The Enquiry | 001

E N Q U I R Y

LEARNING & RESEARCH AT DOWNE HOUSE

001.JOURNAL 1 Student Perspectives 2 Assessment and Feedback 4 Digital Pedagogy and Technology 7 Student Motivation and Success

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001.JOURNAL Contents

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CONTENTS

EDITORIAL COMMITTEE NOTE

Page 4

STUDENT PERSPECTIVES 01. What do you enjoy and value in your learning?

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ASSESSMENT AND FEEDBACK 02. Assessment: A meaningful process?

03. What is your favourite word? Making

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retrieval practice subject specific

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DIGITAL PEDAGOGY AND TECHNOLOGY 04. Teaching and learning enhanced by technology

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05. PDFs and PowerPoints: Using technology as a tool for self-reflection

06. Disruptive technologies and the future of online blended learning

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STUDENT MOTIVATION AND SUCCESS 07. All teachers are teachers of English 08. Rising to the challenge 09. Why we should all take time to read for pleasure

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10. Book Review: The Learning Rainforest (Tom Sherrington)

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NOTICE BOARD INCLUDING STAFF RESEARCH LIBRARY SHOWCASE

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References and Bibliography

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A Note from the Editorial Committee

001. JOURNAL Welcome to the very first edition of an entirely new and revamped journal The Enquiry. Across this issue you will find a wealth of ideas and reflections from members of the Downe House community about all things educational research and Teaching and Learning.

We begin, importantly, with a section devoted to student perspectives about their own learning experience. Here, we asked students from different year groups to write a brief summary of something they enjoy or find useful in their learning. They were given no further brief or guidance. The comments are, not surprisingly, very insightful!

A STAFF JOURNAL DEDICATED TO REFLECTIONS ON EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH AND TEACHING AND LEARNING AT DOWNE HOUSE SCHOOL

We then move onto a section that looks at assessment and feedback, where we begin with an article from Mr George Picker who explores some of the issues surrounding assessment. Dr Andrew Atherton then picks up a similar topic, but this time looking at a different kind of assessment: retrieval practice.

This section is then followed with digital pedagogy and technology, first with an article from Mrs Jane Basnett on the ways in which technology can enhance our teaching. Mr Ian Chapman follows with a similar theme, exploring how we can revitalise technologies such as PDF and PowerPoint as cutting edge self-assessment tools. Finally in this section Ms Marya Akhtar takes a wider view and examines the possible future and current disruptive potential of educational technology.

We conclude with a section loosely based around student motivation and success, with Mrs Katharine Henson suggesting ways to better facilitate an experience of success within the classroom for EAL students. Mr Matt Godfrey continues with an article on teacher (and student!) passion and Mrs Jenny Hill concludes by outlining the very many benefits to a rich and varied diet of reading. Mrs Isabelle Wallace, to close this issue, offers her thoughts about the excellent book, Tom Sherrington’s The Learning Rainforest.

Whilst only a snapshot and by no means encompassing all that is wonderful about our teaching community, we hope this issue of The Enquiry offers not only a wealth of practical strategies that work in our classrooms, but also a real sense of the commitment the entire community has in providing the best and most effective teaching environment for our students.

Our thanks go to everyone that took the time to write and submit an article as well as Sue Lister who was instrumental in preparing and designing this edition. The next edition of The Enquiry will be published in Summer 2022 as a retrospective of Lent Term. A Call for Papers will be announced soon, but if you have an idea and would like to contribute please do get in touch with any member of the Editorial Committee.

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“…A REAL SENSE OF THE COMMITMENT THE ENTIRE COMMUNITY HAS IN PROVIDING THE BEST AND MOST EFFECTIVE TEACHING ENVIRONMENT FOR OUR STUDENTS.” The Enquiry Editorial Committee Dr Andrew Atherton Miss Charlotte Williams Miss Kerry Treacy Mr George Picker

STUDENT PERSPECTIVES

STUDENT PERSPECTIVES

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01.

A Student Perspective: Teacher Passion, Mind Maps, and Retrieval Practice

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ASTUDENT STUDENTPERSPECTIVES PERSPECTIVE

SARA LEE (LVI) TALKS ABOUT THE VALUE OF RETRIEVAL PRACTICE At times, the hardest parts of our learning may be the regurgitation of information to prove we’ve learnt a topic at a satisfactory level, or consolidate it well enough to then use the knowledge as a springboard for forming arguments and ideas. To fully maximise on the results and reach these goals, one could argue retrieval methods, or active recall are crucial to its success. Not only do these methods call for an approach that isn’t passive, they’re quite easy to incorporate into a classroom on a routine that doesn’t require too much planning prior to the lesson.

One way we could go about introducing it would be through a few questions at the beginning of lessons, where a knowledge is recalled from the previous lesson, a few lessons back, and another question requiring retrieval from an earlier part of the course. Whilst such a routine reinforces active recall as an effective strategy for learning, it also ensures knowledge is being recalled from a wide time span, consistently keeping things learnt a while ago at the forefront of our memory. This has helped me endlessly across various subjects, from remembering chemical formulae to quotes in English, so that when time drew closer to exams, I could instead, focus on tackling the more rigorous content, as my foundation of

the course had been previously founded. Coupled with some skilful incorporation of weekly active recall from my teachers, I didn’t even have to spend time outside of lessons making sure my quotes, themes, topics had been learned!

SOPHIA SMEATON (LV) DISCUSSES THE IMPORTANCE OF CONTROLLING THE FLOW OF INFORMATION DURING TEACHING AS WELL AS MIND MAPS

Learning for the intrinsic sake of it is typically driven by passion, and one’s love for the discipline only fuels others. Passion isn’t just the cherry on the top; it’s transformative impact and infectious effects have played a bigger role than expected when shaping my subject choices and identifying the ones I love. Nothing makes learning more enjoyable than seeing a teacher enjoy their craft, and that has only nurtured the love for my subjects, propelling my progress.

One of the styles/methods of teaching I find most useful and effective to my learning is done by my biology teacher, Dr Yabsley.

Her method is to talk through the facts and explain all the knowledge necessary and then do the same again whilst writing notes. I find this so effective for my learning because the facts are explained, and then as you write it down it’s explained again which I find helps me to thoroughly understand it. It also means you can focus fully on what she is saying and not have to worry about writing it all down at the same time, as you make notes afterwards. This may appear to be time consuming but I would say it is actually more time efficient and productive.

“LEARNING FOR THE INTRINSIC SAKE OF IT IS TYPICALLY DRIVEN

BY PASSION, AND ONE’S LOVE FOR THE DISCIPLINE ONLY FUELS OTHERS.”

Additionally, I know Dr Yabsley’s favourite pedagogic tool is the method of mind maps! Mind maps are a really popular method of learning and revising, and I personally find them amazing.

They not only highlight key facts but also show the overall structure of the subject and the different subtopics that make up that subject. Mind maps allow you to use colours to add visual impact whilst still providing you with efficient notes. Essentially, mind

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maps are stimulating and improve key aspects such as reading comprehension, memory, and recall.

LOLA OYEGUNLE (LVI) SHARES WITH US HER THOUGHTS ABOUT THE IMPORTANCE OF TEACHER PASSION BUT ALSO THE VALUE OF A FIVE MINUTE RETRIEVAL TASK AT THE START OF LESSONS. When Dr Atherton first asked me to provide a student perspective regarding ideas around teaching, I wasn’t quite sure what to write on. At Downe House every teacher has a lot to share with their students. Every teacher is highly knowledgeable. Every teacher is thorough and approachable however, when I think of teachers that I am most successful in their subjects or teachers whose lessons I look forward to most, the distinguishing factor is passion.

