Best Practice


Top 10 tips for... Successful staff meetings

The staff meeting is a vital opportunity to demonstrate your leadership and ensure your school retains a sense of community. But we must avoid laboured events that send out the wrong messages and waste valuable staff time. Suzanne O’Connell offers 10 ideas for effective meetings


Andrew Tate: Responding to misogyny in primary schools

The hate and misogyny of Andrew Tate has entered our classrooms and is reaching down into primary age. How can we respond? Lucy Emmerson urges us to consider how RSE tackles issues including gender, power, equality, respect, consent, and healthy relationships



Online safety: Moving beyond compliance

The challenges of recognising and responding to online safety concerns are far-reaching and complex. Laura McPhee discusses moving beyond compliance and developing a safeguarding culture and considers a case study of one school’s approach



School admissions and exceptional SEND cases

Sometimes schools are compelled to admit pupils with exceptional SEND that they cannot meet because the local authority insists on the placement. Nabil Dance outlines how schools can respond in these difficult and often sensitive circumstances



Building a ‘fossil-free’ school

A new school build? Powered only by clean, community-led renewable energy? Matthew Shotton describes an ambitious project to build a fossil-free all-through school





Using the school library for inquiry-based learning

The school library and school librarian can play a key role in supporting pupils to develop problem-solving and critical thinking skills via inquiry-based learning. Elizabeth Hutchinson and Clare Brumpton break down the six stages of the FOSIL approach



Cultures and actions to drive leadership diversity

As part of anti-racism work, the diversity of our staff and senior leadership matters. Orlene Badu says this work begins with a focus on retention and creating cultures to challenge racism and inequality


Effective learning environments for EAL pupils

What are the tenets of a good and safe learning environment for learners who use English as an additional language? Drawing upon the Teachers’ Standards and latest research evidence, Caroline Bruce offers some pointers for primary schools


At crisis point: Poverty in our communities

The cost-of-living crisis has not left many untouched and those working in schools are experiencing first-hand the impact it is having on families. Suzanne O'Connell speaks with three schools to find out what they are seeing and what they are doing to help




Leadership: How to run effective meetings

Meetings matter, but too often in schools they can turn into long-winded affairs wasting precious staff time. Robbie Burns takes a look at how we can make our meetings more efficient and better


Linking metacognition and pupil motivation

Pupil motivation is a key ingredient to successful teaching but motivation can be a slippery concept and difficult to foster. Anoara Mughal considers how teachers can create an environment which will motivate learners





Making chess clubs work at primary level

Chess club can be a successful addition to a primary school’s extra-curricular activities, but it must be approached in the proper way, and beginning with ‘mini-chess’ activities is recommended. Richard James offers some dos and don'ts...

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Headteacher Update is a magazine, website, podcast and regular ebulletin dedicated to the primary school leadership team. We tackle a wide range of leadership issues, offering best practice, case studies and in-depth information, advice and guidance. Headteacher Update magazine is distributed free to approximately 20,000 primary school headteachers.

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