News
June 2010
Welcome. I've recently done some heavy-duty tinkering to add articles and other writing from the past year, plus keynotes on English, literacy and leadership from Gaining Ground, SSAT, NCSL and others.
ARTICLES IN 2010
PUBLISHING IN 2010
ENGLISH TEACHERS & SCHOOL LEADERS
You'll find lots of materials. The most popular pages are the teacher resources, and these are regularly updated so that all conference presentations are uploaded for your own use. These cover English, literacy and learning, plus more recent presentations on leadership, raising attainment in English and "Putting the fun into functional skills".
And, for departmental self-evaluation, here's a copy of Re-Booting English .
TRAINING MATERIALS
All in-service training materials are in this section, for Network Training, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk conference presentations, and PowerPoints for the SSAT, Leading Edge, Gaining Ground, the National Association for the Teaching of English, NAAE, Lighthouse Training and others.
You can download any file by clicking on its name. The only part of any PowerPoint that may not run is the music tracks (my bemused colleagues will know of my love of cheesy muzak). Sorry - you'll need to add your own.
WRITING
There are links to my monthly TES articles, and others. To see the weekly "Writer's Toolkit" articles on grammar written a few years ago with Dick Hudson, look at: Writers' Toolkit. I have now updated many of the writing sections, so that reviews and articles are (almost) up-to-date, including articles for Managing Schools Today .
You can also see articles written for the National Education Trust: Training Teachers
A recent article on whole-school literacy, reminding us of George Sampson's 1922 dictum that "every teacher in English is a teacher of English," is on the TES website here
STUDENT RESOURCES
I've added a couple of straightforward guides on how to get a C or A* in English. I wrote them for Year 11 students I've been coaching over the past year.
The latest "C in English - guaranteed" handout is a simple and straightforward guide to how to write well. You won't become a C grade writer just by downloading and reading it: you need to practise the advice a bit, to get the approach into your bloodstream. But if you do that, it will work, and you'll find yourself a more confident and effective writer. In fact, you'll probably end up getting higher than a grade C. Let me know if you do!
Here's the companion handout: "How to get an A* at GCSE". Good luck.
OTHER RECENT PUBLISHING
I've published several new books in the past few years:
The new "Books" page gives details and links to Amazon where you can find out more about buying them.
JINGLES
Many vistors to the site are here because they share my obscure interest in radio jingles. I no longer have time to add montages to this site, but I am host to the Bob Dinan Jingle Podcast which Bob updates with an eclectic mix of jingle samples two or three times a week. Bob also uses Twitter - search for "BobDinan" and enjoy or endure his regular rants about radio imaging.
So whatever the reason for your visit, I hope you find the site useful. I'm flattered that it now receives so much attention. Thanks for your interest. Comments and feedback are always welcome!