It is always apparent when teachers enjoy teaching their content as their excitement is contagious, particularly at A Level when students have chosen that subject and it is possible to engage in discussion. Passion from a teacher makes lessons far more interesting, interactive, attention-grabbing and increases engagement. Even going on a tangent and straying from the syllabus ever so slightly proves helpful in building a complete image of the topic. From a

student’s point of view, it feels much more like the teachers wants to be there rather than they have to be there. Though, I understand that teachers cannot be excited about every single topic on the syllabus and will have favourites as well as topics that seem dull or tedious, but the chances are if as a teacher that’s how the topic makes you feel, your students may feel similar. I think sharing this information with your students reminds them that you too are human and allows them to begin to build a relationship, in the loosest sense of the word, with you. I genuinely believe that every teacher at Downe is capable of teaching effectively and I don’t really think there’s anything I could say if this wasn’t the case to tell you how to do your job however, what I can do is provide insight into what students think and say. Often, what comes up in conversation after a lesson or when talking about teachers we find particularly effective, is the way they feel about their subjects, how that comes through and in turn how that drives us as learners.

On a more practical note, I have found that the toughest part of learning is actually retaining the information once it is understood.

By the end of the lesson or topic, students are able to understand what they have just learnt, that’s simple, it’s at the beginning of the next lesson where problems can arise. Coming straight from a

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“AT DOWNE HOUSE EVERY TEACHER HAS A LOT TO SHARE WITH THEIR STUDENTS. EVERY TEACHER IS HIGHLY KNOWLEDGEABLE. EVERY TEACHER IS THOROUGH AND APPROACHABLE...”

break time or different subject into your lesson, means that students are not always ‘switched on’ to the subject lesson they are sat in.

What is often valuable is spending 5 minutes at the beginning of the lesson making people recall what has already been learnt, this can be in the form of a couple questions on the board when we enter the classroom, or some questions you read, and we answer on whiteboards. These methods of pulling information from one’s memory makes it stick much more effectively than simply jumping into something new. Yes, students are meant to be consolidating in their own time but taking just a few minutes at the beginning of the lesson to ask them to remember a particularly obscure fact or point from the lesson before helps us as students to refocus so we can be even more engaged with new content.

ASSESSMENT AND FEEDBACK

ASSESSMENT AND FEEDBACK

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02.

Assessment: A Meaningful Process?

MR GEORGE PICKER (HEAD OF UPPER SCHOOL MUSIC, TEACHER OF MUSIC) EXAMINES SOME OF THE RECENT RESEARCH SURROUNDING HOW TO MAKE ASSESSMENT AS MEANINGFUL FOR STUDENTS AS POSSIBLE.

“WHY DO WE ALL ASSESS IN THE SAME WAY? LET’S LOOK AT IT ANOTHER WAY; WHAT DOES 70% IN A TEST MEAN FOR STUDENTS AND TEACHERS? DOES IT MEAN THE SAME FOR A MATHS END OF TOPIC TEST AND A GEOGRAPHY PREP? DO STUDENTS REGARD THESE AS EQUAL?”

Assessment is something we do every day as teachers. Whether that be formative judgements of student engagement on a specific task, observing progress in written work or summative assessments at the end of a topic, it is one of the foundations of pedagogy. As Keith Swanwick said: ‘To teach is to assess’ (Swanwick, 1988:149). But how far do we go to make assessment meaningful for us and our students?

Ever since I started researching assessment strategies, one question always seems to crop up; why do we all assess in the same way? Let’s look at it another way; what does 70% in a test mean for students and teachers? Does it mean the same for a Maths end of topic test and a Geography prep? Do students regard these as equal? What does this do to a student’s motivation towards a subject? I think you can start to see how troublesome assessment can be on a whole-school level and that one size certainly does not fit all. Yet, numerical grades, percentages and other similar methods are something we use regularly and without second thought. So, it begs the question ‘what can we do to make assessment more meaningful and to suit our subject areas whilst adhering to wholeschool frameworks?’.

I’ll use music as an example, but I believe the principle can be shared by many different subjects. In music we broadly teach three main areas – composition, performance, and listening & appraising. Each one of these areas are very different in terms of the skills and knowledge needed to succeed. So, naturally, there is a need to adapt assessment to suit these different areas. From a poll I took of 53 music teachers across the UK in 2021, there was a consensus that assessment criteria need to reflect the nature of the skill being learnt. For example, more teachers in the poll believed composition needs to be assessed against more objective criteria whereas more teachers believed performance must be assessed against criteria which is equally objective and subjective. Why is this important to making assessment meaningful? Well, this concept of adapting assessment to suit the skill is incredibly valuable for students enabling them to understand how and why they are being assessed but also helping them identify strengths and weaknesses in areas of a subjects rather than the subject as a whole.

To this end, in 2019, Martin Fautley and Alison Daubney devised a framework that recognises these differences in music but also encourages teachers to visually demonstrate attainment to make it more meaningful (Fautley & Daubney, 2019). Different areas of musical learning such as singing, improvising and critical engagement are placed on a radar chart and a score (working towards (1), working at (2) and working beyond (3)) is given to each area for each student. The score is devised from formative

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ASSESSMENT AND FEEDBACK

judgements made over time by the teacher and is based on specific measurable criteria. For example, one criterion could be ‘Sings in tune with musical expression’ and it is up to the teacher to determine whether they are working towards, working at or working beyond what is expected of that student’s age rage. Over time and with more formative judgements made about different criteria, a comprehensive and visual representation of student learning is generated (See appendix 1). During the term, students will have access to their radar chart and see their progress in different areas of the subject.

of teaching cycles to be put into a spreadsheet and forgotten about.

Appendix 1 Taken from Fautley and Daubney’s framework (Fautley & Daubney, 2019:18)

We must adhere to whole-school assessment frameworks, but within those parameters, we can make the process of assessment more meaningful to us and our students by recognising that different skills and knowledge within our subjects require separate assessment criteria. Being a Grade 8 pianist does not automatically mean you are an innovative composer or an outstanding musical analyst. Similarly, if you are an innovative composer and an outstanding musical analyst but don’t play an instrument, does that mean you’re not good at music? I believe it is time to recognise that music, along with so many other subjects, is multifaceted and that we should be clearly explaining this to students through the assessment process. If time is taken to explain and model this to students, assessment becomes a mechanism within pedagogy rather than a potential bolt-on at the end

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03.

What is Your Favourite Word?

Making Retrieval Practice Subject Specific

DR ANDREW ATHERTON (DIRECTOR OF LEARNING AND RESEARCH) EXPLORES SOME OF THE RESEARCH UNDERPINNING THE EFFICACY OF RETRIEVAL PRACTICE, A TOPIC PICKED UP IN THE STUDENT PERSPECTIVE SECTION OF THIS JOURNAL, BUT ALSO THE IMPORTANCE OF ROOTING THIS IN SPECIFIC SUBJECTS.

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ASSESSMENT AND FEEDBACK

The capacity for retrieval practice to strengthen longterm retention of previously studied information is one of the most well-established principles of cognitive science. Dating at the very least to the 1880s and Hermann Ebbinghaus’s experiments on memory and the forgetting curve, in which he outlined that revisiting information slows down the otherwise rapid decay of recall, retrieval practice is now a mainstay of current approaches to pedagogy. Featuring, for example, in the excellent, albeit ubiquitous, Barack Rosenshine’s ‹Principles of Effective Instruction› (Principle No. 1 and 10) as well as the work of Bjork and Bjork (2014) and their concept of ‹desirable difficulties›, it is for good reason that retrieval practice is now a routine part of lessons.

aspect of a teacher’s arsenal, one way forward might be to remind ourselves, as in most areas, that the way forward lies in rooting our practices and strategies in the disciplinary traditions of the subject in which they are to be enacted. We should not then think of retrieval practice only as a generic, transferable strategy, but rather as something that specific teachers enact in specific classrooms for specific subjects. We should perhaps think of disciplinary retrieval. With this in mind, I would like to offer a case study for what exactly this might look like in my own subject of English, although the underpinning principle that retrieval ought to be treated as a strategy rooted in and enacted through disciplinary traditions is applicable to any consideration of retrieval practice.

