John MacBeath

`This is a zippy read arising out of the international project "effective leadership in a time of change", which grapples with the nature and practice of leadership (as opposed to management or administration) in schools′ - Times Educational Supplement Who really runs the school - head teachers or governors? What do pupils think of their leaders and should they have a bigger role in school leadership? Is the United Kingdom obsessed with discipline and `strong leadership′ as others suggest? Is New Public Management an insidious undermining of what is important and valuable in the UK educational system? The answers to these and other questions present surprises and challenges to the way things are seen in the UK. This book provides evidence from other countries that raises many questions about effective leadership and how it is seen from different viewpoints, and examines the issues in a political context and in relation to a changing world scene.

Responding to Change

Effective School Leadership

`This is a zippy read arising out of the international project "effective leadership in a time of change", which grapples with the nature and practice of leadership (as opposed to management or administration) in schools' - Times Educational Supplement Who really runs the school - head teachers or governors? What do pupils think of their leaders and should they have a bigger role in school leadership? Is the United Kingdom obsessed with discipline and `strong leadership' as others suggest? Is New Public Management an insidious undermining of what is important and valuable in the UK educational system? The answers to these and other questions present surprises and challenges to the way things are seen in the UK. This book provides evidence from other countries that raises many questions about effective leadership and how it is seen from different viewpoints, and examines the issues in a political context and in relation to a changing world scene.

After finishing school, John - single son of a Brethren family - secretly leaves home. Dreaming of Australia as the ultimate destination he starts hitch-hiking through Europe. Taking a job at a Holiday Camp to subsidise his journey, he learns something about being ‘captive’ in a closed environment in which life is a sequence of institutionalised daily rituals Arriving in Belgium and looking for somewhere to stay he meets a former inmate of a Belgian concentration camp and finds out that for those who suffered captivity and torture the ordeal never ended. Even decades after the second World War he discovers that some wounds have never healed. He returns to Glasgow and attends university where his escape from the captivity of the classrooms pays off in deeper achievement and wisdom. The young scholar finds a job in Belgium, deepens his knowledge of the dark past - held secret by victims as well as by perpetrators. Years later when John gets a job as lecturer in Cambridge University, he meets his first love once more, now engaged to another man. He too is harbouring a dark secret. The voyage through Europe turns into a compelling tour of the human condition.

Escape to Captivity A WANTED AND A WANTING MAN

Maurice Galton

John Bangs

What lessons can we learn from the relationship between policy-makers and schools over the life of the ‘New’ Labour and its predecessor Conservative government? What happened to ‘Education, Education, Education’ as it travelled from political vision to classroom practice? What are the lasting legacies of 13 years of a reforming Labour government? And what are the key messages for a coalition government? These are the questions addressed to the architects of educational reform, their critics and the prophets of better things to come. The 37 interviewees include ministers past and present, journalists, union officials, members of lobby groups and think tanks. Reinventing Schools, Reforming Teaching considers the impact of educational policies on those who have to translate political priorities into the day to day work of schools and classrooms. The authors argue that an evidence-informed view of policy-making has yet to be realised, graphically illustrating how many recent political decisions in education can be explained by the personal experiences, predilections and short-term needs of key decision-makers. The interviews, which explore the dynamics behind the creation of education policies, cover a wide range of themes and issues, including: policy-makers' attitudes to schools, the staff who work in them and the communities they serve the drivers of politicians' reform agendas and the constraints on radical reform the shaping and reshaping of curriculum and assessment the search for a more effective marriage between inspection and school self evaluation the relationship of academic research to policy making how a vision for teaching and teachers might be constructed for the 21st century Contributions from leading figures including; David Puttnam, Kenneth Baker, Estelle Morris, Gillian Shepherd, Jim Knight, Pauline Perry, Michael Barber, Peter Mortimore, Judy Sebba, Paul Black, Mary James, Kevan Collins, David Hargreaves, Mike Tomlinson, David Berliner, Andreas Schleicher, Tim Brighouse, Conor Ryan, Keith Bartley, Michael Gove and Philippa Cordingley are woven in with the insights of teachers and headteachers such as Alasdair MacDonald and William Atkinson. The book's findings and proposals will be of interest not only to professional educators and those with an interest in the current and future state of education but to those interested in the process of policy-making itself.

