About

Hi there!

Welcome to my blog, telling the honest truth about my life as a teacher -initially through both my ITT and NQT years.

Let’s start by giving you a name that is not a Twitter handle (though coming up with @Arithmaticks is one of my proudest achievements in life…) I’m Kathryn and I’m Lead Practitioner of Maths and Teaching in a Secondary School in West Yorkshire. I teach maths at KS3-4, and I am a huge advocate of teaching for understanding, which I also work to instill in my own department. I also work across my school to deliver CPD and other teaching and learning projects.

I am really passionate about learning more about teaching and developing my own practice. I read a lot of books, attend a lot of conferences and you can guarantee that most days I will be having a conversation with someone on Twitter about some maths pedagogy. I’ve then used all this new knowledge to help others develop their own practice (I hope!), through presenting at MathsConfs and working as an NCETM Secondary Mastery Specialist.

I came to teaching a little later than some, after a 3 year stint as a Trainee Actuary. If you read my first post here, and another I did as a guest blog for my lovely friend Steph here,  you’ll get a little idea of why that job didn’t suit me too well and how I ended up where I am today!

I blog infrequently and at random intervals at the moment. This blog has purely been a document for me to reflect on how things have gone so far, and so if and when I have time to, I update. Now this is usually after delivering at MathsConf to share my thinking or when I have made a really cool resource or discovery.

I always strive to be more active, but until then there are lots of old blogs and ideas, and some resources for you to peruse.

If you want to get in touch for any reason, you can do so on twitter, or pop me an email at arithmaticks@gmail.com.

– Kathryn