Principles in Practice Low Res.pdf

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A teachers guide to research evidenceon teaching and learning

STAFFROOM

POSTERINSIDE


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this is an exciting time to be a teacher. It may not always eel that

way, on a Friday aternoon when another Government directive haslanded on your desk, the students have been lively, to put it politely,and you ace a weekend o marking.

But the opportunities or creativity, refection and making adierence to the lie o every child who comes through yourclassroom have never been greater. Teachers today have the evidenceand the tools at their disposal to help children become skilled andenthusiastic lielong learners, and to grow and learn themselves

throughout their own lives and careers.Evidence rom the 22 schools projects involved in the Teaching and Learning

Research Programme led us to the 10 principles o eective teaching and learningwhich are set out in the enclosed poster and explicated on pages 13-16. Building onexperience as well as evidence, these seem to apply across the board. Sadly however, a

conundrum o early 21stcentury teaching revealed in our research is that practitionerssometimes eel they have to choose between their understanding and the type opractice expected o them to achieve the required standards.

It doesnt have to be that way. Policy implementation only succeeds when it issupported by the expert judgement o skilled and knowledgeable proessionals andTLRPs contention is that such judgements are best inormed by educational principles,rather than by de-contextualised prescription. Teachers are key mediators and mustuse judgements about circumstances, contexts, pupils, objectives and teachingapproaches, bearing in mind their values, goals and educational principles.

Teachers need to be aware o the political process, and o its legitimate oversight opublic educational services, but as proessionals they should also be willing tocontribute to it, challenging policy where they eel they must, in the light o their

experience and other evidence.However, just as TLRP aims to challenge governments so that policies are as

consistent as possible with what we know about eective teaching and learning, so too itchallenges ellow educationalists. Is our practice really evidence-inormed?

In this respect, it is exciting that Governments across the UK are encouragingrefective, evidence-inormed teaching. For example, the Department or Education inNorthern Irelands Teacher Education Partnership Handbook says: At the heart obecoming a teacher is, above all else, becoming a learner a lielong learner. To learn,one has to ask questions, o onesel and o others, and to know that this process is

valued and shared across the school.Action research and other orms o refective practice are exciting ways or teachers

to innovate, learn and reresh their thinking. Through them, teachers can monitor,observe and collect data on their own and learners intentions, actions and eelings.Once evidence is analysed, shared and considered, it may lead the teacher to reviseclassroom policies, plans and provision. At its best, such work also draws on insightsrom other orms o social science research.

We hope this guide to a large and growing collection o research data gatheredunder the wing o the TLRP will help you make the most o the joys and challenges oteaching and think about undertaking systematic enquiries o your own.

Andrew PollardDirector TLRP

June 2007

INTRODUCTION

Research into action


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CONTENTS

The learning cultureLearning how to learnHow teacher learning aectschildrens development

Lets thinkBuilding cognitive skillsConsulting pupils about teachingand learning

Education for the whole personHow children negotiate their waythrough schoolingWhat makes an inclusive school?

All together nowWhat makes groupwork work?

A secondary with a vision

Ten principles of effectiveteaching and learningHow they were ormulatedEvidence rom TLRP projects

Children at the centreA primary with a vision

A treasure chest of TLRPresources

Research into practice

Secondary researchThinking about science

Primary researchHow meaning helps spellingHome-school linksTeaching intensive quantities

Early years researchDening qualityICT in the nursery

TLRP and national policyThe projects infuence

List of schools projectsFind out more

Dont miss your10 Principlesposter, at the centreof this magazine

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4 LEARNING COMMUNITIES

As a ormerassistant editoroThe Times

EducationalSupplement, I washeavilyinuenced by

something the educationalresearcher and ormer teacherMary Jane Drummond oncesaid to me. She said shed like toread about teachers thinking.

Not necessarily reachingsolutions, but examiningquestions very hard, tryingthings out and sharing theirreections.

In recent years, some haveargued that it is possible orresearch to determine what

works in teaching oeringcategoric answers to the knottydilemmas o practice and policy.

The Teaching and LearningResearch Programme and itsmany projects are more modestand realistic. In addition to the

insights rom particularprojects, they propose evidence-inormed principles to help withreection and analysis, butrarely hard and ast answers.They recognise that one-size-fts-all solutions are much likeone-size-fts-all garments theydont actually ft anyone exceptthat mythical average child.

What comes across clearlyrom every project, though, isthe importance o ostering the

whole school as a learningcommunity, or teachers,parents and o course children.Findings rom across theprogramme demonstrate thatteacher learning is essential tochildrens learning. In order tohelp children to becomereective learners, teachers frsthave to develop this dispositionor themselves.

There are even statistics tosupport this idea. Perormancetables or 2002-4 comparingpupils rom Learning How toLearn project schools with theprogress o those in similarschools show that three o theour schools with the highest

value added had high levels oengagement with the project

and explicit strategies to supportteachers proessionaldevelopment and networking.

The researchers argue thatteacher learning is bothindividual and collective.Teachers need to gain newknowledge and skills within aculture that supports newthinking and innovation. Theyneed to learn how to evaluateevidence and to have the

confdence to challenge taken-or-granted assumptions,including their own.

In celebration o suchpersonal exploration, let mequote some o Mary JaneDrummonds account oJanice, an inant teacher, inthe orthcoming LHTL book(see right):

As she discusses thetransition rom the FoundationStage to Key Stage 1, sheexpresses some o her doubtsand uncertainties:

Does it actually help them ithey are sitting how you wantthem to sit?

I dont know whether theyare learning about learning ortheyre learning what Im tellingthem.

Looking at the children andthinking whatever were doingisnt working and thinking this isnot right or them I think weeel in a rush and theres notenough time to talk to thechildren or to think about howthey are going to learn best; itsall been about what Im going toteach them.

And later, the account goes on:She continues to brood aboutthe human, emotionaldimension o her own learning,and the difculty, even pain, o

working outside the comortzone: trying to do thingsdierently. She is moving towards

what she calls a more holisticapproach to learning: Learningconnects my mind, body and soulto understanding as teachers

we seek or wider understandingo the whole person.

Diane Hofkins

Diane Hofkins is editor of this guide

T

eachers need to appearcalm and confdent in theclassroom, but inside,many are engaged in a tug-o-war within their ownhearts and minds. Their

principles are pulling them in onedirection, but they believe thedemands o league tables andperormance targets are draggingthem in another.

How can there be time or openenquiry, or pupils to set their owngoals or or experimentation? Youvegot to do well in national tests, sohow can you squeeze in other typeso assessment as well, even i youthink they are important?

The work o Learning How toLearn and other TLRP projectsshows that teachers do not have tochoose between teaching well andgetting good results.

They ound that the morereective teachers came to be, theeasier it was or them to align their

Every teacher

matters

belies with their teaching.This was true o whole schools as

well. Those schools that reused tobe passive but worked reectively,strategically, intentionally andcollaboratively on thecontradictions, to resolve them,showed signs o learning how tolearn in much the way that weconceptualised LHTL by pupils andteachers say TLRP deputy directorMary James and the project team intheir orthcoming book, ImprovingLearning How to Learn in Classrooms,Schools and Networks(Routledge).

The central aim o this researchand development project was tohelp children become sel-motivated, autonomous learners

who enjoyed the process o learningand understood what they neededto do to meet new challenges.

Assessment or learning was apowerul way into learning how tolearn, say the researchers, who

worked with 40 primary and

Teachers can bring their beliesand pratice into harmony

TERIPENGILLEY


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S

econdary English teacher Angelaasked her Year 8s to consider adramatic rendition o a 19th

century poem, seeking to engagethem in the question o what makes orquality in a piece o work. She beganthe lesson by asking the pupils to drawup a list o criteria or perorming apoem. Suggestions all came rom thepupils while she probed, challengedand polished their contributions. Forexample:

Pupil You could speed it up and slowit down.

Angela Yes pace, thats veryimportant in reading.

Angela and the classroom assistantthen perormed the poem and invitedpupils to critique their perormancebased on the criteria. A similar orm oprobing took place.

Pupil It was boring.

Angela What do you mean boring?

Pupil There wasnt enoughexpression in your ace whenthe poem was being read or inthe reading.

Angela So what could I have done tomake it better?

Pupil You could have looked andsounded more alarmed.

The three tasks in Angelas lesson the creation o the criteria, theperormance o the poem and theapplication o the criteria to theperormances governed both thepupils thinking about what wasneeded when they acted out the poemthemselves and the peer assessmento those perormances.

In interviews with researchers,Angela always described assessmenttasks as opportunities or the pupils toimprove their perormance.

In this way the activities had anopen, uid eel which correspondedwith the notion o promoting pupilautonomy. It reinorced a sense olimitless progress wherebyassessment is always seen as a toolor changing uture perormancerather than or judging what has beendone already.

