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What does learning at Oxbridge entail?

Mrs Hattie Franklin, Head of Year 12 and Oxbridge Coordinator (Arts and Humanities), explores what learning at Oxbridge entails and how the Oxbridge and Academic Scholarship programmes can help WHS students with their applications and developing their attitude to their own intellectual curiosity and passions.

Oxford and Cambridge are two of the oldest and most famous universities in the world, ranked at the top of the league tables and justifiably revered for nurturing academia across all disciplines. The undergraduate offering is a world class education and students from all over the globe vie for places in the hope of gaining a well-respected degree which unlocks opportunities in life after university. The myths surrounding the interview process are legendary, the pace of the teaching is fast, demanding and rewarding, the co-curricular offering is rich, and some of the traditions are just a little quirky. But, with competition for places more intense than ever and no guarantee of a successful application, it can be an intimidating challenge to take on. So, I would like to talk through an overview of an Oxbridge education in this article and explain why it is perhaps a little more accessible than you might think.

What kind of thinker are you?

Are you naturally curious, question what you learn in lessons and enjoy debating hot topics with your peers and your teachers? Do you live by the Socratic maxim that ‘the unexamined life is not worth living for mankind’? If so, the Oxbridge teaching model might well suit you. The core teaching for each subject is based around conversations, normally between two or three students and their tutor, who is an expert on that topic. These are called tutorials (Oxford) or supervisions (Cambridge), and they offer a chance to talk in-depth about a topic and to receive individual feedback on your work. To prepare for each meeting with their tutor, students will have read the books on the reading list and prepared an essay a week, or sometimes, two. There is also a requirement to attend lectures, seminars and classes on a weekly basis to supplement learning. Terms are shorter than other universities’ and are only 8 weeks long which means that preparatory work for each term is set for the preceding holiday and examined in the week before term officially begins. So, in addition to strong academic ability, you need to have mastered those important study skills of organisation and time management and be motivated to study independently.

How do I know if it’s the right thing for me?

There is no typical Oxbridge student and no single experience. Students who are passionate about their subject, diligent, driven and, most of all, have a love of academic exploration are already embodying many of the qualities necessary to apply and to succeed. It is never too early to embrace academic excellence and WHS has a varied and exciting Academic Scholarship programme to inspire pupils at every Key Stage, including Rosewell and Explore lectures, subject societies and academic extension clubs, WimTalks and Symposia, masterclasses and more informal discussion groups such as the hugely popular Tea and T’inking. In our new STEAM tower, and through our STEAM+ initiative, we have a brilliant new space specifically designed to help ingenuity to flourish and allow creative experimentation in inter-disciplinary learning. The scholarship programme is a warmly inclusive one: a desire to challenge oneself and venture into new areas of interest are the only criteria for involvement. More on our WHS offering across the school can be found in Mr Addis’s blog here https://wakelet.com/wake/amIaQ4T3b_jPHEuEUGf3v

Above: Sixth Formers studying in the Common Room

I’ve decided to apply: now what?

Every student who decides to apply for Oxbridge will have access to individual and group support as part of the Oxbridge preparation programme. The programme is officially launched in the Spring Term of Year 12 and we assign students a mentor in their subject, with whom they will meet regularly to discuss and develop their areas of interest. The best candidates drive their own mentoring sessions, bringing ideas to the table and challenging themselves to think around their subject. Importantly, it should not feel like ‘extra’ work but an opportunity to explore areas that have particularly piqued your interest in lessons. A favourite author, a specific and niche period of History, a passion for Greek tragedy or a love of linguistics: there are no set boundaries and the world of academia really is your metaphorical oyster!

The application process

Oxbridge applications need to be submitted earlier than other universities, and students will need to finalise their Personal Statements in the summer holiday of Year 12, ready to review and send to UCAS before October half term. You will focus also in the Autumn term of Year 13 on preparing for any aptitude test and, if invited for one, your interview.

Urban myths abound about the ‘dreaded’ Oxbridge interview: as I prepared for my own, I was horrified to be told stories of the naïve student who was asked to throw a brick through a (closed) window or the hopeful who, when asked by the interviewing don to ‘surprise me!’, set fire to his interviewer’s newspaper with unfortunate consequences. The reality for me was a very accessible and interesting conversation about Medea and other Euripides plays, which I had nominated in the interview as my specialist subject, a few difficult questions to prompt lateral and dynamic thinking, and absolutely no requests to destroy any element of my tutor’s study.

Interviews can be unnerving: they are, by and large, a new experience in an unfamiliar place but your interviewer is on your side and will not expect you to be a global expert on your A level subject. At interview, the best candidates present their ability, interest and potential, and are encouraged to apply their knowledge to new problems.

You will be expected to engage in an intense academic conversation to allow you show what you know but also to demonstrate that you would flourish in a tutorial-style learning environment. There will be a few unexpected questions; primarily to stop you reciting your carefully learned, heftily rhetorical speech on why Homer is the best poet that the world has ever seen (He is. But your interviewer also knows that). Thinking hard, pausing to collect yourself, being measured, coherent and eloquent in your responses are all components of a good interview which will hopefully be enjoyed by both sides. With regards to preparation, practice is key to help you acclimatise to nerves and think quickly and logically, so do take advantage of any opportunities organized by the school and independently if you can.

Above: Year 12 Science

Fortes fortuna adiuvat

The highly competitive nature of the application process and the extra effort involved proves to be too much of a gamble for some. In addition, on review of the courses available, other students conclude that their dream university course is not to be found at Oxford or Cambridge. However, pupils who are confident, highly academic and have an intrinsic love of learning should certainly seek advice about Oxbridge application from the teacher of their favourite subject or the WHS Sixth Form Team. Whatever the outcome, the experience of an application will be an intellectually enriching and stimulating one, and it could result in three or four years of an unforgettable undergraduate educational experience.

Moreover, in addition to the academic experience, Oxford and Cambridge also both offer a vast range of activities to be enjoyed outside of tutorials, from debating in the Oxford Union to the Cambridge Footlights; from college choirs to becoming a sporting Blue; plus many of the usual student societies. Do contact me or Mrs Nicolas (for STEM subjects) or myself if you would like to find out more.

And one final word of advice about that interview: do have something in your arsenal which does not involve arson itself, on the off-chance that a world expert actually does ask you to ‘surprise them’…

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The positive geographies of Covid-19

Dr. Stephanie Harel, Acting Head of Geography, explores the positive geographies of our current global pandemic, including a stronger local sense of place and a greater environmental consciousness.

As an educator, I concern myself every day with demonstrating how and why “Geography matters”. Central to our discipline, and indeed my own academic interests, is the often-contested concept of ‘place’. At its heart, lies the notion of a meaningful segment of geographical space, although what is also important to understand, is that places are dynamic and multifaceted[1]. Recently, I introduced our Year 12 students to these ideas, as part of the Changing Spaces, Making Places unit in our OCR specification. Over the past three weeks, we have explored the difference between ‘place’ and ‘space’, the characteristics that constitute a place profile and how perception of place can vary depending on factors such as age, gender and personal experience. Lively class debates have discussed how people can see, experience and understand place in different ways and, perhaps most importantly, how our relationships with places can change over time.

I love teaching this unit, because it aligns with my own research interests and allows me to delve into what was the focus of my doctoral thesis. My PhD explored the complexities of people’s emotional response to disasters. Acknowledging that people negotiate their emotions in different ways, my thesis demonstrated the complex ways that emotions influence how the disaster displaced relate to ‘home’ in the aftermath of disaster. As a practitioner, I see much value in using this research to develop students’ understanding of how the concept of place works in practice. During Guided Home Learning, for example, I relished the opportunity to teach a two-week segment as part of the Geography elective for Years 11-13, which explored the ‘Emotional Geographies of Home’. In our sessions, I shared stories from real people who had lost their homes as a result of the 2011 flood event in Brisbane, Australia, and 2011 earthquake in Christchurch, New Zealand. As I explained to my students, the aim of my PhD research was to extend geographic knowledge on the emotional dynamics of natural disasters. However, I also aimed to contribute to debates within our discipline about how places can be disrupted and altered in a myriad of ways and as a consequence of both physical and human processes. Again, these sessions promoted incredibly rich discussions. The level of independent thought and active enquiry shown in students’ post-course reflections showed deep engagement with course content, on both an academic and a personal level; as a teacher, it was richly rewarding to read these reflections.

