What We Tell Children at the Start of a New Year
Why I don’t set New Year’s resolutions For as long as I can remember, I haven’t really set New Year’s resolutions. Not because I don’t care about learning or growth, but because the ritual has always felt slightly off to me. The idea that a new year should begin with a list of things I […]
The School Year Started with a Poem
The school year didn’t start with policies, schedules, or reminders about uniforms. It started with a poem. The principal addressed all parents seated in the school hall and spoke to what many of us feel but don’t always say out loud. The first day of school is a big moment for children and a tender […]
Class Size Matters. But Design Matters More
I used to think size doesn’t matter. Then I taught thirty-five students at once.That moment strips teaching down to its essentials. Because when numbers rise, there’s nowhere to hide. Every unclear instruction. Every duplicated task. Every assessment done out of habit rather than intention – it all compounds. In that class, I could see the […]
Teaching Children How to Think in an Age of Instant Answers
Long before AI entered classrooms, I was already thinking about what happens after the lesson ends. I’ve always believed that learning doesn’t belong to the teacher. It never lived only in my classroom. My role was to create the conditions, then step back enough for children to realise they could carry learning with them. Making […]
When Curriculum Expands, Something Has to Give
Back in 2012, long before AI entered everyday education conversations, I was working with teachers who were already grappling with a familiar tension. “The curriculum is expanding – and rightly so.” “But we, as teachers, are carrying everything.” Oracy. Collaboration. Assessment for learning. Cross-school exposure. All important. All necessary. And yet, each addition arrived with […]
Seven Dwarves, Seven Roles, One Poison Apple
The final chapter of the LEARNER AI Framework You know the story. Snow White flees into a forest and finds a cottage where seven small figures live, each with a name and a purpose, each essential to the household. Together they teach her things no palace ever did. They taught her how to think harder, […]
He Did Not Know the Answer. So I Told Him to Articulate It to AI.
A is for Articulate. The third role in the LEARNERS AI Framework. When students teach AI instead of asking it, something remarkable happens. A Science question I could not answer. And a student who could. I have never taught Science. Not once in my career. So when Hamzah, a quiet and anxious Primary 5 student, […]
The Day AI Joined My Debate Team
Examining Ideas with an AI Teammate in the Classroom The LEARNERS AI Framework, Role 2 : E is for Examine 7 ways students can use AI to support visible thinking and deeper learning We should be allowed to use AI tools during our lessons. The sentence appeared on the screen in my classroom. A ripple […]
Beyond the Shortcut: What It Really Means to Learn With AI
The LEARNERS series L is for Learn: AI as Tutor If you know me, you know technology is my favourite teaching tool. For years, though, I quietly wondered if I should have learnt coding. As technology reshaped the world around me, I sometimes asked myself whether I had missed a language that mattered – whether […]