From Improving Learning How to Learnin Classrooms, Schools and Networks

(out this year)

CASE STUDY: PERFORMANCE ARTS

5

Assessment or learningis eective when pupils:

Show changes in theirattitudes to learningand in their motivation,sel-esteem,independence, initiativeand confdence

Show changes in theirresponses to questions,in contributions toplenary sessions andin explanations anddescriptions

Improve their attainment

Ask relevant questions

Are actively involved insetting targets, in peeror sel-assessment,and in recognisingprogress in theirwritten work, skills,knowledge andunderstanding.

ASSESSING AFL

secondary schools. But it is difcultto shit rom reliance on specifctechniques to practices based ondeep principles.

As with any shit in practice, asurace interpretation (or examplea teacher using trafc lights sochildren can show whether or notthey have understood, withoutreally coming to terms with thephilosophy behind them) may onlybring about surace changes.Teachers need the intellectualresources to know what to do when

they dont know what to do.Children, teachers and the school

community all need time to absorband use new ways o working.

The innovations introduced intoclassrooms through the LHTLstudies incorporated somecombination o:

Developing classroom talk andquestioning. Teachers need to spendtime planning good diagnosticquestions, possibly with colleagues.Pupils can learn to ask questionstoo, and reect on answers. They

will need more thinking time inorder to come up with moreproound ideas.

Giving appropriate feedback. Careulcommenting has been shown to

work better than marks or evenmarks with comments.

Sharing criteria with learners. Thisincludes expectations, objectives,goals, targets and success criteria.

Peer- and self-assessment. Researchhas shown the greatest gains orchildren previously assessed ashaving weak basic skills. This maysuggest children didntunderstand what was expected,rather than that they lacked ability.

Thoughtful and active learners.Children need to understand thedesired outcomes and theprocesses o learning.

Website www.learntolearn.ac.ukSee also Getting to the heart o childrenp 17, A treasure chest o ideas p 18


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The UN Convention onthe Rights o the Child(1989) includes the rightto be heard as one o itsour basic principles. Thisright is also enshrined in

the Every Child Matters legislation,under the guarantee that young

people should be able to makea positive contribution to theircommunity and society.

Since the TLRPs ConsultingPupils about Teaching andLearning project began in 2000, theidea o Pupil Voice has taken holdacross the UK and has even beenormalised in the Children Act2004. This has dangers as well asbenefts, warn the researchers.

When schools only ollow the lettero the law and consult pupils in atokenistic way, asking them onlyabout unimportant issues, or worse,ailing to carry through on theirideas, this can lead to cynicism anddisengagement.

Rules rom on high canunintentionally limit innovationand improvement. As theresearchers say, Policy-makersknow something aboutconsultation, about when it isgenuine and when simply symbolic.

On the other hand, Beingconsulted genuinely can help pupilseel that they are respected asindividuals and as a body within theschool and that they can make a realcontribution.

One ambitious scheme isBedordshires Students asLearning Partners, built on the

Finding out what theyve got to sayor themselves

Children

should beseen andheard

stops them rom learning buildsrelationships and provides teachers

with crucial inormation.Consulting Pupils project

researchers say that teachers gain adeeper insight into young peoplescapabilities, the capacity to see the

amiliar rom a dierent angle, apractical agenda or improvementand, perhaps most important,a renewed sense o excitementin teaching. The process helpsschools develop a more partnershiporiented relationship between staand students.

Schools consult pupils in a varietyo contexts. These include:

Spotlighting issues o concern orparticular groups, such as girls orthe disengaged

Clariying generalised issues, orexample a reerendum on a keyschool matter

Monitoring and evaluating newstrategies

Supporting individual learners

As part o sel-review

Consultation can

sometimes fail to make a

real difference because

pupils are not truly heard.

Its important to be alive to

the following issues:

Hearing the quiet voicein the acoustic of the

school

Avoiding the creation ofa pupil voice lite

Maintainingauthenticity.

Consultation needs

to be on important

matters and must have

a result.

Sharing data and

offering feedback to

pupils

Trust and openness.Pupils need to feel their

ideas are welcome

and not simply

accommodated so as

not to disturb existing

orthodoxies.

PUPIL CONSULTATION: SOME CAUTIONS

projects work, in which discussionbetween sta and children iscontinual. One aspect involvesparticular students observinglessons and giving constructive andtactul eedback to the teachers.

The Consulting Pupils researchteam brought six projects together

into a network o 43 schools,coordinated by the respectedCambridge Faculty o EducationProessor Jean Rudduck, who diedthis year.The team ound that:

I pupils eel they matter and arerespected in school, they are morelikely to commit themselves tolearning

Pupils accounts o what helpsthem to learn and what gets in the

way o their learning can provide apractical agenda

Examples o practice and pupiltestimony can eed powerully into

whole school policy and planning.As can be seen in many TLRPfndings spotlighted in thispublication, fnding out romchildren what helps them or

6 PUPIL CONSULTATION

Being consultedgenuinely can helppupils feel they arerespected asindividuals

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Building thinking skills or thinking classrooms

When they grow up,todays children aregoing to have to be

extremely skilledthinkers in order to tackle theglobal problems acing them.Traditional approaches tolearning will not be enough.

The ACTS (ActivatingChildrens Thinking Skills)research team in NorthernIreland worked in juniorclassrooms to develop andanalyse the sort o classroom talkthat would help children tothink about their thinking. Acentral aim was or lessons toblend subject content with

thinking skills, an approach theresearchers, led by CarolMcGuinness and Noel Sheehy,call inusion.

The principle o makingthinking explicit is valuable orboth children and teachers.

ACTS used thinking diagramsto clariy the steps in a thinkingprocess. For example, a diagramor decision-making invites thestudents to rst consider and

write down all the options. Eachis taken in turn, pros and consare listed and then weighed up

beore an action is decidedupon. Students can evaluateboth their own decisions andthose o literary or historicalgures in this way. Usingdiagrams also slows down thethinking process, giving studentstime to grasp what is involved.

ACTS builds on the idea thatgood thinking may have as muchto do with creating a dispositionto be a good thinker as it has todo with acquiring specic skillsand strategies.

Researchers developed aramework setting out dierentkinds o thinking which can beapplied to dierent situations ortopics. For example,sequencing is among theSearching or meaning skills,and can be applied readily toscience or history. The othercategories are critical thinking,decision-making, problemsolving and creative thinking.

The researchers ound thatteachers needed support:

to recognise the need to beexplicit about the process othinking as well as the content

to sharpen their ownunderstanding o a range othinking skills

to readily identiy contexts ortopics within the curriculum

which can be matched withparticular thinking skills

to develop lesson plans andteach lessons which meet bothhigh quality thinking skills andcurricular content objectives

to develop a vocabulary ortalking about thinking which issuitable or the age and ability

levels o their pupils.Teachers who took part in a CPDprogramme reported that theirimages o themselves as teacherschanged. Their own thinkingsharpened, their planningimproved, their expectations ochildren were raised and theydeveloped better questioningstrategies. Time was the mainconstraint.

Researchers ound thatteachers using these approachesneed to pay special attention tolower ability children. Although

these childrens strategiesimproved, their sel-imageappeared not to be enhanced.

By and large, though, childrenbecame more sel-motivated andactive as learners. Teachers saidtheir pupils gained betterreasoning powers and greatercreativity. They were more ableto clariy and structure thinkingand to see links betweencurriculum areas. Theircondence increased and theyexpected to be pushed.

In lessons, children were

engaged in cognitivelydemanding tasks.Teachers used

visual tools such as diagrams andwall charts to help thinking andrefection.

The programme has also beentrialled in Wales, England andScotland, and used successullyat key stage 3.

A Teachers Handbook will join theTLRPs Improving Practice Series.www.sustainablethinkingclassrooms.qub.ac.uk

Getthosebrainsintogear

Establishing a more democraticschool system or puttingcitizenship education into action.

The projects work has beenextended by a Northern Irelandstudy, Consulting Pupils on theAssessment o their Learning(CPAL) which is looking at how toengage children in assessment orlearning and at the potential o anannual pupil prole.

The Consulting Pupils team has produceda wealth o books and materials includingConsulting Pupils: A Toolkit for Teachers,MacBeath, Demetriou, Rudduck and MyersandStudents as Researchers: Making aDifference, Fielding and Bragg (Pearson).Visit www.consultingpupils.co.uk andwww.cpal.qub.ac.uk

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Eight and nine-year-oldshad been comparing andcontrasting two pieces oclassical music. At the endo the lesson,the teacherinvited them to makeconnections between thepattern o thinking(comparing andcontrasting) that they hadbeen engaged in and newcontexts.T Can anybody think o a

situation in their ownlives where it might beuseul to compare and

contrast two things?The real lie situationthat I told you about atthe beginning o thelesson was comparingtwo pupils who mightbe class captain.(short silence)

P1I you were looking or ajob, so lets say you have

T Two job oers...P1 ...and you dont know

which one to choose,and by looking at thesimilarities anddierences it might

help you understandwhich job is right oryou.

