David Leat

Background

About David Leat

I am recently retired from teaching at Newcastle University, although I am still involved in research. II have been a Geography teacher, a Geography teacher trainer, a higher degree teacher and doctoral supervisor. I worked for the DfE on the Secondary Strategy (School Improvement) and had funded research and evaluation projects on Thinking Skills, Learning to Learn, Project Based Learning and Coaching. My over-riding motivation is in changing the experience (aka the curriculum) in schools to make education more engaging, challenging and connected for pupils young and old. They need to do individual and collaborative projects in which they go places, meet people and make and do difficult stuff. This work should, where possible, be for an audience or client other than teachers so that it has meaning. Pupils need to be given and take much more responsibility and go deeply into complex issues and subject matter. They need to develop social and cultural capital and develop complex identities and have a better chance of avoiding poverty and associated social ills. In parallel however, we need structural changes in the labour market and social policy so that we do not end up with more intelligent and caring young people, frustrated to hell because they don't the chance to become a flourishing human - indeed to strut their stuff. My current work on Community Curriculum Making puts this into practice but we desperately need some system change too. It is not enough to focus on the metrics of exam passes. Curriculum is much more than the subject matter that you learn - it is also about preparing young people to lead the best lives that they can - which is not incompatible with passing exams. Every time we see evidence of the collateral damage of contemporary adolescence we might be asking whether a richer curriculum could be part of the protective factors against such harm. We need to offer the chance to be more critical, collaborative, creative, caring and fulfilled.