The role of a Head of Department #RiStraining The role of a Head of Department Sarah Brennan Programme Officer

#RiStraining Welcome

Aims for the session Teachers’ Standard 8: Fulfil wider professional responsibilities To focus on the key aspects of leading a curriculum area To look at typical scenarios that HoDs face on a daily basis and how to solve them To see how the RLE award fits in to middle leadership #RiStraining

Strong Department: good teamwork Good teamwork is essential in a high performing department. This film shows a high performing basketball team. Your challenge is To Count The Number Of Passes Made By The Team In White. You will have to concentrate hard…… By focusing on counting the number of passes, people will miss the ‘big picture’. One of the key challenges of a curriculum leader is to keep your eye on the ‘big picture’ whilst delivering superb work in your department. What is the ‘big picture’ is to them eg national changes, issues within school, etc, but the curriculum leader must always focus on the quality of teaching & learning. (13 passes) #RiStraining

r Your challenge is To Count The Number Of Passes Made By The Team In White. By focusing on counting the number of passes, people will miss the ‘big picture’. One of the key challenges of a curriculum leader is to keep your eye on the ‘big picture’ whilst delivering superb work in your department. What is the ‘big picture’ is to them eg national changes, issues within school, etc, but the curriculum leader must always focus on the quality of teaching & learning. (13 passes) #RiStraining

r Your challenge is To Count The Number Of Passes Made By The Team In White. By focusing on counting the number of passes, people will miss the ‘big picture’. One of the key challenges of a curriculum leader is to keep your eye on the ‘big picture’ whilst delivering superb work in your department. What is the ‘big picture’ is to them eg national changes, issues within school, etc, but the curriculum leader must always focus on the quality of teaching & learning. (13 passes) #RiStraining

Reflect on the ‘wordle’ representation of Subject leadership Reflect on the ‘wordle’ representation of Subject leadership. What are the 3-5 key purposes of subject leadership as represented here? What stands out to you? (Securing improvement: the role of subject leaders Ref: DfES 0102/2002) #RiStraining

Extract from “The Heart of the Matter” (NCSL, Leading Edge Series) Teaching – make sure that the teaching delivered by those you line manage is of the highest quality. Learning – make sure that pupils achieve at least to their potential as established by baseline testing, and preferably beyond. Becoming involved in, or initiating, a whole-school activity related to school improvement – help to drive the school forward. #RiStraining

Roles and responsibilities A HoD has many plates to spin – being a classroom teacher but also being the leader of a department. What does that entail? Teacher HoD Planning and delivering lessons Creating Schemes of Work #RiStraining

Roles and responsibilities Teacher HoD Planning and delivering lessons Creating Schemes of Work Line manager of department Budget holder Deliver CPD Implement school policies (behaviour, marking, etc) Exams and data analysis Lesson observations Induction of new staff Mentor for NQT/ ITTs ……… #RiStraining

The Middle Leader, therefore, must: Focus on learning and teaching Generate positive relationships Provide a clear vision and high expectations Improve the environment Provide time and opportunities for collaboration Distribute leadership: build teams Engage the community Evaluate and innovate #RiStraining

Middle Leadership Scenarios Work in a group of 3….. 1 person should choose the scenario & observe; 1 person should suggest a response; 1 person should suggest the skills needed to effectively deal with the scenario. Then, as a group: Summarize your response & the skills needed onto sugar paper Do this for two different scenarios #RiStraining

Middle Leadership Scenarios A: You are not sure, but you suspect that a colleague is not marking books very well. Today you receive a letter of complaint from a parent alleging that your colleague rarely marks his child’s book, and any written comments are minimal. What will you do? B: You have recently been appointed to the post of Head of Department. You have spent non-contact time in the first few weeks visiting lessons and talking to staff and pupils about their work. Worryingly, your subject does not seem to be very popular with pupils and they say they cannot see the point of doing it. Although they are all competent teachers and get satisfactory results, the staff do not agree on why the subject is important or what the best way to deliver it is. What will you do? E: You chair team meetings for your department. These are calendared by the school for an hour and a half after school once every half term. You are concerned because the meetings do not seem to be very productive: a lot of time is spent discussing administrative details and/or problems with particular classes. What will you do? C: The national changes to specifications at A Level and GCSE mean that your department is currently writing new schemes of work. You are concerned that your Key Stage 3 approach is now looking a little dated, but several colleagues feel that the increased flexibility in the KS3 Programme of Study means that you should ‘leave KS3 alone’. What will you do? D: You receive a phone call from a concerned parent. She complains that a member of your department is overly aggressive and confrontational with her daughter, and reports that her class is unhappy in their subject lessons. What do you do? F: The Assistant Head (your line manager) calls you into her office. Her analysis of pupil data shows some evidence of underachievement in your subject in Year 9. You have been asked to speak to the Senior Leadership Group for 10 minutes at next week’s leadership group meeting. What will you do? #RiStraining

How does the RLE fit into middle leadership? Education research methods: Participants will learn about relevant research methodology so that they can engage critically with education research and design and complete their own small-scale, school based research project School leadership: Participants will develop their leadership skills to support the delivery of their research project Building capacity in school teams: participants will receive training in adult facilitation techniques so that participants can deliver CPD to colleagues in their school #RiStraining

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#RiStraining