Teachers Best Practices

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  • Five Tips for Getting and Maintaining Children’s Attention

    No matter how well you know your stuff, sometimes the hardest part is just getting kids to pay attention long enough to learn something. A few helpful tips to maintaining your young students’ attention are:

    1. Reach out

    Instead of calling out to a child across the room, try going to them, positioning your body at their level and requesting in a firm but friendly voice to look at you before beginning your discussion.

    2. Use attention grabbers

    Use sensory motivational devices with varied colours, textures, shapes, movements, smells or sounds to help them focus. Warm, soft colours and an orderly environment can help with kids who may get over-stimulated.

    3. Be playful

    You can use a dramatic voice, sensational hat, clapping, a secret hand sign for them to duplicate or rolling a ball to each child to keep them alert.

    4. Describe what you see

    Refocus their attention by labelling activities or objects and talking or asking about the similarities and differences.

    5. Be clear and specific

    Keep directions short, direct and simple. Avoid saying ‘don’t’ statements, instead clearly say what they need to do.

  • Here Are The Top Reasons To Become A Supply Teacher

    Are you thinking about becoming a teacher or are you currently a teacher, but looking for a slightly different role? If so, then consider becoming a supply teacher. There are many reasons to become a supply teacher, and the top ones include:

    1. Flexibility Scheduling
      The first reason to specialise in supply teaching Cambridge is that your schedule will be flexible. In general, you can work a three day week, which allows you to enjoy more time off. It also frees up time for you to work a second job, if that’s what you want to do.

    Teachers tend to work on a traditional schedule and a set schedule. This doesn’t work for everyone. If you want flexibility and you want to teach for a living, then you’ll want to look into becoming a supply teacher.

    1. Entry To Teaching
      Supply teaching is a great entryway into teaching. If you currently don’t have your NQT, then working as a supply teacher is for you because you’ll learn about vacancies as they come about. Not only that, but you’ll have experience and you’ll gain a competitive edge over other applicants.
    2. Not A Lot Paperwork
      Many teachers become stressed out due to the paperwork involved with their job. They have to do things such as marking, set targets and do a lot of planning. While many teachers enjoy what they do, the amount of paperwork can leave them feeling drained.

    As a supply teacher, you won’t deal with a lot of paperwork. It’s possible that you’ll simply go into work and be able to leave on time. Best of all, the chances are you won’t be bringing any work home with you.

    1. Work At Multiple Locations
      Supply teachers have the opportunity to work at multiple locations, as they are not tied down to a permanent position. This means you can “sample” different types of schools, locations and so forth. This isn’t possible if you take up a permanent teaching position.

    Plus, this allows you to scope out different prospective employers before you lodge an application for a permanent position. However, you might like working on a temporary basis and having the freedom to work at various locations. If that’s the case, then feel free to continue doing this.

    Those are the top reasons to become a supply teacher. If you want to enjoy a flexible and rewarding career, then consider working as a supply teacher. All you have to do now is gain the qualifications required to be a supply teacher or start applying for supply teaching jobs.

  • Why do so many businesses spend thousands of pounds to recruit one individual?

    With social media and job board websites that are relatively cheap to access, why do so many businesses still spend thousands of pounds on recruitment? For many jobs, it makes perfect sense for the business to recruit on their own, using many of the tolls available to them, such as LinkedIn advertising or posts onto job boards, not to mention the free avenue; word of mouth. There is now such thing as cheap recruitment, thankfully, and more businesses should take advantage of this. Of course, there are cases whereby specialist help is required. This could be a particular industry or niche where you’re looking for a very specific and talented individual, and unfortunately the job boards aren’t going to cut it, especially when we start considering ‘head hunting’.

    What is head hunting?

    It’s a technique that’s used when there is a very defined background from which the recruiting company is looking for. It’s ideal for when someone wants a person ‘who is from a competitor’ or where that particular expertise is employed in similar, but not competitive organisations. In the case of headhunting, many of the cheap recruitment options simply won’t cut the mustard.

    So, putting these recruitment situations aside what are some of the top cheap recruitment options for small businesses? One kind of recruitment that seems to be growing in popularity, especially for small firms, is flat rate recruitment. This kind of recruitment is where you pay an individual or agency a flat rate and they then dish your advert out across social media and job boards. This is a wise option for those who simply want to get their advert out there for hundreds of people to see, and if it’s a job where you know you’ll have many qualified applicants who are interested, it’s a great way to spread the word and receive plenty of CVs to go through. Some of the flat rate agencies will even filter the CVs for you and order them fro most qualified to least, so you can have almost all of the work complete by paying just a few hundred pound. This was unthinkable just a few years ago.

    Of course, with LinkedIn as a business orientated social media platform, you can use the advertising feature yourself, spending just a few hundred pounds to spread the word about the opportunity available in your workplace. This can be just as cheap as flat rate recruiting, however, and to ensure your ads are optimised you’ll need to learn a little about LinkedIn ads, so perhaps choosing a social media agency or flat rate recruiter to help is a wise option.

