RPM - Relationships; Purpose; Message
Before you set foot in your school this year/term create 3 specific personal statements (as below). Find an image or symbol for each one. Display the text and images in a place you pass regularly to remind you of the following:

1. Relationships
What are your strengths in making and keeping learning relationships?

2. Purpose
What is your purpose as an educator? What do you want to achieve for yourself and for your learners?

3. Message
If you could make everyone on Earth hear and understand one message, what would that message be?

I’m good at listening to my learners and understanding what their individual needs are. I want to help each pupil find their own way in life, not follow someone else’s way. I’d tell the Earth, look at each person in the context of their whole life, not just in a single moment.

1-Line Diary
I normally keep a diary for about 6 months in every 12. I know that’s not the point of a diary, but for one reason or another I lose interest. The only way I’ve kept the diary habit is by insisting to myself that I write just one line a day; a bit like Twitter. The line must describe the most significant event of that day, clearly and accurately. And by line I mean line of an A4 page. Not a 300 word sentence.

1. Make a commitment to yourself to create a 1-line diary for your class or for one of your groups this year/term. Every school day, record the most significant event: maybe a child ‘getting it’ or a fight or a breakthrough or a joke or an outburst. 

2. This time next year/term you’ll have a potted history of learning – a valuable creation for moving on to the next and following years/terms.

3. Share your diary with pupils (if appropriate) and colleagues – maybe inspiring them to keep their own.