However, such popularity comes with its downsides.

A recent EEF study on retrieval practice, for example, found that the impact in the classroom was perhaps not as effective as one might have hoped or assumed.

Examining this outcome in a 2019 article, Professor Robert Coe suggested this discrepancy between aspiration and practicality, could perhaps be traced to what Steve Higgins (2018) calls the ‘Bananarama Principle: ‘it ain’t what you do it’s the way that you do it›. Coe suggests that it is one thing to demonstrate the efficacy of retrieval practice in small scale research studies, but another matter entirely when one transfers this wholesale to be implemented into the classroom.

There are, Coe indicates, bound to be frictions that have nothing to do with the underpinning cognitive science, which is incredibly robust, but rather the way in which it might be enacted. Whether, as he suggests, it might be teachers are generating retrieval based purely on factual recall (which are easier and less time consuming to produce) rather than those that require students to interrogate the information they are recalling or whether chosen questions are too easy and therefore lacking challenge, Coe’s post issues a timely reminder that thinking generically rarely results in the kind of gains we might desire.

With this in mind, a natural starting point would be to ask ourselves what might we want retrieval practice to look like in English? One direction to take would be to use gap fill exercises for key quotations students need to learn or factual recall relating to context or author biography. There is certainly nothing wrong with this, and knowing such information and being able to quickly recall key quotations is crucial, but equally this kind of retrieval probably doesn’t characterize the kind of affective, connective, synoptic thinking that does to a large extent characterize the study of English.

Whilst the solution is certainly not to abandon retrieval practice, which is a highly effective strategy and a key

WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE WORD?

As an alternative approach within the English classroom, imagine the following scenario. Your students enter the classroom and are met with the below on the board: Write down your favourite word or image from [text currently being studied] and explain why this is your favourite. You might give them 5 to 10 minutes to do this in the fashion of a typical starter. They can pick any word or image and will be expected to justify it in whatever manner seems interesting to them. It’s completely low stakes and upholding that favourite maxim of the English classroom: there’s no right answer.

This also requires some initial retrieval since they need to retrieve from memory, without notes, a favourite word or image. Hopefully, though, given that it is their

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“THE BANANARAMA PRINCIPLE: IT AIN’T WHAT YOU DO IT’S THE WAY THAT YOU DO IT.”

favourite this would not necessarily pose too great a problem…!

Once this initial activity is set up and completed, now the fun can begin as we find ourselves moving towards a kind of retrieval that is squarely and confidently English-y. We could, for example, and as a first step, simply call on one student and ask them to share the word or image they selected and to explain why. We might at this point move around the room and repeat the same conversation with a couple of students and perhaps invite some others to comment. However, a variation on this straightforward start might be to ask one student for their word or image, but then ask another student to justify why the first may have chosen it. First, the student being asked to justify has to think on their feet and use their knowledge of the text to consider the significance of a word or image they may well never have considered before. They are reapplying pre-existing knowledge to consider the text potentially in a new light. However, it’s also really beneficial for the student that chose the word because, inevitably, they’ll hear new things to think about for their favourite word.

You might then go back to the student that chose the word and ask them to develop the justification it or to outline what else they had.

From this basic principle of ‘tell me your favourite word’, we could continue in other, interesting ways. For instance, we could ask two students for their words and ask a third student to connect them in some way or for all to write down a possible connection. The third student in this scenario is doing a lot of cognitive heavy lifting by being asked to consider a connection between what is likely to be two disparate words or images from within the text. It is likely the two words may not have been considered next to each other before and so by thinking about them in this new, realigned context the student is able to reframe their previous conception of the image. The alternative, of course, is that the two words are already naturally connected, but this is good too as it allows further rehearsal of familiar lines of argument.

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If we wanted to use this initial question for some short written practice we could easily do that, seeing retrieval not just as recalling information, but rehearsing ways of writing about texts. As one example, we could ask a student for their word and then ask students to keep their hand up if they feel their word connects. We could then gather 4 or 5 and then ask everyone to write a short analysis that explains the ways they connect. This is a great way to maximise what Doug Lemov labels ratio (the number of students thinking hard at any given time), since everyone is required to do the writing.

You could then transition this into an opportunity for live modelling (where you do it too and verbalise your thought process) or live marking (where you offer in the moment feedback on a couple of the examples students have just produced). Equally, you could ask two students for their words and ask everyone to write down all the ways they could connect those two words, again shifting into the potential for live modelling or marking.

In all of this, and there are many other ways we could develop or extrapolate from the starting activity of writing down a single favourite word or image, we are privileging a kind of retrieval that is specific to and immersed in the disciplinary traditions and norms of what it means to experience English as a subject. In this example, we are viewing retrieval practice not as disconnected from the subject in which it is enacted, as Coe seemed to be warning us against, but rather working within and for it. The same logic could and should apply to any subject. Indeed, this is where the most exciting and interesting thinking takes place at a pedagogic level: what does this look like in my subject and how can it be made to make sense for my discipline? It is at this intersection, between the discipline and the underpinning cognitive principles, such as with retrieval practice, that we can hope to ensure maximum impact, thinking deeply and carefully about what exactly this intersection looks like in the classroom.

DIGITAL PEDAGOGY AND TECHNOLOGY

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04.

Teaching & Learning Enhanced

by Technology MRS JANE BASNETT (DIRECTOR OF DIGITAL LEARNING AND HEAD OF MODERN FOREIGN LANGUAGES) EXPLORES THE VALUE AND IMPACT OF TECHNOLOGY WITHIN EDUCATION, SHOWCASING SOME OF THE TRIUMPHS OF THE DOWNE HOUSE COMMUNITY. On social media the hashtag used to focus attention on the topic of teaching and learning using technology is #EdTech. For me, of utmost importance, is the fact that Ed comes before Tech. What we do in the classroom is all about Education. Technology comes after because we all know that we can teach without technology.

As Andreas Schleicher, the head of the OECD’s Programme for International Assessment mentions, technology ‘is not a magic power… it depends on the teacher’. (Sylvester) And as Daisy Christodoulou reminds us, the teacher and the expertise they possess are of great importance (Christodoulou, 2020).

So, we, the teachers, must know our subjects; we must be the experts in our classrooms. In addition, we must have the pedagogic ability to deliver lessons that inspire, enthuse, and most importantly, enable our students to make progress. We must know what makes for good teaching. This inevitably leads to the question ‘what is good teaching?’. According to the Sutton Trust’s report, ‘What makes great teaching?’

(Coe, Aloisi, Higgins, & Major, 2014), there are some key pedagogical principles that shine through as promoting student outcomes.

Let us focus here on, arguably, the most important principle: quality of instruction. It is key that we not only understand what we teach, but also, how our students will cope with the subject matter. Using our Teams and Class Notebooks we can provide content which can be accessible at any time and perhaps not uniquely when the teacher distributes it. Importantly, content matter now is no longer restricted to the written word, we can also share video tutorials, podcasts, pictures, and even some of our recorded lessons if needs be. In this way we can curate the

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“IT IS KEY THAT WE NOT ONLY UNDERSTAND WHAT WE TEACH, BUT ALSO, HOW OUR STUDENTS WILL COPE WITH THE SUBJECT MATTER.”

ideal resources for our students and this focus ensures that resources are used more effectively and can be retrieved more readily. Crucially, the bottomless pit, that is the Internet, can be harnessed and exploited as we, the educators would like, which means that the resources our students’ access are relevant and pertinent to their needs. Furthermore, we can more easily provide extension work to those who have finished assignments and support tasks to scaffold those who are perhaps struggling with a concept.

Our Class Notebooks and Teams are ideal for this curation of resources and are effectively our digital learning spaces which can contain links and options that facilitate browsing and navigation.

