Stuart Rowntree

Primary teacher & leader. Dad & husband. Seeking clarity, calm & honest scholarship in education. Wanting space for teachers to deepen as thinkers in our craft.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

3)
The arch above - disciplinary thinking & enactive work - is where pupils begin to think as historians, scientists, writers and reach for more through experience.

Reaching it requires scaffolds, adaptive teaching and opportunity - structural supports to ensure equity.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

1)
Too often we treat cognitive science as the ceiling of teaching. It isn’t.

It’s the foundation - the non-negotiable ground of memory, attention and load. Without it, everything else collapses. But it cannot end there.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

2)
On that foundation we build a floor of substantive knowledge.

This is the secure base pupils walk on daily.

Upon it rises the pillar of agency & application - the means by which knowledge is used, tested & made purposeful.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

3)

If professional identity depends on never conceding ground, then it’s a fragile identity.

True conviction doesn’t fear nuance - it should be strengthened by it.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

1)

Perhaps the test of intellectual maturity in our field is the ability to compromise without feeling diminished.

In larger arenas, the fear of loss of status often outweighs the gain of shared understanding.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

2)

In school corridors, teachers compromise daily - it’s called teaching.

But in bigger debates, compromise gets dressed up as weakness. We need to learn from the classroom: nuance isn’t capitulation, it’s craft.

[Lekha Sharma FCCT @teacherfeature2]

‘Great schools take a different route. They start with purpose before anything is planned. They ask, “What do we want pupils to know, understand and be able to do by the time they leave us?’

Purpose before process! Yes 🙌🏼

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

Humanities so often miss out in CPD because compliance (safeguarding, SEND) and core subjects absorb the oxygen.

But when history, geography & RE are undernourished, pupils lose breadth, cultural capital and intellectual curiosity.

Narrow CPD = narrowing minds.

@TeacherTapp

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

Helping children distinguish reading for pleasure from reading for purpose matters. One nourishes identity & joy, the other secures knowledge & discernment. Teaching both frames ensures reading not performative drudgery, but a habit of mind that flexes between delight & inquiry.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

Six week school breaks at age 8 was 3% of your life.

Six weeks at 40 is 0.3% of it.

Childhood summers felt endless because they were vast slices of our lived time.

Adulthood shrinks them not by days lost, but by proportion.

And it stinks.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

Hmm.

"Censory smearing" is real.

Words like fascist/racist get thrown around too easily to close debate. But hyperbole doesn’t erase fact that some behaviours are reprehensible. Being humbled is sometimes necessary; dismissal of all critique as smear is a dodge for some...

[Katharine Birbalsingh @Miss_Snuffy]

Lots of us have had this done to us - ⁦@Adrian_Hilton⁩ gives us a phrase for it: censory smearing.

They try to shut you down by calling your whole moral being into question.

Use this to push back against the practice! 💪🏽 https://t.co/XaPzT5Ery7

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

@DrAimeeQuicks And the fact I even reach for “women’s work” as a shorthand (semi-derogatory) is embarrassing in itself.

It shows how deep the cultural grooves of gendered attitudes run, even today.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

I've read this before, I think.

The “moral panic” around men in early years says more about our culture than about children’s needs.

Media suspicion + lazy stereotypes turn care into “women’s work” and men into risks.

The real losers? Kids, starved of diverse role models.

[Professor Aimee Quickfall @DrAimeeQuicks]

@primarythink This may be of interest https://t.co/Hc1UC2I4u8

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

@DrAimeeQuicks What strikes me most is the infantilisation of primary teaching in England.

In other nations it is seen as intellectual, civic work. Here it’s too often framed as childcare, ‘women’s work’ or policy delivery. That gap between cultures has been bitterly disappointing to witness.

[Professor Aimee Quickfall @DrAimeeQuicks]

@primarythink And this one from Australia https://t.co/jjOdnWNyT9

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

Ownership & politics of legacy media matter. It's lazy, but easy.

A few billionaires shape coverage.

Demonising immigrants deflects anger from structural crises - housing, health, wages - onto scapegoats.

Look over here...not at us.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

@MoreMorrow Immigration stories are “high-yield” for clicks & sales.

Outrage sells.

Older, whiter, anxious audiences = loyal readership.

Legacy titles know how to stoke their market.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

@DrAimeeQuicks That's one I've only ever heard once from someone a long time ago. I was absolutely enraged.

[Stuart Rowntree @primarythink]

"That's not real teaching then is it?"

"Isn't that just crayons and that?"

"You just did it to work with women, I know your game!"

And these are family members and friends...

[Teacher Tapp @TeacherTapp]

Nearly half of male primary teachers (45%) say they’ve received negative comments about their role - and 18% heard them as recently as this year. 👎

For your daily dose of data, download the @TeacherTapp app!
📲 https://t.co/P7CbE7cdMr

[Professor Aimee Quickfall @DrAimeeQuicks]

@primarythink I think it’s even worse in early years. Male student teachers often have their motives questioned.