Whole-School Leadership of Teaching & Learning. Raising Your Game Whole-School Leadership of Teaching & Learning Geoff Barton Head, King Edward VI School,

Whole-School Leadership of Teaching & Learning

Raising Your Game



Geoff BartonHead, King Edward VI School, Suffolk

Tuesday, April 11, 2023

Raising Your GameWhole-School Leadership of Teaching & Learning

Today: the content …

Session 1: Exploring the changing context: changes to the National Curriculum and Ofsted Session 2: Ensuring the basics: re-visiting whole- school numeracy and literacy and making them happen Session 3: What great teaching looks like: a practical exercise Session4: Using data to monitor the quality of teaching Session5: Ensuring provision for AG&T students


Today: the approach …

www.geoffbarton.co.uk/teacher-resources (95)


Ground Rules


Old Joke


Q: What’s the collective noun for a group of headteachers?A: A ‘lack’ of principals


A: A ‘lack’ of principles


"If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've always got"Bill ClintonUS President, 1993-2001


“Those who stand for nothing fall for anything”

Alexander HamiltonFounding Father, 1755-1803


WHATwe

teach

HOWwe

teachit


Ice-Breakers3


3


11. What is your current curriculum like?

What is it for?2. Does any of it serve the school more

than it serves your students (eg EBac)?

3. What does it teach young people to know or be able to do beyond what is tested in exams?

4. Is vocational content for the disaffected? Will it be there after the recent cull of vocational courses

5. Is all that ‘learning to learn’ stuff a bit of a fad that serves the middle classes?

6. Is the quality of a student’s experience in a subject dependant on who their teacher is?

The what and the how …


2 1. Are we angry enough that 50% or so of students leave school with C in English and Maths? What are we doing about it?

2. Does ‘more of the same’ actually make them get worse?

3. What more innovative approaches could we use?

4. Does early entry help or hinder learning? Who is it for?

5. Is the biggest problem in Maths, if you an insecure learner, your Maths teacher?

The basics


31. What is it like to be AG&T in your

school - celebratory, or a case of keeping your down?

2. Do they get more of the same, more depth, more breadth, more qualifications, more stress, more praise, more of the best teachers?

3. Does early entry serve the student’s rather than the school’s needs?

4. Does setting help students to progress?

5. With a blank piece of paper, what would you do for AG&T students?

AG&T


1: Teaching & Learning against a Changing Landscape:

• Revised National Curriculum• Revised Ofsted framework


The National Curriculum Review

• Slimmed-down and oddly optional• ‘Best that has been thought and

said’• No pedagogy, no guidance• International benchmarks• Broadly academic• Consolidation of basics … • Easier said than done.


The National Curriculum Review

Know anything else?


Ofsted

• Satisfactory is unsatisfactory• Outstanding wasn’t always

outstanding• No-notice from September (SEF?

lesson plans? data?)• It’s about teaching and marking• It’s about literacy (‘DCIL’)• What does progress mean?


Ofsted

Look at documents


Ofsted

So … implications at your school?

• How to ensure consistently good and outstanding teaching: do teachers know what it is?

• Are there Ofsted games that have to be played?

• Implications for training and monitoring?


Look at our ‘house style’


How would you use a document like this?


• What are your curriculum ‘values’?• What are the Ofsted implications

for training and monitoring at your school?

Thinking Time


2:Getting the basics right:Literacy & Numeracy Revisited

The Matthew Effect(Robert K Merton)

The rich shall get richer and the poor shall get poorer

Matthew 13:12

“The word-rich get richer while the word-poor get poorer” in their reading skills

(CASL)

“While good readers gain new skills very rapidly, and quickly move from learning to read to reading to learn, poor readers become increasingly frustrated with the act of reading, and try to avoid reading where possible”

The Matthew EffectDaniel Rigney

“Students who begin with high verbal aptitudes find themselves in verbally enriched social environments and have a double advantage.”


“Good readers may choose friends who also read avidly while poor readers seek friends with whom they share other enjoyments”


Stricht’s Law: “reading ability in children cannot exceed their listening ability …”

E.D. HirschThe Schools We Need

“Spoken language forms a constraint, a ceiling not only on the ability to comprehend but also on the ability to write, beyond which literacy cannot progress” Myhill and Fisher

“The children who possess intellectual capital when they first arrive at school have the mental scaffolding and Velcro to catch hold of what is going on, and they can turn the new knowledge into still more Velcro to gain still more knowledge”. E.D. Hirsch

The Schools We Need

Aged 7:

Children in the top quartile have 7100 words; children in the lowest have around 3000.

The main influence is parents.

DfE Research Unit

Every teacher in English is a teacher of English

George Sampson, 1922

The Matthew Effect:The rich will get

richer &the poor will get

poorer

1. Understand the significance of exploratory talk

2. Model good talk – eg connectives3. Re-think questioning – ‘why & how’

– and hands-up4. Vary groupings5. Get conversations into the school

culture

1: What type of talk characterises your classroom? How do you help students to

talk like a scientist / historian / geographer ..?

1: What type of talk characterises your classroom? How do you help students to

talk like a scientist / historian / geographer ..?

2: How do you ask questions? How do you receive answers? Do ‘why’ and ‘how’ questions

happen other than by accident? Do the same

students always answer?