While my doctoral research was carried out within the context of natural disasters, I believe there is huge potential to explore these ideas further, within our current global climate. Media outlets across the country are presenting the endless disruption caused to places as a result of the COVID-19 global pandemic. This is important, of course; the economic and social consequences of COVID-19 will undoubtedly be severe and long lasting. Still, I would like to intervene amidst what sometimes feels like a barrage of negativity. I want to suggest that there are many positive ways in which the pandemic has altered places around the world, at a variety of different scales. The following, therefore, is what I deem to be ‘The positive geographies of COVID-19’:

A stronger ‘sense of place’

When I was researching in Brisbane and Christchurch, and indeed for my Masters research in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina[2], one of the positive outcomes of the experience of a natural disaster was the way in which communities came together in the face of crisis. My research exemplified how emotions play a key role in the construction of place and many of my interview narratives demonstrated the value of social capital in the aftermath of catastrophe. Narratives of those who were displaced and subsequently returned to post-earthquake Christchurch, for example, discussed the importance of community support networks and the strengthening of their local neighbourhoods in the aftermath of the earthquake. From what I’ve seen in 2020, the same concepts ring true during a global pandemic.

Above: Hurricane Katrina Flooding, Pixabay

In Geography, a ‘sense of place’ refers to a feeling of belonging; a strong identity that is deeply felt by inhabitants and visitors. It is often a term used by humanistic geographers to describe our attachment to specific locations[3]. I would argue that with communities coming together to clap for NHS carers and networks of volunteers supporting vulnerable members of their communities, lockdown deeply enhanced our local sense of place. It also, I believe, caused us all to redefine our relationship with ‘home’, purely because we spent such an unusually large amount of time there. Socially distanced neighbourhood street parties and road WhatsApp groups where neighbours could check in on each other became the new norm. The 75th anniversary of VE day saw us all aptly enjoying the sound of ‘We will meet again’, celebrating with our local communities, from the comfort of our own driveways. In a personal capacity, lockdown resulted in a significant increase in the amount of time I was able to spend with my husband and young daughter; time I will cherish. I was able to witness my daughter’s first wobbly steps, knowing this was only possible because I was working from home. I then watched her grow confidence as she navigated the potholes along our road, cheered on (from a distance) by our kind neighbours.

Although I have long explored the concept of ‘place’ and acknowledged the way in which places are constructed by humans and human interactions, COVID-19 illuminated this reality in a way I never expected. Places truly are defined by the people within them; it is the experiences we have, and the relationships and memories we create that make geographical locations meaningful. The stronger sense of local place I feel towards my local community is evidence of this, but I am also struck by heightened sense of place created here at school as a result of the pandemic. Despite lockdown, our community remained united – Together Apart – and I think this unwavering sense of place experienced at Wimbledon High School during a time of national crisis is worthy of celebration.

Environmental consciousness

As well as teaching the core Human Geography Unit in Year 12, I also teach our Year 13 Geographers the core Physical systems unit, ‘Earth’s Life Support Systems’. Content within ELSS incorporates an understanding of our global water and carbon cycles, the consequences of human activity on these natural systems and the importance of management strategies which protect our vulnerable planet. Carbon emissions remain one of the world’s most significant environmental concerns. Emerging and developing countries, such as China and India have long been at the top of the contributor list for global greenhouse gas emissions. Interestingly, however, the pandemic has shut down industrial activity and temporarily slashed air pollution levels all around the world.

Above: Pollution levels in China in 2019, left, and 2020. Photograph: Guardian Visuals / ESA satellite data

I find myself wondering: Inadvertently, is this the largest scale pollution experiment the world has ever seen? Could this be the outcome of moving towards a low-carbon, green, economy in the future? And it is not just our dominant developing countries that have seen the positive effects of lower carbon emissions as a result of COVID-induced lockdowns. Italy’s usually heavily congested roads substantially reduced levels of traffic, resulting in drastically lower nitrogen oxide levels in the country[4]. The positive environmental consequences of this are unprecedented and offer an opportunity to think more critically about the implications of our everyday practices.

In addition to the global decline in factory pollution, it is also worthy to acknowledge the positive implications associated with a reduction in air travel as a result of national lockdowns around world. Today’s society is a society (normally) on the move. With the development of mass automobility and aeromobility, the scale of our travel has grown immense, and social life and social organisation are increasingly dependent on mobility[5]. COVID-19, however, has restricted our international mobility in a way that feels almost unnaturally authoritarian. While of course I acknowledge the challenges associated with being bound within our national territories, I’d also like to highlight the positives. The outcome of an inability to travel abroad is an increase in local and national ‘staycations’. I admit that I am someone who has lived in Australia and the USA, but never been to the Peak District. I’ve travelled to Singapore but haven’t explored many of the islands from my Scottish homeland. What COVID-19 has allowed for is an appreciation of the natural beauty that surrounds us not only in locally in London and the South-East, but all over the British Isles. As a nation, our inability to holiday overseas has increased an awareness of our local geographies, prompting an enjoyment of these local landscapes and the wonders that surround us, and sparking a renewed environmental awareness that aims to preserve them.

So then, it is pertinent to remember that 2020 is not a year to write off; perhaps it is, instead, a year full of opportunities. A time to connect and reconnect. A chance to acknowledge the beauty of our local surroundings and reconsider the impact our patterns of consumption so that we can rectify our environmental impact. As a geographer, I have long been fascinated by the relationship between people and places. I hope this post has demonstrated how geographers can offer some very useful ideas for making sense of our current situation; what has happened, what we might be feeling, and how we might go forward – stronger than before.

References:

[1] Cresswell, T. (2004) Place: A short introduction. Blackwell Publishing

[2] Morrice, S. (2012) Heartache and Hurricane Katrina: Recognising the influence of emotion in post-disaster return decisions. Area 45(1), 1-7.

[3] Massey, D. (2005). For Space. London: Sage.

[4] Watts, J. & Kommenda, N. (2020) Coronavirus pandemic leading to huge drop in air pollution. Accessed at: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/mar/23/coronavirus-pandemic-leading-to-huge-drop-in-air-pollution

[5] Gustafan, P. (2014) Place attachment in an age of mobility. In Manzo and Devine-Wright Place (eds.) attachement: Advances in Theory, Methods and Application. Routledge, 2014.

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STEAM+

Suzy Pett, Director of Studies, and Richard Bristow, SMT Secondee, discuss Wimbledon High’s unique STEAM+ strategy.

 

We’ve had a whole two weeks of inhabiting the new STEAM Tower. It’s beautiful, airy and light. However, it represents so much more than simply a new, physical space. I’m reminded of the poet Emily Dickinson who writes about a “certain slant of light” where “internal differences are”. And that’s the point. The tower is physically very different, but it represents the deeper, inner differences to the way we think about learning here at WHS.

First, we had STEM, that initiated the idea of interdisciplinary learning.

Then, we the realised that with the creativity of Arts, the problem-solving potential to real world problems was magnified. So, we developed STEAM. We need the imaginative, ethical, social and historical capabilities of the Arts to allow us to rigorously contemplate the complex issues of the 21st century. And my goodness have we shown our STEAM real-world problem-solving capabilities. Just last week we heard that our students were winners of the air pollution study by Bristol ChemLabS. Some of our students have worked with UCL’s Mullard’s Space centre to analyse data about the erosion of the Earth’s plasmapause, while others are almost ready to publish Sport Science research on the Wimbledon Championships in partnership with the All England Lawn Tennis & Croquet Club. Recently, our Year 11-13s have been working with the Wellcome Sanger Institute (near Cambridge) as well as ELLS lab in Heidelberg Germany on bioinformatics projects. Not many school students ever have the opportunity to participate in ‘real’ research that could be published in scientific journals, but we do.