P2 Buying a houseT Explain...P2 Youre looking at two

houses, and there isone that is cheap but itisnt so good, it hasnt agarden and things likethat...

T So it would help youweigh up two things likechoosing a house...

P3(rom the back o theroom) I you got

accepted by twouniversities you couldsee which one wasbetter and it would helpyou decide which one togo to...

T Thats a goodexample....

P4 (hesitantly but gainingin confdence) I gotinvited to two birthdayparties and they wereon the same day and Ihad to decide which oneto go to...

T Very good...

THE LONG AND SHORT OF IT


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Personalised learning.

What does that phrasemake you think o? A newand conusing demandrom the Government? Anexciting opportunity?

Children studying in their own littlebubbles? Or do you just go blank?

According to the Identity andLearning Programme, children arecreating their own personalisedlearning every day, as they activelynegotiate their way throughschooling. And it is not always whatthey really want or what is best orthem.

Children create their own schooland learning identities in responseto the way they are treated byteachers and other students, and thesuccessive experiences they have asthey move through education.Researchers Andrew Pollard, nowTLRP director, and Ann Filer,ollowed small cohorts o workingclass and middle class children in anEnglish city through their pupilcareers rom ages our to 16. Themost undamental orm oeducation, the process o becominga person, requires careulconsideration as well as the

Children build their own identitiesas learners. How can teachers and

schools make a dierence?

8 INCLUSION

The social world o school

I

n a series o books, Pollard and Filer have told the engaging and revealingstories o individual children as they negotiate their way through the

academic and social challenges o their school years. The Social World oSecondary Education (Continuum, orthcoming) includes comparison othe careers o two girls rom the same middle-class primary who went onto comprehensives with more working-class environments.

SALLY

Sally had been a star in primaryschool popular with teachers andchildren, good at sports and dramaand a top student. She enjoyedbeing the caretakers daughter,auaitwith all aspects o the school.

Within days o starting at StMargarets Comprehensive, shewent home ill and miserable, and

things did not improve or a longtime. From being the high status,popular pupil o her primary schoolyears, Sally had become a pupilwith no real riends. Moreover, ittranspired that she was beingbullied... However, through thatdifcult and distressing time, Sallymaintained astonishing levels oacademic success.

Socially, she had lost thespecialness she had at primary,but she retained her image as anideal pupil or teachers makingher peers even more resentul. It

was devastating because, as herather said, Sally likes to be liked.She was actually quitevulnerable, needing approval.

Eventually, she did makeriends working-class girls whoaccepted her, rather than themiddle-class ones who made herlie a misery. She became muchhappier, broadened her accent,and began to do less well in school,dropping rom straight As to a mixo As, Bs and Cs by Year 11,

although she retained goodrelationships with teachers.

The researchers conclude:Whilst she was socially adept inthe context o her primary school,she had ew strategic resourcesor adapting to dierent peerexpectations or shaping a dierentidentity... When she fnallyrelinquished her ormer peeridentity and conormed to the peerculture, so also she relinquishedher high-achieving academicidentity. Teachers could considerwhat might have helped her to

respond dierently.Six years ater GCSEs,Sally is

training as a transport companyjunior manager.

HAZEL

Hazel also suered rom peerhostility and bullying when she gotto Southwater Comprehensive, butshe had the resources to managethe situation, and she did so bystrengthening and elaborating,rather than compromising, herdistinct identity.

Her (middle-class) parents hadsought out a secondary schoolwith a pastoral and social ethoslikely to be sensitive to theemotional vulnerability and socialmarginality that Hazel had shownthrough her primary years, andwhich would also support herartistic talents, which had beenless well-appreciated at primary.

At Greenside shed believed artwas her only talent, but Thenwhen I went to Southwater, I oundI was good at lots o dierentthings, and art, she said in Year 9.Teachers valued her individualityand her out-o-school interestswere known and recognised.

Her Y9 art teacher said o her,

An exceptional artist, real talent.An eccentric we need people likethat, though I can see it causesproblems with her peers.

Hazel was someone who knewwho she was, and wasnt interestedin conorming to the norm, quitehappily dismissing popular music orTV as a load o rubbish. However,she sought out the unusual, artisticpeople, and brought them togetherin a riendship group.

O course, this may have beenlargely due to her owntemperament and to parentalsupport and endorsement or herindividuality, say Pollard andFiler. However, Hazels accountscertainly suggest that the schooland its curriculum also supportedthe development o her identityand or academic and socialgrowth in areas that were o greatimportance to her.

Hazel has now graduated romart college and has held her frstsolo exhibition.

WHOARE

YOU?

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Teachers oten thinkabout inclusion in termso children with specialeducational needs, but

researchers on the Under-standing and DevelopingInclusive Practices in Schoolsproject sought to broaden thedefnition. They worked overthree years with a network o25 schools to help groups osta engage with evidence

about pupils experience oschool and about their ownpractice.

Sta in the participatingschools came to recognisethat barriers to pupil-learningoten stem rom teachersmisplaced assumptions about

what their pupils can do andhow best to teach them. Whatsneeded is not just new wayso working, but new ways othinking and this takes time.

Researchers ound that itcan be more useul or a

school enquiry to ocus on aspecifc issue o concernrather than whole schoolchange. For example, oneprimary school was concernedbecause childrens languageskills were holding them back.They devised a questionnaireater consulting the children.

Answers to What dont youlike about writing? included

It hurts my hand and Ittakes me a long time to think

what Im going to write. Whatchildren did like about writingcentred on the chance to usetheir imaginations.

A teacher commented: Itmade me try to analysethings because we couldlook at the childrens answersand so started to think, well itheyre thinking this way

how do we have to think to getthem to change their mindsabout what theyre doing?

Teachers saw that teachingthe curriculum harder andlonger wouldnt improve manypupils learning outcomes.Rather, they needed to thinkabout actors that underpinlearning, such as pupils sel-esteem, enjoyment and their

view o themselves as learners.The researchers concluded:Addressing both under-achievement and inclusion

requires that the nationalocus on highly measurableoutcomes o school bebroadened to include theseunderlying actors.

Project contact [email protected] reading: Improving Scools,Developing Inclusion, Ainscow,Booth and Dyson (Routledge)

9

Towards schoolswhere everyone

belongs

The Index forInclusion was usedto inorm the actionresearch This is anexample o theindicators it uses:

Building community

Everyone is madeto eel welcome.

Students help eachother.

Sta collaboratewith each other.

Sta and studentstreat one anotherwith respect.

There is apartnership

between sta andparents/carers.

Sta andgovernors workwell together.

All local commun-ities are involved inthe school.

Establishing

inclusive values

There are highexpectations or allstudents.

Sta, governors,students andparents/carersshare a philosophyo inclusion.

Students areequally valued.

Sta and studentstreat one anotheras human beingsas well asoccupants o a role.

Sta seek toremove barriers tolearning andparticipation in allaspects o theschool.

From the Centre orStudies on InclusiveEducation (CSIE)inclusion.uwe.ac.uk/csie/indexlaunch.htm

CREATING INCLUSIVE CULTURES

acquisition o knowledge and skills,they conclude.

However, i a childs ownbackground, personality andstrengths ft in well with the ethosand curriculum o their school, theyare more likely to succeed. Pollardand Filer ound that middle classchildren attending independent orselective schools had a moreconsistent identity whether theywere at home, at school or out withriends. But children incomprehensives oten experienceddisparities in the discourse, valuesand expectations o signifcantothers in their homes, schools andpeer groups. This meant theydeveloped more ragmentedidentities, which could make itharder or them to learn andsucceed in school.

One o the lessons is that childrenneed to be seen more in the round,

difcult though this may be in aworld which presses remorselesslyor short-term perormance. Theresearchers insist that: Maximisingthe potential o children and youngpeople calls or a more appropriateunderstanding o them as socialactors within their cultures andcommunities, and o how educationfts into, and contributes to, theirlives as a whole.

Identity and Learning ProgrammeBooks associated with the programmeinclude:The Social World o Childrens Learning,Pollard and Filer (Cassell)The Social World o Pupil Career, Pollardand Filer (Continuum)The Social World o Pupil Assessment in

Primary School, Filer and Pollard(Continuum)Refective Teaching, Pollard(Continuum)


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here are a few reasons

1Behaviour improves

2Attainment goes up3Teachers have more time to think

When groups ochildren are workingproductively, withreal engagement,

genuinely listening to each otherand developing ideas together, ittransorms the teachers job. Aspupils demonstratedgroup-working skills, teachersreported that they had been reedrom many o their ordinaryprocedural duties and they were

now able to reect on their teachingand think strategically about it,say researchers rom the TLRPsSPRinG project.

But getting the class to that pointis not easy. In classrooms across theUK children are seated in groups,but working as individuals. Thisseating arrangement can distractchildren rom their learning ratherthan help with it as children goo-task to chat to their neighbours.Groups in classrooms are otenormed without a strategic view otheir purpose.