From Political Visions to Classroom Reality

Reinventing Schools, Reforming Teaching

Neil Dempster

Leading schools is becoming almost daily a more complex and demanding job. Connecting Leadership and Learning reassesses the purpose of schools, the nature of learning and the qualities of leadership that make schools authentic places of learning. Starting with a review of what we can claim to know – and not know – about learning, leadership and their inter-relationship, this book explores what it means to lead schools that place learning at the centre. Drawing on research from seven different country projects - including the United States, Australia and five European countries – the authors offer five key principles for practice: a focus of learning an environment for learning a learning dialogue shared leadership accountability; internal and external. These key principles have been tested by teachers, senior leaders and school students and found to be applicable across cultural and linguistic boundaries. The challenges faced by in inner city schools, whether in London or New Jersey, prove a stern test for the five principles yet, as these schools testify, they bring a new sense of hope and resolve that learning is for everyone. Based on rigorous research yet thoroughly grounded in practice, this book aims to challenge the reader with big ideas about learning and leadership, and to break new ground in thinking about where leadership and learning meet so that practitioners can see how it works in school and classroom practice. It should be of interest to all school leaders and those aspiring to the role.

Principles for Practice

Connecting Leadership and Learning

By John Macbeath

The great Unities

Archie Mcglynn

Self-evaluation in schools sits at the top of the national agenda in response to an awareness that performance tables and inspector's reports can only tell a partial story. Schools are now encouraged to raise questions about 'How are we doing?' and 'How do we know?'. Self-Evaluation: What's in it for Schools? demystifies school self-evaluation and encourages schools to be self-critical and self-confident. The book helps schools and teachers develop the necessary confidence to work with evaluation tools. Accessible and packed with case studies, it tackles the issues that are at the forefront of the national agenda in most countries in Europe. Challenging ideas for the future are given through discussion of the concerns and issues of schools in the present day.

What's In It For Schools?

Self-Evaluation

`This is a well written and thoroughly researched book on an issue of vital importance. It places the experiences of individual teachers under pressure into the larger UK and worldwide context. Policy makers need to wake up to its messages' - Sara Bubb, Institute of Education, University of London What is it really like to be a teacher in today's demanding classrooms? Maurice Galton and John MacBeath spoke to teachers, parents and students in England, and compared their responses to similar inquiries in Asia, America, Australia and New Zealand. Their findings were disturbing. Teacher stress and workload were persistent themes in the four studies, with teachers frequently stretched to breaking point as they endeavour to 'make a difference' to their pupils' learning and welfare. Issues examined in the book include: - frustrations facing those trying to make inclusive education work in practice - effects of constantly changing policies on the staff required to implement them - loss of status within the teaching profession - reasons for teachers choosing to leave the profession - the consequences of staying on and fighting for what one believes in This fascinating read will be of interest to anyone involved in teaching, school leadership and educational policy.

Teachers Under Pressure

In the World Library of Educationalists series, international experts themselves compile career-long collections of what they judge to be their finest pieces - extracts from books, key articles, salient research findings, major theoretical and practical contributions - so the world can read them in a single manageable volume. John MacBeath has spent the last 30 years researching, thinking and writing about some of the key enduring issues in education. He has been involved in advising on policy both nationally and internationally, and has contributed books and articles across topics as diverse as the curriculum, the nature of schooling, homework, self evaluation, and leadership. In this book, John MacBeath brings together eight of his most influential writings including chapters from his best-selling books, articles from leading journals, and excerpts from his contributions to the press. Also included are examples of press responses to research reports and to controversial issues. Starting with a specially written Introduction, which gives an overview of John's career and contextualises his selection, the chapters cover topics such as: Developing Skills for life after school The Talent Enigma Schools on the Edge: responding to challenging circumstances Leadership as a Subversive Activity Do Schools have a Future? Through this book, readers can follow the themes and strands that John MacBeath has researched and written about over the last three decades and see his important contribution to the field of education.

