Bounce Back Resources

Mpower is bringing together the expertise and energy in our 2k strong community to give you as much free and additional support as possible at this challenging time - and ensure you, and your business, are in the best possible place to #bouncebackstronger

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Home-learning insights (from surviving to thriving)

with Emma Lambert, Grace Kew, Hayley McDonnell, Vicki Raven

This free session is part of the Mpower community's 30-day #makelemonadetogether initiative where our experts are donating their time, energy and resources to help as much as they can in this time of need.
 
For those with school age children at home, parents face the additional challenges of how to support their child's learning. 
 
Without knowing when schools will begin to reopen, and many parents also trying to juggle work and business from home, the pressures, uncertainty and questions are very real.
 
Some parents and children may have already found their home-learning mojo, but many may feel overwhelmed and stretched, wonder if they are doing the right thing, and be worried about how long they can keep this up for.
 
With over 90 years of combined experience and expertise in education, our expert panel covers the areas of early years, primary education, secondary education, home education, special needs edcuation, learning through play, family learning, children's mental and emotional well-being, GCSE and A-level examinations.
 
In this recorded panel discussion, our four education experts, who are all also mothers going through the "home-learning" experience themselves, share their thoughts and insights to help parent and child, have the best home learning experience possible, during these challenging times.

Watch the home-learning insights panel discussion...

 

Meet the panel...

Emma Lambert

I am a Primary school teacher / ex Deputy Head originally from London and with a range of experience in teacher training, 1:1 support, curriculum development and project work.  A recently separated mum of two boys aged 9 and 12 I, like many of you, am now working at home and juggling many balls!   I met Nicola 4 years ago whilst home educating and starting up on my own so am very pleased to be able to offer my thoughts on this platform and help in any way I can.

I home educated my children for 2 years and during this time I wrote bespoke curriculums for other home educators. What was unique about these was that they were designed to meet family needs – enabling a parent to set all children working on similar activities without feeling stretched in all directions!  With the situation we now find ourselves in I am more than happy to adapt these to meet the needs of families trying to accommodate different aged children.  I can also offer help with queries about the work set by school, signpost to useful sites or give suggestions for organising the day.

My passion is helping others to feel inspired by learning, whether that is helping children directly or the adults who work with them and my work is varied: I am an associate tutor for L2-4 NVQ support work in schools, training adults; 

I work as 1:1 support for a disabled undergraduate, I support in schools or on short term projects to develop a more creative and play based environment, or purposeful, inspiring planning. Recent projects have included writing the material for Little Troopers school packs, supporting military children, toolkits and blogs for Kitcamp and lots of research around play based learning, ready to feed into next projects.

I am excited to see where the next few months lead when we all find a new normal!  You can connect with my on my EC Primary Learning Facebook page.

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Grace Kew

Grace has an outstanding track record as a leader and previous Headteacher of a Special - Teaching School. Her teaching career began in Denmark and has varied enormously to include primary and secondary education in mainstream and special schools. She has particular expertise in SEND. Grace is passionate about promoting Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health in schools and achieves this through supporting leadership teams in successfully implementing the ‘Wellbeing Award Strategy’ as an Adviser and Verifier for Optimus Education.

She is a very versatile, enthusiastic, and dynamic professional with a successful background delivering substantial improvements in standards of teaching, learning and assessment in special schools.

Grace is also an accredited Executive coach (Marshall Goldsmith - Stakeholder Centred Coaching), founder of Grace Kew Consultancy and Enhance Education Consultancy.  She specializes in leadership performance, team building, dynamics, diversity and inclusion, offering a wealth of practical and realistic ideas and strategies to achieve and maintain outstanding business outcomes.

Grace lives with her husband has two sons and is a very proud grandmother of four. She loves going to the gym, boating, spending time with family around the globe, and embracing fresh challenges as they arise! 

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Hayley Mcdonnell

I have over 21 years teaching, leading and managing experience in Grammar schools throughout the North West.  I am a trained GCSE and A-level examiner for EdExcel particularly in the fields of Philosophy, Ethics and Religious Studies.  I also have extensive experience in post 16 education with A-level teaching, Careers Information and Guidance, UCAS mentor, Personal Development and EPQ.  Ask me if you aren’t sure of any these acronyms.

I  now specialise in bringing SMSC (Social, Moral, Spiritual, Cultural) education to the forefront of the curriculum and help school leaders develop their provision in schools so their SMSC is embedded into the curriculum or school ethos without missing out on vital curriculum time I am writing a book to support school leaders with SMSC within their schools and I have written a chapter on Home Learning and SMSC too. Finally I have written a course to develop CPD for teachers within this “stop in” period. 

I can help parents with any queries regarding.

  • Transition from Primary to Secondary.
  • Assessments
  • UCAS statements (Post 16) what admissions tutors are looking for with guidance for early applicants too.
  • Taking a year out after A-levels.
  • EPQ (Post 16) – how to make progress now and take advantage of this time.
  • Choosing GCSE subjects
  • Choosing A-level subjects
  • How teachers predict grades before submitting to exam boards
  • The examination process.

www.hayleymcdonnell.com

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Vicki Raven

I’ve been a teacher for almost 30 years now so you can imagine I’ve seen a lot of changes in education! I believe that every child is unique. And has the ability to learn and grow. However, in recent years the way the National Curriculum has developed doesn’t leave much freedom for different learning styles and ways of seeing the world.

Life is becoming stressful for young children which is stressful for you as a parent. The effects of this don’t necessarily go away as your children get older. They may hide the effects or avoid situations that they find stressful. Neither of which helps them to become a mentally and emotionally healthy adult.

I founded Caterpillar Learners to encourage a more adaptive and creative approach to learning. I use a range of approaches such as games, self massage, craft, visualisation and positive self talk in my sessions to help children to become more aware of their feelings and to learn how to express them clearly and safely.

Please join me at www.caterpillarlearners.co.uk

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