The SPRinG researchers arguethat children cant just be placedin groups and expected to workeectively together; they have tobe trained. It is well-known that

children need to have the skills tocommunicate eectively throughlistening, explaining and sharingideas. But pupils also have to learnto trust and respect each other,and they need skills in how to plan,organise and evaluate their group

work.The project stresses supportive

relationships between pupils andbetween teachers and pupils. A keyaim is the development o pupil

independence and the need toaddress difculties betweenpupils.

Teachers, too, need to learn towork dierently, operating more asthe guide on the side than as thesage on the stage.

The projects directors, PeterBlatchord (Institute o Education,London) Maurice Galton(Cambridge) and Peter Kutnick(ormerly at Brighton and now atKings College London), say theSPRinG research shows that weneed to rethink current teaching

theories, which appear to avourteacher-led situations andindividual work. It also hasimplications or school disciplinepolicies, which are usually designedto control rather than eliminate theproblem.

They say wider use o theirfndings could transorm theenvironment o classrooms acrossthe country. Groupwork deservesto be given a much more centralrole in educational policy andschool practice.

Improving the Eectiveness o PupilGroupwork in Classrooms:www.spring-project.org.ukContact [email protected] www.groupworkscotland.org

Individual success ishighly valued, andcompetition encouraged,so why is it importantto get children to workeectively together ingroups?

When group think

is a good thing W

hile manyschools paylittle morethan lip-service tocollaborative

learning, it has been anessential eature o lie atone Suolk comprehensiveor almost two decades. Yetto understand how pupilsat Kesgrave High, on theoutskirts o Ipswich, are ableto work successully in groupsor large parts o every lesson,it is necessary to understandkey aspects o the schoolsorganisation.

There were two things Iwanted to change when I camehere in 1986, says George

Thomas, the head, and theywere both to do with climate,culture and the capacity tolearn.

At that time, pupils weredivided into three abilitybands along crude lines thattied them to their alloted bandright across the curriculum. Aconversation with the deputyhead girl in which the 16-year-old said that she elt she wasstill in the B band reallydespite having been moved upto the A band convinced him

that the school should godown the mixed-ability road.

Having abolished banding,Mr Thomas then turned hisattention to the timetable,

which he elt was all aboutchopping up the curriculuminto bits and then having tohave lots o periods to sort itout. He set about replacingthe seven-period day with amuch simpler system,comprising two long periodsbeore lunch and a singlelesson in the aternoon. Andsoon, the benefts becameapparent.

A bi-product has been thatthe school is calm, heexplains. You dont havelateness to lessons, and peopleget on task within a minute othe bell. But the real essence othe 95-minute slot was that itenables real learning to takeplace, rather than chalk andtalk, or the kind o passivelearning which is easy to do i

youve got 40-minute lessons.Its very easy in a short

lesson to use a passivestructure to get yourbehaviour sorted. Kids are lessthreatening i theyre sat

down, writing notes or doingwork o the blackboard.

But the essence o a longsession is that the teacher ischallenged automatically tolook at what youre doing inthat lesson to look at variety,pace and the involvement opupils in the learning. Gettingkids to talk about things iscrucial. You need kids to beembedding their learning,and its this internalising thatthey get rom group work andtalking, not rom doingendless examples.

In most lessons, pupils atKesgrave will spend some time

working either in pairs, or inlarger groups, depending onthe nature o the task. Sta

will occasionally intervene in

Although teachersinvolved were initiallyworried that group workmight hinder curriculumcoverage, SPRinG (SocialPedagogic Researchinto Group work) is thefrst study in the UK toshow that when it is well-planned and understood

by pupils and teachers,this approach toclassroom organisationleads to higher gains inindividual attainmentthan other types oteaching and learning.At key stage 1, beneftswere seen in reading andmaths. At KS2, all types o

science knowledgebenefted, butparticularly conceptualunderstanding andinerential thinking.Meanwhile, in KS3,success depended on thetype o topic, butappeared to benefthigher order thinking.

RESULTS

TOGE

10 COLLABORATIVE LEARNING

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You probably workbetter when youre

happier, so i youreworking in a group, havinga kind o riendship thinggoing on with other peoplein the group means yourwork will be bet ter.

Its less stressul doinga particular piece o

work in a group. I you dontunderstand something,

you can ask other peopleor advice. And you canusually come up with abetter product becauseits everyones ideas ratherthan just your own.

The teachers here arequite open, so you can

pull them to one side andsay, Look, this person herewont shut up, can you dosomething about it?

You learn whos good at

what, and where yourspeciality lies.

Ifnd that in sometheory-based subjects

like English or philosophy,when youre working withpeople you dont normallywork with, you seedierent points o view thatmaybe you havent seenbeore. By working withpeople like that, you canadd their view to your ownand have a wider diversityin your outlook. Imconscious o doing that.

You learn it frst,then in a group you

get together and bounceideas around and putwhat youve learned intopractice.

I we hadnt worked ingroups since Year 7, I

dont think Id fnd it easyto talk in ront o otherpeople. Ive learned totalk to people or listen topeople or react to whattheyre saying. And Ive

been able to use that indierent circumstancesoutside school even justwhen youre talking to youramily. You can react to itbecause youre doing it atschool all day.

You come in, you sitdown, they talk to us,

you work in groups and talkabout it again. You do yourthing on your own, then

you get to talk about it withother people. And in a way,they re-teach it to you. Andi you dont understandjust a little bit o it, they canexplain it to you in termsyou understand becausetheyre on your level andtheyve just learned it andtheyre also your riend.

Ilike working in agroup its easier and

more interesting, althoughI tend to not write things

down as much as when Imbeing taught. Im a bit proneto that.

It helps me rememberthe things weve done

in class. When Im doingrevision, I think: Oh, thatsthe thing we did in thatgroup, and I remember thatmore than something Ivedone on my own becauseIve enjoyed it.

The not-so-brightpeople would

deliberately tag along withpeople that they thoughtwould do all the work. I gotthe impression it was aneasy way out or them.But they do learn rom itas well.

Iwas always the personwho didnt really do

much and let everyone elseget on with it. But I think Ivelearned rom that and nowI fnd that Im doing morework than the rest o them.And its defnitely a lot moreun working in a group.

the ormation o each group,but pupils themselves say thatthey quickly learn romexperience how to ormgroups and operate withinthem - a process which they sayincreases their confdenceboth in themselves asindividuals, and also in theirown ability to learn.

We have lots o childrenwho go to university and comeback and say: We weresurrounded by people whodidnt know how to learnindependently, says MrThomas. Theyd been spoon-ed, and when told to go oand research something, theydidnt know what to do. Butour kids do. They have thatculture right rom Day One.

HER WE STAND

11

Group-work is central to

Kesgrave High Schoolsphilosophy. David Newnhamtalks to headteacherGeorgeThomasabout making surestudents are engaged,empowered andenjoying school

What sixth ormers atKesgrave High say

about group learning


12/28

1The classroom andgroups should be

constructed strategicallyand fexibly.

The classroom should bearranged to allow group-work as well as individualand whole class work.

the number of groups

These should maximiseeective interactionbetween pupils as well aswith the teacher. Balancebetween the size and thenumber o the groups isimportant butchallenging! Lots o smallgroups or pairs may workwell over short time periodswith a deadline (e.g. around5 minutes). A ew largegroups lead to higherpotential or pupildistraction and disruption.Flexibility is needed.

group size

It is important to make thesize o groups relevant to thetask at hand and the age andability o pupils.Pairs

They can be good orcollaborative high levelthinking tasks (i.e.decision making, problemsolving) and or peertutoring.

Small groupsUnits o 4-6 pupils aregood or manygroup-work activities andor reducing groupdomination by one childbut there is greateropportunity or somemembers to do less andquiet children may be lesswilling to contribute. Thelarger the group theharder it is to plan andorganise work, roles, andinteraction and engage in

conversation.Large groups

Groups o 7-10 pupils maybe useul where the aim isto bring many viewpoints

to a debate on issues, butthey are problematic.

group composition

This should be strategic. Arandom allocation allowsproblems to run ree butalso lets children work withpeople they might notnormally work with. A

shared teacher-pupildecision is oten a goodsolution.Same or mixed ability?

In same ability groups(high or middle only)pupils can push each otherand come up with ideasthat individuals would notthink o alone. But it is wellknown that low abilitygroups are unlikely to besuccessul. The best ormo mixing is probablyputting high and middleability pupils and low andmiddle ability pupilstogether.

Friendship groupsIt may be best to balanceriends with non-riendsin a group.

Personality and working styleWe all know that somepupils have conictingpersonalities or may notwork well together. But

these situations may beused to encouragechildren to learn how todeal with dierent people.

Integrating children withspecial needs, eals, isolates etc

This may be problematic,or example. the child maycontribute little to group-work or disrupt. Careulconsideration is required.

2Group-work should bedesigned to maximise

interactions that are linkedto eective group-workoutcomes.