To these curated resources we can include interactive quizzes that enable ongoing learning. We know that frequent low-stakes testing can aid learning and support our students to embed knowledge in their long-term memory. We have a plethora of tools at our disposal: Microsoft Forms, Quizizz1, Quizlet, Carousel, Century Tech2 and even Kahoot! Each of these tools have their own distinct advantage and it is important to use each one appropriately. They must be seen as more than ‘fun’ elements of a lesson as they are robust, educational tools that enable students to make progress and learn. Of course, it is important to note that learning takes place, as we know, beyond the four walls of a classroom. All the tools mentioned here are all quickly available on students’ surfaces and mobiles which means that with a simple link in our Class Notebook or Team we can provide ongoing learning opportunities that bear fruit for our students.

For me, the old, polarised debate which pits ‘tech lovers’ against the ‘tech sceptic’ is no longer of relevance. What we do in the classroom is enhanced by technology. My focus here has been on quality of instruction which for us, at Downe House, has been enhanced by our VLE3 – Class Notebook and Teams – where we can store our resources, successfully guide our students through appropriate content and give them plenty of opportunities for self-testing which promote opportunities for both students and teachers to understand levels of comprehension. Technology, in these scenarios, is the means to the desired outcome.

The last word must go to George Couros, author of The Innovator’s Mindset (Couros 2015 cited in Kingsley 2021, p26) who states, ‘Technology will never replace great teachers, but technology in the hands of a great teacher can be transformational’. And at Downe House, right now, we have the means to transform teaching.

1 The school will be purchasing a subscription to Quizizz which will provide us with more resources to create live lessons or learning opportunities for the students.

2 The school already has a subscription for this. It is available for English, Maths & Science.

3 Virtual Learning Environment

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05.

PDFs and PowerPoints: Using Technology as a Tool for Self-Assessment MR IAN CHAPMAN (TEACHER OF ECONOMICS) EXPLORES STRATEGIES FOR USING TECHNOLOGY TO FACILITATE EFFECTIVE SELF-ASSESSMENT ROUTINES FOR STUDENTS. When the dark clouds of Covid formed recently, the opportunities that this presented for online learning were clearly evident.

However, as teachers, we glean so much information by being able to observe the behaviour of our students and facial expression when we deliver material. The challenge that this presented was to find a way of helping students to revise material that was delivered when they were away from the normal support that teachers can give when “face-toface”.

I have been interested for many years in writing interactive material for students so that they can go through different material themselves and test their own understanding. For many years, we have been trying to instil

“I HAVE BEEN INTERESTED FOR MANY YEARS IN WRITING INTERACTIVE MATERIAL FOR STUDENTS SO THAT THEY CAN GO THROUGH DIFFERENT MATERIAL THEMSELVES AND TEST THEIR OWN UNDERSTANDING.”

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DIGITAL PEDAGOGY AND TECHNOLOGY

confidence in students and the ability to revise carefully without the “teacher” standing over them to check their understanding. In my retirement, I have set myself this task.

There are many ways of doing this online including sites such as Quizlet but they are limited (on the whole) to definitions and some lists and static diagrams, although some are becoming more sophisticated. I was looking for a way to take a huge body of notes and powerpoints that I have written over the years and writing interactive material that enabled students to check their understanding of basic terminology as well as written analysis and understanding of quite complicated diagrams.

I sought to follow some simple rules and precepts: ■ Writing this material had to be simple and not create a large amount of work for the teacher; ■ The material had to be easily accessible to students in a format that they understood; ■ It had to help students with higher order skills such as analysis and evaluation.

■ It had to enable them to test their understanding and then give them a chance to “reset” the material for further testing at a later stage.

There are 4 ideas that I would suggest.

■ Using PowerPoint as this is usually something that we have all used and have lots of teaching resources already. The addition here is to make any slide ‘interactive’ by adding a ‘shape’ and making that shape the trigger for something else to happen, such as to make text appear, a circle to fly to an area of a diagram etc. This can be used imaginatively to make answers appear for Multiple Choice questions, to indicate an area or point on a diagram or to highlight text to show statements of analysis or application.

■ Create a video of you teaching a particular topic through the use of ‘MS Streams’. The key addition here is to know when you are going to “stop presenting” and make the student answer a question about what you are about to say next. All you then need to do is upload to ‘EStream’ or use an online site such as ‘Edpuzzle’ where you add questions that have to be answered before the students can continue to watch the video. You will, of course, then tell them the answer and explain it and, as an added bonus, you can be sent a spreadsheet of their answers.

■ Use Adobe Indesign to write your own interactive material. It is easy to import word documents and then set up ‘buttons’ to show answers, highlight diagrams etc. This is more complicated but highly satisfactory when you have learned the basics of this programme.

■ If you are a user of Apple, why not bring your word documents into Apple Pages, where you can export the document to an EBook for publishing online?

All of the above have a tremendous value to students who need to check their own understanding or more complicated ideas and do not take an inordinate amount of time from busy teachers.

Ultimately why not record yourself teaching small snippets of harder material (using Streams facilities or even on an IPad) and then insert this into a document to help students in their understanding. You could then produce an Ebook which is able to be downloaded onto any device including phones, IPads, Surfaces for students to have at their fingertips at all times.

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06.

Disruptive Technologies and the Future of Online Blended Learning MS MARYA AKHTAR (DIRECTOR OF HIGHER EDUCATION AND GLOBAL INITIATIVES) EXPLORES THE INCREASING IMPACT AND SIGNIFICANCE OF ONLINE BLENDED LEARNING WITHIN EDUCATION. The first signs of development or disruption in education can be traced back to about 500 years ago when the role of the lecturer was defined from its source ‘lectura’, meaning ‘reading.’ As books were scarce and literacy rare, the lecturer could educate students by reading from a book, imparting education to small groups. Later, the advent of the printing press transformed the mechanics of education, and the sector evolved from ‘reading to’ to ‘disseminating of’ a wider set of knowledge on a much larger scale, and in a more organised manner. Up until the last century, the role of the educator was very much given; teach lessons, set assignments, test the students’ understanding and prepare them for formal exams. Calculators, overhead projectors, blogs and online textbooks all helped in enhancing the learning experience, rather than transforming it. Even the mass deployment of digital whiteboards and computers in schools did not truly transform teaching and learning or attainment levels to a great extent.

Perhaps the status quo would have remained, had it not been for the rise of laptops, tablets, smartphones and Wi-Fi. Although the growth in mobile technology adversely affected the Personal Computers industry, it facilitated disruption in nearly every business sector; music, banking, law, cars, electronics, postal services, television, energy supply, food delivery and higher education all started coming up with better products, or a more positive experiences for their customers. This pattern was sector agnostic and very soon the world started coining and adapting to neologisms linked to use of disruptive technology; FinTech, MedTech, RegTech, PropTech, InsureTech, BioTech, FoodTech and EdTech to name a few. The transformation witnessed by these industries supported the term coined by Professor Clayton M. Christensen of Harvard Business School – ‘Disruptive Innovation’:

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Disruptive innovations fundamentally transform a sector by replacing expensive, complicated, and inaccessible products or services with much less expensive, simpler, and more convenient alternatives (Staker 2011).

Over the last decade, digitisation of teaching and learning to suit the needs of Gen Z students, and exogenous shocks like the COVID-19 pandemic have led to a similar disruption in the education sector, especially at the K-12 level. Online learning and blended learning not only stepped in but also started to take root, and it is with keen interest that analysts watch this space.

Blended learning or blended synchronous learning or hybrid learning is a formal education program in which students learn: ■ partly through online platforms, with some element of student control over time, place, path, and/or pace.

■ At least in part, in a supervised brick-and-mortar location away from home.

■ and, the student’s learning path, within a course, is connected to provide an integrated learning experience.

Recent definitions of blended learning stress that 30% to 50% of the course material should be delivered through online activities, while 50% to 70% of the teaching should happen face to face (Terry, Zafonte, Elliott 2018).

