SIMON BROOKS EDUCATION

Building a rich culture of thinking in our classrooms and schools is a long, complex, thrilling and challenging process (Ritchhart, 2015). Like children themselves, a culture of thinking needs constant care and attention if it is to flourish. Something interesting for us all to think about is not so much what we do as teachers in a culture of thinking, but how we are. What do we look and sound like as teachers who characteristically attend to children’s thinking? What entr

Click here for 100 questions to ask your students during class discussion. I’m often asked what I believe to be the defining characteristic that distinguishes ‘cultures of thinking’ classrooms from other classrooms. Of course, the answer to this question is complex and nuanced, and difficult if not impossible to capture in a nutshell. However, having been privileged to spend many years in the classrooms of outstanding teachers, both as a K-12 Director of Teaching and Learning

One of the joys of my role is the opportunity to work closely with teachers from many different schools, all interested in how they might build a culture of thinking. At many schools, I work closely with groups of teachers as they identify and interrogate the big questions of education that matter most to them in their classroom practice. One such colleague is Joanne Elmes, a Year 1/2 primary school teacher at Asquith Public School in Sydney. In the story below, Joanne reflec

A couple of weeks ago I was pleased to spend a wonderful day at the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, Australia. Of the many wonderful works in the gallery, I found that one painting in particular spoke to me that day. It’s a work entitled Mount St Michael, Cornwall, painted by Clarkson Stanfield in 1830. Take a look for yourself, and see what you think. This Blog entry is part four of an eight-part series exploring 7 Big Rocks for Educators keen to build a culture o

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