Alex Quigley's Blog, page 11

Why Literacy Fails (Part 1)

This blog is based on my talk entitled, ‘Why Literacy Fails (And What To Do About It)’, at the researchED National Conference, in a baking-hot Camden classroom! It will be the first part of a short series of blogs.   I’ve never found a teacher who disputes the importance of literacy, reading, writing, or the …

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Where does ‘growth mindset’ go next?

Has ‘growth mindset’ been debunked? Will the million+ selling book quietly be removed from shelves, or will it reappear rebooted in teacher training in some other guise in future?  I began writing about the promise and the problems with ‘growth mindset’ in 2014. It was a wildly popular topic that was common in school INSET, based …

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Top 10 Blog Posts of 2023 (So Far)

From the blogs of 2023 so far, this is my top 10 most popular blogs. They span from 'Crafting Great Sentences' to free research reads on spelling, and more.

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Revising writing and why it matters

If I was to identify one important writing process that is most neglected by pupils, I would pose revising their writing. Why is this vital strategy so commonly neglected? In my ‘Closing the Writing Gap’ book, I propose that ‘revising’ writing is misunderstood and confused with ‘editing’. So, what is the difference between these admittedly …

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The Struggle with ‘Writing Stamina’

After some grim national writing results last year, and lots of conversations with school leaders about their post-Covid teaching and learning priorities, writing is high on many schools’ priority list. Common issues that have been raised to me by school colleagues are wide ranging, from issues with spelling, to extended writing, problematic writing assessments, and …

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The Challenge of Editing Writing

“To write is human, to edit is divine.”  Stephen King, ‘On Writing’ ‘I’ve finished’ is a common refrain you hear in the classroom soon after pupils are set a writing task. Pupils’ urge to write can see them rush to pour their ideas onto the page. Alas, for too many pupils, their energised efforts can …

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What should we do with WAGOLLs?

Few teachers would teach writing in primary or secondary classrooms without using a WAGOLL to model writing for novice pupils. The language of ‘WAGOLL’s – or ‘What A Good One Looks Like’ – is common, but there may be less shared understanding about how to use them most effectively in the classroom. You will find …

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Write Less; Read More

There are few simple solutions in education. If you are being promised one, it is at best a hopeful fib, at worst a deceptive sales-pitch. But there are some helpful principles that can guide our actions. A useful one I think could help improve literacy in primary and secondary schools: write less; read more. It …

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Crafting Great Sentences

We can take the brilliant complexity of sentences for granted. Each sentence written in the classroom is a distillation of a near-infinite number of complex moves. For pupils, practising one sentence brilliantly may be worth a hundred sentences written in haste. Too often, in the classroom, sentences are modelled, but pupils don’t have a strong …

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Why might ChatGPT damage learning?

This is not another moan about the perils of ChatGPT, or teeth-gnashing about the inexorable takeover of AI. It is a quick expression of a genuine concern about the potential losses to learning that could attend useful tools like ChatGPT if it becomes a classroom mainstay. I suspect that ChatGPT, and the AI revolution, like …

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