Brian's Blog

As I write this post on creating safe learning spaces and behavioural management, I want to acknowledge that this topic has come at a personally challenging time for me. This week, I've experienced a wide range of emotions, from celebrating my daughter's 18th birthday to mourning the passing of my wife's grandmother and attending my brother-in-law's wedding. These personal experiences have highlighted the wide spectrum of emotions that life brings, giving me a deeper understanding of the joys, struggles and challenges many of our students face daily. It reinforces for me the critical importance of effective understanding, practicing empathy, displaying an attitude of patience and support within our school communities as we develop safe learning spaces and behavioural management practices. In schools, creating a safe and secure learning environment is not just an optional add on, it's the very foundation upon which the educational trust rests. As educators, we unders...

Thornburg's Learning Spaces Theory (2014) is a revolutionary approach to classroom management that focuses on creating learning environments that are both engaging and effective. Created by David Thornburg Ph.D., an award winning futurist and educational consultant, the theory is based on the idea that students should be able to move freely in the classroom, and that learning should be an interactive process.  The theory is built on the metaphor of four primary learning spaces: the campfire, the waterhole, the cave and life; however, is not limited to these. The campfire is a central gathering place for social interaction, explicit teaching and collaboration where they work together in a comfortable and inviting atmosphere. It is a place where students can share their ideas and experiences, be guided in direct instruction to grow their understanding and work together to solve problems. The campfire is a place where discussion, collaboration, brainstorming and problem-solving activi...

One of the biggest challenges school leaders face is how to redesign the learning system to have the greatest effect on our students? With researchers such as John Hattie (2012) focusing his lens on the impact of the teacher on the student’s learning there is the push to have teachers identify ways that they can redesign the learning environment, redesign pedagogy and redesign assessment. How do we re-imagine the concept of school to make the teaching have the greatest effect on student learning in real and authentic ways and what will this look like? As we drill down into this question the focus is drawn further away from the upfront teaching and redirected firmly to student centred learning. Having a shared understanding of what learning looks like is essential as practitioners we can identify ways of embedding this into practice.  Learning is the essence of what happens in the classroom every day, but when we discover what good learners are and the keys to switch all le...

"Change is the essence of life: be willing to surrender what you are for what you could become" - Reinhold Neibuhr  Over Christmas, I was asked by friends what the New Year had in store for me as a professional? My response was considered; however, vague. Unlike other years where my role and direction was very clear, this year was totally different. This year is one where major changes are about to happen for my team and I. It is a time where many of our practices formed over years of working in  silo's  were going to be torn down as we move into a new facility designed for team teaching with a minimum of 5 teachers and over 100 students. This change will force countless amounts of unknown practical transformations along with major pedagogical shifts in us individually as professionals by removing our ability to hide our professional practice behind walls away from each other.  While this could be seen as a scary step, I fi...