Now we are in the next phase of our evolution. That is STEAM+. Whilst maintaining the integrity of STEAM and its problem-solving potential, we are capitalising on the myriad of different connections between all subjects with STEAM+.

Why this is ethos is vital, is best explained by our Year 13 STEAM+ subject leaders.

Above: WHS Chemistry class, by Zest photos

Maddy:

“The principles of STEAM+ have been useful in allowing me to combine my interest in both the humanities and sciences. I found it very difficult to decide between the two when choosing my GCSEs and A levels. However, I have discovered opportunities in North America that allow me to continue to pursue interdisciplinary study at university level. Their system of combined majors and minors enables students to explore various subjects and the connections between them, thus specialising their course to their interests, lending itself perfectly to the idea of STEAM+.”

Karimah:

“My interest in STEAM probably stemmed from a visit to the Science Museum about 7 years ago – that, and my mega fascination with Doctor Who. The million-dollar “Bionic Man” had just been unveiled, complete with its own set of artificial organs, synthetic blood and robot limbs, all of which could potentially be fitted into a human body. Although I didn’t understand anything at all about how it worked (bearing in mind I was about 9 at the time), I was intrigued by the notion that science, technology, engineering, art and maths combined had accomplished something so remarkable and could benefit so many people.”

 

Above: WHS Biology, by Zest Photos

Sophie:

“I am studying Chemistry, double Maths, and English, aiming to study Green Chemistry at university. With regards to being a STEAM+ subject leader, the links between humanities and science is what first got me interested in pursuing a science degree, having for example read a book called Napoleon’s Buttons which talks about the significance of specific chemical molecules in historical events. This showed me how important interdisciplinary learning is, and has encouraged me now to find ways to combine different subjects, leading to my interest in the green aspects of chemistry which not only has a scientific backbone but also requires thought about social and political matters.”

Lena:

Above: VR Headsets in class, 2019

“I became a Steam + leader due to my appreciation in combining both my creative and scientific demand. My infatuation in applying both design and technology was prompted further by a trip I took to the German Cinematic Museum in Berlin. There I was presented a variety of virtual headsets – when worn, these headsets borne different combinations of the virtual and real world. Here I was introduced to the future of VR, AR and MR. These devices could either create completely virtual and explorable environments, or act as extensions of real-world structures. From then on, I have strived to explore ways in which I could utilise this technology.”

Fedra:

Entrepreneur and computer programmer Aaron Swartz says, ‘Be curious, Read widely, Try new things. What people call intelligence just boils down to curiosity”. Climate change is not solely a scientific issue but also a social issue. This is why I decided to become a STEAM+ leader, as the interrelation of my A Level subjects -Geography, Biology and Economics – has enabled me to look through a different lens and a different perspective of climate change, before going off to university to study Environmental Studies

Our five STEAM+ subject leaders have recorded a WimChat podcast, so look out for this on Twitter and our website to hear more about their views on STEAM+ and how it is opening doors for them.

Last week we heard that Martine in Year 11 and Phoebe in Year 10 were both awarded prizes for their writing submitted for the Charles Causley Trust poetry competition.  Reading Martine’s poem, we were struck by how it encapsulates the connections that can be made when subject disciplines dissolve and we can connect our thinking in different ways.

台灣 (Taiwan)

There’s a sense of magic in a place I can only half remember.
Where the faces and names are delicate leaves of my youth, falling in late September
And the neon signs with the squiggly lines glow dimly somewhere in my memory
But the falling leaves are hard to see and evade my grasp in an act of treachery.

The magic of the minute yet colossal differences, the bathrooms, the ads, and the subway.
My young eyes like a camera, spinning and capturing the scene of my beloved Taipei.
From my grandmother and my family came the knowledge of a culture I had amassed
When I could enchant in a language that rolled off my tongue like a spell I cast.

The brutal heat of London these days tugs at a memory in the back of my mind,
Of waiting by the food stall for seconds stretched to hours, pleasant and unkind.
I dream of a return where every piece falls into place
When I’ll feel the heat and humidity wrap me in a soft embrace.

There’s a tugging, restless longing in my heart
For a place I now understand as much as abstract art,
But I know its smells like the lines of my hand
And the sounds of the motorcycles revving were my favorite band.

There’s a chasm in my core when I return to the place I only half remember
Because the night markets are weary and bored and feel like a misnomer.
The dumplings taste all the same and the plane ride was too expensive,
And the disillusioned neon signs reveal the grime that feels incomprehensive.

There’s a suppressed sense that I wish I had never returned,
So it would remain the same golden red forever,
Only half remembered.

Martine’s poem ‘Taiwan’ might not initially appear to be particularly STEAM focused, picturing, through a foggy memory, the images, smells, sounds and beating heart of a city far away. At its core is a nostalgia for a memory – a memory which has greater beauty than the reality later experienced by the author. So what has this got to do with STEAM+?

Well – knowing that STEAM+ allows us to make connections between subject disciplines and to explore the ‘gaps’ between them, we can see many links: between the sprawling city and the people who live there; the sounds of language and the noise pollution of traffic; the role of memory and how we often experience emotions from the past more strongly than emotions from the present.

Above: STEAM Tower

We have a beautiful new STEAM Tower, but STEAM+ is not a place, or a room, but rather a mindset. It is a way of thinking that allows us to not be limited by the subjects we study, but rather encourages us to see links between subjects to look at making connections, exploring new avenues, and solving real-world problems. STEAM+ is for all subjects, and for all students and staff at WHS.

Whether you believe the myth that ‘85% of jobs in 2030 have not been created yet’ or see this as being deeply problematic (it’s only 10 years away..), what we do know is that resilience, creativity, adaptability and critical thinking are going to be highly valued skills for the workforce of the future. Engaging with STEAM+ – our inter-disciplinary exploration programme – will help you to develop these in-demand global skills.

As a school, we want WHS pupils to step out to shape the society in which they live and work. What connection will you find that helps you to do this?

 

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Transitions: stepping in to Year 7

Head of Year 7 Jenny Lingenfelder reflects on encouraging emotional agility during the ‘transition’ phase from Year 6 into Year 7.

We prefer ‘Stepping In’…… I fondly call my new cohort of Year 7s on their first day (or should I say term?), ‘turtles’…. their backpack has their life in it and appears to dwarf them as they wide-eyed, set off down school corridors navigating their way around what will be ‘home’ for the next 7 years.

Even for the majority who are eagerly awaiting the increased independence and exciting changes ahead, transition from primary to secondary school is well known to come with its challenges – both academically and emotionally. One aspect we have been focusing on in the Year 7 pastoral team is that of emotional agility and how to resolve conflict when the ‘friendship issues’ emerge once they have settled in. These are a common and developmentally crucial feature of adolescent life and so our focus is primarily how to navigate them effectively.

Brene Brown’s research into shame and vulnerability over the past twenty years is insightful and brings a wealth of authentic guideposts which can be easily adapted for pastoral care. The crux of her book ‘Daring Greatly’[1] focuses on how we build shields up to protect ourselves from feeling vulnerable such as perfectionism, foreboding joy, playing the victim or the Viking to name but a few. Traits we as adults can all recognise but which start to emerge when we are in the playground. Her strategies to break down these shields include practising gratitude, appreciating the beauty in the cracks, setting boundaries, cultivating connection, being present and moving forward all of which resonate deeply with our pastoral vision at WHS for our young girls in today’s society.

Above: Year 7 Stepping In Ceremony

All well and good but how does this work in practice?