    There are of course still the tried and tested traditional methods, such as advertising your job in the local paper and nowadays these are published in print and online, so the reach is still relatively good. Adverts in local papers are often viewed with more trust than a listing on a job board, and you can choose to have candidates email their CV and cover letter over, or call you to learn more.

  • What does it take to be a great teacher?

    There are some things that one must do to become a great teacher as we are going to discuss in this blog post. To be most loved among the little children you require something beyond learning. You should be a very friendly but then a strict individual to be able to teach in a school. There are numerous approaches to be a great teacher yet the mystery lies in incredible relational abilities. It’s exceptionally fundamental that a teacher talks well. Listening is likewise another fundamental part of becoming a great teacher.

    Tolerance is another key necessity that makes one a great teacher. You ought to understand that your understudy isn’t at standard with your insight and that it will require them much time to comprehend what you can comprehend in just a second. Likewise, every understudy is a quick learner. Hence you need to have tolerance with every one of them and ensure to be their top pick.

  • What is the average teaching salary in the UK?

    According to the some of the latest statistics, the average teaching salary in the UK is £23,000, however, when you’ve worked in the industry for over 10 years as a teacher, this reaches around £28,700. With the average salary in the UK being £27,600, it’s a wonder why so many people are drawn to teaching. If you think long and hard about the training you need to go through to become a teacher as well as the hard work you have to put in each and every day, then it’s difficult to see what the hype is all about. This is why it’s so true that to become a teacher, you have to have a passion for teaching and a love of pupils. It’s the same for nurses in the UK. They’re paid very badly compared to non-specialist roles in the UK, but to be successful as a nurse or a teacher it can’t be about the money, it’ has to be about your passion, love and level of care for the individual you’re helping.

  • Types of teaching career options available for all levels of teachers

    Career in education is a great challenge in itself yet rewarding. A teacher is one of the most important aspects in sculpting a whole generation. Therefore, it is important a person opting for teaching career should be calm, patient and should have a thorough knowledge of the subject and will of learning new things.

    As we go from school to college and for higher education, every teacher in these education institutes holds a different degree and license to teach a particular subject to a particular grade. Teaching career goes beyond the teacher communicating with a mass of students in the class. we have outlined a few teaching career options available for all levels of teachers. (more…)

  • The importance of teachers nameplates in schools

    What is in a name?

    It’ one’s own brand, something that you’re identified by, anytime, anywhere. Well, have you been at a hospital and noticed how nurses and doctors display their names on nameplates? This is not only merely to reveal part of their identity, but also to ensure patients know who to refer to, whilst a name and job title can ensure people know who to go to for particular purposes.

    Likewise, teachers are role models to students and should show pride in their work by having their name and job title on show at any time within schools. Displaying nameplates indicates that the teachers are proud of their career and are not shy of being associated with this noble profession. It is a sign of self-confidence in teaching as a career, but of course, there’s much more to a nameplate or name tag than that. (more…)

  • Textbooks vs iPads

    UK schools spend a significant amount of their budgets on top quality gadgets that can facilitate the teaching process, and it’s not uncommon to walk into a classroom nowadays to see 30 odd students using iPads.

    That said, there is some debate over how useful these are, as they can be rather distracting. As an example, with a textbook, all the students can focus on is the text in front of them, they’re then more likely to absorb that information and process it. Whilst iPads may also be used for other apps, games and websites, so it could be a little easier for a student to go off topic. Of course, teachers can set up the iPads in ways that keep them focused, perhaps using passwords to keep the children in the app, but are costs going to waste on tech our kids don’t need, and should students just use textbooks most of the time instead? Let us know what you think about this one.

  • Making it through your first week in a new school

    As a teacher, it can be quite nerve-wracking to move to a new school. You have so many names to remember, and not just the students but teachers too. It does take some time to settle in, and you will probably feel like everyone is staring at you at times, but that’s exactly why confidence is needed, and it will prevail. If you are relatively new to teaching, it’s important you understand that the way things worked in your last school may not be the same this time around. Moving to a new school takes time to adapt, so be willing to change your approach, be open to making friends and learning who everyone, is, but most important keep your cool and after a few weeks, everything will start falling nicely into place. You can then begin to flourish in your new school and you’ll then be showing someone else the ropes.

  • 3 signs that say you’re not cut out to be a teacher

    There are certain traits that people need if they want to have a successful career as a teacher, and if you don’t possess these qualities, you may want to consider another career.

    Patience

    Without patience, you may struggle to adapt in a classroom. There will be such a diverse range of students and you have to have the patience to really get the best out of each individual.

    Attention to detail

    You have to know your course material inside and out, but you also have to have a keen eye to see which pupils are doing well and which pupils need more of your time to see better results. It’s all about being on the ball at all times, which isn’t easy.

    Confidence

    If you lack confidence in the classroom the students will sense it, and that can be a major problem. They need to respect you, and the only way they will is if you really own that classroom and ensure they know who is in charge.