Collins Schools

Secondary RE – How to Debate and Evaluate

Secondary RE – How to Debate and Evaluate

I want to encourage my students to consider different opinions and views towards a social or moral issue, but I also want them to start developing evaluation skills too.

4 min

Secondary Social Sciences – Recap lesson carousel

Secondary Social Sciences – Recap lesson carousel

This lesson evolved from a discussion with a colleague about how we can ask students to recap their knowledge thoroughly, but without endless exam questions and essays. What emerged was so successful that I did it to death that week...

5 min

Primary - Bread Making

Primary - Bread Making

As well as being great fun, bread making takes us back to the very basics of food production and to a time when a happy accident led to flour, contaminated with natural yeasts was left longer than usual on a...

6 min

Secondary RE – Introducing Spirituality

Secondary RE – Introducing Spirituality

Spirituality can be difficult to define and explain, so where can you start when trying to introduce the topic in a meaningful way to a class of 13 year olds?

3 min

Secondary Geography – Geographical Enquiry

Secondary Geography – Geographical Enquiry

One of the most useful tools in the teachers’ toolkit is the work of Margaret Roberts and her ‘cycle of geographical enquiry’.

3 min

Secondary English – Market Place Persuasion

Secondary English – Market Place Persuasion

“Roll up, Roll up!”  Teaching persuasive writing through role play

4 min

Secondary History – Interpreting Sources

Secondary History – Interpreting Sources

Who am I? Students always have problems getting their head around the idea of Interpretations. They look for certainty, and find it hard to grasp that most history is a construct, it is someone’s opinion, put together by carefully selecting...

3 min

Secondary Science – The Nobel Prize for Chemistry

Secondary Science – The Nobel Prize for Chemistry

The “impossible” crystals –  The 2011 Nobel Prize for Chemistry This year’s Nobel Prize for Chemistry has been awarded to Prof. Daniel Shechtman of Israel.

3 min

Secondary RE and PSHE – Enquiry-Based Learning

Secondary RE and PSHE – Enquiry-Based Learning

During an INSET day in September, I was reminded that students learn and remember best when the learning has meaning. Essentially, the learning undertaken within PSHE and RE should have meaning to all...

3 min

Secondary Sociology – Sociological Settler Activities

Secondary Sociology – Sociological Settler Activities

The settler is essentially a thought-based prelude to a starter activity.  In my practice, it’s usually something projected on the interactive white board as students enter the class.  Not only does a good settler maximise a patch of dead time...

4 min

Secondary Sociology – Marxism, Education and Music!

Secondary Sociology – Marxism, Education and Music!

Penned as a critique of the rigid education system of the 1950s, I find that Pink Floyd’s 1979 hit “Another Brick in the Wall” (Part Two) serves as a useful illustration of Marxist concepts.

2 min

Secondary History – How to argue at A Level

Secondary History – How to argue at A Level

Charlotte Grove, History Teacher, Dame Alice Owen’s School Can you negotiate your hostage’s path to freedom? ‘But it’s really hard, it’s a big step up Miss’.

5 min