#46 Metacognition and Change

Hi Everyone

It was with slight alarm and some sadness that I realised this week that the children's book that a wrote only a few years back is now well out of date! It has in fact become almost an historical document. In 'George and The Dragon' which is set in the village where I live, a young boy moves to a new house (in reality my house) and soon gets frightened because he suspects that there's a dragon living nearby.

The story came about because we used to laugh about how easy it would be o convince a small child that we had dragons, due to some unusual features of the area. The first involves the railway line that lies about 20metres from the house. When we first moved in, we kept hearing a sound coming down the chimney that we couldn't identify. It was something like a throaty roar accompanied by a considerable rumble, which we decided had to be a helicopter.

Turned out to be an old diesel engine pulling trains along our more isolated country line. We nicknamed it 'the dragon', and came to love it's throaty roar.

We had moved fairly close to a sugar factory and although we have beautiful views over the countryside out front, we can see the chimneys of the factory from the raised decking at the side of the house. During the sugar beet processing season when the factory is in full swing (roughly September to March) a great flume of steam appears as if from behind our garden shed in the back garden, looking extremely like dragon breath if you're not aware of the factory's existence.

If you're not convinced yet, at night, if you're outside the front door, there are some really weird noises coming at you in the dark! It's so easy to believe that some creature is lurking out there waiting to pounce, but it's difficult to tell exactly where the sound is coming from. It's nothing to do with the railway line or the factory, but is in fact coming from the large piece of marshland that lies between us and the river.

Protected as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (ie; has SSSI status), the area is the nesting site for thousands of water birds, including a very rare species that 'twitchers' are keen to photograph. As it goes dark and all the different species are settling down for the night, the combined sound of their various calls, produces an unidentifiable cacophony that gives rise to a weird feeling at the back of your neck.

So, the book had to be written (still available through 'Waterstones' on line) and was published in 2019. So why am I bothering to mention it now? Well, it doesn't seem that long ago, and yet, the diesel engine has now gone and we have new modern engines pulling carriages to the coast that don't have the character (or the roar) of the old ones.

The factory has changed it's processing to be more environmentally friendly and steam no longer flumes out across the sky. The birds are still there and hopefully protected through their legal status, but it's scary to think that in a short period of only 4 years, 2 of the major features of the George and the Dragon story have completely disappeared. Just think, if I had moved into this house now, the story would never have been written!

So much else has changed too, for all of us since 2019, as a result of the pandemic. Everyone has sad stories to tell about how Covid19 has impacted (and continues to impact) on their families.

Some of those most affected have been children and young people facing such a disrupted education that they've found it difficult to find their true place again. Schools are reporting an increase in numbers of students who; refuse to attend, behave badly when there, just don't engage with the curriculum any more, or struggle with their mental health.

Some change is inevitable, but how do we help learners to re-engage effectively with education again. How can we best help them manage the changes? Well, you know what I'm going to say next. Help them to develop metacognition! It's not just for using in order to make academic progress, but is in fact a process that takes place in the decision making part of the brain, allowing us to change our minds about anything.

Let's 'be in their corner together'. Why not join me at next week's free event (Tuesday 2nd May at 11.00am) for School leaders (or aspiring ones) and anyone else interested in helping learners get back on track. We will be looking at; Metacognition - The Key to Attendance, Behaviour and Engagement. Please register now using the link below and I look forward to seeing you soon.

(Copy and paste this link into your address bar if necessary).

Warm regards

Liz