Balfron Matters 

Dear colleagues,

I hope you have had lovely weekend. Another great win for our girls who beat Stonelaw High School in the final, this time in the Rugby 7s last week. The girls rugby team, pictured above, are going from strength to strength. Thanks to Fiona Fisher for her work leading and inspiring the team.

Thanks also to Sheena for coordinating the Tri-learning and for your input observing and being observed.  This is an important feature of our Learning and Teaching strategy and a wonderful opportunity to share our practice, ideas and learn from one another. At Balfron improving learning and teaching is a priority and key part of our ethos.

Another feature of our Learning and Teaching strategy is Open Doors days. Some positive highlights across the school this term have included:

•  great routines that enhance learning & behaviour management, from meet and greet at the door, starters, frequent use of Think-Pair-Share or 'discuss with your partner' to scaffold for learners before cold calling.

• increased use of show me boards - ensuring learners are engaged and helping teachers adapt.  I've seen some wonderful teachable moments come from this where a learner may be otherwise quiet and flying under the radar.

• learners able to explain about the importance of retrieval and interleaving.  I heard an excellent explanation from a pupil in history comparing retrieval to creating a path in long grass, making the path clearer over time.

• fantastic displays in science - if you get a chance, pop up and have a look! They really set a positive tone for the value of learning.

Without exception, teachers' explanations have been precise and clear. The challenge for us all is to focus on the participation rates of all learners in each class so that we ensure that our learners are working harder than us.

Massive thanks to colleagues in Expressive Arts, Science, Social Subjects and Health for the warm welcome and opportunity to discuss much interesting practice.  It has been great to see many examples of retrieval practice in action.  I am looking forward to visiting Languages on Friday this week.

There is CLPL on Nurture, Principle 1, on Thursday after school in the Strathendrick.  If you would like to go along please sign-up.

Phil is looking for feedback on the effectiveness of our Tracking & Monitoring.  If you haven't, please help by completing this very short survey.  

Finally, thanks to Scott for presenting the winners of the House Cup on Friday.  It is always a great buzz to have the school together in the atrium.  Congratulations to Campsie House - interhouse winners again! Pictures and video clip below.

Have a great week.

Elaine