deputy Headteacher to ensure a new vocabulary around wellbeing has been used in school.
Following the ideas launched by #teacher5aday we built 2 staff wellbeing weeks into our school calendar. This meant no meetings but a chance for all staff to #connect #collaborate #learn #notice and exercise. We offered a variety of activities ranging from an introduction to mindfulness to an afternoon of Italian cookery to yoga for beginners and create your own ceramics. We also introduced the Good Karma club where staff secretly buddy up with someone and pay good karma forwards. Candles, notes and #teacher5aday bags have added to the sense of wellbeing around school.
Happy staff was only part of our wellbeing this year. Students and parents have been learning about positive psychology. Each term we have looked at a different layer grit, resilience, growth mindset, mindfulness, happiness and wellbeing. Students have learnt that happiness, mental health and wellbeing are things which can be developed. Plans for next year is to do even more.
@MsHMFL Assistant Headteacher - Wiltshire/Gloucestershire
Image credits: flickr.com/photos/holiday-extras/4703294074 by Holidayextras used under Commercial Creative Commons 2.0 License.
22 UKED Magazine
In B
rief
Meditation in the Classroom“The mind is everything. What you think, you become”
- Buddha.It has been long known that having time to quietly think
about things helps both students and adults answer some difficult questions. This is why we have ‘thinking time’, before we asks for answers. However, recent case studies are beginning to show that scheduling meditation into the school day could bring a multitude of benefits. Studies lead by Shauna L Shapiro of Santa Clara University have shown meditation could help students and staff deal with stress. In a CPD session at our school we looked at how schools had implemented 10 minutes of meditation every morning and the effect this had on the student’s behaviour, which drastically improved.
I personally have been meditating for around a year and can only agree with what these studies show. I and many other students use meditation and the idea of mindfulness to calm students after lunch break, especially after wet lunch, and the atmosphere is markedly calmer after. I recently took this one step further and played a 10 minute guided meditation to my form during form time. They said they felt considerably calmer and more ready to face the day. But the real test, how I know they found it useful, they asked to do it again the next day!@MsGlynn2014 Maths Teacher - London, UK
My Experiences Of Teaching RefugeesI was really excited when I entered my new
classroom on the 18th of February. I was excited because it was my first time teaching asylum seekers.
The lessons was very relaxing. We had a lot of fun playing games or doing role-plays.
The students got much more confident at talking in German and learned some new things about the German culture. The students were really interested in so many things. They asked me where are some nice places to visit in Germany or where they can find work. A doctor from Syria asked me if he is allowed to go to the library at our University because he wants to continue his studies.
I have taught this class now for three months and I haven’t fallen ill, I didn’t get robbed by one of them like some stereotypes say. I even met up one time with one of my students during the evening. He had found some German friends and went out with them. How nice is that!
The point is that this is just a normal class and could be a class anywhere in the world.
@kesselpa German Teacher - Augsburg, Germany
Pareto Knew How To Balance It AllIn an ever demanding world the
need to balance school and home life has never been greater. Recently I explored and shared with staff the 80/20 principle. Pareto’s rule of measuring effective output. It hit home to all staff when we data analysed where 80% of our grade A’s were coming from to discover actually stemmed from 20% of the subjects on offer! So we delved into how we allocate our energy and discussed shared planning and directing energy towards the critical 20% of activities that will yield 80% of our most useful outcomes. Well worth a further read and during half term or summer just order that to do list and make your life that bit easier.
@ArtyTeach79 Subject Leader - Wigan, UK
Get their hands dirty!It is essential that children in today’s ‘technology focused world’
get real, hands-on experiences. The only things that some of my children have in their hands, once at home, are games console controls! By making learning fun and interactive we can engage children in finding out about the world around them and their past, instilling a love of learning and giving them some practical skills to use in the real world!
I set a maths challenge for the children to set up their own pizza parlour. They needed to do data collection to find out which toppings would be popular; measuring and weighing whilst making the pizzas; they looked at fractions when slicing them and then we had valuable lessons on mental addition and subtraction when we sold them to other children in school; finally, they looked at profit and sales margins when we evaluated and totalled our profits!
This week, I have taken the children back to the 1940’s cooking Wartime turnovers experiencing food when tightly rationed.
Giving children hands on experiences opens up their eyes to a range of skills needed in their futures, as well as making my job that little bit sweeter!
