Enthusiasm is key to unlocking the potential of school pupils - John Tomsett
According to the National Foundation for Education Research (NFER)’s, latest report on teacher recruitment in England, more than six teaching posts in every 1,000 were left unfilled in 2024. That might not sound too many, but the implications are dire, because a vacancy cannot stand in front of 30 children and teach them.
As the government attempts to fulfil its election pledge to recruit 6,500 extra teachers, the situation shows no signs of improving any time soon. Indeed, the NFER suggests that the “increased reliance on unqualified and non-specialist teachers suggests teacher shortages are growing”.
It would, then, be easy to be gloomy about things. Except, I’m not, and I want to explain why.
Having taught for 33 years, and been headteacher for 18 years in two Yorkshire secondary schools, I know lots of truly great teachers. Last September I set off around the country to watch 19 of them teach. I spent a day with each one. It was a genuine privilege.
I visited England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. I went to Holywood School in Glasgow, the biggest school in Scotland, spent a day at Ysgol Cwm Brombil, in the shadow of Port Talbot’s steel works, enjoyed the wonderful Moyle Primary School in Larne and, closer to home, watched teachers at Yorkshire’s Huntington, Fulford, and Malet Lambert schools.
A typical day saw me speak to their headteacher and their pupils, watch them teach, interview them, look at their pupils’ progress scores and collate parental testimonials. I turned the material from each visit into an 8,000 word chapter for two new books, one for primary and one for secondary.
So, what did I find out? Well, these 19 truly great teachers have several behaviours and attitudes in common, including the way they teach with genuine enthusiasm, build positive working relationships and have genuinely high expectations of both themselves and their pupils. Importantly, all these teachers’ pupils make incredibly good progress in their learning.
Every single teacher taught with unbridled, infectious enthusiasm, one of the keys to success in the classroom. Only a cardboard cut-out could fail to be excited about making bread rolls with Huntington’s head of Food and Nutrition, Garry Littlewood. Teachers have to be enthused; it’s on the job description. If you’re dulled by what you’re teaching, what chance do the pupils have?
And those positive working relationships are the foundation for everything. Malet Lambert’s head of English, Tom Fraser, treats every one of his pupils with unconditional positive regard. What was extraordinary in Tom’s case is how his core relationship with his pupils is manifested in how he teaches, in that he asks them questions about the work as though they are solving problems together.
His pupils adore the way he is with them. One said, “that’s just how it feels. It’s not him and us. We do the work for each other. He’s learning as we’re learning.”
Education has to be about more than examination outcomes. Teachers do more than just help pupils make academic progress. They create communities. Schools are, arguably, the most important social centres in our crumbling neighbourhoods and their output goes beyond examination results. They are comprised of classroom communities built by truly great teachers like those I visited.
The sense of communal obligation to each other that these teachers create in their classrooms leads to great things, one of which is the way pupils mimic their teachers’ behaviours and attitudes. When those foundational working relationships are established, whatever the teacher does, the pupils will do too. Most importantly, it was as clear as day that every single truly great teacher worked demonstrably hard for the pupils.
The conversations with the pupils were utterly illuminating. Without exception, they said that they worked hard because their teacher worked hard. This was typical of the pupils’ comments: “If she puts the effort in, then we have to. I didn’t want to let her down”.
Which leads me to my final point. The teachers I visited were visibly enjoying their lives in the classroom. Pupil behaviour was great. I never heard a teacher shout. Both teachers and pupils were happy to be there. Truly. These teachers were being themselves.
Providing a high-quality education for every child in our country is an amazingly ambitious endeavour. I marvel at the whole enterprise. It depends upon dedicated professionals – like the teachers featured in my new books – in the corners of our schools, in villages, towns and cities across the land, maintaining high standards, giving their all for our children, day-in, day-out, when no-one is looking.
Buoyed by my experience, it strikes me that if we are going to solve the teacher recruitment crisis, we have to create conditions in our schools where classrooms are devoid of fear, places where it is enjoyable to teach and to learn.
John Tomsett is an education consultant and author of This Much I Know About Truly Great Primary Teachers (and what we can learn from them) and This Much I Know About Truly Great Secondary Teachers (and what we can learn from them), which will be published in July 2025.