Craig Barton interviews guests from the wonderful world of education about their approaches to teaching, educational research and more. All show notes, resources and videos here: https://www.mrbartonmaths.com/blog/
Will is a genius. He is a head of maths, blogger, and the creator of Numeracy Ninjas. He also has a keen interested in cognitive science, and memory in particular. We spoke about being a successful Head of Department, prior learning dependency flow and the fascinating subject of memory.
For more information about today’s guest, plus links to the websites, resources and ideas they mention, please visit the show notes page: http://www.mrbartonmaths.com/blog/10-will-emeny-great-maths-teaching-ideas-and-numeracy-ninjas/
On this episode of the Mr Barton Maths Podcast I spoke to Will Emeny.
Will is Head of Maths at Wyvern College, the author of the Great Maths Teaching Ideas Blog, as well a couple of excellent educational books, and the creator of Numeracy Ninjas
In an epic 2 hour interview, we covered loads of things, including:
- How does Will plan lessons? – we dive very deep into this!
- How do Will and his department try to create renewable lessons?
- Can Will describe a lesson that went badly, and what he learned from it?
- How is Will preparing his Year 11 students for their GCSEs, and what are his plan for students embarking upon the new GCSE specification?
- What has Will learned in 3 years of being a Head of Department?
- Then we delve into two fascinating areas:
- Firstly, what did Will discover during his amazing analysis into Prior Learning Dependency Flow, and what are the implications for the teaching of mathematics?
- Secondly why does the concept of Memory fascinate Will so much, why is the distinction between Learning and Performance so important, and again what are the implications for teaching and assessment?
- What was the inspiration behind Numeracy Ninjas, and what are the future plans for the website?
- What does Will wish he had known when he first started teaching?
It’s a longy, but I promise it’s a goody!
Links to things discussed in the show:
Diagnostic Questions
I have put together a description of five simple strategies on Diagnostic Questions that we are using with our Year 11 students in preparation for their GCSEs. There include daily questions, full GCSE papers, and a tool for independent revision. These are all dead easy to set up, are having a massive impact on our students, and best of all, they are completely free. Have a read of my blog post to find out more
Links to the research that Will mentions, as well as all the research cited by my previouis guests, can be found here
Prior Learning Dependency Flow
Prior Learning Dependency Flow – blog post
You’ve never seen the GCSE Maths Curriculum look like this before – blog post
Memory Flow
Forgetting is necessary for learning, desirable difficulties and the need to dissociate learning and performance – blog post
Numeracy Ninjas
http://www.numeracyninjas.org/
Will Emeny’s Big 3 (or Big 4 in this case!)
My post explaining the important ideas in memory research, desirable difficulties etc
Evidence into practice blog by Nick Rose
Michaela blogs!
Joe Kirby https://pragmaticreform.wordpress.com
Naveen Rizvi http://conceptionofthegood.co.uk
Bodil Isaksen http://blog.bodil.co.uk
Dani Quinn https://missquinnmaths.wordpress.com
Hegarty Maths! www.hegartymaths.com
Link to Podcast Puzzle
If you cannot see the image, visit here
My usual plugs:
- You can help support the podcast (and get an interactive transcript of all new episodes) via my Patreon page at patreon.com/mrbartonmaths
- If you are interested in sponsoring an episode of the show, then please visit this page
- You can sign up for my free Tips for Teachers newsletter and my free Eedi newsletter
- My online courses are here: craigbarton.podia.com
- My books are “Tips for Teachers“, “Reflect, Expect, Check, Explain” and “How I wish I’d taught maths”
Thanks so much for listening, and I really hope you enjoy the show!
Craig Barton
An inspirational interview! I got so much from this – it really put me back in touch with some of the ideas I was interested in during ITT, and has opened up some exciting avenues for me to explore. Thanks so much for this Craig – all the hard work that goes into these podcasts and everything else you do is really appreciated. Keep up the good work! 🙂
Thanks so much for your kind words, Dom, I really appreciate it!
What an epic listen! Took a few car journeys to and from work but well worth it! Have been using numeracy ninjas all year and was so interesting to listen to both of you being so enthusiastic about the job in general. Have emailed department telling them to give it a listen!
Keep up the excellent work!
Thanks so much!
Thank you Craig and Will. As a trainee teacher this has really inspired me to develop better teaching methods – I particularly like the idea of learning as an intrinsic motivator. Working through your back catalogue of interviews – done soon so keep the new ones coming
Really pleased you enjoyed it
Thank you so much for this and all the podcasts. I am really enjoying listening to them and am totally inspired. Still learning after 20+ years teaching and still loving it. I’ve taken loads of notes and am busy planning how lots of this will be appearing in my department very soon. Bring on the Ninjas! Very pleased to learn that Mr B is a Lancashire lad!
Just finished listening t Will. We will be using numeracy ninjas next year! Thank you to all your guests and you for the time and effort you put into these podcast. This one I really enjoyed