Nicola Lambros’ contribution to the GL Assessment Children’s Wellbeing report[2] this year clearly lays out the correlation between wellbeing and impact on learning. Whilst genuinely complimenting schools on their support for the mental health of their students, she compares some of this help to that of taking paracetamol for a headache – whilst alleviating the pain, it doesn’t help uncover the underlying causes. She has a point. So how do we avoid putting a plaster over these issues? How do we bring about a deep, raw and authentic cultural shift in how we manage teenage behaviour in an ever increasingly sexualised, intrusive and pressurised society where comparison is the killjoy of creativity? How do we go about ensuring the girls develop emotional agility from a young age? And develop self-efficacy which is authentic and whole-hearted, a firm foundation for the teenage years and life in general?

Big questions, but ones we relish in the Year 7 team, especially with the knowledge that scientific research has now proven that the teenage brain has a further burst of growth at this time allowing for the reprogramming of those learnt behaviours which were previously thought of as hardwired and unchangeable. With this understanding, it is an exciting prospect to know we can equip our girls from an early stage with the tools on how to be emotionally agile throughout their teenage years and beyond.

Here are some reflections outlining where we are seeing some fruit:

  1. Practising proactive intervention. When a friendship issue arises, at times getting those involved around the table for a mediation is the best option. It’s uncomfortable (initially) but that vulnerability enables authentic conversation, breaks down walls and provides a way of moving away from blame and forging a pathway forward. Another strategy we have used is the ‘Support Group Method’ which encourages collective responsibility: with the individual’s permission, spilt the form into small groups, share what the problem is and ask for ideas on how to move forward. Getting students to write down their ideas and pop in a box enables more freedom of thought.[3]
  2. The not so nice emotions and how we describe them. Psychologist Susan David in her TED talk ‘the gift and power of emotional courage’[4] maintains ‘tough emotions are part of our contract with life’ and more poignantly ‘discomfort is the price of admission to a meaningful life’. Enabling girls to experience this on their level with a friendship fallout is crucial in helping them develop emotional intelligence. She also stresses that we own our emotions, they don’t own us. So, rather than ‘I am stressed’ using the phrases ‘I’m noticing’ and ‘I’m feeling’ can help embed emotional agility in the long term.
  3. Use of coaching methods. Whether in PSHE lessons or pupil meetings these can equip girls with tools to reach their full potential and prevent bad habits from setting in early. Top performance coach Sara Milne Rowe’s new book ‘The Shed Method- Making Better Choices When It Matters’[5] is illuminating on this topic. She maintains ‘mind energy is the fuel that fires our brilliant human brain and is at the heart of building any new habit- be it a body habit, mood habit or mind habit’ and provides practical examples of how to set goals and achieve them; strategies which can be translated easily into the school setting.
  4. Listen to pupil voice. Whether it is touching base after the first couple of weeks, canvassing opinions on the Year 7 PHSE programme or at the end of a term, we ask our Year 7 girls for feedback regularly which helps enormously to know what is really going on during this phase. One notable occasion is asking the girls to nominate who and why they want to give the Speech Day ‘Grit’ Awards to in the year group. Reading the nominations has each year brought me both to tears and chuckles and reminds me that we wouldn’t have known about the small acts of kindness or bravery that happen on a daily basis unless we asked our girls to tell us.
  5. Thinking creatively. We took Year 7 to see Wicked this year and have incorporated the story into how to approach friendship issues and ideas around acceptance in the wider world. The staff enjoy this just as much as the girls!

It’s an organic and evolving process and one that excites me greatly. Sometimes ensuring a smooth transition process does require a paracetamol or a plaster. However, building emotional agility takes time and effort to adopt as a habit. It is not (as is often perceived) the case of putting on resilient armour reading for battle. Vulnerability is at the core of this approach and that takes real courage. But it is worth it and I feel privileged to work in a place where girls and staff are willing to give it a go.

Jenny Lingenfelder, Head of Year 7


References:

[1] Brene Brown ‘Daring Greatly. How the Courage to be Vulnerable Transforms the Way we Live, Love and Parent and Lead’, 2012

[2] GL Assessment Children’s Wellbeing: Pupil Attitudes to Self and School Report 2018

[3] See Ken Rigby University of South Australia for more detailed information on different intervention approaches, March 2010

[4] Susan David TED talk ‘The Gift and Power of Emotional Courage’, Nov 2017 https://www.ted.com/talks/susan_david_the_gift_and_power_of_emotional_courage

[5] Sara Milne Rowe ‘The SHED METHOD Making Better Choices When it Matters, 2018

 

 

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What is Scholarship?

WimTalks

Mr Dan Addis, Head of Academic Scholarship at WHS, looks at our continuing Academic Scholarship programme and how you can get involved.

How often do you feel you really get to think? I mean, really think. To get your mind around a question, mull it over, think of a variety of angles, add variables, take away variables, introduce other protagonists who could affect the outcome, analyse experts’ views to see what suggestions they have, bring the idea down to the absolute minimum and build it back up.

In the day to day of modern existence, I would suggest this has been a rare occurrence until recently. I have no doubt you have seen umpteen articles on what being in lockdown has allowed people to do, but please forgive me one more example. With the time at my disposal, I decided to take on the burden of cooking ‘proper’ meals (as opposed to pasta and sauce) and the question that appeared to me was “What should I do with this cabbage?”. On the surface, I admit, this seems like a very banal question, not in keeping with the title of this post. However, I had the opportunity to run with it. I immediately ruled out just boiling it as a side, I wanted it as a key ingredient. I could not think of any recipes particularly that had cabbage as a key element, so I had to change my angle. Kimchee perhaps, exciting but not in the flavour spectrum I was looking for. I could add spices, herbs, perhaps a meat option. I ended up with a full roast meal in my head, but that seemed to complex, so I pared it back down. I asked my fiancée what she thought, what flavours she was hankering for. She suggested something hearty with gravy. Excellent call, but just cabbage and gravy? Not enough! I went to the internet, did some research on dishes involving cabbage. I mused on the topic for at least an hour. In the end, I made an Irish colcannon with an onion gravy, garnished with spring onions. It was exactly what I wanted.

I hope there are not too many of you who are looking at this and are exasperated. I was promised Scholarship and I have been given the culinary ravings of some idiot! But consider a different question I grappled with over lockdown. Do I have a philosophy of life? I started by thinking about what is important to me, considering the different aspects of my life that bring me joy or cause me distress. I asked my fiancée about her thoughts regarding what I find important and took on her feedback. I found a Blinkist (link below) page on personal philosophies and learnt the difference between Epicureanism, Daoism, contemporary Islam and more. I thought about it carefully for at least an hour. In the end I decided I am a modern Stoic. It fit my personality and priorities.

If I review the two questions I above, there is only one which many would consider to be worthy of scholarship. But if we look at the processes I went through in each instance, are they particularly different? Were there different skills evident in each instance? I would argue not and believe that the future of Scholarship lies in the broadening of our concept of what Scholarship is away from the traditional models and into more complex and interesting territory.

Above: WimTalks Session

There are two messages I would like to argue for in this blogpost:

  1. Anything can be Scholarship; and I mean anything;
  2. The interesting part of Scholarship is the similarities and connections between the lines of conventional subject knowledge.

To my first point, I would like to turn to Mary Beard. In the introduction to her book “Confronting the Classics” makes the case for the study of Classics not just for the benefit of the individual, but so we are certain that ‘someone’ is studying it. It does not really matter who that someone is, but it is vital that there are experts in the field to ensure knowledge is not lost and context is understood. Without these experts understanding the depth and complexity of a topic, we are bound to fall into clichés and incorrect retrieval of history used to divide us or perpetuate a damaging status quo (gestures at everything).

In the recent Black Lives Matter protests and movements, one of the appeals made towards white allies to the cause was that we educate ourselves. A huge amount of phenomenal material has been designated unworthy of scholarship because it does not fall into the prescribed canon. There have been innumerable posts across social media asking why people have not learnt about Black Wall Street, the true history of colonisation, that Alexandre Dumas was black, and many further examples. I would argue much of this is to do with what we consider worthy of learning.

