Grab and Go Guides

Towards the end of last year I wrote an article on how most music teachers use metacognition in the classroom. This is an area I feel passionate about as a teacher. I hope you find the strategies here useful. 

 I was asked to review Rappin the Classroom by Francis Winston for Music Teacher magazine. I loved this book (apart from a few publishing issues) and highly recommend you get a copy if, like me, you’re not overly confident or comfortable teaching rap. 

 As part of my ongoing thoughts on ways to reduce workload I wrote an article for Music Teacher magazine on using DAWs (Digital Audio Workstations) and other technology to reduce workload whilst also keeping an ongoing record of student progress over time. This can be accessed here . If you have further ideas on how to use DAWs and technology to reduce stress/workload share them below. 

 Over the past few years I have often felt like I had reached the end of what I could do. At one point, about 3 years ago, I literally did and ended up off work for 3 weeks. Since then I have been reading and researching techniques I could use to help myself. I will freely admit I do not have all the answers. I still get to the point of feeling overwhelmed and over-stretched in my working life. But I do have better strategies to deal with it.  Multiple times I have sat down with trainee teachers and ECTs to discuss how they can use ‘cheats’ to help them manage. When experienced staff overhear they then start to use them too. It made me realise that we are not talking enough, not sharing enough, about how to deal with the stress of the job. This made me start to research the current situation in teaching. In turn I started to write articles (like this one for Music Teacher magazine  on using technology to help music teachers) and give presentations and workshops on differe...