Working Effectively With Your Teaching Assistant
From Sara Alston, co-author of The Inclusive Classroom, comes a new book supporting primary teachers to work more effectively with their teaching assistants to promote children’s learning.
Specifically focused for early career teachers, this book provides valuable support for managing this vital but potentially challenging relationship.
Working Effectively With Your Teaching Assistant supports teachers in maintaining classroom relationships, including working with the expert or inexperienced TA. It explains:
- different TA roles, including the role of the classroom TA or learning support assistant, the special needs assistant and 1:1 TA
- different forms of intervention, including pre- and over-learning and the importance of ensuring that all children access quality first teaching
- how to work collaboratively, including ways of sharing planning and feedback, differentiation strategies, promoting independence and how to support each other beyond the classroom.
Featuring quotes from TAs about their classroom experience and what would help them, plus solutions for when things don't go to plan, this book will help primary teachers to have a significant impact on learning, while saving themselves time and reducing stress.
Sara Alston is a practising SENCO and an independent SEND and safeguarding consultant and trainer with over 30 years of teaching experience. Sara has written a number of online courses and resources for teachers and TAs, including on pre- and over-learning and differentiation, for a range of organisations such as Inclusion Expert, School Bus and UK Parliament Education Service. She writes regular articles for Teach Primary and Headteacher Update as well as blogs about SEND and safeguarding issues. Sara is the co-author of The Inclusive Classroom: A new approach to differentiation, with Daniel Sobel.