The four popular models of blended learning are (Horn & Staker 2017): The Rotation Model – students rotate between different ways of learning – online learning, group work, individual tutoring, and whole class instruction. They rotate on a fixed schedule between learning online in a one-to-one, self-paced environment and sitting in a classroom with a traditional face-to-face teacher.

The Flex Model – students follow curricula online at their own pace. Teachers and assistants support and conduct small group work, projects, and individual exercises; they offer support on a flexible and adaptive basis through in-person tutoring sessions and small group sessions.

DIGITAL PEDAGOGY AND TECHNOLOGY

“DISRUPTIVE INNOVATIONS FUNDAMENTALLY TRANSFORM A SECTOR

BY REPLACING EXPENSIVE, COMPLICATED, AND INACCESSIBLE PRODUCTS OR SERVICES WITH MUCH LESS EXPENSIVE, SIMPLER, AND MORE CONVENIENT ALTERNATIVES.”

The Self-Blend Model – a student chooses to take one or several courses online, in addition to other traditional courses they attend. Schools offer a la carte online courses to individual students facilitating self-blending.

The Enriched-Virtual Model – a combination of remote online learning and attending lessons on campus.

course (Christensen 2008). It had initially something to do with the rising culture of home schooling in America, which was an estimated 3.7 million during the 2020—21 school year. Moreover, the rise of EdTech start-ups in the last decade, followed by school closures brought about by COVID-19 speeded this process up.

BLENDED LEARNING AT HIGHER EDUCATION LEVEL

Pre-COVID 19, the more established online schools can be categorised under:

Blended Learning, in its most recent manifestations, is gradually changing the way universities think about education. EdTech was already providing solutions that had the potential to revolutionise tertiary education in the form of VLEs, MOOCs, LMS etc. These very much changed the role of the lecturer yet again. ‘Lecture capture,’ saw recorded lectures streamed, allowing universities to re-evaluate the effectiveness of live lectures and lecturers. ‘Flipped learning’ was used where instead of a lecturer teaching and then setting students some work, saw the student watching a pre-recorded video of the lecture through the VLE or LMS. The lecturer then assessed, in class, how well the students have understood the subject. Overall, analysis showed the positive impact of using prerecorded video lectures depended on good planning, and balanced integration of asynchronous and synchronous components. Universities like Columbia, Cambridge, Imperial, Harvard and Stanford, have taken this flipped learning one stage further. Smaller colleges, who were struggling to recruit the best teaching staff, could buy small private online courses (SPOCs) from such leading universities, delivered on LMS (Learning Management systems) provided and maintained by EdTech start-ups. The London School of Business and Finance (LSBF) went on to putting its full MBA course online, so that potential students could see the quality of the course and learn at their own pace.

Premium providers – Stanford online High School that started in 2006 and operated by Stanford University with 800+ students enrolled in grades 7 – 12 across 30+ countries. Avenues, The World School, a highly selective school founded in 2010 with 400 annual students.

BLENDED LEARNING AT K-12 LEVEL At the K-12 stage, it started small in the US first, in 2000, roughly 45,000 K–12 students took an online

Affordable providers – Curro Online founded in 2019 offering IB Curriculum for grades 4-10 with 400 students in that year. Connexions Academy established in 2001 developed by Pearson Education offering summer camps and career education with 70k+ enrolled.

Special Educational Needs providers – Personalised 1:1 schooling for grades 6 – 12 established in 1989 with less than 100 students enrolled annually. Pamoja provided flexible online courses for different international curricula with 90+ subjects on offer, established in 2009 and 5000+ annual registrations.

Prior to COVID-19, there was already high growth and adoption in education technology, with global EdTech investments reaching $18.66 in billion in 2019 and the overall market for online education projected to reach $350 billion by 2025. There was a significant surge in the use of Language Apps, Virtual Tutoring and VideoConferencing tools, and online learning platforms. Post COVID-19, in response to the surge in demand, many online learning platforms like BYJU’s and Tencent started offering free access to their services. Since announcing free live classes on its Think and Learn app, BYJU’s has seen a 200% increase in the number of new students using its product. Tencent classroom, meanwhile, has been used extensively since mid-

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February after the Chinese government instructed full-time students to resume their studies resulting in the largest “online movement” in the history of education with approximately 730,000 or 81% of K-12 students, attending classes via the Tencent K-12 Online School in Wuhan. In the UK, online schools like Harrow Online, King’s College Online, Minerva’s Virtual Academy, Cambridge Home School and Wolsey Hall Oxford all stated are leading the way in online education at K12 level.

LEADING EDTECH COUNTRIES AND COMPANIES EdTech start-ups are on the rise all over the world, with the majority of companies located in the United States, which accounts for 1,385 or 43% of all EdTech company headquarters. The country’s population size, large economy, and tech and innovation hubs, such as Silicon Valley, are likely to contribute to its success. The remaining countries with the most EdTech start-ups include India (327), Brazil (275) and the United Kingdom (245), with China (101) wrapping up the top 5 list.

IMPLICATIONS FOR THE FUTURE OF ONLINE BLENDED LEARNING With the mushrooming of EdTech tools like Quizlet, Flipgrid, Edpuzzle, Spiral and Miro, and LMS platforms like Canvas, TalentLMS and Schoology which are supported by communication platforms like Microsoft Teams, Google Meet and Zoom, it will not be long when most schools will start offering some form of blended online education to their students. Whilst some believe that this unplanned rapid move since 2020, especially in the K-12 sector, with insufficient planning, training and bandwidth might result in a poor user experience, others remain more optimistic, believing that a new sustainable hybrid model is round the corner yielding significant benefits. Many top universities have already made a successful transition, for example, Imperial College’s new course on ‘Science of Coronavirus’ launched in 2020 is the most enrolled

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class, and Zhejiang University managed to get more than 5,000 courses online in just two weeks into the COVID-19 transition using “DingTalk ZJU”.

Studies have shown that children extensively use their senses to learn, making learning fun and effective through use of technology is crucial, according to BYJU’s Mrinal Mohit. “Over a period, we have observed that clever integration of games has demonstrated higher engagement and increased motivation towards learning especially among younger students, making them truly fall in love with learning”, he says. There are, however, many challenges to overcome – students without reliable internet would struggle to be a part of this digital revolution and gaps are being seen across countries and between household income brackets.

Whilst there is evidence that learning online can be more effective mostly because e-learning requires 40 – 60% less time to learn than in a traditional classroom setting (re-reading, accelerating, choosing, skipping), the effectiveness does vary between age groups, with a more structured environment required for the very young learners. Lastly, limited budgets at K-12 sector and lack of endowments, like large universities have, might slow down this process or stop organisations from taking off.

The Education industry is part of a complex service sector in which quality is not as easy to define, instead of measuring success in terms of massification and revenue generation, we will need reliable data on the effectiveness of niche products that provide specialised, career-enabling and life-enabling education. As online blended learning continues to grow in the coming years, adequate data analysis and research will provide more evidence to school leaders and educators, when it comes to planning programmes for younger learners.

The use of AR/VR in teaching and learning is also an area needing further research. Will K-12 be the next sector to adopt blended learning on a larger scale like the universities have, especially in the UK, is something we will be following with keen interest.

STUDENT MOTIVATION AND SUCCESS

STUDENT MOTIVATION AND SUCCESS

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07.

All Teachers are Teachers of English MRS KATHARINE HENSON (DIRECTOR OF CURRICULUM ADMINISTRATION AND DIGITAL LEARNING, TEACHER OF MATHEMATICS) EXPLORES SOME OF THE ISSUES THAT CONFRONT STUDENTS WITH ENGLISH AS AN ADDITIONAL LANGUAGE AND HOW WE MIGHT HELP TO SOLVE THEM. SETTING THE SCENE ‘All Teachers are Teachers of English’ was the title of one of the lectures on my Mathematics PGCE course over twenty years ago. At the time, the focus of the talk was on the importance of using correct mathematical terminology and being prepared to correct errors such as spellings or incorrect use of punctuation or capitals. However, it does not take long to discover that the interaction between English language and Mathematics teaching is much more subtle than simply knowing how many letter Ls there are in parallel (Fig. 1).