@MissNina1983 Year 6 Teacher - International School - Cairo, Egypt
In B
rief Active TechActive TechActive Tech
By Martin Burrett
Technology is often lambasted for creating lazy, passive cyber couched-potatoes. While the hours we endure bathed in flickering pixel light, slumped in a variety of contorted lurching positions over the input device of our choice is hardly the recipe for a healthy body. Yet, technology is becoming ever more part of our active lives and it is also spilling out into the ‘real’ world. As teachers, we can insist technology, or we can make it part of our classroom repertoire for PE and beyond.
One obvious example is active gaming. Until recently, games exercised the thumbs, but little else. Since the introduction of game consoles with motion tracking, such as the Wii and Xbox with its Kinect device, players are finally off the couch and up on their feet. Such devices shouldn’t be a replacement to the usual range of PE activities, but because of the intrinsically motivating nature of these games they can reach pupils who usually loath PE and the length of time pupils will spend on such games more than makes up for the relatively limited amount of movement involved compared to an average PE lesson. Naturally, I do not have 15+ devices (not on a teacher’s salary!), so when I have done this with my own primary class I have asked parents to get involved and to bring in whatever they have available at home. Firstly, this means that the parents are around to ensure that the equipment is being used in an appropriate manner. Secondary, it’s wonderful to see the dads getting overly competitive once they inevitably decide to have a turn.
The web is awash with dance videos of every genre. Sites like gonoodle.com and 5-a-day.tv are great places to start and have a great range of fitness and mindfulness videos to try. A quick search on YouTube.com and vimeo.com will deliver a vast number of videos to get your class moving. Yet better still, rather than being consumers of fitness videos, challenge your class to produce their own.
Using video recordings to play back and observe one’s sporting performance is not only limited to the professionals. Video cameras are everywhere and watching one’s own striking kicks, racket hits and running form can give insight for both the teacher and pupils to help them improve.
The rise of fitness trackers and mobile apps has meant that we can each produce a vast quantity of data about our health. This can be very useful information to allow the sports person to improve, but it is also a wonderful resource for cross-curricular work. Heart rates, lap times, speed data and much more are useful to give a real context to data handling in maths and the health topics of the science curriculum.
Lots of physical activity happens outside. Orienteering with GPS enabled devices or Geo-caching (like a map coordinates treasure hunt) are wonderful activities to get your children engaged and moving. Apps such as the superb trebleapps.co/knit allows the teacher to leave virtual ‘breadcrumb’ messages which are triggered when the pupil reaches a particular set of coordinates. Use it to leave clues in a outside treasure hunt.
Virtual and augmented reality finally seems to be living up to its promise. While most VR apps used in schools current do not require the user to move from the spot, technology is being developed which maps out a space and ‘fools’ the user into moving around a space which is seeming larger than it actually is and prompting the user away from the walls. So it may not be long until your class can play virtual tennis at Wimbledon, run against a digital Usain Bolt, or take part in cyber cycling at the Olympics.
I look forward to the first virtual egg and spoon race at sports day!
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Wind back 12 months, Year 6 SATs, in their old form, were over and we were beginning to plan for a whole new world….assessing without levels.
Every discussion threw up problems and positivity about how we moved forward was severely lacking. The initial problems that we discussed were:
How are the old levels going to be converted to something new when there is no guidance to do so?
How are only 3 categories enough to describe a whole cohort? (Emerging, Expected and Exceeding)
What would the thresholds for the above levels be?How do we know that we are making sufficient progress-
either within a year group or from KS1 to KS2.What was ‘Mastery’ and what did it look like?I decided to volunteer to search the internet, surely
someone, somewhere had created something to remedy this? There must be some guidance from the government, they wouldn’t be so remiss to set up something new and give no support….would they?
Sadly yes. The internet was an assessing without levels wasteland, there were more tumbleweeds blowing across the World Wide Web than in a Western movie. Another dead end, cue more of the same questions as before but no forward movement; we were stuck, clueless and unsupported but something had to be done.
So we took the plunge; we made a decision as an SLT. We were going to use percentages and we were going to create 5 bands instead of 3, after all, our cohort of children couldn’t be categorised into 3. The expected category was so broad that some children would never move out of it and therefore wouldn’t show progress, hence the percentages, this would show progress, even within a particular category.
The writing assessment was already embedded and written in percentages. It needed some adjustment for the new objectives (and interim framework that followed). Reading was created quickly from the interim assessment framework and curriculum objectives. I had to create the one for Maths, easy I thought, I’m good with spreadsheets and formulas, I was very wrong.
