Youth Work’s Contribution to the Education of Young People
Youth Work is often valued (particularly by young people) but not always well understood. In this session, you will learn how, via a voluntary relationship with a Youth Worker, young people learn, develop and progress by gaining skills and knowledge in a variety of settings. Youth Work takes place in both formal (e.g. schools, colleges) and less formal settings (e.g. Youth Clubs, Community Centres, hospitals and on the streets), as well as digitally, with a focus on personal and social development. Youth Workers are also skilled at understanding and breaking down barriers preventing access to services such as formal education and many are effective leaders, at all levels.
Gavin Gibbs, Marco Gil-Cervantes
Reading & Writing For Life
Motivating your students through genuine engagement is the route to successful learning. Helping students see how they will be richer from your lessons and the relevance of those lessons to their lives is absolutely essential. Hywel and Martin offer some practical ideas and deep thinking about success in your classroom. They will consider how to tell imaginative stories and develop reading and writing skills useful to the world of the 21st Century. They will also work on writing stories and consider the ways in which reading and writing can broaden your world, your expectations, your confidence and your skills as a communicator. Looking at real writing for real purposes with genuine audiences is at the heart of developing strong approaches to how we read and how we write.
Hywel Roberts, Martin Illingworth
Values as an Organisational Compass
Being a values-based school means following a model of seven elements in every aspect of school life, from how guests are greeted, to how conflict is mediated between pupils. This session will also look at the authentic modelling by adults, developing an inner curriculum, creating a values-based environment and curriculum, developing quality leadership and the development of an ethical vocabulary. During this seminar you will leave with an understanding of how you can breathe even more life into the values of your school and community.
The Importance of Play & Playgrounds for all Children
Reports show that some pupils are finding unstructured playground play and socialisation difficult post-Covid. Many schools are having huge problems in the playground. Play is crucial to children’s wellbeing, resilience and ability to learn, with play laying the foundations for literacy, communication and spontaneity. Jenny will highlight key common issues that are found in playgrounds currently and ways of encouraging healthy, active play, good communication between supervisors and children and ideas that children can help to take responsibility for their behaviour and support the problem-solving process to finding solutions to playground issues.
The Art of Argument
How can children/young people learn to argue skilfully, both emotionally and with good reasons? Argumentation is a key life skill and central to many essays and exams. This workshop will be practical, fun, and give colleagues great techniques for helping your pupils/students to be more reasonable!
13:30 - 14:20
SEN Seminar
Maths – Teach for Today’s World
Curriculums and teaching methods change but is the way we are teaching maths today the best way for those with ALN/SEN? This seminar looks at popular topics such as Money, Time, Times Tables, Data Handling and looks at ways to teach them given the world we live in today. It explores ways to utilise technology and student motivation to teach.
Supporting TAs to Develop Metacognition
The Education Endowment Foundation indicates that explicitly teaching metacognitive strategies, such as planning, monitoring and evaluating, can have a significantly positive impact on pupil outcomes. The guidance report, outlines seven key recommendations, which offer teachers and senior leaders’ practical advice on how to develop their pupils’ metacognitive skills and knowledge, however teaching assistants (TAs) are in fact best placed to achieve this goal. This session will look at ways to support TAs to develop the understanding to help pupils develop independent learning skills and manage their own learning.
Ensuring Behaviour Sanctions Don’t Compound Mental Health Issues
One of the areas education seems to struggle with is behaviour management. We continue to use confrontational, punitive systems that are ineffective. What we also need to address is their impact on the mental health of students, especially Neurodiverse students. This session will look at how common elements of behaviour management systems can be damaging to student mental health, as well as potentially being against safeguarding guidance and The Equality Act 2010. It will discuss how your setting can assess your behaviour management system and make adaptations to reduce the harm for the student.
Cadw a chynnal athrawon o fewn y proffesiwn – beth sydd angen ei feithrin mewn darpar athrawon?
Honnir gan sawl ymchwil bod athrawon ledled y byd yn gadael y proffesiwn un ai yn fuan yn eu gyrfa neu'n ymddeol yn gynnar iawn (Harrison, Newman & Roth, 2006; Perrachione, Rosser & Petersen, 2008; Dolton & Van der Klauuw, 1995). Mae'n broblem byd eang, nid dim ond yng Nghymru. Ond sut mae sicrhau bod athrawon yn parhau ac yn ffynnu yn y proffesiwn? Dewch i ddysgu mwy yn y seminar hwn.