Welcome to the latest edition of Chisnell Chatter. This edition is packed full of educational research and publications to inform your role in school. I share a range of publications from the EEF including in maths, PSED in the early years and feedback. There is also a research review from Ofsted and some top tips from yours truly from the perspective of a lead inspector.
As ever, I would love to hear from you about your thoughts on this edition. Also, my diary is waiting for you to sign me up to visit your school to support you in your strategic development. My consultancy offer is varied and includes coaching for leaders, subject lead training, safeguarding reviews, website reviews, research training, adaptive teaching for subject leaders, coaching into appraisal and much more.
Connecting with early maths – EEF research
The EEF have produced a research paper on early maths. In the paper, the researcher suggests that “promoting fluency with numbers and sequences can support early mathematical development, when taught alongside other mathematical approaches. Opportunities for practice and repetition, matching number names to number symbols, use of educational technology and board games are all strategies practitioners can use to integrate this into their daily practice.’
The report outlines two key approaches:
Teaching the association between number and quantity – This approach involves teaching the child to understand numbers and quantities. This could include using objects and pictures to visualise quantity, modelling counting sets, teaching the rules of counting, as well as recognising very small amounts without counting (subitising).
In order to put this into practice, the teacher should name and label quantity, encourage estimating, emphasise and visualise numbers.
Promoting fluency with numbers and sequences – This approach involves using daily routines and moments throughout the day, such as singing, recognition and repetition, to promote fluency with recognising numerals and saying the count sequence.
In order to put this into practice, the teacher should engage children in repetition, choral response, questioning to prompt recall and name & label numerals.
While these actions may sound obvious to an early yers practitioner; they may be more consistently seen in teacher directed activities. It is worth considering how embedded these are in child-initiated play and actives.
You can read the full report here.
Ofsted release RE subject review
The latest report from Ofsted focuses on religious education and contains a number of recommendations for schools, including that they should:
- Make sure there is a distinct curriculum in place for teaching RE at all key stages. This should be rigorous and challenging and it demonstrably build on what pupils already know.
- Leaders in secondary schools should design the curriculum to meet or exceed exam board specifications, rather than be driven by them.
- Make sure that all teachers have the subject and pedagogical knowledge that they need to teach RE well.
- Organise the timetable for RE so that gaps between teaching are minimised.
- Provide opportunities for pupils to review and build on important knowledge over time. Pupils should be able to use the knowledge that they gained in previous years as the curriculum becomes increasingly more complex and demanding.
The full Ofsted RE research review can be read here.
Top tips from an Ofsted inspector
As a lead inspector for Ofsted, I am always interested in defining key ways that the Education Inspection Framework can align to good practice in school leadership. Here are some key elements of great practice that appear in the inspection handbook that resonate with great practice as a school leader:
Here are the 17 elements of ensuring a good QE outcome:
- Build a culture ion school where there is Ambition for all, including disadvantaged pupils and those with SEND
- Ensure that there is clarity of thinking in all subjects in the planning and sequencing of substantive and disciplinary knowledge.
- Be crystal clear about how the curriculum is adapted to ensure ambition for pupils with SEND
- Provide a broad and balanced curriculum offer for all.
- Support the development of teachers’ subject and pedagogical knowledge
- Be clear and explicit about the pedagogical approach to delivering the curriculum.
- Plan for retention of knowledge and skills in every subject.
- Be clear about the approach to assessment in each subject to inform practice and to help students to know more and remember more.
- Create a learning environment and provide resources that support learning.
- Ensure activity choices support learning.
- Provide a clearly sequenced Reading curriculum from phonics to reading fluency.
- Have a tenacious focus on achievement including pupils’ work and getting to your curriculum end points
- When considering data, use this to inform your practice and target those who have fallen behind.
- Ensure at each key stage, pupils are ready for their next stage.
- Ensure that pupils with SEND achieve the best possible outcomes
- Help pupils to learn and apply their mathematical knowledge, concepts and procedures both within maths and across subjects.
This is by no means an exhaustive list. I would love to hear your additions to this that impact in your school and trust.
Personal, Social and Emotional Development
Here is a link to a great little blog by the EEF regarding Personal Social and Emotional Development in the early years by Laura Grocott. In the blog she outlines five key strategies:
1 teaching awareness of emotions and feelings
2 teaching and modelling managing emotions and feelings
3 teaching and modelling social behaviour
4 teaching relationship skills
5 teaching how to sustain positive relationships
Effective Feedback
The EEF have produced an interesting article on the three conditions for effective feedback. The full article is available here. The article resonates with other research articles shared in this blog regarding retrieval practice, questioning and assessment. The top three in the EEF feedback toolkit are:
- Feedback needs to be perceived as useful by the students.
- Students need strategies for using their feedback.
- Feedback should be delivered without a grade.
These are really powerful prompts for teachers to ensure that their feedback to pupils helps them to learn and remember.
Connecting Curriculum and Assessment
Professor Stuart Kime has written a super article for the EEF on connecting the curriculum and assessment. The full article is available here.
He urges the following steps:
STEP 1: Understand your curriculum intimately
STEP 2: Turn abstract curriculum concepts into the concrete learning constructs.
STEP 3: Select assessment questions and tasks which target the constructs you have identified.
STEP 4: Tread assessment as a process of teaching, not an isolated event.
Final spaces available on Headspace – a conference for school leaders.
Irresistible Learning 