Posts on Teaching
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The wrong ends of the constructivist stick
Despite the perennial debate on whether teachers should “just tell” or not, both sides of the discussion tend to accept constructivism. Constructivism is a stance on learning which broadly says that students construct meaning in their own minds. Constructivism, however,…
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Understanding isn’t just knowledge (& how we can teach it)
The knowledge-understanding problem is perennially debated. Many sense a difference and argue that we should ensure students learn knowledge and understand it. But others claim that understanding doesn’t exist beyond what you know. The issue begins with an assumption: knowledge…
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The false choice between teaching consistency and teacher autonomy
Education is caught in a debate over autonomy and cohesion. On one side, teachers are demanding professional autonomy: the right to discretion over their lessons. Others are demanding “consistency” through rigid structures and scripts. Neither is fully right. Professional autonomy…
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Direct Instruction’s limits: A nuanced look at Engelmann’s ideas
When Engelmann developed his popular Direct Instruction1, his principle was that students were capable of learning anything. This seems like a good rule to follow; it removes blame from the student. If they didn’t manage to learn something, it was…
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Information theory and why explaining clearly isn’t enough
Claude Shannon’s groundbreaking information theory focused on getting a message from A to B. It’s now one the major underlying theories of the computers we use every day. Its principles also tell us something fascinating about classroom communication: an explanation…
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Does “checking for listening” help learning?
I’ve attended a couple of training sessions as a teacher in which the trainer would ask “check for listening” questions. They’d tell us things and then ask a question to someone chosen at random. “Seriously!?” I’d think, as the question…
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The illusion of knowing the “best” teaching techniques
Recently, a claim has emerged: if leaders are frustrated with teaching outcomes, the fault isn’t the teacher, but the specific techniques (like turn and talk) they’ve been trained to use. And the proposed solution? Swap it for a different technique…
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The pros of teaching without PowerPoint
PowerPoint was a central tool in the community of teachers I was inducted into. Almost everyone I knew used it to develop their lessons (or at least obtain a pre-made one). It was at once a sketchpad for planning as…
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Evidence-based educational movements are actually games
Around 2012ish, a new movement rode into the UK (school) educational scene. It came with the banner of “evidence-based”, to counter the previous movement. I’m not writing to contend whether the movement was right or wrong, but to offer a…
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An edu-fad’s purpose is what it does
Stafford Beer, a systems theorist, regularly claimed that a system’s purpose is what it does. There was no point claiming, he thought, that its purpose was what it consistently failed to do. In this post, I want to apply the…
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Decoupling lower & upper secondary curricula
All systems exist in a constant co-adaptation with their environment. The upper secondary sections (KS4) of England’s schools are continually adapting to their communities, the government’s inspection body (e.g. Ofsted), and standardised exams (e.g. GCSEs). The demands of the standardised…
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Podcast episodes
Cognitive Science and Teaching (2026) Trevor and I discuss how the cogsci revolution in teaching and the problems with a handful of concepts from cognitive psychology being treated like they are the science of learning, as opposed to a collection…