When establishing the new National Curriculum, the government said they were firmly indebted to the work of E.D. Hirsch, who advocates for a Scholar Academic model in which there is a corpus of information that it is vital to know in order to succeed in our society and have a beneficial education. In this corpus, there are the usual suspects; Troy, British Empire, Holocaust, American Civil War etc. However, there is a distinct lack of inclusion about African history and culture, understanding of Chinese philosophy, Aboriginal oppression across the globe, and other key ideas and stories that are important if we want to build a more united world away from the bastion of the old white men’s club. The National Curriculum is doing a disservice to our children, and I believe the starting point of a shift away from this damaging perspective comes from an acknowledgement that anything can be scholarly. Everything is worthy of study so long as the person is interested and willing to look at the topic in an academic fashion from multiple angles. If we move to this understanding of scholarship, as opposed to a traditional model of what can be deemed scholarly, then we will create opportunities for our students to extend their learning beyond what is expected and have a generation of students who do not put a ranking on knowledge; who do not assume that certain facts, figures and stories have greater worth than others; and who can go into the world open minded and willing to explore without the weight of historical prejudice hanging onto them.

My second point connects prominently to our STEAM+ ideology, now towering in a beautiful physical manifestation at the centre of our school. Within the hierarchy of knowledge, which I discussed earlier, is a rather Victorian perspective on education; that knowledge can be chopped up and distributed to the students in easily differentiated chunks. However, this means that links are missed, the core elements that combine the different subjects are thrust apart. By encouraging the students to focus on whatever they find interesting, whether it is in official curricula or not, we can encourage students to attack a problem from multiple angles, playing with the blurred lines between the subjects, and discovering links that were hidden to them before. Quite apart from the fact that this lateral thinking is a skill that will benefit them in whatever avenue they wish to pursue in later life, it is also fun and rewarding. One of my greatest delights as a teacher is seeing a student’s awe-filled expression when they discover a link between subjects. (My favourite is explaining the connection between the Latin ambulare – to walk, and the modern day ambulance and how it comes from the fact that wounded soldiers on historical battlefields used to be carried away by people walking with a stretcher).

Scholarship should be fun and exciting, and the links students discover are what make it so. It becomes complex, rich and akin to discovery, when traditional learning can be staid, bland and akin to commuting. We need to encourage our students to find the fun of scholarship as that is the greatest gift we can give them.

I shall finish this blog by outlining how we plan to do this in our Academic scholarship programme, which is open to all students who wish to engage with it. Our intention is to encourage individuality. Scholars will be having 1 on 1 meetings with myself each half term to talk with them about their own areas of interest, from football to Hamlet. Whatever takes their fancy, we encourage them to do their own research, explore the topic in detail from a variety of perspectives, and then create something. Over lockdown, several of our KS3 students created short videos on areas of interest, from prized pets to quantum computing (which you can find here), as an example.

The idea is to allow them freedom in their study, away from the traditional academic models. To give them inspiration we also have a variety of different academic opportunities they can engage with. We have the Rosewell lecture programme, which will be done virtually, with speakers due to be announced soon. We will have the Explore programme, where our teachers will delve into topics that are interesting and engaging beyond the set curriculum. Tea and T’inking, a club where students can discuss and analyse topics as random as synaesthesia to meme culture, will be a safe environment where no question is unacceptable and help students stretch themselves intellectually. We also will have the Masterclasses, as mentioned in the co-curricular programme. And more than any of this, I would be delighted to hear from any student who has an area of interest and would like to pursue it. Whether it is writing an article for WimLearn, submitting an essay for a competition, or just discovering something new and wanting to discuss it. Scholarship is for everyone and should be free and open to run in any direction. We are here to help students follow that interest and passion; who knows where it may end up!

I would like to finish this article by returning to my cabbage. I will admit that I did use a particularly ridiculous example to make my point (a classic reductio ad absurdum!). However, did you know that cabbage has been cultivated for over 6000 years, almost longer than any other vegetable? That eating cabbage helps keratin production which leads to healthier hair, skin and nails? That raw cabbage juice is used as headache relief? That cabbage used to be an elixir for baldness? See, even the humble cabbage can be interesting and scholarly!

References:

https://www.blinkist.com/ – website/app that condenses non-fiction books into easily readable chunks or 15-minute podcasts.

Beard, M. (2014) Confronting the Classics: Traditions, Adventures and Innovations, Profile Books Ltd

Hirsch, E.D. (1988) Cultural Literacy: What every American needs to know, Random House USA

McInerney, L. (2012)  Things to know about ED Hirsch and the ‘Common Cultural Literacy’ idea, https://cfey.org/2012/10/things-to-know-about-ed-hirsch-and-the-common-cultural-literacy-idea/

Pigliucci, M., Cleary, S., Kaufman, D., (2020) How to live a good life: A guide to choosing your personal philosophy; Penguin-Random house.

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Community: the crux of the post lockdown classroom

Amidst national concerns about students’ academic progress during lockdown, Suzy Pett, Director of Studies at Wimbledon High, thinks about the far more essential point: that the return to the classroom – and the very act of learning itself – is intrinsically about human connection and communion.

As Director of Studies at Wimbledon High School, now more than ever I am thinking about what our classrooms will look and feel like in September. As a teacher of 10 years, I’m familiar with the end-of-summer surge of excitement and apprehension about school return. Despite the nerves, there is something ritualistic and reassuring about it. In the words of Philip Larkin, we can ‘begin afresh, afresh, afresh’.

But, with Covid-19 having forced us from our physical classrooms for so long, this time it feels different. There is, of course, the fact that classrooms will now look unfamiliar. In a throwback to times gone by, students will all be facing forward, with the teacher pinned to their white board or laptop at the front. However, the changes run deeper. I’ve been thinking through the implications of them on the very way we teach.

Concern about the lack of learning during lockdown is understandably high in the national consciousness. Exasperated parents took to Twitter, wryly pleading for “Alexa [to] please home school my child.” A study by the National Foundation for Educational Research reported that most students did fewer than 3 hours study per day. Educators worked harder than ever to engage and motivate students, with innovative online programs. Fortunately, there were many success stories, and at Wimbledon High our Guided Home Learning allowed students to maintain pace and progress in their education.

However, teachers across the country will be returning acutely aware of the curriculum content they need to cover. They will be detecting where students’ understanding might be shaky from home learning. They will employ their most winning combination of quizzing, questioning and testing to unearth – and then fill – any knowledge or skills gaps. They will be helping students to self-reflect and be ready to proffer feedback. In pursuit of maximum academic progress, classrooms will be aglow with teachers’ voices enthusing, encouraging, cajoling and reassuring their students. There will be – I am certain – no lack of ambition for what this generation of young people will achieve this year.

Though, what is uppermost in my mind as I prepare for school return in September, is the fundamental nature of the classroom as a community. With reports of students feeling increasingly isolated and disconnected in lockdown, it’s even clearer to me that learning is an act that unites. Whilst I am ardent about academic progress, I am far more attuned at the start of this school year to how my methods of teaching can forge those much-needed meaningful, human bonds.

It goes without saying that the soul of the classroom is far more than the acquisition of knowledge. Intrinsic to the very process of learning is human connection and communion. With the flimsy and chimeric relationships on social media, our classroom spaces – and the way we teach – can be a salve for young people needing to feel part of a more stable community. Lesson rules become shared customs. Rigorous class discussion allows every student to have a voice that is heard. Opinions and ideas are shared and probed so that conversation is far more nuanced and rich than social media sound bites. Judging the right challenge and pace of learning creates trust as students rely on each other and their teacher to problem-solve and move forward.

In lessons, we metaphorically go through the woods and come out the other side. Together. Connected. No one is left behind. And, it is teachers’ careful planning and pedagogy that enable this. Online learning went some way to recreate this, but nothing will beat the power of in-person learning to rekindle that sense of togetherness for young people.