3Pupils should have thesocial, communication

and problem solving skills

that support eectivegroup-work and encouragethem to take an active rolein their own learning.

Group-work is eectivewhen it encourages pupils tothink and talk about theirunderstanding, to questionideas and get ideas romothers. Social skills,communication andproblem solving skills needto be developed. Theyshould be approacheddevelopmentally, i.e., socialskills frst, thencommunication skills, thenproblem solving.

social skills

Children need skills whichhelp build up anunderstanding o what isinvolved in being a membero a group, and increaselevels o mutual toleranceand trust, mutual respect,

12 COLLABORATIVE LEARNING

and sensitivity to others.Activities encourage pupilsto see situations rom otherpeoples perspectives.

communication skills

The most benefcial aspectso group talking are: Taking turns at talkActive listeningAsking and asking or

questions Making and asking or

suggestions Expressing and requesting

ideas and opinions Brainstorming

suggestions, ideas andopinions

Giving and asking or help Giving and asking or

explanations Explaining and evaluating

ideas Making group decisions

and coming to consensus Summarising

conversations Persuasive talk.

problem-solving

strategies

These allow the group toplan and organise eectivelyso that they are not relianton adults. Some suchstrategies are: How to organise/plan the

group-workWorking out the time scale Brainstorming Deciding whether some

individual activity orthinking prior togroup-working is needed

Whether to create roles(e.g. leader, scribe,reporter, observer etc.)within the group orallocate aspects o the task

to dierent membersWhether achieving

consensus is a necessarypart o the task .

These activities should besupported by pre- andde-briefng.

4Adults should act in away that supports

eective group-workingand positive outcomes.

Class teaching and/orbriefng should includediscussion about what is to

be achieved and learnt andhow whole class instructionis connected to thegroup-work. Briefng shouldalso remind pupils about

the skills, strategies andrules that they should beusing.

Adult intervention shouldbe to the point, and shouldmodel suitable

communication skills. Moresupport is likely to beneeded in the early stages.At the end o a session pupilsshould be encouraged toreect.

5Tasks and activitiesshould be constructed

strategically to encourage/warrant eective group-working and be used todevelop high level learning,thinking andunderstanding.

6Group work can beused in all curriculumareas.

Tasks which encouragegroup-work include: problemsolving, project work, groupdiscussion o issues, decisionmaking tasks, tasks thatinvolve sharing inormation,researching an issue,collecting data/inormation/

views.Tasks can vary in terms o

how open-ended they are.They are most eective whenthe path to the solution/decision is not obvious.

structuring group work

Group-work can bestructured in terms osub-activities or ways ointeracting, by givingparticular pupils roles(e.g.scribe, chair, leader,decision maker/s,discussers) or broken downinto sub-tasks. Putting an

expert with a novice is themain way to set up peertutoring.

Group-work tasks can bestructured into phases, e.g.brainstorming, ollowed byjustiying/explaining andevaluation/ reducing ideasdown. Tasks can bestructured by sequencingthe size o groups, e.g.,moving rom individualwork to dyads, then groups.

Briefng and de-briefnghelp pupils know why they

are doing the task.Group work tasks can be

applied to all curriculumareas. It is important not tomarginalise it.

How to make

groups workSPRinG has developed six key points toguide the planning o group-work

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policy structures.Ten had a niceresonance so we stuck with that. In theirsimplest orm, we chose to present theprinciples in the round to show that,

although there is a logic, there is nonecessary hierarchy.

We completed this initial work ratherhurriedly because we wanted to issue theprinciples in a Commentary rom theTLRP at the time when the Schools

White Paper, proposing more specialistschools and academies (now theEducation and Inspections Act 2006),

was being discussed. We especiallywanted to emphasise that improvementcomes rom teaching and learning ratherthan simply changing school structures.

The principles didnt hit us in suddenEureka bursts; rather, we watchedthemes and overlapping ndings emerge.Oten they chimed with what we knewrom prior research. For instance, theSPRinG project on what makes eectivegroupwork was built on the Oracleproject o the 1970s, and their ndingssupport the old clich that two (or evenmore) heads are better than one. The

value o thinking with other people isdemonstrated throughout TLRPs work,rom the high quality talk whichcharacterises the best early yearspractice, as shown by the Eective Pre-school and Primary Education project, tothe benets o peer review ound byTowards Evidence-Based ScienceEducation. Its through communicationthat we nd out what we think.

Evidence rom numerous projects also

Learning is more than acquiringnew knowledge and skills. It isalso about making sense o theworld and creating new

knowledge. It involves testing newexperience against previously

learned ways o thinking and doing things,and changing habits o mind. And itinvolves using the ideas o other peopleexpressed through what they say, write ormake. New knowledge is always, in thissense, a joint production.

Developing the 10 principles oteaching and learning was an act olearning itsel and had thesecharacteristics. As Deputy Director oTLRP, with responsibility or 22 schoolsprojects, one o my tasks was to try tocome to some overview o their ndingsso that we might be able to answer thequestion: What has TLRP ound outabout eective teaching and learning inschools? There is still a long way to go withthis but I started by reading the reportsand publications that projects hadproduced to date and began to get a senseo the points o similarity and dierence.But then I needed some structure toorganise these thoughts. I wantedespecially to nd some way tocommunicate these to busy teachers.

Andrew Pollard, the ProgrammeDirector, had developed a simple way oarranging ideas: moving out rom thoseat the heart o classroom processes (aims,curriculum, teaching, assessment andrelationships) to those that support theseprocesses, such as teacher learning and

conrmed the need or consistent policyrameworks. Repeatedly, researchershave ound that teachers willingness toexperiment and their progress in

bringing in orms o assessment whichhelp children learn have been inhibitedby a climate o testing and league tables.

While Ministers on the one handencourage assessment or learning, onthe other, they continue to put pressureon schools to raise their results in high-stakes summative tests. This can militateagainst the use o other, voluntary typeso assessment, even when they are shownnot only to boost childrens learning skillsand autonomy, but also to raise theirscores in national exams.

So how do we know that the principleswe have pinpointed are universal? Theshort answer is that we can never be sure.

As the best scientists will say, knowledge isalways provisional. However, theprinciples are drawn rom a large numbero recent, highly-regarded researchprojects. People seem to nd theminteresting and helpul. The rst 8,000copies o the Commentary few o theshelves in a matter o weeks and, and45,000 copies were downloaded rom theTLRP website in six months.

We have asked our project teams tocritique the principles so that we canrene them. Some o the researchers haveproblems with the word should in eachprinciple, as represented on the poster,nding it too prescriptive, but theyunderstand that teachers seek advice andguidance. So, or now, should remains.

Its throughcommunication

that we find out

what we think

s

Can you boil down the principles o eective teaching and learning into ashort and lucid list?Mary Jamesexplains how it was done

AND THEN THERE

WERE...

THE PRINCIPLES 13

Mary JamesDeputy DirectorTLRP


14/28

14 THE PRINCIPLES

equips learners for life in its

broadest sense

1School is about more than

passing exams anddelivering thecurriculum. Whathappens in school needs toconnect with the outside

world, both by relating whatchildren are learning to events athome and abroad and by helpingthem develop the skills, strategiesand courage they will need in anuncertain uture.

Collaboration will becomeincreasingly important. Learningshould aim to help individuals andgroups to develop the intellectual,personal and social resources that

will enable them to participate asactive citizens and as workers able toadapt.

Flexibility o mind the ability totranser skills and to thinkmethodically but creatively will bean increasingly hot intellectualproperty.

The TLRPs SPRinG andScotSPRinG projects helpedschools develop eective groupworkin which children didnt just sittogether, theythoughttogether.

Activities were specically designedto encourage children to explain

The 10 principles grew out o anextensive and ever-expanding bodyo research ndings about whatreally makes a dierence in theclassroom.Diane Hofkins looks atthe data and the philosophy behindthe ideas on the pull-out poster

engages with valued forms of

knowledge

2In the justiable swingtoward emphasising theprocesses o learning andaway rom the pressure topack in content and acts,it is important to

remember that every subject has atits heart elements that make itunique. Teaching and learningshould engage with the big ideas,key processes, modes o discourseand narratives o subjects so thatthey understand what constitutesquality and standards in particulardomains. This precept is

well-supported by the EPSE(Evidence-based Practice in ScienceEducation) studies. Leadingscientic thinkers were able to agreebroadly on what constitutes thenature o scientic knowledge (suchas what has been established beyondreasonable doubt and what is stillopen to debate) and the key

elements o scientic method. Thebest way or students to understandthese concepts is through classroomdiscourse. This means a change inteachers role rom transmitter oinormation to acilitator oopportunities or children tounderstand the various dimensionso science.

Skills cannot be taught in avacuum; the Learning How toLearn research shows that learningpractices are best developed whenchildren are learning aboutsomething signicant and specic.The process is part o subjectteaching, not a course o its own.

This theme also chimes withGovernment guidance. For instancethe proposed Key Stage 3ramework says children shouldbecome successul learners whoknow about big ideas and eventsthat shape our world andunderstand how they learn andlearn rom mistakes.

