We are thrilled to announce the winners of London Teachers Innovation Fund awards, funded by the Mayor of London. After receiving applications from 29 of the 33 London boroughs, we’ve selected 11 teachers to work with. The winners are exemplary teachers, who will share their expert subject knowledge and pioneering ideas with their peers, to encourage high quality teaching in London schools.

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, says: “As a child I was lucky to have a great education in local state schools with teachers who inspired me. Today’s teachers are the uncelebrated champions of our communities – they don’t simply coach the Curriculum, they bring together children of all abilities and backgrounds and have a lasting impact on their lives. I look forward to seeing how the winners’ innovative projects help drive forward London’s fantastic schools and help more young Londoners reach their potential”.

The winning teachers are…

Adam Moorman: Fortismere School in Haringey
Adam’s Don’t Just Say It: Rap It! project will use rap to help Key Stage 5 students learn Mandarin. By using the medium of rap, Adam is encouraging humour and creativity in his classroom, whilst preparing his students’ ability to give presentations and extended answers to questions in Mandarin. These key skills will help the students with their speaking examination, and the resources produced from this project will be freely distributed amongst other schools teaching Mandarin.

Andrew Smith: Shaftesbury Park Primary School in Wandsworth
Andrew’s school is leading the way for teaching Modern Foreign Languages in a ‘Content and Language Integrated’ approach. With many teachers from other schools in the area already coming to see how Andrew and his colleagues give bilingual lessons — such as a Geography lesson taught in French — there’s a real demand for a replicable model and teaching resources. Andrew’s grant will be used to work with three to six schools over a year, giving them training via formal observation of lessons, study projects, and language tutoring for teachers and teaching assistants.

Carole Kenrick: Gillespie Primary School in Islington
Carole’s aim for her STEAM Hubs is to increase children’s identity as scientists. Carole has experience in running a successful Hub in her own school, Lab_13, which is a space for experimenting, inventing, research and investigation managed by children and driven by their curiosity. She will use her grant to support other teachers to build STEAM Hubs within their own schools, giving them CPD and sharing the resources to do so.

You can find out more about Carole’s project here.

Charlie Andrew: Greig City Academy in Haringey
Charlie has developed a Classics Club Junior course for Key Stage 2 students. Her project gives pupils from Years 4-6 the opportunity to learn foundation Latin, and discover the ‘highlights’ of Classical culture. Charlie will use her grant to train more teachers in Latin so the project can successfully grow in more schools, whilst evaluating the effectiveness of the project and extending it to cover three terms.

Coralie Allison: St. John’s Angell Town Primary in Lambeth
Active Learners In Numeracy is Coralie’s idea for delivering a toolkit of movement-orientated, play based pedagogical activities for children in Reception. The project will support children’s physical development whilst also addressing specific numeracy learning objectives. Her grant will be used to roll the toolkit out to teachers in Lambeth, with class-based workshops in the participating schools.

Danny Brown: BSix Sixth Form College in Hackney
Danny will use his grant to help himself and his colleagues identify and analyse each other’s teaching. He plans to record lessons so they can see more of what happens in each other’s classrooms, and analyse particular events in more detail. By identifying possible improvements to their own in-the-moment choices, Danny and his colleagues will be able to advance their own and others teaching pedagogy.

Heba Al-Jayoosi: Mayflower Primary School in Tower Hamlets
Heba’s project seeks to enhance the memory skills of all children, but it specifically targets those with special educational needs. The children taking part in the project are encouraged to use their preferred mnemonic strategy in games and exercises, before being taught to apply it to unfamiliar tasks. The impact and resources of Heba’s project will be shared with other schools.

Jamie Frost: Tiffin School in Kingston
Jamie’s current website is a library of maths resources created by him. He plans to create a new homework platform for the site, which will allow students to take online assessments on topics across the national curriculum and beyond, either as homework set by a teacher or for more informal practice. Teachers can manage students’ accounts and monitor their progress, whilst also being able to provide tools for other teachers to build homework in a user-contributed library.

Kathy Karydis: Broomfield School in Enfield
Kathy’s Science Write Up project is designed to build teacher knowledge and expertise in the delivery of science. Teachers from the primary school partners local to Kathy’s school will take part in a tailored training programme, which will be delivered by science and language specialists. As a result of the project, schemes of learning will be adjusted and all training will be cascaded within the department.

Lucy Mathieson: Wyvil Primary School in Lambeth
Lucy and her colleagues will create the Grammar Masters project to inspire and motivate teachers, teaching assistants, and parents in the Year 3 community within her school and others. She’ll run an initial external workshop session about the value of grammar for powerful, effective and exciting communication both written and spoken. The lessons will be planned in depth as a resource, which will be ready to use in class and/or be adapted by teachers.

Rosie Osborne: Eltham Hill School in Greenwich
Play Righters will work with a core group of 25 students, from across all year groups, to write and perform plays with the help of practitioners from the Royal Court Theatre. Rosie’s project will address the lack of women playwrights available for study in school, whilst the students produce their own plays. The entire school community will be involved in final performances of their work, and the results of Play Righters will be shared across the borough. An update from Rosie about the project can be seen here.

SHINE were delighted to work with the GLA, and would like to thank everyone who entered and supported the competition.

If you’d like to know more about the London Teachers Innovation Fund, you can visit this page, or get in touch with us at teachers@shinetrust.org.uk.