How schools can transform their teaching methods

IN Partnership with

‘Teacher talks, student listens’ has been the standard for generations – but is it working? Author and speaker Lee Crockett discusses why it’s time to overhaul our approach to learning

CULTIVATING “responsible, capable and independent learners” – this is the mission of author, speaker and inspirational thinker Lee Crockett, and the subject of his broad range of written works. Working with educators and corporations in several countries, Crockett is one of Hawker Brownlow Education’s most prolific authors. Future-focused from the very start, Crockett’s first books discussed the potential for massive global changes – including the shift to remote working, and the move away from lifelong careers with one company. “I believe in a bright future and our ability to build it together. I really wanted to explore what skills our learners were going to require in the future,” Crockett tells The Educator.

Hawker Brownlow Education, a Solution Tree company, is Australasia’s leading provider of educational resources, events and professional development services. Since 1985, we have empowered F–12 educational professionals with the tools and skills they need to improve classrooms and raise student achievement. From our head office in Melbourne, we publish the latest and best-regarded educational thinking, releasing over 300 new titles and printing over 100,000 publications each year to support educational professionals. We train and inspire thousands of educators through major conferences, regional events and in-school support, delivering over 2,000 hours of professional development annually.

Find out more

“It simply makes no sense for us to spend years memorising what we can google in a minute. Teachers being demoted to the role of content delivery is insulting to their expertise, so we have to shift how we’re doing things”

Lee Crockett

“This was around the time when Australia released the General Capabilities, which describe the skills and dispositions we would want all learners to have by the time they leave [school]. Though the language may vary, my conversations with stakeholders around the world reflect a widely shared vision that involves learners acquiring these skills. That’s when I began to question whether our learners were engaged in developing these skills of future-focused learning, and whether there was a clear methodology for us to evaluate them.” With his focus on education, Crockett says some teachers found his views “confronting” in the beginning – but as the world is changing more quickly than ever before, the need for an overhaul of teaching methods is long overdue. In his latest books – Future-Focused Learning: 10 Essential Shifts of Everyday Practice and Agents to Agency – he “guides educators to embrace learner-centred practice so that classrooms transform, learning comes alive, and outcomes improve”. Crockett says Future-Focused Learning is now on the agenda of every school. He believes schools and teachers everywhere know change needs to happen. “We have heard the reasons ‘why’ for a very long time, but missing from the conversation has been a definitive ‘how’ – a results-based methodology for manageable change,” he says.

“I understand the challenges of bringing about change in the education system, and the pressures and reality of achieving this at the classroom level. So I literally wrote the book on the subject, based on our proven success in over 20 countries.” Crockett says Future-Focused Learning, his bestselling book, is his response to the ‘how’ – a roadmap to transformation used in schools and universities worldwide. In the book he details “ten core shifts of instructional practice teachers can use with learners immediately, regardless of core curriculum or instructional pedagogy. These proven shifts offer a clear pathway for taking the great work teachers already do and making it exceptional”.

Crockett also regularly holds workshops and masterclasses through Hawker Brownlow Education, all with the aim of helping educators shift their practice in achievable ways. “I also want schools to understand that there is no such thing as ‘best practice’ – there’s only evolving practice,” Crockett says. “It’s a constant, never-ending adjustment, and that also means we can be a bit more relaxed about how we do things, because we understand that it’s going to be a lifelong journey.”

Developing learner agency Crockett’s most recent book, Agents to Agency, is currently being prepared for publication. While his previous books were focused on methods, this one will take a closer look at outcomes, and will explore how teachers can make learning more effective by developing “a rich conversation” around learning, rather than just feeding students the required content. “We want an endpoint where learners are self-directed, capable and independent, and they’re in charge of their own learning,” Crockett says. “That may be a challenging shift for some educators to implement, particularly those who are heavily content specialised – but it simply makes no sense for us to spend years memorising what we can google in a minute. Teachers being demoted to the role of content delivery is insulting to their expertise, so we have to shift how we’re doing things. My wish is to guide educators to deepen their impact and elevate their practice by uncovering the essential understandings, critical concepts and individual perspectives that are the curriculum's heart. “If two years of lockdown in Australia taught us anything, it’s that the synchronous delivery of content shouldn’t happen again. It doesn’t work, and it’s ineffective,” he adds. “It’s better to spend our synchronous time in developing learner agency through rich conversation around learning intention. So the book is really about the steps we need to take to move from a teacher-centred classroom to a highly capable and independent learner-based classroom.”

“If two years of lockdown in Australia taught us anything, it’s that the synchronous delivery of content doesn’t work, and it’s ineffective. It’s better to spend our synchronous time in developing rich conversation around learning intention”

Lee Crockett

Supporting the shift to a learner-centred approach In his work with Hawker Brownlow Education, Crockett regularly arranges workshops in schools where he presents the concepts he discusses in his books, along with practical day-to-day tips on shifting teaching practice. He is also the president of the Future Focused Learning Network – a private, membership-based community for professional learning and networking where teachers can learn from Crockett’s works, and from each other. In May 2023, Crockett will be presenting at Hawker Brownlow Education’s Thinking & Learning Conference. His main topic of discussion will be how schools can improve learner outcomes, with significantly less stress for teachers and students, using his frameworks to shift practice towards a learner-centred approach.

He will also be discussing some of the language used by various Australian education directorates, and how it can be applied to everyday student engagement. “The directorates have developed conceptual documents that are very impressive, and use words like 'voice, agency, leadership’ without fully developing a shared understanding of what those concepts are,” Crockett explains. “I’m aiming to simplify and clarify. For example, if students have voice, they have a vote – they have a student rep council, and they can decide what colour the gym is going to be painted, or which one of two activities they want to do. “Agency is autonomy, which means you’re responsible for directing your learning to mutually determined outcomes,” he continues. “My work in the conference will be around the specifics of how teachers can accomplish this, and I’ll be bringing a lot of data and research to that. “Over the last two years, I’ve watched as there have been a variety of responses to the struggles we’ve all had,” Crockett concludes. “Some schools have used it as an opportunity to build walls, lock down, and continue to do what they’ve always done – and those schools are struggling. But the schools that have used this as an opportunity to see what something new could look like, those are the schools that are thriving. “I applaud the courage of those educators and leaders, and I’m really excited about the future for education, because there’s an openness to transforming practice and trying new things that hasn’t been there before.”

best in education

Events

Resources

technology

business

News

K/12

Higher Education

Companies

People

About us

Privacy

Terms & Conditions

RSS

K/12

Higher Education

K/12

Higher Education

Best in Education

Events

Resources

technology

business

News

Companies

People

About us

Privacy

Terms & Conditions

RSS

K/12

Higher Education

K/12

Higher Education

Best in Education

Events

Resources

technology

business

News

Companies

People

About us

Privacy

Terms & Conditions

RSS

K/12

Higher Education

Prints 100,000+ publications annually

Releases 300+ new titles every year

Reaches over 9,200 schools across Australia and New Zealand

Supports educational professionals in 50+ countries

Delivers 2,000+ hours of professional development each year

Hawker Brownlow Education: the numbers

Future-Focused Learning: 10 Essential Shifts of Everyday Practice

Agents to Agency

Literacy is NOT Enough: 21st Century Fluencies for the Digital Age

Mindful Assessment : The 6 Essential Fluencies of Innovative Learning

Top titles by Lee Crockett