Effective teaching and learningthings to each other and to promote

joint reasoning. Other activitiesdeveloped social skills by

encouraging pupils to see situationsrom other peoples points o view.

The A or attitude culture hasbeen sneered at; it implies that therecipient really wasnt very good atthe subject, but tried. In act,evidence rom across the TLRPshows that that attitude is crucial.Starting with the early years, themassive EPPE (Eective Pre-schooland Primary Education) studyshows that toddlers need to developa disposition to learn.

Other projects, such as ACTS IISustainable Thinking Classroomsrom Northern Ireland,demonstrated how learning andthinking skills help boostcondence, autonomy andattainment. More broadly, the 12-

year Identity and LearningProgramme showed how childrenand young people develop alearning identity rom the socialinfuence o parents, teachers andpeers as they progress through theirschool careers. Attitudes to lielonglearning are ounded on eachpupils experiences o schoolingand on the strategic biographies

which make sense o these.

Scaffolding is about teachers recognising when they should inter

Whats theevidence?

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15

assumptions about some groups ochildren. Teachers involved in theDeveloping Inclusive Practices inSchools project in England and

Wales began to see that they couldhelp change pupils attitudes, sel-esteem and engagement withlearning; these were not xed.

National policy is beginning torecognise that local culture andenthusiasms can be built into thecurriculum.Excellence and Enjoyment,the 2003 Primary Strategydocument, encouraged this, as doesthe revised KS3 programme.TLRPs Home-School KnowledgeExchange aimed to tap andrecognise the und o knowledgethat children can draw on in theirhomes, communities and ethniccultures. Meanwhile the Scottishstudy, learning with ICT in Pre-School Settings ound that the so-called digital divide between well-o and poorer amilies is not assignicant as is sometimes assumed.

requires the teacher to

scaffold learning

4Scaolding in teachingis like scaolding inbuilding work; itsupports theconstruction until thehouse (or the childs

learning) is secure enough to standon its own. This scaold is built oteachers knowledge o howchildren learn.

Scaolding is about teachersrecognising when they shouldintervene to help the child move onto a higher level o understanding.The TLRP s Learning with ICT inPre-school Settings study ound that

young childrens encounters withcomputers and other technology

were enhanced when practitionersstepped in to guide them. Teachersin turn learned more eective

ways to scaold childrens learningthrough CPD.

The InterActive Education study

also concluded that ICT in theclassroom will not help learning onits own. Without the support o ateacher, students are unlikely todevelop their knowledge omathematical proo rom their

everyday reasoning, knowledge othe Italian Renaissance romknowledge o popular culture orknowledge o science rom game-like simulation sotware, theresearchers say.

They ound that students workingon computers on their own or anextended period o time may comeup with odd inormation, ormisapply rules. For instance somesecondary pupils using the internetto research the Renaissance werereading about somewhere calledFlorence in the USA.

needs assessment to be

congruent with learning

5Assessment should helpadvance learning as well asdetermine whetherlearning has taken place.This may sound obvious,but many teachers

involved in TLRP projects havecomplained that the assessmentsystem in England militates againstgood learning. When sta end upteaching to the test rather thanteaching to the principles they

believe in (and the government saysit endorses), something is not right.

However, TLRP ndings havebegun to infuence policy. The new21stCentury Science GCSE courselaunched in September 2006, isbased on EPSE research, and meldscontent and assessment in acoherent way.

The project on pupil consultation,in England, has shown that beingable to talk about their own learninghelps students become better able tomanage it, more condent andpositive about education and able tocontribute to the development o theschool. This pupil engagement givesteachers a deeper insight into theirpupils capabilities. A relatedproject, on assessment in NorthernIreland, makes the point that suchconsultation is an obligation underthe UN Convention on the Rights othe Child.

The Learning How to Learnstudy concluded that the ultimategoal o assessment or learning is topromote learning autonomy so thatpupils can refect on where they areand where they need to go, and thenact in such a way as to get there.

recognises the importance of

prior experience and learning

3Few people these daysthink that children arriveat school as empty vesselsto be lled withknowledge. The principleo starting where children

are and helping them to moveon is widely recognised.Never-the-less, with a class o 25 or30, it can be dicult to determineeach ones starting point. The EPSEproject has ound that careullydesigned tools, underpinned bysolid research, can quicklydiagnose childrensunderstanding o key scienceideas and inorm what the teacherdoes next.

Pressure to cover an overloadedcurriculum makes it harder orteachers to nd the time todiagnose individual chidrensneeds, and a number o TLRPprojects challenged teachers

ene to help the child move on to a higher level of understanding

s


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promotes the active

engagement of the learner

6I a key goal o educationis to promote studentsautonomy and encouragethem to have positive

attitudes to learning, itneeds to start at the

youngest age. The EPPE researchshows the importance oencouraging child-initiatedactivities as well as ones set in trainby adults.

The Learning How to Learnproject showed perhaps ironically that teachers who tookresponsibility or their pupils sel-motivation (and did not blamehome circumstances oradolescence) had the most engagedgroups o students. The most

eective teachers organised open,fuid activities. The pupilconsultation studies ound thatchildren develop a stronger sense osel-worth when they are able to talkabout their learning. Classroomtasks allowed students to enter thesubject community, to behave as ascientist, an historian or an artist.

In addition, pupils are more likelyto be engaged with schooling whenthey are consulted and their viewstreated with respect.

fosters both individual and

social processes and outcomes

7Learning is a socialactivity. It demandsinteraction with otherminds. TLRP studies ongroupwork, teacherlearning and inclusion,

among others, show that whenschools unction as genuinelearning communities, students andteachers thrive both collectively andas individuals. Pupils who workedeectively in groups also didmeasurably better on individualexams than those who had otherorms o teaching and learning. TheSPRinG and ScotSPRinG projectsound that in key stages 2 and 3,children who worked eectivelytogether made gains in theirinerential thinking and theirhigher cognitive understanding.Groupwork also improved socialrelationships among pupils andbetween pupils and teachers. InFrom Black Boxes to Glass Boxes,experiments carried out with olderstudents, using concept-mappingsotware, also showed thatopportunities or students to discusstheir maps with others was thesignicant actor in raisingattainment.

The dramatic impact o teachers

16 THE PRINCIPLES

learning together is also beingrecognised throughout the world oeducation.

recognises the signifcance of

informal learning

8Everyone now recognisesthat parents are childrens

rst educators, but it canstill be dicult to connecthome learning withschool learning. In the

Home-School KnowledgeExchange primary pupils tookphotos to show the maths andliteracy activities they were doing athome. Maths activities includedcooking, shopping, playing boardgames, setting timers andconsulting timetables.

Children were also asked tocompile a shoebox o arteacts romhome called All about Me, whichenabled teachers and other pupilsto nd out about their interests andabilities.

The EPPE research has shownthat when parents engage with

young children in learning activitiesat home, children do better later on.In act, parents educational andeconomic backgrounds are lessimportant than whether or not theyprovide enriching learningenvironments at home or children.Tellingly, boys tend to receive lesshome learning than girls, and thiscould be one reason why they do less

well when they get to school.Childrens lives outside school

have a huge impact on who they areas learners. The Identity and

Learning Programme, whichstudied small numbers o childrenrom middle- and working-classbackgrounds over time makes clearhow amily relationships at homeand peer riendships in thecommunity aect the sel-condence and belie in themselves

as learners which children andyoung people bring to thechallenges o school.

depends on teacher learning

9This was a consistenttheme throughout TLRPndings. The need orteachers to develop theirknowledge and skills andinitiate their own

classroom-based research should berecognised and supported both bygovernment and within schools.

Improving outcomes or pupils,however they are dened, otenrequires teachers to change theirclassroom practice, sometimesradically. But these innovations canonly occur i teachers themselveshave learned. Its also important orthem to be willing to examine theirown practice. The Learning How toLearn project ound collaborativeclassroom-based inquiry to becrucial and the project on UsingResearch Study Lessons shows aspecic way o doing this.

Researchers also ound thatteachers valued materials andcourses which would help themimplement new ways o learning ornew content. For instance, many othose involved in the project on why

morphemes are useul in primaryschool literacy had to learn aboutmorphemes (units o meaning in

words) themselves. They alsolearned new teaching methods.

The Development o Inclusive

Practices in Schools studyconcluded that at the heart o thisprocess o change were groups osta involved in generating andengaging with evidence aboutpractice, and about outcomes orpupils.

The government has been toldthis beore. A much-publicisedlongitudinal study it commissionedrom the University o Ontario onthe implementation o the NationalLiteracy Strategy said deep learning

was necessary i teachers grasp othe new policy was to be more than

supercial. However, as the VITAE(Variations in Teachers Work andLives and their Eects on Pupils)project emphasises, teachers levelso commitment and resilience are a

vital condition or change.

demands consistent policy

frameworks with support for

teaching and learning as their

primary focus

10Governmentpolicy should notchop and changeevery year or two,

and ministersshould act on the

understanding that good pedagogyand pupil engagement will do moreto raise standards than league tablesand catch-up classes.