Mathematics can be a linguistic minefield for native speakers of English, with apparently common words taking on unexpected meanings, but for those studying in a second language the challenge is even more significant. This is not unique to Mathematics.

With an increasingly diverse student population, all teachers, irrespective of subject, need to become teachers of English.

“BE PREPARED FOR THE UNEXPECTED. IT MAY NOT BE THE TECHNICAL WORDS THAT ARE CAUSING THE PROBLEM. SETTING THE SCENE AND DISCUSSING THE CONTEXT CAN HELP TO DRAW OUT ANY UNFAMILIAR WORDS.”

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LOST IN TRANSLATION Anyone who has been on a foreign holiday and tried to converse in the local language will appreciate some of the difficulties that face students working in a second language. It requires a high degree of concentration to follow conversations, made all the more difficult if several people are talking at once. The context of a conversation may help, especially if you have a few preprepared responses, but if the format deviates from the expected pattern this can quickly lead to confusion.

STUDENT MOTIVATION AND SUCCESS

Fig. 1

Fig. 2

So, what is actually happening?

■ Are you responding spontaneously in the target language?

■ Are you translating back to your own language before formulating a response?

■ If so, you have probably missed sentence two and three while making sense of the first sentence?

■ Or are you hoping that the conversation fits your rehearsed model?

In this case you are probably not understanding any of the fine details but trying to spot a few key words.

As you become more proficient in the second language, you are more likely to be able to reply spontaneously, but unfamiliar words present a challenge. You may be able to guess the meaning from the context, but this is not always a reliable strategy. For adults on holiday, the consequence may be no worse than ordering an unexpected dish in a restaurant. For students in our classrooms guessing the meaning of words makes the difference between success or failure.

Unfortunately, students are usually reluctant to say they do not understand, so we need to employ strategies that enable them to construct meaning for the unfamiliar terms. As teachers, we often focus on subject specific definitions, and possibly key instruction words such as explain, analyse, or compare.

However, in many cases the linguistic confusion lies with much more mundane words, either because the word is apparently being employed slightly differently in the subject or a word is deemed so common by the author of a question that they have not anticipated that it might be misunderstood.

Consider the word diagonal: in general parlance, diagonal is used to describe a sloping line, one that is neither horizontal nor vertical. In Mathematics, the word diagonal means a line joining non-adjacent vertices of a polygon. We might try to illustrate this with a diagram (Fig. 2), but in doing so we merely reinforce the everyday interpretation.

Fig.3

However, it would be better to use a diagram (Fig.3) that shows the use of the word in a way that supports the definition in a more specific way.

Misunderstanding is not restricted to subject specific words. Often the cause for confusion lies in an apparently innocuous word such as counter. The student might be familiar with the word in the context of a shop counter, but may have used a word such as token to describe the small plastic discs used in most children’s games.

CLASSROOM STRATEGIES Good classroom management helps all students to hear and understand what is being said. A quiet environment with one speaker at a time gives everyone the opportunity to listen. Ask questions that enable the students to explain new terms and give them opportunities to use the words in sentences to show they understand the meaning and model good responses so that they know how to construct sentences correctly using the new words. Ask them to provide an example of how they would use the word, rather than simply asking if they understand, as this usually prompts a positive response even if they have no idea what it means.

When introducing new concepts, make sure there are plenty of illustrative examples. It is relatively easy for students to memorise a definition but is it much harder to explain how the definition might relate to a particular context. It may be helpful to provide a range of activities that enable the students to apply the definition in a variety of situations, with a greater or lesser degree of scaffolding. Activities that highlight the connections between concepts are also a good way to shift a student’s way of working from recall to better understanding.

Be prepared for the unexpected. It may not be the technical words that are causing the problem. Setting the scene and discussing the context can help to draw out any unfamiliar words.

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08.

Rising to the Challenge MR MATT GODFREY (DEPUTY HEAD) LOOKS AT THE IMPORTANCE THAT INSTILLING A LOVE OF LEARNING HAS FOR STUDENTS AND THEIR LONG-TERM ENJOYMENT OF THE SUBJECTS THEY STUDY. Recently, the association which connects the Heads of the world’s leading independent schools – known as HMC – revealed the outcome of a recent survey of its 360 members. They had been asked their views on a range of educational matters.

The survey reveals a very significant gap between what teachers think education should be for, and what the curriculum is delivering. They think the current system focuses too much on qualifications and not enough on broader aims such as values, attitudes, and skills: strikingly, 94% believe GCSEs need partial or complete reform.

The teachers were stating loudly and clearly that there needs to be much more emphasis on curiosity and a love of learning rather than a box-ticking, narrow curriculum. I have seen other surveys published, with very similar results, during my 20 years of teaching. Frankly, I digested this latest one with weary resignation. I knew it would be far more revealing and interesting to talk directly to our own students about their own lessons at Downe House.

So, I gathered a group of UVI girls in my office and grilled them about their experience of my own subject, English, during their time at our school. As a newcomer, I hoped they had experienced more ‘love of learning’ than box-ticking in our classrooms. The girls were pleased to air their thoughts and were candid with their feedback.

They were overwhelmingly positive but there were some important messages to take away.

The most important and emphatic message from the girls was how much they valued passion and enthusiasm from their teachers.

As one of the girls said: “I just love it when my teacher gets excited in our lessons. Her passion is infectious.”

“I was dreading studying Pride and Prejudice for A Level,” said another. “I tried and failed to read it over the summer before LVI started. It was so long and mushy.

But then Mrs Boswell told us that she had fought to teach it to us because she loved it so much. She made the novel come to life.”

The girls explained how different teachers reveal their enthusiasm in different ways. One said: “Mrs Boswell is like a teenager when she’s excited – it’s so funny.” Another said: “Mr Owen is different: he cares a lot but is much more cynical with it. I remember how irritated he was by the lovers in Wuthering Heights!”

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The girls were keen to tell me how their enjoyment of English is maximised when their opinions are listened to and valued. “When we studied The Handmaid’s Tale at A Level, it was the first time we were asked our opinion about things that really mattered to us,” said one of the girls. “It was just amazing: suddenly we were talking about abortion, spirituality, love, pornography and more. I remember being told by the teacher: if you’re not angry, you’re not paying attention.”

“I like it when the teacher argues with us and challenges our opinions,” said one of the girls. “It makes it all much more engaging and thought-provoking.”

STUDENT MOTIVATION AND SUCCESS

“I THINK GIRLS CAN APPEAR QUITE PASSIVE IN LESSONS WHEN THEY ARE YOUNGER, BUT WE BECOME LESS SO AS WE GET OLDER AND FIND OUR VOICE.”

One of the girls shared a revealing anecdote: “I hadn’t enjoyed GCSE English very much and wasn’t going to do it at A Level. But then I was chatting to a sixth former in the library who was reading about the historical context of Othello. I realised that English was about a lot more than simply metaphors and similes.”

Clearly, for the subject to be interesting, it needs to be sufficiently challenging.

“The best teachers find a way to let you know they expect more from you,” said one of the girls. “Not in a mean or pressurised way, but in a way that reminds you or makes you aware that you are capable of doing better.”

“Yes,” said another. “One tactic some teachers use is to call you to the front for a ‘chat’ about your work while the rest of the class work quietly.

I remember being told how I could improve and all the others in the class could hear! But it was fine – and it was good to get individual attention like that.” One of the girls said: “If a teacher knows me well and has faith in me then I will be motivated to try harder when they expect a lot from me. I will try harder for them.”

I was struck by the passion with which the girls spoke. I told them that they were a far cry from the stereotype of an all-girls school full of well-behaved but rather

passive students.