Here at Wimbledon High we’ve always believed in the intertwining of pastoral and academic care. They are not separate. As I start this school year and think about my teaching practice for the months ahead, I am convinced of this more than ever.

 

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Celebrating the first year of PPE at Wimbledon High

Ms Suzy Pett, Assistant Head (Teaching and Learning) at WHS, looks back at the end of the first year of the new PPE course studied by Year 10 pupils at WHS.

We are at the end of the inaugural year of our PPE course. We wanted students to look outwards and question the ideologies – political, economic, philosophical – that are influential in shaping our world. One of our school’s key objectives is for each student to “stride out’ and be prepared to “shape the society in which she lives and works’. Our PPE course has certainly helped our Year 10s become savvy and robust thinkers on important global, national and personal issues.

The course ended with students writing their own articles on a topic of their choice. The array of interests was kaleidoscopic! Articles ranged from Kantianism vs Utilitarianism; to immigration; to beauty; to Plato; to student loans; to voting…to Trump…and everything in the middle (including, of course, the impact of Coronavirus). There is no doubt that students have developed mature, thoughtful and increasingly bold voices on these matters. Their articles were hugely impressive.

Here is a small selection for you to enjoy:

Izzy S – Successes of the language of populism

Jasmine H – Student Loans: Friend or Fraud?

Amy C – ‘If Walls could talk!’ – What we can learn from the first modern artist about the value of isolation to our ability to express ourselves

Bella R – Your President

Marianne-K-PPE-Project

 

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Why read?

Book

Mr James Courtenay Clack, English teacher at WHS, argues for a long summer holiday spent reading.

One of the less-heralded benefits of this sorry excuse for a year has been the absence of the daily commute. I only live a short train ride from Wimbledon, but the time that I have saved – which would normally be spent jammed up against other angst-ridden riders of the Tooting-Wimbledon bullet train, listening to Prince through tinny headphones – has been spent pondering the big questions. Mostly. Well, sometimes. Questions such as why study English? Why teach English? Why teach at all?

Photo by Leah Kelley from Pexels

Moving away from the obvious one, I found that my answer to these three questions all linked back to the answer to my first question: why read? There are all sorts of reasons for both studying and teaching English as a subject, but I realised that I teach, idealistic fool that I am, because I believe in the innate good that comes from reading.

For the purpose of this article, I am going to distinguish between studying English Literature as an academic discipline and reading in general, regardless of how easily this distinction crumbles once submitted to further questioning. This is not going to be an essay in defence of the timetabled subject English (for a start, the school mandates that every student study both English and English Literature up to Y11, so there), but one in defence of reading, broadened to include anyone – student, staff member, parent – who might read this article.

So, I ask again, why read? Well firstly, because the things we find in books are as crucial to our survival as food, drink and government-mandated, socially-distanced exercise. The American poet William Carlos Williams wrote that ‘it is difficult to get the news from poems/yet men die miserably every day for lack of what is found there’. There are two ways of looking at this. Primarily, Williams is right, in my experience at least, that books are there to shine a light on what it means to be a human being. This oft-used phrase may sound trite, but that doesn’t detract from the fact that it is essentially true. Whether it is in Borges’ mythical Library of Babel (containing every book ever written and ever to be written) or just in Foyles on the Charing Cross Road, there is guaranteed to be a book on the shelves in which the feelings, tensions, crises or traumas that you currently are experiencing are explored, questioned and perhaps even resolved.

For example: I wouldn’t say that we live in a political climate ruled over by a sometimes charming, always loquacious demagogue, driven to insanity by a long-held grudge and sense of emasculation and who has enlisted the populace to follow him to a shared destruction, but when I read Ishmael’s mix of horror and fascination as Captain Ahab exhorts his crew to pursue Moby-Dick to the ends of the earth and to the ends of their lives, I can’t say that I don’t feel a slight tingle of grim recognition.

Photo by Artem Beliaikin from Pexels

On a less epic scale, I have taken great comfort during the lockdown from reading books published in the early 1920s, in the aftermath of the devastation of the Spanish Flu. I recognise myself, scratching at the front door of my flat like a demented Cairn terrier desperate for a walk, in Clarissa Dalloway’s sheer delight at going out to buy flowers after being struck down by influenza. Do I not too feel ‘what a lark! What a plunge!’ as I leave the house and queue up outside Sainsbury’s? How wonderful to find that moment of recognition, no matter how epic or how mundane, in a book that was published nearly a hundred years ago? How reassuring to realise that for all of our differences (sadly Clarissa and I don’t also have a large Westminster townhouse in common), there is something fundamental to human experience?

These moments of recognition – the realisation that somebody else has felt or thought or experienced what we do now – can sustain us. These moments in reading, where we recognise our own feelings – whether they be of hope or anxiety, love or heartbreak, friendship or loneliness – in others, allow us to see something fundamental about ourselves. The American educator Mark Edmundson, who has written a number of amazing books defending the ideals of a liberal education, writes ‘the reason to read Blake and Dickinson and Freud and Dickens is not to become more cultivated or more articulate… The best reason to read them is to see if they may know you better than you know yourself’.

There has been much debate recently about writers telling stories that are not part of their own lived experiences. This debate is far too nuanced to unpack here, but one thing I find unsettling is the idea of staying in your lane when it comes to literature. I think the second, and perhaps most important, answer to my original question is that reading allows us not only to see our own lives reflected back to us, but also to see what life is like for people whose experiences are almost completely alien to our own. Here, the importance of reading comes not just from the content of a book (Moby-Dick, say) but from the act of reading itself. I have no real understanding of what life would be like on a 19th Century whaling voyage and, like most people, am horrified by the idea of killing whales and yet Moby-Dick is my favourite book. By reading the book, I must leave my own life behind and spend time in another one. To go back to Edmundson again, we read ‘because, as rich as the one life we have may be, one life is not enough.’

To pick another example, in my Caribbean Literature elective with Y11 and Y13, I have asked my class to put themselves in the shoes of indentured Indian labourers in Trinidad, a Saint Lucian fisherman who works in the same waters into which the bodies of his ancestors were thrown during the Middle Passage and an apparently mad woman who is locked in the attic by her uncaring husband. All of these things are so beyond our own lived experiences that reading becomes an exercise in extending empathy.

It is no secret that we experience the world in different ways and that at this moment, the world seems particularly divided. No matter what the cause of these divides – whether it be how we experience race, gender, sexuality, or class; our views on Brexit or Trump or globalisation – there is always something to be gained from looking at the world through somebody else’s eyes. You might also just find that a person born to a different time, race, gender or political disposition has felt or thought something that you thought only you had.

So, that is why we read. Lucky then, that the government has just reopened the book shops in time for the summer holidays.

References

· Why Read – Mark Edmundson, Bloomsbury USA; Reprint edition (1 Sept. 2005)

· Why Teach? – Mark Edmundson, Bloomsbury USA (24 Oct. 2013)

· ‘Through the smudged pane’ – Elizabeth Winkler, TLS https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/pandemic-consciousness-mrs-dalloway-essay-elizabeth-winkler/

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Learning what to do when you don’t know what to do – tackling unseen texts in English

Miss Lucinda Gilchrist, Head of English, considers the virtues of being ‘stuck’, and how this can help pupils tackle challenging tasks with more confidence.

A growth mindset and being ‘stuck’

Carol Dweck’s influential work on growth mindset has become common parlance across schools now, and we know that helping pupils develop grit, perseverance and resilience is key to supporting them in their learning. A growth mindset is one in which ability is seen as ‘changeable’, and which ‘can be developed through learning’ (Dweck, 2006), rather than innate or fixed. As teachers, we want pupils to be able to reframe their thinking about things they struggle with to develop a growth mindset. We therefore provide scaffolds and supports to ease pupils into the ‘zone of proximal development’ and enable them to see smaller successes on the path to larger ones.

