SIMON BROOKS EDUCATION

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

Introducing 8 to 1: a new thinking routine for capturing the heart of the matter being studied in service of deeper understanding and cognitive engagement. This routine encourages students to distil the essence of the content being studied, whether it's understanding the functionality of topographic maps in Geography, solving equations with the distributive property in Mathematics, exploring the Weimar Republic in History . . . anything really! Here's how the routine works: 1

What type of thinking do you make routine in your classroom? Teachers interested in building a culture of thinking ensure that they create multiple opportunities for students to engage a variety of high-leverage thinking moves in service of developing understanding and engagement. One of these thinking moves is PREDICTION. Some years ago, I decided to create a prediction-centred thinking routine to use in my own classroom as an English teacher. The routine is called ‘What ha

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE PODCAST What are thinking routines? How are they different to activities? What's the difference between management, instructional and thinking routines? And how might the use of thinking routines support the growth of a culture of thinking? Cultures of Thinking is an educational framework arising from the work of Dr. Ron Ritchhart and colleagues at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. For many years, I have enjoyed a close affiliation with th