I am sure that many teachers do know what underpins their effectiveness in the classroom. My departmental colleagues know precisely what they must do to ensure effective teaching and classroom management. Our lesson observation prompt sheet contains almost exactly the points made by the HayMcBer report and at a fraction of the cost. Hwever, sometimes the obvious does need stating or else it can easily be overlooked, as with the threshold applications, where teachers often found it difficult to assemble all the necessary evidence, because so much of what we do is accomplished on automatic pilot.

Maybe teachers should state the obvious a little more often. Our credibility will certainly not be harmed.

Andrew Green

Head of modern languages

Brayton high school

Doncaster Road

Selby, North Yorkshire