I quickly realised that the National Curriculum objectives for all year groups were very broad, they needed specific prior learning and a number of steps to achieve them. Eg: some children would never be able to order numbers up to 1,000,000 but would be able to order them up to 10,000, but that wasn’t the objective.
With this in mind I created feeder objectives and split the NC into 14 units that consolidated prior learning this meant that progress and attainment was shown for EVERY child, a real key as OFSTED are due this year.
After 100’s of man hours and updates the first version was complete by Mid October and was rolled out to staff;
initially the reaction was positive and staff thought that it was a useful way of tracking the children (cue a tracking document that runs alongside).
A thought still niggled me, children are not just numbers, not just data on a sheet, it needed to be data that was used effectively to support the learning of the children and was useful for the teacher. Luckily we seemed to have stumbled on this by accident. It seems that there are positives in assessing without levels and what started out as a simple spreadsheet (now on Version 4) has drawn the following feedback from staff.(April 2016).
We use it to find the gaps in learning as the colour coding allows this to be easily identifiable.
We can clearly see the groups within the class that need further support and interventions.
The HA group is clear.The feeder objectives show us the steps needed for the
child to fulfil the KPI.We can see progress in the child’s learning which is
positive for both us and the child.It’s useful for pupil progress meetings, allowing them to
be more focused.It’s easy to use.As you can see, these positives are due to the fact that
we have had to create something to replace levels and we have reason, as teachers, to feel positive about this, as long as the right system is in place.
Big questions still remain though:How do the systems of individual schools correlate?
If a child moved to another school would the numbers/ categories be understood?
How do these systems help to predict a child’s SATs score as we still don’t know what an expected score will be?
How will our assessments translate to Secondary schools for transition? Will it make sense to them?
I’m really proud that, as a profession, teachers manage to find ways of solving the problems thrown at them but support from the DfE is needed; we need guidance and examples of how this is to be done. We, as a school, are confident that our system is robust, manageable and vitally, takes a key role in the learning of progress of the children but what if ours is wrong, what if the thoughts of the DfE are widely different.
12 months on, we still don’t know…..that’s wrong.
Assessing Without Levels:...12 Months On
Andrew Byrne @musingsofmrb is an Assistant Head, Maths lead and Year 6 teacher at a large Primary School in Central Birmingham. He is passionate about education and regularly blogs about his thoughts at musingsofmrb.wordpress.com.
By Andrew Byrne
Great Expectations Knowledge Organiser by @JSchwartz100 Download: uked.directory/SEE00003 Stretch and Challenge vocabulary for characterisation and plot in Great Expectations
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oe is
as
saul
ted.
Bid
dy m
oves
in to
look
afte
r Mrs
Joe.
Jagg
ers t
ells
Pip
of h
is "g
reat
ex
pect
atio
ns" a
nd se
crec
y of
ben
efac
tor.
Pip
unde
rgoe
s tra
nsiti
on p
oint
in C
hapt
er 1
9 as
he
visit
s Mr T
rabb
’s sh
op a
nd a
ppar
ently
with
out “
boas
ting”
flau
nts h
is ne
w w
ealth
.
Volume 2
Ch.
20-2
6 P
ip lo
dges
with
Her
bert
. Wem
mick
take
s Pip
to B
arna
rd's
Inn;
Pip
reco
gnize
s Her
bert
as
"pal
e yo
ung
gent
lem
an".
Herb
ert t
ells
Miss
Hav
isham
's st
ory.
Pip
take
s up
row
ing
and
livin
g th
e lif
e of
a ‘g
entle
man
’ as h
e sp
ends
his
fort
une.
Mr J
agge
rs fl
aunt
s his
hous
ekee
per,
Mol
ly’s
wris
ts in
a sc
ene
of so
cial p
ower
and
mal
e do
min
ance
. Pip
is y
et
to re
alise
Mol
ly is
Est
ella
’s m
othe
r. Ch
. 27
-33
Bidd
y w
rites
to P
ip a
skin
g if
Joe
can
visit
Bar
nard
's In
n; h
e ca
lls P
ip "S
ir" h
ighl
ight
ing
Joe'
s "sim
ple
dign
ity" t
hat d
oes n
ot fi
t with
the
figur
e of
the
‘gen
tlem
an’.
