Exceptional teacher practice

One of my favourite questions to ask a student is, “What do you think differently about now?” At THINK Global School, our students have plenty of stories to tell about the places they’ve been and the people they’ve met. I love hearing those stories. The conversation often gets more interesting when we slow down and talk about an assumption they’ve reconsidered, a question they’re still carrying or something they would do differently next time.

I try to bring that same curiosity to the way I lead. In a recent conversation, a colleague told me how much time they’d spent finding their way around our school’s systems. They’d started making a map for themselves. As we talked, we realised it could become something that would make the first few weeks easier for the next person joining the school. I enjoy that part of leadership. Sometimes the most useful thing I can do is give someone the time and encouragement to develop an idea they already have.

At Tay Creggan, I saw how much it mattered for Year 9 girls to have adults who knew them well enough to judge when to step in and when to give them room. Through Envision, we asked girls to make decisions about their work and take on challenges that stretched them. Making time for mentoring and helping girls build relationships as they arrived on campus were part of making that independence possible.

That experience is one reason PLC’s ambition to learn with girls speaks to me. I would love to help build a Centre where a question raised by a student can become something teachers investigate together, where research helps us look more closely at what’s happening in classrooms, and where we go back to the girls to ask what they noticed and what we might have missed.

I care about doing that work carefully. I also want it to feel like work people are glad to be part of. For me, that starts with listening closely, asking good questions and making time to follow through on what people tell us.