The Selected Works of John MacBeath

Learning in and Out of School

Written in an easily accessible style, each chapter of this book illuminates deeper lying issues about the nature of schooling, learning, leadership, research, and the impact of globalisation on the lives of schools, teachers, children and families. Each of the seven themes, or lenses, through which the education system is viewed, will be of value to teachers and school leaders, as well as to academics and students on education programmes.

Myth, Heresy and Misconception

Education and Schooling

This best-selling book illustrates how schools can tell their own story. It draws on ground-breaking work with the National Union of Teachers to demonstrate a practical approach to identifying what makes a good school and the part that pupils, parents and teachers can play in school improvement. Its usefulness for and use by, classroom teachers to evaluate their practice will prove to be its greatest strength in an ever expanding effectiveness literature.

The Case for School Self-Evaluation

Schools Must Speak for Themselves

Y. C. Cheng

The impact of globalization is being felt in numerous spheres of educational policy and practice, in rapid growth of information and communication technologies, in economic transformation, and international market competition, all of which conspire to create new demands and place new pressures on school leadership. Drawing on examples from 12 countries in different parts of the world. The Editors have brought together 28 renowned scholars in Europe, Australia, North America, and Asia-Pacific countries to contribute to this book. The first six chapters address key themes and provide the framework for the 12 country reports which follow. With the aim of increasing international understanding and teasing out issues of transfer and application across cultural and linguistic boundaries, we have chosen national reports which cover a range of countries representing a diversity of culture and contextual backgrounds. We believe, these chapters and the book as a whole, can provide important theoretical, policy and practical implications that will inform the debate about the future of education and of schooling. While each of these country narratives underscore the importance of context, at the same time there are insights and values held in common.

International Perspectives

Leadership for Learning

Patrick Carmichael

Sue Swaffield

Mary James

Richard Procter

Robert McCormick

David Pedder

Bethan Marshall

Alison Fox

Paul Black

Mary-Jane Drummond

Dylan Wiliam

Joanna Swann

Learning how to learn is an essential preparation for lifelong learning. Whilst this is widely acknowledged by teachers, they have lacked a rich professional knowledge base from which they can teach their pupils how to learn. This book makes a major contribution to the creation of such a professional knowledge base for teachers by building on previous work associated with ‘formative assessment’ or ‘assessment for learning’ which has a strong evidence base, and is now being promoted nationally and internationally. However, it adds an important new dimension by reporting the conditions within schools, and across networks of schools, that are conducive to the promotion, in classrooms, of learning how to learn as an extension of assessment for learning. There is a companion book, Learning How to Learn in Classrooms: Tools for schools (also available from Routledge), which provides practical resources for those teachers looking to put into practice the principles covered in this book.

Classrooms, Schools and Networks

Improving Learning How to Learn

Colin Conner

DYLAN WILIAM

Leslie Honour

David Frost

Peter Dudley

Learning how to learn is an essential preparation for lifelong learning. This book offers a set of in-service resources to help teachers develop new classroom practices informed by sound research. It builds on previous work associated with ‘formative assessment’ or ‘assessment for learning’. However, it adds an important new dimension by taking account of the conditions within schools that are conducive to the promotion, in classrooms, of learning how to learn as an extension of assessment for learning. Among the materials included you will find: an introductory in-service session self-evaluation questionnaires an action planning activity workshops tools for school development a network mapping activity guidance about different ways of using the resources teachers descriptions of ways they have used of adapted them references to further information and advice. In addition, there is a support website and examples of how individual schools have used or adapted these materials to maximize their benefits.

John MacBeath

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