However, small and incremental scaffolds may actually serve to make them more reliant on the support from their teachers than on their own reasoning. An example of this: as part of some of my MA action research, I declared ‘war’ on the PEE/PEA structure, which I knew pupils had become too reliant on and which was making their writing too mechanical, and many of them simply relied on another acronym they had learnt in the past. By easing pupils into a task too gently, we run this risk: ‘if a task does not puzzle us at all, then it is not a problem; it is just an exercise’[1].

We therefore sometimes need to remove even more of the support structures, and defamiliarise pupils even further in order to make them less reliant on the scaffolds we put in place, and make them more aware of the ways in which they can get themselves unstuck, helping them to understand what to do when they don’t know what to do. We can expose them to challenges which they might consider beyond their ‘zone of proximal development’ – be this a new style of Mathematics problem, an unusual context for a theory in the Sciences, or a piece of music unlike anything they’ve heard before.

An example from English – analysing ‘unseen’ texts

Many students of English Literature at KS4 are anxious about the concept of ‘unseen’ – the part of the examination where pupils have to write an essay about a text they have never seen before. It’s particularly challenging with poetry: a poem is often by nature oblique and abstract, resisting an easy answer. While this is what we love about poetry, it can be frustrating for some pupils who want the ‘right’ answer! Pupils who find developing their own interpretations of texts hard sometimes rely on ‘getting’ the notes about texts, and thereby the ‘right’ answer, rather than developing the habits they need to be able to respond to any text, whether one they have encountered before or not. This is understandable: while English teachers will argue that all texts are ‘unseen’ before they are studied, pupils can become used to the scaffold of discussing with pairs or small groups, and the reassurance that, at the end, the teacher would eventually confirm the ‘right’ response by guiding the discussion and asking purposeful questions.

As Angela Duckworth says in Grit, ‘We prefer our excellence fully formed’ (2016). We would prefer to show the world the successful final outcome, rather than the training and experimenting, which means that committing pen to paper and articulating an interpretation of an unseen poem, or even just verbally expressing an idea in class discussion, could make unseen poetry a locus of fear and failure where pupils may feel intimidated by the myth that some people just ‘get it’ and others don’t, rather than seeing it as an enjoyable challenge. When I surveyed my Year 10 class about what they felt the biggest challenges in responding to unseen poetry were, several of their responses focused on the idea of a fixed, or correct interpretation – they were concerned about “analysing the text correctly” or finding “the right message/s of the poem”.  While many of them commented that they liked “reading new poems” and to have a “fresh start and use things we’ve learnt from other poems”, it is interesting that the pressure to ‘get it right’ still prevails.

So I decided to give my pupils a challenge which would deliberately make them feel stuck. As a starter activity just as we started our unseen poetry unit, I gave them a poem which was on a Cambridge University end of year examination in 2014, and which consists only of punctuation[2]:

They were definitely daunted by this – in a survey after the lesson I asked them how they felt when they saw it:

  • I felt a bit out of my depth, I struggled to analyse any of it
  • Quite stuck for words… I wasn’t really sure where to start seeing as we had no context and there were no words so how were you able to deduce anything from it?
  • Freaked out, how was I meant to be able to understand a poem with no words!These phrases echo exactly the sort of being ‘stuck’ feeling I’m sure we’ve all experienced when encountering something unfamiliar. The pupils spent some time on their own examining and annotating the poem, and then in a Teams video call we discussed the kinds of clues they could look for to help them understand the poem – although there weren’t words, they gradually began to use the information they did have, and came up with some insightful ideas, utilising the ideas about the structure and clues from the punctuation marks to try and gain some meaning from the poem. Here are some of the ideas from the Meeting Chat:

They were beginning to notice some really interesting ideas: the open-ended nature of the poem because of the unfinished last section, the implications of the punctuation marks which were there, and the fact that the lines were bracketed, suggesting some sort of devaluing of whatever words might have been inside them. I then revealed the title of the poem: ‘Tipp-Ex Sonata’, and explained that the poet, Koos Kombuis, was a South African performer and writer. With additional context, and using another pupil’s observation about apartheid, they then made some even more impressive deductions:

They had got very close to what Koos Kombuis had said about the poem himself: that it’s a protest against censorship of anti-apartheid voices in South Africa. So far, so good: the pupils had proved that they could reframe their thinking and use different clues to help them analyse the poem.

I then showed the pupils a poem in German:

This, naturally presented pupils with a different problem. However, they could identify rhyme and internal rhymes, alliteration and sound iconicity, and when they heard the poem aloud they could hear the regular, almost monotonous iambic pentameter. They identified that the first and last words of the poem were the same (although one is a pronoun and the other is a verb, they were using the right sort of reasoning!), and made an interesting point about the poem having a cyclical structure as a result. We spoke about how these gave the impression of something enclosed or making repeated movements – and of course, they were actually very close! This poem, ‘Der Panther’ by Rainer Maria Rilke[3], is about a panther, trapped in a cage and moving around in tiny circles as his mind calcifies. Without realising it, and without knowing any of the words, the pupils managed to understand this poem at a surprisingly deep level.

I then asked the pupils their feelings about unseen poetry, having attempted these two poems which would have been certainly at best uncomfortable, and at worst enough to make them feel ‘stuck’:

  • I like analysing unconventional poems, because you can interpret it on a much broader range, rather than analysing the meaning of words and literary devices.
  • less confused and a bit more confident in my capability to analysis texts
  • it made me more confident in understanding different ways to analyse and use other methods to deduce a message from a poem
  • Slightly reassured that annotations aren’t all there is to a poem and you can find other key elements elsewhere.
  • After these activities, I feel like I have a better approach to unseen poetry, and am able to discover the writer’s meaning without context or the internet.
  • now I understand that there is more than just the words on the page that can be understood.
  • it makes it a lot clearer because I now know there are other ways to look at a poem, for example after looking at “der panther” it made me realise I could’ve looked at the rhyming structure or words that rhyme in order to get a sense of the poem.These pupils’ responses suggest that putting them out of their comfort zone and possibly dangerously close to their ‘panic zone’[4], actually made them understand that there were more tools available to them than the most obvious ones. (It is particularly gratifying to see that at least one has learnt they don’t need to consult Google!) Not only is unseen poetry now less daunting, because they had successfully engaged with something even more unfamiliar, but they had also deepened their understanding of a greater range of devices which poets use to create meaning.This is a really useful strategy for helping pupils engage with something which they might feel daunted by, especially when it’s a new topic. Another example is from a Year 13 lesson when we started Chaucer: I was concerned that my class would be daunted by Middle English when they encountered it for the first time, so gave them versions of a text in Old English dating from the 10th and 11th century, and then the same text in Middle English from the 14th century, at which point the pupils began to recognise trends and similarities in the language and structure, eventually identifying it as the Lord’s Prayer, before I provided a more familiar 16th century translation. Making these connections helped pupils feel less alienated by Middle English and more confident to approach Chaucer.

    At WHS, we are fortunate enough to teach thoughtful, perceptive and independent students, and it’s encouraging to see the ways that they engage with really tricky material, and begin to see that, if they can tackle an undergraduate exam text in Year 10, they can tackle any poem! The same strategy could be used in many subjects – a piece of artwork which doesn’t look like what someone might assume to be ‘art’, a piece of music which challenges the expectations of a particular genre, data which might seem to buck a trend in science subjects.  These lessons are memorable as well: one of the girls in my Year 13 class signed up for my elective module on Sociolinguistics on the strength of the introduction to Middle English activity which she had enjoyed several months earlier! By challenging pupils’ expectations and perceptions of their own limitations, they are able to see their subjects in a broader light than the examination syllabi, make connections with wider experiences, and learn a valuable lesson about what to do when they don’t know what to do.

 

References and Further Reading

Duckworth, A. (2016) Grit: Why passion and resilience are the secrets to success, Vermillion.

