Rainbow Skies for Teachers

163 Episodes

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159. Small Acts, Big Ripples: Teaching Kindness for World Kindness Day

2026-11-0116:54

One kind note can change someone's whole day. And when your students see that for themselves, kindness stops being a poster on the wall and starts being something they actually do. In this episode, we're sharing our favourite ways to bring World Kindness Day into your classroom. The ideas are simple and meaningful, and you can use them all year, not just for one day. We chat about where World Kindness Day came from and how to help students define kindness in their own words. We share role pla...

158. Every Kid Is Creative: Rethinking How We Teach Writing, with Matt Stanton

2026-10-2540:46

You know the student who stares at a blank page and tells you they’ve got no ideas? Matt Stanton reckons that’s almost never a creativity problem. It’s a confidence problem. Matt is a bestselling children’s author and illustrator, and in this chat he unpacks what actually gets kids writing. Time to think. Room to move. Permission to speak or draw the idea before writing a single word. If creative writing has become the hardest part of your week, you’ll walk away with a few things you can try ...

157. From Finger Counting to Fast Facts in 10 Minutes a Day

2026-10-1827:08

You know the moment… you ask 6 x 7 and half the class starts counting on their fingers while the other half either guesses or just looks at you with a blank stare. We've been there too, which is exactly why we spent months building something to fix it. In this episode, we're unpacking our brand new Fact Fluency Pathway for multiplication and division. It's a simple 10 minute daily routine that helps your students recall their facts accurately, quickly and flexibly, without eating into t...

156. Zero-Prep Math Games with Liz from Playful Learning Games

2026-10-1156:57

Most of us were taught that play is what kids get once the real work is done. Liz reckons that's backwards. Play can be the learning itself, and for kids aged 7 to 11 it's often the quickest way in. Liz is the founder of Playful Learning Games, and in this chat she walks us through games you can run tomorrow with a deck of cards, a handful of dice and a stack of post-it notes. No laminating, no budget, no prep. She also takes on every pushback we've all made. No time. No space. It'll be chaos...

155. Why Handwriting Still Matters in Math (and 5 Ways to Use It)

2026-10-0423:53

In a world of screens and devices, handwriting can feel a bit old-school. But the research keeps landing on the same thing: when students physically write, they process, organise and remember more. In this episode we’re making the case for keeping the pencil in your math lessons, and showing you exactly how. We get into why writing by hand builds stronger brain connections (there’s a fascinating Norwegian study on this), why explaining your thinking matters far more than just landing the righ...

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