I eective teaching and learningare the core unctions o schools(and what else could be?) theyshould be the ocus o policy atschool and national level. This wouldgive coherence to other policies.

Teachers in a number o TLRPstudies believed progress was beingmade despite government policyrather than because o it. TheLearning How to Learn studies, orexample, ound that The currentperormance-orientated climate inschools in England seems to make itdicult or teachers to practice

what they value. And the Inclusionstudy concluded that school leadersshould be selected and developednot only on the basis o theirmanagerial skills, but on their

values. It said national policy shouldsupport teachers who are workingcollaboratively to use a range oevidence about their teaching(including pupils attitudes andengagement) which goes beyond arelatively narrow range operormance indicators.GE

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Y

ear 2 teacher Chris Starkls class hasbeen asked: What will make mehappy to learn? The resulting mind-map shows answers such as: Whenmy teacher helps me, When I try

mysel, Interesting books, Its OK tomake mistakes, Fun activities, Drawing, Whenmy teacher is happy and my riends andmysel.

At Malvern Way Inant and Nursery nearWatord in Hertordshire, everyone, down to theyoungest child, is thinking about learning. Its aschool that embodies the TLRPs 10 principles oeective teaching and learning, both indoorsand out. For instance, to reinorce pupilautonomy, child-size sheds were put up in theplayground to allow youngsters to get their ownequipment.

Teachers and children work together todiscover how they learn best, and childrens ideasare incorporated into the planning o topics. Inthe Dont Stop Moving topic, Y1 children wantedto learn about: bubbles in bottles, dinosaursunder attack, water moving, how we move, howanimals move, how does the world turn, windand clouds, how we make things move, andmaking moving models.

It all ts in exactly with national curriculumplanning, says headteacher Janet English. Wealso have an unplanned area in our planning,which we never had beore. Its purpose is widerand deeper than simply allowing time orchildren to take advantage o a snowall or newly-hatched chicks. We dont want to just make it atoken input or children, she explains. It will bea genuine response to the childrens learning.

17

When Mrs English became head o the 300-pupil school in 2004, her burning desire was tobring the principles o assessment or learninginto practice. We started rom the research romthe TLRPs Learning how to Learn project, andused their CPD (see A treasure chest, page19).

What chimed with the teachers? Thedierence it makes to children. Teachers saidthat what altered their practice the most was achange in climate, so that it was OK to take a risk.She encouraged sta to look at the researchevidence, develop an idea or themselves andthen share it with other people.

AFL makes everything cohesive and really

gets to the heart o children, she says. Thatswhat teachers like; its giving them permission toreally ocus on the children.

In the summer term o 2007 Malvern Way stawere looking at the dierence between alearning objective and its context. What we havegot really good at is all the skills-basedobjectives, says Mrs English. In literacy, orexample, these include using interestingadjectives or putting ull stops at the end o asentence. They have got to be there, but what wereally want to look at is the quality underlying allthat imagination, the way they describe acontext or a story. We need to delve a bit deeper

Headteacher

Janet English tellsDiane Hokins aboutbuilding a learningcommunity

Getting

to theheart ofchildren

We encourage them to go to their peers, share their successess


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18 TLRP RESOURCES

This chart is designed to help inants

think about how to solve problems and

make sure they have understood.

Teachers at Malvern Way are still refning

Problem Pig, asking themselves

questions such as: is it the right

sequence? or should it be a mind-map?

or what it is that makes quality inwriting.

Or when it comes to problem-solving, Not just, can they count intwos, but when theyre aced with anew situation, can they apply that ina problem?

There are learning posters inevery classroom, asking children tothink about what they know already,and then nd out something new.Everyone is responsible not just ortheir own learning but or helping

others, too. We encourage childrento go to their peers, share theirsuccesses and the things they needto develop, and to recognise thateverybody has specic strengthsthat may be dierent to their own,says Mrs English.

At weekly Celebration oLearning assemblies, children talkabout something theyreparticularly pleased about havinglearned at home or school.

Teachers have a responsibility tohelp children reach or newaccomplishments. We ask, Wheredo you think you can get to?

And they assess childrenslearning all the time, trying todiscern who has understood and

who needs more support. What wehave ound is that children who aredoing well tend to get moreeedback, says Mrs English. Those

who arent get less because teachersdont want to hurt their eelings. But

we are saying, they need to have justas much specic eedback, butperhaps based on smaller steps.

National policy-makers otenunderestimate teachersproessionalism, she eels. I do notthink some o them give teachersthe credit they deserve or theirknowledge and understanding.

Worried aboutofsted? Whatsomeone in

Whitehall mightthink? That the

schools police willarrest you unless you triple-mountthose displays? You need a supportgroup. And the down-to-earthteachers on the TLRPs Teachingand Learning DVD (enclosed withthis magazine) might be the placeto start.

Belast primary headteacherHelen Farrimond has got a pep talkor you. Teachers need to be braveand condent, she says, and risk-taking. Its OK to have yourlearning outcomes pinned uphaphazardly around the classroom,

rather than having beautiuldisplays which may be no more thandecoration, she argues. And whenthe inspector comes, you dont haveto have all your ev idence on paper.I you know the children havelearned, tell the inspector to askthem about it.

She appears in one o six episodeslmed in dierent parts o the UKillustrating some o the TLRPs 10

evidence-based principles oeective teaching and learning.Longer interviews with some o theparticipants, who have all beeninvolved in TLRP development and

research projects, are also included.The DVD can be shown in ull, or itscomponents used individually inCPD sessions.

The lessons and interviews shownare not intended as examples o howto teach; theyre meant to raisequestions and encourage refection.Similarly, a booklet to go with theDVD poses open-ended questionsto complement each segment.

In the section illustratingLearning should involve andengage the learner, Boltonheadteacher Tony Purcell tells us

that without pupil consultation, theschool would miss out on 2,000peoples ideas. And a student adds,Pupil voice is important. Otherwiseits the teachers school, not thechildrens school.

To add to this, the booklet oersquestions such as: How can thequiet or disaected be heard? Andhow can the creation o a pupillite be avoided?

WHAT DO IALREADYKNOW?

WHAT DO INEED TOFIND OUT ORUSE TO HELPME SOLVETHEPROBLEM?

I CAN TELL MYFRIENDS HOWTO SOLVE THEPROBLEM

AM I CORRECT?HOW WELLDID I DO?

IS IT WORKING?YES OR NO?

*

*

*

*

*

*

*

PROBLEM PIG

Enter through the magic portal

www.tlrp.organd prepareto be amazed by the richesthat await you. You can nd

authoritative evidence about aspectso teaching and learning rangingrom subjects such as maths andscience to social issues such asinclusion and pupil voice.

There is a wealth o practicalideas, too, through many o theprojects own websites (a ull list oschools projects is on page 27) andthe large collection o Practitioner

Applications (see ar right).Click on Projects, on the let o

the screen, and you can nd yourway to gems such as the Consulting

Pupils about Teaching andLearning website, with its hoard oideas you can use in your school(http://www.tlrp.org/proj/phase1/phase1dsept.html).

A related book in the TLRPsImproving Learning series is soonto be published by Routledge. It willlook at the role o consultation in amore partnership-orientedrelationship between teachers andpupils. It will cover the problems onding time to consult and ocoping with the uncertainty that thechange in power relationshipsbrings.

Books in the Improving Learningseries are explicitly designed to

A treasure chest of ideas

Brain hurt?Take sixof these

Books in theImproving

Learning

series support

evidence --

inormeddecisions

I UNDRESTANDTHERES APROBLEM

WHATHAVE ILEARNEDFROMTHIS?

WHAT IS THEBEST WAY TOSOLVE THEPROBLEM?

GETTYIMAGES


19/28

support evidence-inormeddecisions in educational practiceand policymaking. Improving Schools,Developing Inclusion, by Mel Ainscow,Tony Booth and Alan Dyson takesthe view that marginalisation,exclusion and underachievementtake many orms and aect manydierent kinds o child.

Another jewel in the treasurechest is the Learning How to Learnproject, which has published a bookoTools for Schools(Routledge). Itprovides ideas and materials orteacher workshops and other in-service activities developed withteachers by some o the best-knownnames in educational research. And

there is much more besides athttp://www.tlrp.org/proj/phase11/phase2.html.

The TLRP website will also leadyou to printable posters or many othe projects and a set o researchbriefngs summarising their mainfndings and recommendations.

There are many ways to search,including by themes such asCurriculum or Learning Processes.These will take you to briefngs,articles and other publicationsacross dierent projects. Amongthem are Commentaries romTLRP on Personalised Learning,Eective Teaching and 14-19Reorms.

