Dave Watson

Dave Watson started his primary education in Alloway in Ayrshire, completing his secondary education in Rochdale and his degree and teaching qualification in Salford and South Manchester respectively.

He started teaching at his old school in Rochdale in 1982, but on moving up the promotion ladder, developed a preference for challenging schools with students with difficult backgrounds as he felt that it was in these schools that he could make the greatest positive difference in children’s lives.

It was in the last three of these in Kearsley, Darwen and as a Deputy Headteacher in Middleton that he became particularly interested in creative, personalised approaches to learning and developing the skills in children that they need to access learning.

Dave moved to a second Deputy Headship at Stamford High School, Tameside in September 2003, where he found the opportunity to put many of his beliefs into practice within a new school vision.

It was within the SLT at Stamford that he met a colleague with whom he shared a common interest in the work of Alite in general and Accelerated Learning in particular. Dave attended Mark Lovatt’s course How to Create an Accelerated Learning School in the Spring of 2004 and was so inspired that he persuaded his Headteacher to let him and his colleague run with a new initiative in keeping with the school vision to introduce Accelerated Learning alongside a home grown Learning to Learn course in Year 7.

The success of this was rapid, initially recognised by HMI Iwaskow and later came to the attention of Alistair Smith. Together they now host Open Day style conferences at Stamford attended by colleagues from all over the country and provide a consultancy service to a number of schools to give an insight into how the cultural shift which has gained national recognition for the school was brought about.

To book a course with Dave please contact Hilary Thomas on (01628) 810700 x20 or email Hilary.