Heads of Department for English both, Gena Bagley (Otago Boys' High School) and Chris Waugh (Christ's College) share their experiences, insights, dilemmas and triumphs in their work in these iconic South Island boys' schools.
In this discussion, Bags, Chris and a Emma Stilwell, the Christ's College librarian examine the reported declining reading habits of adolescent boys and explore strategies we've employed successfully to reverse this trend. We highlight that while students value approachable teachers who connect with them, many struggle with sustained focus due to the omnipresence of digital distractions and AI. We advocate for structured routines, such as dedicated silent reading time in class and at home, to build the "mental fitness" necessary for academic success and personal wellbeing. By treating reading as a disciplined practice akin to physical training, we believe that schools can foster a genuine love for literature. Ultimately, collaboration between teachers, families, and libraries is essential to creating an environment where reading is both expected and celebrated as a core value.
10 Aug 2025
NCEA's Imminent Demise
Change is an inherent feature of our education system, but it has to be said that the changes have been coming thick and fast in recent years. Our Curriculum was undergoing what is euphemistically described as a 'refresh' over the last few years, only for us to find that it's now in the bin, to be replaced by a new 'revision'. Similarly our national assessment system, NCEA, which is in the middle of 5 year revision, has been ditched in order to go back to a system that seems reminiscent of the one it replaced 20 years ago. Bags and Chris reflect on these changes on the day they were announced and start putting together plans.
23 Mar 2025
Total Silence
Bags and Chris, in a moment of unexpected synchronicity, both have a class that is uncannily silent. We ask a question: crickets. They're doing good work, they're great young men - but as a group: diabolical. We explore the possible precursors for this and we look at what action we can take to get the boys talking.
8 Mar 2025
Lava Lamps and Scholarships
In the third week of the school year, Chris and Gena explored the new year as a fresh start, including Chris' newly 'upgraded' classroom (complete with LEDs and a lava lamp). The conversation shifted to celebrating Gena's outstanding achievement of three English scholarships at Otago Boys, including one outstanding scholarship. We discussed the importance of maintaining high expectations, establishing powerful routines, and the positive impact this has on student learning. We reflected on how setting ambitious targets ourselves models the very dispositions we ask of our students, and shared insights about the learning relationships we build with boys who may not verbalise appreciation often but deeply value rigorous, disciplined learning environments.
30 Nov 2024
What actually happens in an English classroom?
Bags and Chris share specific examples of what happens in their English classrooms, shedding light on the real-world impact of AI on boys' learning in these settings.
15 Nov 2024
AI has no place in a boys' English classroom
We may be in the minority, but Bags and Chris are in full accord on this one: AI is going to do until damage to boys' learning in English.
Only this week, articles in the Christchurch Press "Number of illiterate uni students ‘at crisis level’" and the Otago Daily Times article "Despair over Literacy Levels demonstrate that the literacy of University students in the towns where we teach is falling off a cliff–and we already know that this is even worse for boys.
This conversation explores exactly why AI is such a disaster for the classroom, what we're doing about it, and why we thing it should go the way of "Whole Language" teaching of reading and Modern Learning Environments - to the dustbin.
13 Sept 2024
Good Chat
Bags explores how she creates rich discussion in her English classroom.
30 Aug 2024
English Scholarship
Bags and Chris compare notes on how they tend to approach the preparation of students for the Unfamiliar Texts section in the New Zealand English Scholarship examination.
17 Aug 2024
Push Through the Tears
Bags relays an experience she had recently with a student who was struggling to speak in front of the class and then Chris grabs the microphone and talks for too long in order to attempt to explain how Grammar for Writing actually works in the context of a Year 9 classroom.
2 Aug 2024
Open Evening
Around this time of the year, across the Motu, teachers in secondary schools crack out their very best craft skills and upgrade the displays in their classrooms and departments in readiness for the school Open Evening.
Bags and Chris talk about this phenomenon (and the many things you find yourself responsible for as a teacher) as well as the Structured Literacy pedagogy that is now mandated in New Zealand primary schools.
What have you been asked to do for a school open evening?
19 Jul 2024
Thriving after Loss
9 Years ago, Bagley's daughter Scarlett died, age 7. We take some time in this episode to examine how this deep loss strengthens her work in the classroom.
Rarely does anyone gain an insight like this into the privacy of another person's grief. As a listener to this podcast perhaps you'll get a sense of the honesty and inner strength that makes Bags such a successful classroom teacher of English.
Shakespeare features too. Of course.
5 Jul 2024
Appendix 6
23 years ago Chris wrote an entry in his online journal that described his time at Otago Boys' High School. This was subsequently published in a history of Otago Boys' High School that was published for its 150th.
We'd been searching around for a text to analyse on the podcast and Bags suggested that Chris read it. So here it is.
21 Jun 2024
Patterns and Cognitive Overload
Bags and Chris come out of their respective closets for Pride week and we discuss how setting up patterns in the classroom accelerates boys' learning.
7 Jun 2024
Routines and Bagley's Age
This week we start looking inside (and as it happens, outside) the doors of our classrooms with an exploration of the routines we operate in our classes to support safe healthy relationships and to keep the focus on the learning.
Today's routines are the macro ones, the procedures we use as students enter and leave the class which can be crucial to setting the tone.
What are the routines like in your classrooms, or the classrooms you remember - and importantly: what purpose do they serve?
24 May 2024
Just Do Your Job
This week we get to hear what advice Bags gave the delegates during her conference presentation and we reflect on how to get the culture right in the teaching of boys. There are some new boys' voices too.
10 May 2024
The Conference
So we succeeded at putting on a conference that focussed our attention on Teaching Boys English, and by all accounts it was a real success. Gena and Chris chat about the messages of the event - including a few reasonably contentious points of view - until we were interrupted by boys arriving for English!
26 Apr 2024
Manage Your Wriggling
Our last episode attracted some really interesting feedback, so we've used that to cue us into this week's discussion. After setting out our stall last week with apocalyptic statistics about boys' education - we're now embarking on our mission to explore what we do, should do, and will do about it.
15 Apr 2024
Face the Truth
A quick interrogation of assessment outcomes for boys in New Zealand education renders some alarming results. Boys achievement is some 30% beneath that of their female counterparts in almost every measure you can come up with.
HoDs of English Gena Bagley (Otago Boys' High School in Otepoti Dunedin) and Chris Waugh (Christ's College in Otautahi Christchurch) examine some of these statistics and set out their intentions with this podcast series: to tackle boys' education - specifically in the teaching of secondary English - to face this truth and set about doing something about it!
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