‘While cognitive ability reflects what an individual can do, it is non-cognitive factors that reflect what an individual will do.’ Chamorro and Furnham (2004)
‘Good character education is good education.... we need to take character education as seriously as we take academic education.’ Berkowitz and Bier (2005)
Too often as teachers we find ourselves ascribing disappointing student progress to cognition. We might label young students 'weak', or diagnose their performance in terms of their intelligence – 'they aren't capable of this work', or 'they're not bright enough to grasp this'. But there is a growing body of research that suggests successful students approach their studies with a specific set of behaviours, skills, and attitudes, and that despite not differing cognitively from their peers, they can significantly outperform them. In short, academic success can be as much about character as it is about intelligence. In this session, Steve will explore key principles of character education, share tools and strategies for effective coaching and intervention, and discuss strategies for embedding a culture of character education at KS5.
Steve, along with this colleague Martin Griffin, have developed and delivered an extensive range of consultancy courses including work for both the London and Manchester Challenge Programme to improve Sixth Forms across the country. They have recently worked with a number of local authorities to develop their Sixth Form provision and work individually with Sixth Form start-ups. In addition, they have developed and delivered a series of middle leaders courses in the North West.