The Prep School Teacher

12/02/2026

Just came across an odd UK teacher quirk and paternity leave. HR: If I start pat leave midweek before half-term and it continues into halfterm (as it can only be taken in week long blocks) I can't claim back that missed time (either lose a period of half-term or lose a period of paternity leave). Seems mean when my son was born on the Wednesday before half-term

If HR is correct, this oversight is easy to fix for future teachers (as part of improving pay and conditions let us take the 2 weeks in 2 flexible blocks) have been great for my wife but even this service doesn't go far enough for teachers

02/09/2025

I am starting to question if people like this have ever seen a classroom.

I’ve examined how commercial technologies reshape education – often in ways parents instinctively resist, but are told to ignore, says academic Velislava Hillman

14/07/2025

We need the name of the person (and their vested interest and their deep understanding of childhood) who was behind the inclusion of this sentence in the new Writing Framework.

This has almost certainly been put in so that big corps phonics with their associated handwriting schemes can drive their profit gouging even deeper and earlier into childhood. Why else would such a dismissive and unfounded statement be there?

We have to wake up to what’s going on in this document - a brazen attempt at profiteering, self-marketing, and unwarranted influence.

None of it is statutory though so do not allow your leaders to sleepwalk into handing over school budgets to the people who are already leeching millions. These companies deliberately diminished the free and effective Letters and Sounds approach so they could create a market for their phonics schemes, and now this is their next new market. It’s what capitalism does - the continued, desperate search for new ways to make more money for itself.

Hand writing schemes for 3-4 year olds will be incoming and all sanctioned by a government with its arbitrary 75% GLD target and bizarre ‘school readiness is if you can sit still’ agenda.

Join the dots and you’ll see it’s all about💰

Resist ✊🏻

👧🏻👦🏾not🤖🤖

07/07/2025

This is just fascinating https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/jul/06/1960s-schools-experiment-created-new-alphabet-thousands-children-unable-to-spell

Decades ago, a generation of UK schoolchildren unwittingly took part in an initiative aimed at boosting reading skills – with lasting consequences

13/06/2025

The playlist my Year 1 class chose for Funky Friday...their choices are certainly interesting...

06/06/2025

is a great free resource. Lots of books (we looked at the fairy tales for this lesson) all for free. They have audio book versions (paid subscription) and I wish I could get a school subscription for it

12/03/2025

This might be the coolest thing a child has ever bought in to show. Part of a thigh bone for a Woolly Mammoth

28/02/2025

For a Yr 3 STEM session this week, we looked at colour and how certain colours are easier to remove than others when making videos. This is their first introduction to editing videos. is still the easiest to use

21/02/2025

Nice to see the phonics book promoting an unhealthy work-life balance 🙄

07/02/2025

A bit of with Yr 3 to finish the day. I set 3 levels of programming for their Mini mini golf game

05/02/2025

Club day. is a life saver with its free resource. The Yrs 4 and 5 have loved making old school arcade games and music players

04/02/2025

I have been slowly building comprehension questions for our phonics books so that we can use these in guided reading sessions and to help guide the parents when we send these books home... . In the future I will need to add a glossary in some of the books for EAL families.