Pip
read
s in
loca
l pap
er th
at P
umbl
echo
ok is
his
"pat
ron"
. Pip
visi
ts M
iss H
avish
am; O
rlick
is
gate
keep
er. P
ip d
ecla
res h
is lo
ve fo
r Est
ella
. Pip
wai
ts fo
r Est
ella
who
is v
isitin
g Lo
ndon
. W
emm
ick sh
ows h
im N
ewga
te (c
onvi
ct m
otif)
. Ch
. 34
-39
Pip
and
Herb
ert a
ccum
ulat
e ra
ther
larg
e de
bts a
nd M
rs. J
oe d
ies.
Pip
com
es o
f age
(N
ovem
ber)
and
beco
mes
resp
onsib
le fo
r his
finan
ces;
asks
Wem
mick
's ad
vice
for
Herb
ert.
Pip
is to
esc
ort E
stel
la a
nd ta
ke h
er to
Sat
is Ho
use;
qua
rrel
s with
Miss
Ha
vish
am a
nd d
iscov
ers B
entle
y Dr
umm
le a
s Est
ella
’s su
itor.
He le
aves
hea
rtbr
oken
. Pip
is
23 n
ow a
nd M
agw
itch
retu
rns -
rev
ealin
g he
is P
ip's
bene
fact
or.
Volume 3
Ch.
40-4
4 Th
e m
an o
n th
e st
airs
, "Pr
ovis"
com
es to
stay
; Jag
gers
conf
irms h
is st
ory
as P
ip’s
bene
fact
or. H
erbe
rt th
en m
eets
Mag
witc
h/”P
rovi
s”. H
erbe
rt a
dvise
s Pip
to ta
ke
Mag
witc
h ou
t of t
he co
untr
y; th
ey a
sk h
im a
bout
his
life.
Pip
tells
Est
ella
he
love
s her
bu
t Est
ella
is se
t to
mar
ry B
entle
y Dr
umm
le.
Ch.
45-5
0 Pi
p fe
els h
e is
bein
g w
atch
ed…
He fe
ars E
stel
la is
mar
ried
but w
ill n
ot m
ake
sure
. Pip
di
nes w
ith Ja
gger
s; Es
tella
is m
arrie
d. P
ip re
cogn
izes M
olly
as h
er m
othe
r and
Wem
mick
te
lls o
f Mol
ly's
tria
l. Ch
apte
r 49
sees
Miss
Hav
isham
's co
nfes
sion
and
repe
ntan
ce;
Este
lla's
adop
tion
and
the
fire.
Pip
says
"I fo
rgiv
e he
r". H
erbe
rt te
lls o
f Mag
witc
h's c
hild
an
d Pi
p kn
ows E
stel
la is
his.
Mag
witc
h sa
id th
at P
ip re
min
ded
him
of h
er.
Ch.
51-5
9 Ja
gger
s exp
lain
s Est
ella
's ad
optio
n an
d ad
vise
s tha
t Pip
kee
p it
secr
et. O
rlick
's co
nfes
sion
and
atte
mpt
ed re
veng
e; P
ip re
scue
d by
Tra
bb's
boy
and
Herb
ert.
Mag
witc
h's e
scap
e is
thw
arte
d; C
ompe
yson
dro
wne
d an
d Pi
p re
conc
iled
to h
is be
nefa
ctor
, Mag
witc
h. P
ip's
wea
lth is
forfe
ited
to th
e cr
own.
Mag
witc
h co
nvict
ed a
nd
sent
ence
d; P
ip te
lls h
im, b
efor
e hi
s dea
th, o
f Est
ella
. Pip
bec
omes
ill a
nd is
arr
este
d fo
r de
bts b
ut re
scue
d by
Joe.
Orli
ck e
nds u
p in
jail.
Miss
Hav
isham
's w
ill is
read
and
Pip
pl
ans t
o pr
opos
e to
Bid
dy. S
atis
Hous
e go
es u
p fo
r auc
tion
and
Joe
mar
ries B
iddy
. El
even
yea
rs la
ter,
Pip
retu
rns;
sees
you
ng P
ip a
nd m
eets
(wid
owed
) Est
ella
at S
atis;
"no
shad
ow o
f…pa
rtin
g".