19

and inspiration

Food or thought

Among the many resources you can nd atwww.tlrp.org/search/pa/ is a large

collection o activities to help teachers refect. These practitionerapplications have been created by CUREE (Centre or the Use o Research

and Evidence in Education) or the TLRP or areas ranging rom assessment andbehaviour to relationships and social inclusion.Here are two o them.

Research taster

Many pupils have little oreven no understanding owhat precisely makeswork good. Pupils oten

think that workingharder involvessupercial issuesperpetuated by teachersresponses in lesson time,along the lines o talkingless, completing work ontime and presenting itneatly.

Your evidence

To help studentsunderstand the criteriaor good work it is rstimportant to make clear

to them how they cananalyse their own work.You might want to nd away to do this inormally,e.g., when a story is

brought or marking astudent can be asked orhis or her opinion on it. Oryou may wish to be moreormal, perhaps by askingpupils to ll in a commentorm at the completion oa project to indicate whatthey had liked best/leastabout it, what they had

ound easy/dicultabout it, what they hadlearned rom it (contentand skills), what theythink they need topractise more or tryharder at etc.Alternatively, i thechildren can write reely,you could ask them tokeep a journal in whichthey can review theirachievements on aregular basis. You canthen use comment orms

or journals to help youidentiymisunderstandings orareas where moreclarication is needed.

Moving forward

This is perhaps one o themost important aspectso pupil voice as a topic. Ipupils can be properlyinormed about thecriteria or good workthere can be a seriouseect on most o theirschool lie. You might want

to nd ways o lookinginto pupils ideas aboutassessment criteria tohelp them in re-examiningdierent aspects o theirwork. How can you do thisin such a way that theyare still working out orthemselves how toimprove their work?

Find out more

The project is ConsultingPupils about Teaching andLearning. Its website is at:

www.consultingpupils.co.uk TLRP Research Brieon pupil voice is at: www.tlrp.org/pub/research/no5.pd

Research taster

Although ICT changes theways in which teachersdirect learning, it doesntreplace them. Developingan understanding o howto support students whoare completing learningactivities using ICT, in orderto ensure that they arebeing challenged and theirlearning tested, is clearlyan important ingredient inthe development oteachers roles.

Your evidence

Would it be helpul or youto explore yourunderstanding o yourrole in supporting ICT inthe classroom? Could

you identiy an ICTactivity you use regularlyand eel condent with,then ask a colleague toobserve a lesson in whichyou use this activity togive you a more detailedpicture o the dierentroles you take thanordinary recall provides?You might like to ask themto consider: the instructions yougave to your students; the support that youoered to your studentsduring this activity.

Moving forward

Do you need to do somediagnostic work toestablish which ICT skillsget in the way o learningabout core objectives inyour lessons? Could youplan, or example, anintensive activity to

ensure that all studentsknow how to store dataand generate a graphautomatically, or use allthe available ormattingtools to improvepresentation?

Find out moreThe ull project isInterActive Education:teaching and learning inthe inormation age. Theproject website is at:www.interactiveeducation.ac.ukYou might like to read areview o 42 studiesabout the use o ICT:Scrimshaw, P. (2004)Enabling teachers tomake successul use oICT. Becta. This article isavailable online at: www.becta.org.uk/page_documents/research/enablers.pd

What do pupilsunderstand aboutthe criteria forgood work?

What role doteachers play indirecting learningwith ICT?


20/28

What science dochildren need tolearn at school? Andhow best should it betaught? Terms likescientifc literacy,

ideas about science and morediscursive teaching are requentlyinvoked by curriculum planners.Internationally, experts worry overhow wide and how deep scientifcunderstanding needs to penetrateor modern societies to unction. Inthe UK, universities and employers

worry over a large and continuingdrop in students wishing to studyscience at advanced levels. It all addsup to pressure on the scienceclassroom. The tests press: teach tothe tests!

What can teachers do? And how?Research shows that over-testing o

actual recall likely overestimatesunderstanding o key concepts: itdoes not improve it. Crudely, istudents memorise acts or tests,they will not necessarily be able touse the concepts behind the acts inother contexts: the teacher mayhave transmitted inormation butnot true knowledge.

Yet taking more time to establishpupil understanding, through open

20 SECONDARY

Whats thebigiddiscussion and ocused questioningcan, paradoxically, pay o in moreefcient learning. Particularly whenteaching ideas about science,teachers need to expand beyondtheir own expertise on the nature oscience and learn how to managestudents progress in handlingideas. Its a big challenge or adults

who have grown up mastering abody o subject knowledge.

The new GCSE specifcations arebuilt around a dual demand: that allpupils should be scientifcallyliterate whilst those who need to beare equipped with a sound basis insubject knowledge or advancedstudy. How should the content bedivided up?

So-called science wars havehotly debated what science needs tobe known by whom. Research rom

THE BIG CIRCUIT

When the second wire

from the battery is

connected up to the bulb,

what will happen?

Pupils may assume that

there is a delay, following a

source-consumer model.

Yet the bulb lights up

instantaneously. If the

teacher sets the circuit up

with a wire stretching

around the whole

classroom, the lively

discussion which ensues

when the bulb lights up

enables the teacher to

challenge their conception

and makes pupils try to

devise a new model to

explain the phenomenon.

Victoria Neumarkexplores waysthat teachers can get their studentsthinking about science

GETTYIMAGES


21/28

understanding. Schools urgentlyneed to invest in CPD to helpteachers lead open discussion in

which students reect on their ownemergent understandings: neither aree-or-all nor rote-learning.

What kind o materials could helpsuch CPD? EPSE researchers

worked with teachers at key stages 2,3, and 4, devising diagnosticquestions and research-inormedactivities. They scored signifcantlybetter than traditional teachingsequences in establishing pupilsunderstanding o key concepts.

Special probe questions aimedto establish correct understandingand misconceptions in specifcareas: electrical circuits, lieprocesses and orces and motion.The questions were in two stages:

one to predict and one to ask or anexplanation. For instance, key stage3 pupils were asked to predict whatthe reading on an electrical circuit

would be at given points, and thento choose an explanation or theirprediction. Some pupils wereollowed up to probe understandingurther.

Depressingly, then, less than halo the sample at age 14 knew thatelectric current is the sameeverywhere on a circuit;disturbingly, the proportion at age16 was well nigh the same. Ideas

built on this, such as therelationship between voltage,current and resistance, weregrasped by ewer than 20 per cent o16-year olds.

Such fndings are not new: theyare almost exactly the same as thosepre-dating the national curriculum.But they do indicate that decades oinnovative science teaching havedone little or generalunderstanding and that currentmeasures o student perormancedo not highlight this gap.

Teachers in the study ound theprobes useul, be they as goodquestions: were so short o useulquestions or as end-o-topic tests.Most interestingly, the probes couldbe used to open up discussion andbring misconceptions to light. I gotan entire unplanned lesson, saidone. Their clear structure enabledteachers to begin dialogues withoutearing classroom anarchy.Multiple-choice answers promptedmore discussion than open-response ones as they made studentsconsider other viewpoints: theymade real progress with theirthinking.

Even non-specialists ound thattheir teaching was enhanced by theuse o the probes, which enabled

activities or teachers built in arange o types o communication:teacher-led demonstration, opendiscussion, small group work withteacher support. There is theinormation or instance, theormation o starch granules when aphotosynthesising organism is keptin the dark and there is the need touse scientifc concepts to ormulatean explanation. Dierent parts othe lesson call or dierentmethods.

Generally, teachers tend to eelthat external tests rely excessively onactual recall to test pupilsunderstanding. But the good newsis that more innovative approaches,using questions based on researchinto how pupils learn, is as good or,mostly, better than traditionalapproaches even in questions basedon actual recall. Perhaps this isbecause it is easier to rememberacts i you know why they aretrue. Revolutionary: but it mightcatch on!

Website www.tlrp.org/proj/phase1

bsept.html

THE NATURE OF

SCENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE

1Science and certainty

How ar somescientic knowledge,

particularly that in school

science, is beyond all

reasonable doubt and

how ar other ideas are

open to question. This

includes: The nature o

theory: thatnew evidence

can always aect

interpretation.

2HistoricaldevelopmentStudents should be aware

o some o the historical

background.

METHODS OF SCIENCE

3Scientifc methodsand critical testingThe experimental method,

the use o controls and

how a single experiment is

rarely conclusive.

4Analysis andinterpretation o dataScientic analysis is more

than sheer data; itrequires sophisticated

theory building.

Disagreements are

entirely legitimate.

5Hypothesis andpredictionThis process is essential

to developing new

knowlege about natural

phenomena.

6Diversity o scientifcthinkingThere is no single

scientic method or

approach.

7CreativityAs much as any otheractivity, science involves

imagination, inspiration

and passion.

8Science andquestioningScience is a process o

continual and cyclical

questioning, out o which

new theories and

techniques emerge to betested in their turn.

INSTITUTIONS AND

SOCIAL PRACTICES IN

SCIENCE

9Cooperation andcollaboration in thedevelopment o scientifc

knowle

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