Dweck, C. (2006) Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, Ballantine Books.

https://www.buildinglearningpower.com/2016/04/i-give-up/

https://www.buildinglearningpower.com/2016/05/getting-unstuck/

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-27680904

http://www.thempra.org.uk/social-pedagogy/key-concepts-in-social-pedagogy/the-learning-zone-model/

[1] https://www.buildinglearningpower.com/2016/05/getting-unstuck/

[2] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-27680904

[3] https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-panther/

[4] http://www.thempra.org.uk/social-pedagogy/key-concepts-in-social-pedagogy/the-learning-zone-model/

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Why a teacher should never stop being a pupil: from the perspective of the MFL classroom

Mrs Claire Baty, Head of French, looks at the idea of teachers being life-long learners, and the benefits this affords in our classrooms.

It’s widely accepted that learning something new can enhance your quality of life, give you confidence, have a positive impact on your mental health and above all be fun. “Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever” (Ghandi). Yet learning from scratch, purely for the cognitive challenge, is something that most of us rarely do.

As a French teacher, my focus has always been on imparting knowledge; enthusing and, I hope, inspiring my students to learn this language that I have spent years studying. I encourage my students to be curious beyond the curriculum. I ask Key Stage 3 to look up extra words to extend their topic specific vocabulary beyond the confines of the textbook. I set Key Stage 4 longer, more authentic reading and listening texts to decipher, hoping to instil a desire to build upon their knowledge. I expect Key Stage 5 to indulge in research into cultural, literary and historical topics beyond the course. I hope that they do this with the same sense of pleasure that I feel when doing the exact same thing. Yet, I haven’t taken into consideration that for my students, especially those in Years 7-11, they are not yet fluent in this language. French is still new to them. When I read the news in French or look up a word from a novel I am reading, none of it is new, I am merely building on years of study, whereas my students are starting from scratch.

So to become the pupil again and experience language learning from the perspective of the student in the MFL classroom, was an opportunity that couldn’t be missed. Learning Mandarin alongside a class of Year 8 students is enlightening in so many ways. Not only have I learnt how to introduce myself and family in Mandarin, I have found myself reconsidering how we learn language and the effectiveness of our methods for the students that we teach.

The reality of learning a new language

Chinese is a fundamentally different language to the European languages that I am familiar with but, if I am totally honest, I expected to find it easy to make progress quickly, after all I am a linguist, a languages teacher and a motivated student with the advantage of knowing how to learn a language. In reality, it is proving less obvious than I had first thought!

My desire to always get it right has a direct impact on my confidence and self-consciousness when speaking in Mandarin. Even when I know the word I am profoundly aware of the lack of authenticity of my pronunciation. What is more, I was completely unprepared for how difficult it is to multi-task during a classroom based lesson. Copying vocabulary from the board, whilst listening to the sound of the word and trying to remember the meaning all at the same time as being prepared to answer a question from the teacher requires an agility of mind that is hard to achieve. But, perhaps most surprisingly for a linguist, is how hard I find it to recall new vocabulary from one lesson to the next without considerable pre-lesson preparation and sneaky glancing at notes! As a teacher, I often find myself saying to my French classes “but we saw this word last lesson in exercise X, page Y”. I now understand first-hand how difficult instant retrieval of vocabulary is, but also how important it is if you want to progress in a language.

If this is how I am feeling, when the language classroom is my ‘zone’, then how do my students feel? As teachers, do we ask too much of them each day or do they adapt to the demands placed upon them as learners and I am just out of practice?

Mandarin
Above: Mrs Dai teaching Mandarin

How is second language taught?

Due to the closure of schools in March, my experience of learning Mandarin has moved from face-to-face classroom learning to independent textbook exercises, remote virtual learning and online platforms such as Duolingo, inadvertently placing me in a good position to consider this question.

In the MFL classroom we learn by rote, repetition, hearing others, practising, being creative with the language, revisiting previous knowledge. Independent access to a textbook is valuable to a point but then you need an expert to answer questions (and I have lots of questions!). Remote learning has become part of the ‘classroom’ experience and unexpectedly for me, the sense of anonymity created by initials in black squares during a TEAMS video conference has actually helped me to feel more confident when speaking in Mandarin and more inclined to take a risk. I wonder if my French students feel the same.

But what about all the online platforms available that claim they are the best way to learn a language? These applications offer a totally different approach to language learning. Often providing minimal explanation of key words or grammar, the focus is clearly on lots of practice, which means you get things wrong – all the time! To some extent this mimics how a child might learn a language; seeing and hearing words in context with lots of repetition. Whilst I must admit that these platforms are addictive because of their gaming style, I find myself wanting greater explanation. I want to read the notes, make my own notes, learn the information before attempting the exercise, whereas Duolingo seems determined to force me to have a go and risk getting it wrong.

What about the role of online translators? I have spent most of my working life warning students of the pitfalls of ‘Google Translate’. Every language teacher can give numerous examples of student’s work containing glaring and often comical errors, yet now that I am a beginner learner of Mandarin who is frustrated that the textbook glossary doesn’t contain the word I want to use, I find myself turning to Google Translate more and more frequently and with a surprising level of success. Perhaps the key here is that I am also a linguist and language teacher and hence know what pitfalls to look out for. But this does support what language teachers have been forced to accept; that A.I has transformed machine-based translation and Google Translate is no longer the enemy it once was. I agree whole heartedly with my colleague, Adèle Venter who, in her article Approaches to using online language tools and AI to aid language learning, says that students need to be taught how to use these tools rather than being told not to use them at all.

Above: STEAM Spanish with Ms Horno Garcia

How does this affect my teaching?

What have I learnt from this whole experience, apart from being able to introduce myself and family in Chinese? Can learning a new language make me a better French teacher?

  • Knowing how to learn helps you learn. I am at an advantage over my fellow Mandarin students, not because I am innately any better than them at Mandarin, but because I know how to take notes, revise vocabulary and practise the language independently. Activities aimed at improving pupil’s metacognitive skills must be a significant part of the classroom experience.
  • It is also clear that retrieval practice needs to be a priority in every lesson. Ross Morrison-McGill (TeacherToolkit) makes an interesting link with the ‘knowledge’ test for London black cab drivers. According to his article Why do London cab drivers know so much? “spaced practice and interleaving” are the key to memory. I would also agree with Andy Tharby who comments in his article Memory Platforms that quizzing is a far more powerful tool to retrieval than re-reading notes or listening to teacher explanations. The latter create what he refers to as an ‘illusion of fluency’ – we think we know when in fact the knowledge doesn’t stick. Effective starter activities that encourage the transfer of knowledge from one lesson to another, one topic to another need to be incorporated into every lesson.
  • Students need time in lessons to reflect, to consider what they are learning, to form and then ultimately ask questions and to consolidate their learning. Being overwhelmed, tired even anxious can all stem from a feeling of busyness that comes from having a distracted mind. We feel busy because we are in the habit of doing one thing while thinking about the next (mindful.org) Giving students time to process and complete the task I am asking of them during a lesson could lead to much deeper understanding and as a result, greater confidence.

I am not learning Mandarin because I have immediate plans to travel to China, nor do I need to use the language every day to communicate at home or at work (although I can see how it would be beneficial), I am learning purely for the sake of learning something new. It’s exciting to be able to do something that I couldn’t do 10 months ago. The change of perspective that has been afforded to me by becoming the pupil rather than the teacher is invaluable and I am excited to consider what I will change about my own classroom practice as a result.

Further reading and references

http://whs-blogs.co.uk/teaching/tag/mfl/ https://www.teachertoolkit.co.uk/ https://reflectingenglish.wordpress.com/2014/06/12/memory-platforms/ https://teacherhead.com/ https://www.mindful.org/a-mindfulness-practice-for-doing-one-thing-at-a-time/ https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/14/magazine/the-great-ai-awakening.html https://www.economist.com/technology-quarterly/2017-05-01/language