Richard Southward

Seen, Valued… and Able: Designing Classrooms for Social and Academic Belonging | Belonging Effect Belonging isn’t separate from academic teaching. Strategies that build knowledge - when done correctly -also build belonging.

"Leaders, If belonging is an initiative in your school, make sure the strategies you model in professional development build belonging socially & academically. It’s not either/or — both matter." @triciatailored.bsky.social: www.thebelongingeffect.co.uk/seen-valued-...

Autonomy, authority and anarchy: creating a better school culture Most schools live with a quiet tension between what’s written in policy and what actually happens in lessons. Getting to grips with this tension is at the heart of creating an improved school culture.

As someone with an interest in philosophy *and* school improvement, it felt like this blog was written for me! There’s lots to think about about even if philosophy is not your bag. open.substack.com/pub/carousel...

🧰 If you’re looking for practical tools to make planning, collaboration and improvement easier, I’ve designed a set of free tools you can use anytime. Simple, clear, and built for busy leaders.

Start exploring 👉 buff.ly/NqzjSQe

#EducationalLeaders #SchoolImprovement

The promise and the price of autonomy Why guidance, not premature independence, is the real foundation of freedom

Autonomy sounds like liberation, but the Greeks had a clearer view: freedom wasn’t being unwatched it was upholding the law for your self. Now, in classrooms and staffrooms alike, that’s the promise and the price.
open.substack.com/pub/daviddid...

How to Develop Self-talk in the Classroom How self-talk can develop metacognition and self-regulation

NEW: How to Develop Self-talk in the Classroom

Creating a culture of teacher and pupil self-talk to develop metacognition and self-regulation.

researchschool.org.uk/bradford/new...

Chasing after deer - Midlake
Drive the cold winter away - Stick in the Wheel
Blackwater side - Anne Briggs
Candleland - Ian McCulloch
Darklands - Jesus and Mary Chain

#FridayFive

Mini-Whiteboards: A Long-Overdue Rant (and Love Letter) A Slice of Primary Leadership

Thank you to @adamboxereducation.bsky.social
and @laurastam for the final kick of inspiration yesterday morning to get this blog about mini-whiteboards finally out of my head and into the world.

Mini-Whiteboards: A Long-Overdue Rant (and Love Letter)
open.substack.com/pub/theeduca...

Making Sense of Generative Learning Educational Psychology Review - How do learners make sense of what they are learning? In this article, I present a new framework of sense-making based on research investigating the benefits and...

🎓 For more on the theory, check out this review of generative learning activities:

link.springer.com/article/10....

(and for a wonderfully practical exploration, see the Enser’s book on the topic)

Why a generation of kids are learning to read everything except books. carlhendrick.substack.com/p/in-defence...

9 million rainy days - Jesus and Mary Chain
Blue Thunder - Galaxie 500
The Storm - World of Twist
‘Cross the breeze - Sonic Youth
The wind cries Mary - Jimi Hendrix
#FridayFive

Metacognition and Self-Regulated Learning Apply metacognitive strategies in the classroom.

The @theeef.bsky.social has released updated guidance on Metacognition & self-regulated learning - one of its most widely used evidence resources.

Explore the update here: educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/education-ev...

Identifying pupils with special educational needs and disabilities - Education Policy Institute A new study from the Education Policy Institute (EPI), funded by the Nuffield Foundation, highlights significant inconsistencies in how children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) ...

A big contributor to SEND rates is how schools identify additional needs - something the EPI uncovered in a landmark 2021 study.

I also dug into it in 2023, because the raw EHCP and SEN figures can be misleading without context schoolsweek.co.uk/send-special...

epi.org.uk/publications...

Good schools make good teachers What kind domains, wicked traps and school culture mean for improvement

NEW: Good schools make good trachers

If teachers don’t always improve with experience, the problem isn’t them. It’s the environment. Schools that get better do so because they make feedback clearer, practice more deliberate, and culture more trustworthy.

open.substack.com/pub/daviddid...

YouTube video by Dodgy If You're Thinking of Me - Dodgy

Morning all, a very old favourite this morning. youtu.be/NdUmytb63BA?...

Subject Leader Self-Audit Tool With the new Ofsted inspection toolkit removing subject deep dives, it’s now harder for leaders to demonstrate the quality of education through traditional triangulation.

