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Teach Like a Pirate #Tlap: The SEN Classroom

Implementing The Teach Like a Pirate Philosophy In Your Classroom

One of my first discoveries of an education book that I could get behind and implement was Dave Burgess’s book Teach Like A Pirate, or #tlap as it’s known. Now I am a fan of pirates and need little encouragement to embrace Pirate culture. Now unlike some ‘how to be the best teacher and teach better than anyone else books’ I believe Dave’s book is easy to apply in any setting and does not suggest anything that any special needs teacher cannot apply.

Download Teach Like a Pirate Ebook Free PDF Preview

What Does Teach Like a Pirate Mean?

I imagine many of you are familiar with the concept of teaching like a pirate but for the uninitiated landlubber there are 5 strands to this:

Passion

Dave states and I agree that students (and staff if you work as part as part of a class team) are not motivated by monotony and mediocrity. No one wants to come to work with challenging students in a classroom lacking in energy and interest from the captain. This is the greatest means of promoting engagement in your pupils available for free for teachers.

Immersion

To summarise this; get involved the activities your students are doing, join in, don’t watch PE or games played to enhance social skills join in as an active participant. Not a director. Model those skills you are trying to develop in your class.

Rapport

This is a great one, Get to know your students! In SEN the relationships you have with your students will be your greatest teaching asset. No resource, plan, behaviour support strategy, learning intervention will come close to matching the impact of having a great positive respectful relationship with your class.

Ask and analyse

Failure is only feedback in disguise. Teach like pirate practitioners are always seeking feedback to improve.

Transformation

Dave asks two questions

1) If your students didn’t have to be there, would you be teaching in an empty room?

2) Do you have any lessons you could sell tickets for?

Transformation is about looking at how you deliver lessons, giving them context and meaning. In SEN it is vital that we provide our students with an experience they will remember and learning they can practice and apply outside the classroom.

Enthusiasm

Now if I am honest, sometimes the last thing our students want to do is sit in a classroom all day listening to me. Imagine a CPD event where all you did was listen to a monotonous speaker drone on (this is hopefully not me)! Well, whatever your classroom setup if you create your lessons with enthusiasm they will be better, if you deliver them as though you are invested in the subject your students will be buoyed up. It’s not about performing all the time. It’s about presenting your lessons as the creative investments in time you have made to craft them. The barriers to this, Dave states may be fear of ridicule or lack of focus. I have never met a less judgemental more forgiving group of students than those I teach.

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Dave states that “We need entrepreneurial innovators who are capable of captaining the educational ship through waters that are rough and constantly changing.”. He suggests teachers embrace the spirit of the buccaneer to “denounce conformity, and seek adventure”

Teach like a pirate quote
Dave Burgess Quote – Teach like a Pirate

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3 Comments

  1. Hi Joe,
    We really loved your presentation last night, especially the slides used, ‘which step have you reached today’. Is there any chance you could email a copy to use on display around the school?
    Kind regards Tracy Bullock

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