The 6th P - Principles

Elsewhere in this blog you will find me espousing the 5Ps as a model for developing and planning lessons. I would like to add another please!

For some time I have placed values and character at the heart of my educational practice but only this morning recognised that there was a fundamental shortcoming in my 5Ps approach. Where did this blinding revelation come from? This morning I had the privilege of listening to Professor Bill Lucas (look him up and buy “Expansive Education” or “Educating Ruby”) and he was talking about a “split screen” approach when teaching, not only thinking about content but the character trait you also want to develop. This got me thinking, I had in my own teaching thought about the content and the thinking skills but never previously thought about explicitly planning for character traits or values. I realised that this should be easy to achieve yet could have a profound impact.

What would this require? In the simplest form it may simply be stating along with the learning objectives that “today we will also be developing our understanding of empathy” because the lesson would naturally do this anyway. The difference then being the explicit statement of intention and then hopefully an appraisal after the activity of how well the trait had been understood and developed. It may be more complex; the school may be focusing on a specific value that week, for example “unity”. You may need to adapt an activity to promote the activity and so would require more effort. I accept that this would take a little more but I believe that if you commit time and effort to developing character and values then it is more likely that a pupil will be successful in the long run.

And so back to the title. I already had 5Ps and so I really had to have another “P”, after all “5Ps and a V” would never do. Consequently I thought that “Principles” was close enough to summarise my intention and maintain the alliteration. So if you have found the 5Ps useful I would ask you to add the 6^th.

As with the others I would suggest that you consider some questions before constructing your lesson.

• What are our core traits or values?
• Does the topic lend itself to the development of a particular trait?
• Is there a particular trait I want to develop and can I adapt my tasks to reinforce this?
• How will I communicate and model the trait?
• How can I tailor my activities to allow the development of the trait?
• How will I know that pupils have understood my intentions and the trait I wish to develop?

And so now the 6Ps look like this: