Beyond Good

Join Matt and Femi for the second part of their interview with Barry, as they talk about his leadership style, teaching, developing teachers, SLT and much much more.

Barry Smith was a founding Deputy of Michaela School, Wembley.  The kids’ amazing French and his unique approach to MFL teaching created huge buzz at Michaela.  He went on to become head of Great Yarmouth Charter School - the tenth head in 10 years, at a school that was rated inadequate for a decade.  In 5 months, Ofsted declared Charter, ‘a miraculous turnaround’.  Barry went on to lead the turn around of inadequate Hackney New School.

Barry now works freelance, mostly supporting headteachers with culture, behaviour, courtesy, teaching & learning, systems, and he has his own podcast: Barry Smith Education.

Join Matt and Femi as they talk to Barry Smith about his experience of taking over and turning around a failing school.

Barry Smith was a founding Deputy of Michaela School, Wembley.  The kids’ amazing French and his unique approach to MFL teaching created huge buzz at Michaela.  He went on to become head of Great Yarmouth Charter School - the tenth head in 10 years, at a school that was rated inadequate for a decade.  In 5 months, Ofsted declared Charter, ‘a miraculous turnaround’.  Barry went on to lead the turn around of inadequate Hackney New School.

Barry now works freelance, mostly supporting headteachers with culture, behaviour, courtesy, teaching & learning, systems, and he has his own podcast: Barry Smith Education.

In this episode Femi and Matt discuss what they've learnt and are discovering about coaching: how powerful it is, and how it's harder to do really well than it looks!

In particular they dive into the ideas of sequencing/structuring teacher development, giving the coachee the opportunity to own and unpack what they've done well, and the importance of rehearsal, amongst other things.

They reference the fantastic 'Responsive Coaching' by Josh Goodrich:
https://amzn.eu/d/0bKPFOMq

Pritesh is a science teacher, head of science and assistant head in charge of teaching and learning at Ark Soane Academy.  Known as the best science teacher in the country because of his student’s outstanding results, Pritesh takes us through the what, why and how of his approach to classroom teaching, including direct instruction, rehearsal, participation, the three phases of questioning, independent work, booklets, sequencing, chunking and precision.

Amongst other things, we also discuss the intentional development character, culture and behaviour – things which are evident in abundance when talking to students at Ark Soane Academy.

In this episode Matt talks to Femi about the things he has learnt from his visits to some of the highest-performing schools in the country and reflects on the ways he would change his teaching as a result.

The pair talk about answering in full sentences, paired talk, choral response and rehearsal, amongst many other things.

Get in touch with comments, questions and suggestions: @BeyondGoodPod on X

A short announcement from me to say that we have decided that the last published episode will be the final episode in Season 2, an announcement which simultaneously heralds the arrival of Season 3. 

I’m excited to say that you can expect more guests on the show in the coming series – Our interviews with star science teacher Pritesh Raichura, and eminently sensible super head Barry Smith are both in the editing pipeline, and we’re aiming for something like a 1:1 ratio of episodes with guests to episodes with just me and Femi.  

New series and next episode coming very soon, thank you for your patience, and have a wonderful summer term!

Today Femi and Matt discuss their career changes, both recent (in Matt's case) and forthcoming (in Femi's) and how they are thinking about teaching and learning, and education going forward.  This context should throw some light onto some of the conversations they have had recently or that are coming up.  

The discussion today was prompted by a listener question about students being late to lessons, so Matt and Femi each give their take on that.  They discuss what they think the relevant psychology is and how they each handle this situation.  They talk about whole-school policies and dealing with a culture of lateness as middle and senior leaders – and different ways that schools approach the starts and ends of lessons, as well as transitions.  Femi and Matt also muse on some of the interesting situations they’ve faced in which the more effective approach contradicted school policy. 

The topic of today’s discussion is Matt's visit to Ark Soane Academy, and in particular the impressive whole-school culture and the remarkable impact of that on student behaviours, attitudes and learning.  Femi and Matt talk about the best science lesson Matt has ever seen, and wider discussion about starting and running schools and embedding shared routines across the school.

As always, all questions or comments welcome: @beyondgoodpod on X.

The topic of discussion this week is warning systems – so very much a behaviour-based episode rather than a maths one.  
Matt and Femi cover a fair bit of ground: from classrooms with names written on the board and hundreds of warnings being issued each day through to classrooms with no warnings and students absorbed in their work.  And from supporting colleagues with behaviour issues through to the prospect of creating a school-wide culture around behaviour that leaves deleterious learning behaviours at the school gates.