Char
acte
rs
Pip
Pirr
ip
Felic
itous
, Tim
id, S
usce
ptib
le, B
ourg
eois,
Im
prov
iden
t, Th
e Fo
rtun
atus
Pro
toty
pe
The
Bild
ungs
rom
an's
prot
agon
ist, P
ip is
an
orph
an
serv
es a
s the
app
rent
ice o
f the
gen
tle b
lack
smith
Jo
e. W
hen
he u
nexp
ecte
dly
com
es in
to a
fort
une,
Pi
p gr
ows h
augh
ty a
nd e
xtra
vaga
nt in
pur
suit
of a
lif
esty
le g
ente
el e
noug
h to
mee
t the
refin
ed
stan
dard
s of E
stel
la. C
onfu
sing
pers
onal
inte
grity
w
ith p
ublic
repu
tatio
n, P
ip is
crue
lly d
isloy
al to
Joe
and
Bidd
y, a
void
ing
them
bec
ause
of t
heir
low
er
class
. Stil
l, Pi
p le
arns
to ju
dge
peop
le b
y in
tern
al
rath
er th
an su
perfi
cial s
tand
ards
and
rede
ems
him
self
by re
pent
ing
since
rely
and
refo
rmin
g hi
s pe
rson
al v
alue
s.
Miss
Hav
isham
De
crep
it, M
egal
oman
iac,
Spe
ctra
l, Af
fluen
t, De
sola
te, D
iscon
sola
te, W
retc
hed,
Eva
sive,
Tac
it Th
e w
ealth
y da
ught
er o
f a b
rew
er, M
iss
Havi
sham
was
aba
ndon
ed o
n he
r wed
ding
day
by
her
fian
cée
(Com
peys
on) a
nd, t
raum
atize
d.
She
pres
erve
s her
self
and
her h
ouse
in w
eddi
ng
rega
lia, s
hutti
ng o
ut th
e w
orld
for o
ver t
wen
ty
year
s. To
exa
ct h
er re
veng
e on
men
, Miss
Ha
vish
am a
dopt
s and
raise
s Est
ella
to b
e be
autif
ul a
nd d
esira
ble
but c
ompl
etel
y he
artle
ss. M
iss H
avish
am is
capr
iciou
s, m
anip
ulat
ive,
bitt
er, a
nd, u
ntil
nove
l's e
nd,
unab
le to
reco
gnize
any
one'
s pai
n bu
t her
ow
n.
Este
lla
Mor
ally
Ban
krup
t, Ha
ught
y, V
aing
lorio
us,
Cont
empt
uous
, Disp
arag
ing,
Inso
lent
Th
e ad
opte
d da
ught
er o
f Miss
Hav
isham
, Est
ella
is
prou
d, re
fined
, bea
utifu
l, an
d co
ld, r
aise
d by
Miss
Ha
vish
am to
“wre
ak re
veng
e on
the
mal
e se
x”.
Miss
Hav
isham
has
raise
d he
r to
lack
a tr
ue h
uman
he
art a
nd sh
e is
unab
le to
love
.
Bidd
y An
orp
han
Pip
mee
ts a
t the
vill
age
scho
ol, B
iddy
m
oves
into
the
forg
e to
hel
p ou
t afte
r Mrs
. Joe
's at
tack
and
late
r bec
omes
a sc
hool
teac
her.
She
is hu
mbl
e, k
ind,
mor
al, a
nd fi
erce
ly in
telli
gent
, ab
sorb
ing
know
ledg
e w
ithou
t any
form
al
educ
atio
n. S
he is
also
shar
ply
perc
eptiv
e an
d se
es th
roug
h ev
eryo
ne's
pret
ensio
ns, c
allin
g Pi
p ou
t on
his d
elus
ions
and
snob
bery
long
bef
ore
Pip
can
reco
gnize
them
. Jo
e Ga
rger
y Vi
rtuo
us, R
ecitu
de, M
agna
nim
ous,
Dole
ful,
Obse
quio
us, U
ncou
th
Joe
is a
fath
er fi
gure
for P
ip th
roug
hout
Pip
's ch
ildho
od a
nd h
is te
nder
kin
dnes
s pro
tect
s Pip
fro
m M
rs. J
oe's
hars
h pa
rent
ing.
Joe
has n
o fo
rmal
ed
ucat
ion
but p
osse
sses
a d
eep
sens
e of
inte
grity
an
d an
unf
ailin
g m
oral
com
pass
. Joe
is lo
yal,
gene
rous
, and
kin
d, a
nd a
cts l
ovin
gly
tow
ards
Pip
ev
en w
hen
Pip'
s is u
ngra
tefu
l.
