Category Archives: Evidence

What Works for What?

Posted on February 28, 2017 by suecowley

“If you’re not using evidence, you must be using prejudice …” Kevan Collins, EEF In our brave new world of research based this and evidence informed that, I am very much swimming against the tide, because I don’t think we … Continue reading →

Posted in Education, Evidence, Research | 10 Comments

The Slaying of the Mythical Beast

Posted on December 8, 2015 by suecowley

My partner is a big fan of The Walking Dead. He loves to sit and watch people slay the hideously deformed undead in a violent fashion. He can cope with the blood, and the guts, and the gore; he’s happy … Continue reading →

Posted in Evidence, Learning | 2 Comments

The Xylophone Technique

Posted on September 23, 2015 by suecowley

A few years ago, I met a teacher who told me he managed his classroom ‘By Xylophone’. When he said this, my first thought was “say what?”, my second thought was “that sounds cool”, and my third thought was “how on … Continue reading →

Posted in Behaviour, Creativity, Evidence | 3 Comments

The How and The Who

Posted on September 12, 2015 by suecowley

The thing about teaching is that anyone can do it. People do it all the time. This is not to say that anyone should be able to do it in schools; for that you need specialised training. But if you … Continue reading →

Posted in Children, Evidence, Learning, Teaching, Teaching and learning | 2 Comments

Cause for Concern

Posted on January 8, 2014 by suecowley

‘You must understand, sir, that a person is either with this court or he must be counted against it, there be no road between. This is a sharp time, now, a precise time – we live no longer in the … Continue reading →

Posted in Evidence, Government, Learning, Reading, Schools, Systems | 46 Comments

N.I.T.E.

Posted on September 10, 2013 by suecowley

I’ve followed the coverage of the ResearchEd Conference with great interest. By all accounts it was a brilliant experience for those who were able to attend. Congratulations are due to Tom Bennett and Helene Galdin-O’Shea for organising the event. It’s … Continue reading →

Posted in Children, Evidence | Tagged | 1 Comment

Willingham on Willingham

Posted on May 28, 2013 by suecowley

Sometimes the direct approach works best: you just need to ask nicely. I’ve had a brief exchange of emails with the very courteous Daniel Willingham (or Dan). I decided to write after posting this about evidence based teaching. Here’s my … Continue reading →

Posted in Evidence, Teaching and learning | 1 Comment

Searching for the Silver Bullet

Posted on May 26, 2013 by suecowley

You can test for ‘most efficient’, but ‘best’ is a value judgement. I’ve been trying to work out why I’m nervous about all the talk of teaching as an ‘evidence-led profession’. I get all the arguments about why it’s a … Continue reading →

Posted in Children, Evidence, Flexibility, Teaching and learning | 1 Comment

Doing the Data Dance

Posted on May 25, 2013 by suecowley

If I can’t prove it, it doesn’t exist. Uh, perhaps your test just wasn’t very good? If I can’t prove it, it isn’t useful. But intuitively, it works for me. How can you say it’s not useful if I find … Continue reading →

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Making my own Mistakes

Posted on May 19, 2013 by suecowley

I love these words: learning, experience, complexity, uncertainty, experimentation, creativity, communication, language, children, family, love, community, connections, commonsense, intuition, emotion, engaged, sideways. These words are popular right now: certainty, knowledge, rigour, measure, progress, evidence, data, outstanding, standards, efficient. We are … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Evidence, Knowledge, Pedagogy, Risk taking, Skills, Teaching and learning | Leave a comment