I am Alison, a qualified teacher with over 20 years of teaching experience in secondary schools. I am originally from Hampshire but live in the Forest Of Dean. I Have a BSoc Sc (Bachelor of social science) degree in Economic and Social History from the University of Birmingham and a Post Graduate Certificate of Education (PGCE) also from the University of Birmingham. I worked in Surrey for 4 years before moving to Herefordshire where I worked as a Head of Department before becoming an Assistant and then Deputy Head Teacher. During this time as a senior leader the school was judged on 3 occasions by OFSTED as an ‘outstanding’ school. I taught History, environmental science and animal care. History is my first subject and my passion. Pupils often learn better from ‘seeing’ and ‘visualising’. I led many school trips to sites of historical interest both at home and abroad. I introduced animals to the school, initially for therapeutic reasons. Eventually an animal care course grew out of the sheep, goats, chickens, pigs, dogs, rabbits, guinea pigs, bearded dragons, water dragons and tree frogs! However the primary focus for having the animals in school always remained a therapeutic one: Education is about developing the whole child and ensuring they are prepared for their next phase or stage whether that be in education or in life. Since 2016 I have worked part time as an Ofsted inspector, inspecting both primary and secondary schools. More recently I have worked for a local authority monitoring standards and supporting education settings across all phases from nursery settings to post 16 colleges. I also hold a TEFL qualification (English as an additional language)
I am trained to Level 3 in Children’s safeguarding. Please see the policies section of this website for more information about safeguarding.
Post Covid I have wanted to get back to working directly with the young people , to feel that buzz again as they learn something new and you see that light bulb moment!. I wanted to be able to tailor the teaching to an individual, providing a first class learning experience for each child without the constraints of a national curriculum . I also wanted to have the flexibility that teaching in a school does not provide: This is how I have come to set up my tutoring business, Forward Focus Tuition.
In my spare time (and I really don’t have much of that!) I train my many border collies who compete in dog agility and I also am a show jumping course designer for British Show-Jumping and British Eventing. I grew up with horses and dogs and love the outdoors lifestyle.
