Mary Myatt

Mary Myatt is a respected speaker, writer and education adviser. She has worked as a teacher and as an Ofsted inspector.

Biography

Studied Classics at university.
Worked for PR and marketing companies.
Owned her own ice-cream company.
Became a teacher at 34.

Ideas about the curriculum

The curriculum should be an ongoing piece of work, not only aimed at government inspections.
She believes the curriculum should be robust.
- The stronger, more robust, more demanding and more interesting the curriculum is, the better for the pupils.
When planning the curriculum, the conversation in schools should not be about "wanting more time for subject X", but rather "how to make the most of the time subject X gets."

Gallimaufry

Mary Myatt uses the word Gallimaufry to represent what she thinks of the current curriculum in schools.
- The word means "a confused jumble or medley of things".
SLT in schools need to make time for discussions about the curriculum. They need to strip out things that are not really adding value to school, so they have time to talk about the curriculum.

Cultural capital

Secondary school should be about building cultural capital and not only training students to pass exams.
It is impossible to teach everything. So, we should identify the big ideas and show students how they fit together.
- We need to identify what students really need to know.

Wider texts

Myatt thinks teachers should use wider texts to motivate and engage students. It is ok if they cannot answer every single thing about that text in their homework.
Example: Richard Kennett is a Year 7 History teacher. He uses the scholarly text "The Norman Conquest" by Marc Morris with the students.
- Students are expected to read parts of the texts and answer questions.
- They will not be able to get the entire text, but it is a high challenge with low threat, which motivates interest.

Effective learning strategies

Myatt is also an advocate of spaced and retrieved practices.
She recommends choosing a topic and teaching it in different contexts.
- Example: Choose one topic and discuss it from the point of view of different literature books.

1Important Educational Researchers Currently

1.1Interesting Current Educational Researchers

1.1.1Mary Myatt

1.1.2Daisy Christodoulou

1.1.3Alex Quigley

1.1.4David Didau

2How to Have an Evidence-Informed Classroom

2.1How to Have an Evidence-Informed Classroom

2.1.16 Steps by the Evidence Based Teachers Network

2.1.23 Steps by the George W. Bush’s Institute

2.1.35 Steps by the University of Birmingham

3Interleaving

3.1Optimum Interleaving

3.1.1Optimum Interleaving

4Curriculum

4.1Cognitive Sciences and SEND

4.1.1Cognitive Sciences and SEND

4.2Curriculum Design

4.2.1Curriculum Design

4.3Christine Counsell: Senior Curriculum Leadership

4.3.1What is Senior Curriculum Leadership

4.3.2The Curriculum as a Narrative

5Future Questions

5.1Future Questions

5.1.1Future Questions

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