With the new Ofsted toolkit removing deep dives, subject leaders need a new way to consider quality assurance.

I’ve shared a practical Subject Leader Self-Audit Tool to help evidence strengths and plan next steps within the 2025 framework.

Download it here:
🔗 open.substack.com/pub/enserm/p...

YouTube video by ChapterhouseVEVO Chapterhouse - Mesmerise (Video)

Morning, got a bit if shoegaze on this morning. Hope you're having a good day

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ecm0...

Relationships and Learning: Clarification on a Popular Quote - The Effortful Educator How important are relationships on learning? Depends on what you mean by relationship.

“No significant learning can occur without a significant relationship.” – Dr. James Comer

An incredibly common quote in education...but it is usually used incorrectly. Read below to find out what sorts of relationships Dr. Comer was actually taking about.

theeffortfuleducator.com/2018/05/09/r...

Are we approaching a Turing Test for Teaching? A deep dive into the evidence on AI tutoring. carlhendrick.substack.com/p/the-algori...

YouTube video by David Bowie David Bowie - Starman (Official Video)

Morning all, had this on during the walk in. A bit of a classic.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=t365...

DfE ignores Francis review and proposes progress 8 reform Government pledges changes to subject make-up of league table measure - despite review calling for no changes

Update: The DfE has clarified its new progress 8 measure would first apply to GCSEs sat in 2029, meaning any schools that run three-year GCSE courses will need to take it into account during subject choices for their current year 8s

schoolsweek.co.uk/dfe-ignores-...

NEW REPORT: Modelling and reforming school choice
By Ellen Greaves, @estellecantillon.bsky.social, @mariagraziacavallo.bsky.social and me.

Blog economics.blogs.bristol.ac.uk/2025/11/06/a...

Policy briefing
www.bristol.ac.uk/media-librar...

#EconSky #EduSky

1/9

Just right for me. Got nowt to sell so not chasing follows or posts (totally understand it’s quiet on here for people who do). Love the people I follow, positive interactions, loads of interesting blogs and posts and all with complete lack of X-like bile.

Powerful for What? Why Powerful Knowledge Needs a Pedagogy to Match

What can pupils actually do with powerful knowledge?

It’s pedagogy — not just curriculum — that turns entitlement into capability.

📚 New post: enserm.substack.com/p/powerful-f...

Even more than funding or relevant opportunities, "Time" was what the most teachers and leaders selected as a key requirement to engage with CPD in our recent survey.

Read more about the enablers and barriers to CPD which education professionals reported in 2025

A neural state space for episodic memories Episodic memories are highly dynamic and change in nonlinear ways over time. This dynamism is not captured by existing systems consolidation theories that predict a unidirectional process where memories are first supported by the hippocampus and then the neocortex. Here, I propose a 3D state space for episodic memories. The first two dimensions relate to whether episodic retrieval is driven by the hippocampus and the neocortex, critically allowing for independent and additive contributions from both regions. The third dimension relates to the episodic specificity of retrieval. Memories can be located at any point in this state space and move to any other location. The state space captures the dynamic nature of episodic memory and broadens the search space of possible memory states and transformations across time.

On my lab reading list—
A neural state space for episodic memories: Trends in Cognitive Sciences www.cell.com/trends/cogni...

It’s rare that I’d describe a thread as beautiful but wow that has blown my mind!! Thanks David.

Schemas vs Mental Models: Does the difference make a difference? Why the distinction between “schemas” and “mental models” tell us more more about our language than our minds.

“For a difference to be a difference, it must make a difference.”.
Education loves new distinctions, but unless they change what we do or how students learn, they’re just semantics. Are schemas and mental models really different or just two terms for the same thing? open.substack.com/pub/daviddid...

The Miracle of Schools Why Simplistic Narratives Miss the Point

In my latest Substack post, I look at why schools are so complex - and why that’s what makes them beautiful, not broken.

📖 The Miracle of Schools
👉 enserm.substack.com/p/the-miracl...

Frankly, it’s amazing that schools work at all.

Every day, hundreds of pupils stream through the gates and a vast, invisible system whirs into motion: teaching, safeguarding, meals, attendance, support, behaviour, communication, enrichment and care.

A short thread about why schools are miracles:

Cheers Jim. I’ll get into both of those tonight. Much appreciated