Education is a world of very special people but you will meet few as extra special as Nina ‘Ninja’ Jackson.
Her work in the area of mental health and well-being has had an overwhelming impact on children, teachers and parents alike. She has rescued many who were on the brink of despair and given teachers the motivation to carry on when they nearly walked away from their careers.
When you hear her own personal story and all the amazing strategies she has employed to overcome the very worst experiences in life, you’ll then understand how she has managed to help so many people and why she is known as ‘The Ninja, who moves in mysterious ways’.
With a background in mainstream and special needs education and many years’ experience in schools as a pedagogical and pastoral champion, Nina has a breath-taking grasp of what makes classrooms - and all the people in them - tick.
She is a highly creative educator and, whilst her first book explored her research on how music can improve learning and motivation in all classrooms, her latest best-selling book, Of Teaching, Learning and Sherbet Lemons: A Compendium of Careful Advice for Teachers, is helping put the ‘fizz’ back into classrooms for thousands of teachers.
For Nina, it’s all about the sherbet lemons. Classrooms need to have the ‘hard stuff’ in place - rigour, systems, expectations and a professionally inclusive approach to the achievement of all children. But there also needs to be the ‘fizz’ – the magic, the excitement, the emotional engagement, the sense of wonder, the passion for teaching and learning, that special energy that Nina personifies when you hear her speak.
What’s more, as an Apple Teacher and Book Creator Ambassador she works globally to help teachers embrace learning technologies in a way that actually makes a difference. Sharing simple strategies and accessible hardware and software, Nina shows how simple it is to build technology into great lessons to bring the best out of all children, including those who might otherwise have trouble accessing the curriculum fully.
Yet it is her work as an international emotional health and well-being ‘ambassador’ for which she is currently most in demand. With ongoing rise of high-stakes testing and market-driven education, the impact of these so-called school improvement approaches are taking their toll on young people and adults alike. Speaking with compassion and drawing on experience and expertise drawn from across the UK as well as from her time in challenging classrooms as far apart as as Chile, Ghana and China, Nina shows schools a way forward to ensure everyone can actually thrive in this toxic climate.
Whether it’s receiving standing ovations from audiences of school leaders, running whole-school INSET days and twilights or working directly with children in their classrooms, Nina brings warmth, humanity, honesty, humour and fun to every environment, making a truly lasting impression wherever she goes.
For a speaker who moves in mysterious ways, you know where to look.
Swansea
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