“I think girls here can appear quite passive in lessons when they are younger, but we become less so as we get older and find our voice,” said one of the girls. Another added: “If we are not challenged, we are likely to seem passive in lessons because we are bored.

But if we are challenged and motivated, we will not be passive.”

The HMC survey may have shed some light on how the UK’s education system has become too crowded and overly focused on results and assessment. But what is clearer to me is that our girls will rise to anything when they are challenged and inspired by their teachers.

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09.

Why We Should All Take Time to Read for Pleasure MRS JENNY HILL (LEARNING RESOURCE MANAGER) CELEBRATES THE JOY THAT READING CAN BRING AND ITS MANY BENEFITS. Time is our most valuable commodity. We live in a high-speed world where technology controls, tracks and takes up an ever-increasing amount of the 86,400 seconds that we are allotted each day of our lives. According to OFCOM, 15 to 24-year-olds now spend 4 hours of every day on their smartphone and check them every 8.6 minutes.1 The use of social media such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram is at an all-time high with mounting evidence that it can seriously affect our health and wellbeing – there’s now a recognised mental health condition called social media anxiety disorder.

In addition, teenagers have to face the inevitability of tests and exams that may well determine the opportunities they will have in the future.

Commitment to academic study and revision is essential for success, but that’s yet another time-eater and stress-inducer.

So how do we ensure that we stay healthy and mentally well, that we find some calm and peace in this frenetic world, but equally, that we perform academically to the best of our ability? We all know the benefits of exercise, eating healthily and having face-to-face social interaction with friends and family but have we stopped to consider the very real benefits of taking time to pick up a book?

WHY READING FOR PLEASURE IS GOOD FOR YOUR ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT Reading for pleasure has been defined by the National Literacy Trust as ‘reading that we do of our own free will, anticipating the satisfaction that we will get from the act of reading’.2 It is really important to be making a choice to read because of an intrinsic desire to engage with stories and learning, not because of extrinsic factors such as your teacher or parent giving you a reward for doing so. It’s when we develop that love of books, that desire to curl up and get lost in other worlds and lives that magic starts to happen. According to research carried out by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development on education and reading, reading for enjoyment at the age of 15 is a strong factor in determining future social mobility.3 In an earlier report they found that reading enjoyment is more important for children’s educational success than their family’s socio-economic status.4 A 2013 study from the Institute of Education found that children who read for pleasure, or who read at home, do much better in spelling, vocabulary and even maths tests right up to the age of 16 and a key review of research literature in 2006 by Clark and Rumbold identified these main benefits:

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■ Reading attainment and writing ability; ■ Text comprehension and grammar; ■ Breadth of vocabulary; ■ Positive reading attitudes; ■ Greater self-confidence as a reader; ■ Pleasure in reading in later life; ■ General knowledge; ■ A better understanding of other cultures; ■ Community participation; and ■ A greater insight into human nature and decision-making.2 The body of research that support the academic benefits of reading for pleasure is compelling, but the benefits don’t end there.

WHY READING FOR PLEASURE IS GOOD FOR YOUR MENTAL HEALTH A study by Dr Josie Billington, the Deputy Director at the Centre for Research into Reading at the University of Liverpool, in conjunction with Quick Reads, concluded that regular readers feel happier about themselves and their lives.6 Her study explored the emotional, social and psychological benefits to adults of regularly reading for pleasure and showed that books can not only educate but inspire and motivate us to make positive changes in our lives. The study also reveals that reading can lead to a more tolerant and empathetic society where we have a deeper understanding of and respect for other people and

STUDENT MOTIVATION AND SUCCESS

cultures. This makes perfect sense when you realise that each time you pick up a book, you imagine what it’s like to be that character and compare their reactions to how we imagine our own would be in similar circumstances. Billington also refers to reading as the ultimate stress remedy and highlights the significant effect that a good book can have on our feelings of contentment and fulfilment.

“The positive effects that reading can have on society are widely documented and what has been made abundantly clear by this research is that books can help us to enjoy the little things in life and be happier in ourselves; a useful and timely reminder for all of us to draw on the many benefits that only reading can deliver.”6 There is also growing evidence that regular reading can reduce

the symptoms of anxiety and depression and that it can even be effective in lowering the risk of dementia in later life.7

MAKING TIME TO READ Overwhelmingly, the most common reason that people give for not reading is lack of time. It’s seen as an indulgence rather than a necessity. Yet, as discussed, the evidence for the benefits of reading for pleasure is overwhelming – just half an hour every day (30 minutes less of scrolling through Instagram or one less episode of a favourite TV show) will reap untold rewards.

CHOOSING A BOOK The quality and range of fiction and non-fiction available for young adults to read has never been better.

Some of our best contemporary authors – Malorie Blackman,

“…READING IS THE ULTIMATE STRESS REMEDY AND HIGHLIGHTS THE SIGNIFICANT EFFECT THAT A GOOD BOOK CAN HAVE ON OUR FEELINGS OF CONTENTMENT AND FULFILLMENT.” Suzanne Collins, John Green, Veronica Roth to name but a few – all write in this genre and address many important coming-of-age issues. Bullying and popularity, sex and pregnancy, racism and exclusion, drugs and violence and dysfunctional families are all addressed but in a safe environment between the pages of a book and without embarrassing or patronising adults getting involved. The days when young readers graduated from Enid Blyton and C.S. Lewis to Agatha Christie and classics like Dickens, Hardy and Austen are, thankfully, long gone – there has never been a better time to be a reader.

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10.

Book Review: The Learning Rainforest by Tom Sherrington MRS ISABELLE WALLACE (HEAD OF FRENCH) REVIEWS THE EXCELLENT ‘THE LEARNING RAINFOREST’

BY EX-HEADTEACHER AND EDUCATIONAL AUTHOR TOM SHERRINGTON, A COPY OF WHICH IS AVAILABLE IN THE STAFF RESEARCH LIBRARY. I first came across Tom Sherrington about five years ago when I attended one of his Master classes in Manchester. I met him several times after this as he did some workshops in my previous school and every time, I could not but be inspired by his passion and commitment to teaching and learning. He is one of the most prolific bloggers and educational authors and you can follow him @teacherhead or read his wellknown blog, teacherhead.com.

The eponymous ‘learning rainforest’ is a metaphor to illustrate Sherrington’s ideas about what makes a great learning experience. In the first part of the book, he shares his own experience in the classroom and includes some of the research that has contributed to his thinking, highlighting common traps to avoid. In the second part he describes strategies that teachers might want to explore when growing their own ‘rainforest’ classroom.

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STUDENT MOTIVATION AND SUCCESS

I particularly liked the idea of ‘building a timeline’, where subjects contribute to an agreed cross-curricular chronology.

I put this into practice in my previous school, when the MFL and Geography departments worked together. I was going to take a group of students to the south of France (lucky me!) and wanted to include a focus linked to sustainable development.

Geography and French worked together so that students could learn about the impact of climate change, the importance of fair trade, buying local, the flora and fauna, comparing the Fylde coast with Provence. The fact that my students had studied this in Geography before we went to France enhanced motivation in both subjects. Students were working in groups, researching and presenting. Once in France they were able to present their region, proudly sharing their knowledge with our French partners. Students could connect what they were learning in different subjects. What they were asked to learn was relevant.

They had a purpose and suddenly, ‘it made sense’.

Another idea that I took from this book is ‘to dare’. For me this meant daring to play with the curriculum by listening to the ‘student voice’, transforming students into leaders of their learning. So, what does it mean

in real terms? Having a door open to establish a dialogue between our young learners and the not so young teachers (speaking for myself of course!). ‘What do you want to learn? How do you want to learn? What else can I provide to enhance your learning?’.

A few years ago, I was teaching a bottom set of Year 9. They were ticking boxes, struggling with their learning and I can honestly say that French was not a priority on their list. I had the idea of giving them the Schemes of Work and asked them to become the teachers. In groups, they organised three weeks of lessons.

