We invested an hour in a joint planning exercise for the next half term of our scheme of work today and it raised some fascinating questions. Without this discussion we may not have fully addressed the below:
- Are the planned content and activities really ‘teaching to the top’?
- Are we shying away from a difficult topic or is it actually inappropriate at this stage?
- Why did we originally map out two areas of study for this term?
- How much new vocabulary is appropriate? Are we overloading them?
- What sort of analysis questions and which command words?
- Are we using recent CPD input?
- What opportunities are there for interleaving/spaced practice/retrieval of vocabulary from last term?
- Learning the vocabulary definitions before applying it – is this right or should the listening and definitions be combined? (How do we learn musical concepts?)
- Where are the opportunities for meta-cognition?
An hour well spent! Although this process involves an initial input of time, less individual time is spent planning lessons and the focus of future conversations is on the learning experience of the pupils.
Victoria Hughes Ed 