M
rs Jo
e “C
apric
ious
”, T
yran
nica
l, Co
nden
sing,
Cho
leric
M
rs. J
oe is
fier
y, ty
rann
ical,
and
false
, har
ping
on
her
ow
n vi
ctim
hood
eve
n as
she
abus
es P
ip
and
Joe.
She
is o
bses
sed
with
socia
l sta
tus a
nd
repu
tatio
n. Y
et, a
fter t
he a
ttack
by
Orli
ck th
at
give
s her
bra
in d
amag
e, M
rs. J
oe's
pers
onal
ity
chan
ges c
ompl
etel
y an
d sh
e be
com
es p
atie
nt,
com
pass
iona
te, a
nd d
ocile
.
Prov
is (a
.k.a
. Abe
l Mag
witc
h) (a
.k.a
. the
conv
ict)
The
sam
e es
cape
d co
nvict
Pip
hel
ps in
the
nove
l's
open
ing
scen
es. P
rovi
s' gr
atitu
de to
war
ds P
ip
insp
ires h
im to
dev
ote
his l
ife-s
avin
gs to
Pip
, be
com
ing
Pip'
s ano
nym
ous p
atro
n. C
ruel
ly
swin
dled
by
Com
peys
on, P
rovi
s has
live
d a
life
in
and
out o
f pris
on. S
till,
his c
rimin
al re
cord
is
larg
ely
the
resu
lt of
unf
ortu
nate
circ
umst
ance
s, no
t cha
ract
er, f
or P
rovi
s is k
ind,
goo
d-he
arte
d,
and
imm
ense
ly g
ener
ous.
Mr J
agge
rs
Supe
rcili
ous,
Judi
cious
, Eru
dite
, Ret
ribut
ive,
Sa
gacio
us, O
bdur
ate
A fa
mou
s law
yer i
n Lo
ndon
, Mr.
Jagg
ers i
s Pip
's gu
ardi
an a
nd th
e m
iddl
eman
bet
wee
n hi
m a
nd
his p
atro
n. M
r. Ja
gger
s also
wor
ks fo
r Miss
Ha
vish
am. H
e is
ratio
nal,
shar
p-m
inde
d, a
nd
intim
idat
ing.
He
prid
es h
imse
lf on
nei
ther
ex
pres
sing
nor r
espo
ndin
g to
hum
an e
mot
ion.
Bent
ley
Drum
mle
M
achi
avel
lian
Prin
ce, G
uard
ed
Bent
ley
Drum
mle
stud
ies w
ith P
ip. H
e is
a w
ealth
y he
ir to
a b
aron
etcy
, upp
er cl
ass a
ccor
ding
to th
e ol
d sy
stem
of i
nher
ited
rank
. Des
crib
ed a
s "id
le,
prou
d…an
d su
spici
ous,"
Dru
mm
le is
Pip
's ne
mes
is.
He p
ursu
es E
stel
la.
Herb
ert P
ocke
t Lo
yal,
Aspi
ratio
nal,
Inva
riabl
e, E
ndur
ing,
Pi
p's b
est f
riend
, Her
bert
is co
mpa
ssio
nate
, ho
nest
, and
unp
rete
ntio
us. H
e an
d Pi
p liv
e to
geth
er in
Lond
on w
here
he
wor
ks in
a
coun
ting
hous
e as
a m
erch
ant.
He ch
eerfu
lly
help
s Pip
thro
ugh
all o
f Pip
's st
rugg
les.
Them
es
Ambi
tion
& S
elf
Impr
ovem
ent
Socia
l Cla
ss
Crim
e &
Gui
lt In
noce
nce
&
Just
ice
Fam
ilial
Co
nnec
tions
Re
veng
e Re
dem
ptio
n Av
arice
Se
tting
Voca
bula
ry
Fade
d Op
ulen
ce
Dila
pida
ted
Here
dita
ry
Priv
ilege
Su
perio
r
Ostr
acise
d
Gent
eel
Retic
ent
Pros
pero
us
Corr
upt
Woe
bego
ne
Inco
ngru
ous
Para
doxic
al
Path
etic
Falla
cy
Impu
dent
Vene
rate
Disp
arity
Rem
uner
atio
n
Episo
dic
Oste
ntat
ious
Prop
itiat
ion
Bene
fact
or
Prol
ix
Reve
nant
Mal
igna
nt
Port
ento
us
Clem
ency
Grea
t Exp
ecta
tions
: Kno
wled
ge O
rgan
iser