They had ‘carte blanche’ in the way they were going to deliver the content. Their only brief was to ensure that the vocabulary and grammar content was delivered.

It was fantastic to see them organise the lessons, teaching themselves the ‘imparfait’ before teaching it to the rest of the class.

I was obviously checking before the lessons to ensure the accuracy of the content. It was fantastic to see them enthused and to do their best to be the top teacher. The group started to become more confident, they were helping each other and they were interested.

I can still see some of their faces.

Very special, indeed!

The final nugget that I would like to mention is feedback. Following Tom’s workshops, a whole school approach was adopted and I

think this is the key. First of all, we all know that marking can be an incredibly time-consuming task for teachers and Tom acknowledges this and dares to find a solution. Is marking really necessary, he asks? Do students really read every comment and do they make any difference?

Tom’s research demonstrates that the most impressive marking is marking that has been acted upon. In other words, a few small steps of clear progress built on simple marking is more effective than screes of comments that students don’t appear to have read. I am sure we have all seen this: students are often eager to know their overall percentage but do they understand how to get to the next step? Can they reflect upon their own performance?

Are they able to look back and remember their mistakes or the targets for improvement?

Perhaps we might even venture to hand back papers without the mark, sharing the mark scheme and inviting them to question their performance and to reflect about how they could have done better. We have learnt from each other, sharing strengths and weaknesses without being scared of being judged. It has been a very positive learning experience based on trust and collaboration.

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NOTICEBOARD

THREE BLOGS TO READ

ONE VIDEO TO WATCH

Challenge beyond Bloom’s – A Chemical Orthodoxy (wordpress.com) This is a really great post about how we define and utilize challenge in the classroom, as well as challenging the once ubiquitous idea of Bloom’s taxonomy.

Planning Teacher-led Lessons A really interesting conference presentation about how to plan an effective teacher-led lessons with a focus on questioning technique, and including clips from a lesson.

Just because they’re engaged, it doesn’t mean they’re learning – impact.chartered.college A really interesting article from Impact about engagement, what we mean by it, and why engagement doesn’t necessarily equal learning.

The art of modelling… it’s all in the handover | teacherhead An excellent short post looking at the value and important of modelling and in particular how to transition from the teacher doing the work to the student.

DEPARTMENTAL DISCUSSION QUESTION What strategies do you use to ensure the maximum number of students are learning the maximum amount of time?

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NOTICEBOARD

STAFF RESEARCH LIBRARY SHOWCASE

WALKTHRUS BY TOM SHERRINGTON

All of the following books, and many more, are available for staff to borrow in the Staff Research Library, situated in the Staff Common Room.

WalkThrus by Tom Sherrington is a superb and highly practical set of five-step routines covering areas of teaching from behaviour to curriculum design to explanation.

The book also outlines an approach to using these routines, or walkthrus, as part of wider deliberate practice and coaching strategies. The book is also the focus of our Try This Tuesday sessions. If looking to refine certain strategies that we already use or embed new ones into our practice then this is an excellent starting point for new and experienced teachers alike.

TRIVIUM 21C: PREPARING YOUNG PEOPLE FOR THE FUTURE WITH LESSONS FROM THE PAST BY MARTIN ROBINSON Taking as a starting point the question ‘what would I want my child’s education to look like?’, Robinson explores how the Classical Trivium of grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric might hold the answers he seeks. Using the Trivium as a pedagogic framework, Robinson explores the ways in which grammar might refer to the teaching of foundational knowledge and disciplinary traditions, dialectic as the ability to critique, scrutinize and question that knowledge, and rhetoric referring to the capacity to communicate one’s ideas, either verbally or in writing. Robinson offers a powerful account of what a vibrant and powerful teaching experience might entail for students.

As well as being philosophically minded, the text also offers practical suggestions as to how to enact and embed these ideas into our teaching, from ways of telling students the narrative of a curriculum to providing lots of opportunity for the intellectual critique of that curriculum.

The Enquiry | 33

NOTICEBOARD

LOVE TO TEACH BY KATE JONES As with her other book, Retrieval Practice, here Jones focusses not only on the research underpinning her teaching, but, crucially, provides a wealth of practical resources and strategies for helping to put it into action in the classroom. This would be a valuable read for NQTs as well as experienced teachers, combining as it does an exploration of recent pedagogy but also masses of actionable ideas. There is bound to be something here that you could implement with immediate benefit.

34 | Learning & Research at Downe House

REFERENCES

References & Bibliography

02.

ASSESSMENT: A MEANINGFUL PROCESS?

Kingsley, A. (2021). My Secret Edtech Diary.

John Catt Publication.

Fautley, M. & Daubney, A. (2019). The National Curriculum for Music: A Framework for Curriculum, Pedagogy and Assessment in Key Stage 3 Music.

(Online). Available at: ISM_The-National-Curriculumfor-Music-booklet_KS3_2019_digital.pdf [Accessed 1 January 2021].

Picardo, J. (2017). Using Technology in the Classroom.

London: Bloomsbury.

Swanwick, K. (1988). Music, Mind, and Education.

London: Routledge.

03.

WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE WORD? Rosenshine, Barack. ‘Principles of Instruction: Research-based Strategies that All Teachers Should Know’. American Educator (Spring 2012). 12–39.

Bjork, Elizabeth & Bjork, Robert. ‘Making Things Hard on Yourself, But in a Good Way: Creating Desirable Difficulties to Enhance Learning’. In M. A. Gernsbacher and J. Pomerantz (Eds.), Psychology and the real world: Essays illustrating fundamental contributions to society (2nd edition). (pp. 59-68). New York: Worth.

Sylvester, R. (2021, November 27). The AI revolution can supercharge learning in school. The Times.

07.

ALL TEACHERS ARE TEACHERS OF ENGLISH Dehaene, S., 2021. How We Learn. London: Penguin. von Glasersfeld, E., 1995. Radical Constructivism: A Way of Knowing and Learning. London: The Falmer Press.

09.

WHY WE SHOULD ALL TAKE TIME TO READ FOR PLEASURE 1. OFCOM (2018). Communications Market Report: A Decade of Digital Dependency.

2. Clark, C., and Rumbold, K. (2006). Reading for Pleasure: A Research Overview. National Literacy Trust.

Higgins, S.E. ‘Improving Learning: Meta-analysis of Intervention Research in Education’. Cambridge: CUP

3. OECD (2011). Education at a Glance: How Does the Enjoyment of Reading Affect Performance?

Coe, Rob. ‘Does research on ‘retrieval practice’ translate into classroom practice?’EEF Blog: Does research on ‘retrieval practice’ translate into classroom practice? | News | Education Endowment Foundation | EEF Accessed 01/07/2021.

4. OECD (2002). Reading for Change Performance and Engagement Across Countries – Results from PISA 2000.

04.

TEACHING & LEARNING ENHANCED

BY TECHNOLOGY Christodoulou, D. (2020). Teachers vs Tech? The case for an ed tech revolution. Oxford University Press.

Coe, R., Aloisi, C., Higgins, S., & Major, L. E. (2014).

What makes great teaching? Review of the underpinning research. Retrieved 12 7, 2021, from http://dro.dur.ac.uk/13747

5. Sullivan, A. and Brown, M. (2013). Social Inequalities in Cognitive Scores at Age 16: The Role of Reading, Centre for Longitudinal Studies Working Paper 2013/10, London: Institute of Education.

6. Billington J. (2015). Reading Between the Lines: theBenefits of Reading for Pleasure.

7. The Reading Agency (2015). Literature Review: The Impact of Reading for Pleasure and Empowerment.

BOP Consulting.

PHOTOGRAPHY & IMAGE CREDITS: iStock, Pexels, Pixabay, maxpixel.net, Shutterstock

The Enquiry | 35

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