2: How do you ask questions? How do you receive answers? Do ‘why’ and ‘how’ questions

happen other than by accident? Do the same

students always answer?

3: How do groupings work in your classroom? Are they

planned? Do the word-rich get richer? Is spoken

vocabulary modelled?

3: How do groupings work in your classroom? Are they

planned? Do the word-rich get richer? Is spoken

vocabulary modelled?

1. Demonstrate writing2. Teach composition & planning3. Allow oral rehearsal4. Short & long sentences5. Connectives

Know your connectives

Adding: and, also, as well as, moreover, too

Cause & effect: because, so, therefore, thus, consequently

Sequencing: next, then, first, finally, meanwhile, before, after

Qualifying: however, although, unless, except, if, as long as, apart from, yet

Emphasising: above all, in particular, especially, significantly, indeed, notably

Illustrating: for example, such as, for instance, as revealed by, in the case of

Comparing: equally, in the same way, similarly, likewise, as with, like

Contrasting: whereas, instead of, alternatively, otherwise, unlike, on the other hand

1: What kinds of writing do students need to do in your subject? Where do they see the process as well as the product? When

do they see you writing and reflecting aloud on your writing?

1: What kinds of writing do students need to do in your subject? Where do they see the process as well as the product? When

do they see you writing and reflecting aloud on your writing?

2: What are the 4 essential ingredients in a text required in your subject:

a)personal/impersonal?b)formal/informal?c)layout features? d)key vocabulary?

2: What are the 4 essential ingredients in a text required in your subject:

a)personal/impersonal?b)formal/informal?c)layout features? d)key vocabulary?

1. Demonstrate writing2. Teach composition & planning3. Allow oral rehearsal4. Short & long sentences5. Connectives

READING

1. Teach reading – scanning, skimming, analysis

2. Read aloud and display3. Teach key vocabulary4. Demystify spelling5. Teach research, not FOFO

SKIMMING

The climate of the Earth is always changing. In the past it has altered as a result of natural causes. Nowadays, however, the term climate change is generally used when referring to changes in our climate which have been identified since the early part of the 1900's . The changes we've seen over recent years and those which are predicted over the next 80 years are thought to be mainly as a result of human behaviour rather than due to natural changes in the atmosphere.

The best treatment for mouth ulcers. Gargle with salt water. You should find that it works a treat. Salt is cheap and easy to get hold of and we all have it at home, so no need to splash out and spend lots of money on expensive mouth ulcer creams.

Urquhart castle is probably one of the most picturesquely situated castles in the Scottish Highlands. Located 16 miles south-west of Inverness, the castle, one of the largest in Scotland, overlooks much of Loch Ness. Visitors come to stroll through the ruins of the 13th-century castle because Urquhart has earned the reputation of being one of the best spots for sighting Loch Ness’s most famous inhabitant.

SCANNING

1.Where did the first cell phones begin?

2.Name 2 other features that started to be included in phones

3.Why are cell phones especially useful in some countries?

Cellular telephones

The first cellular telephone system began operation in Tokyo in 1979, and the first U.S. system began operation in 1983 in Chicago. A camera phone is a cellular phone that also has picture taking capabilities. Some camera phones have the capability to send these photos to another cellular phone or computer. Advances in digital technology and microelectronics has led to the inclusion of unrelated applications in cellular telephones, such as alarm clocks, calculators, Internet browsers, and voice memos for recording short verbal reminders, while at the same time making such telephones vulnerable to certain software viruses. In many countries with inadequate wire-based telephone networks, cellular telephone systems have provided a means of more quickly establishing a national telecommunications network.

Where begin? Two features?

Some countries?

Close Reading

RESEARCH SKILLS

Research the life ofMartin Luther King

So how would you, a fully paid-up member of the literacy club, approach

the task?

1. Teach reading – scanning, skimming, analysis

2. Read aloud and display3. Teach key vocabulary4. Demystify spelling5. Teach research, not FOFO

1: What kinds of texts do students in your subject need

to read? What are the barriers to understanding? How do you help them – eg

with vocabulary?

1: What kinds of texts do students in your subject need

to read? What are the barriers to understanding? How do you help them – eg

with vocabulary?2: What are the ‘power words’ in your subject?

Where do students encounter them? Which are the

troublesome spellings? How do you demystify them?

2: What are the ‘power words’ in your subject?

Where do students encounter them? Which are the

troublesome spellings? How do you demystify them?

3: What’s your contribution to reading for pleasure? Do

students see you reading and hear you talk about reading? Do you teach them research

skills?

3: What’s your contribution to reading for pleasure? Do

students see you reading and hear you talk about reading? Do you teach them research

skills?

1. The issue is often language, not numbers: teacher questioning & thinking time are key …

2. … and ‘explaining’3. Use diagnostic questions4. Use Maths coaches

1: Literacy matters, but

maybe ‘literacy’ is the wrong term

2: Great teachers make the implicit explicit – and

model it

3: Without us, the rich will get richer & the poor will get poorer


The Ofsted view of literacy


Literacy & numeracy implications for your

school?

Thinking Time


3: Practical session:

Looking at Teaching & Learning


1. Familiarise yourself with the Ofsted materials

2. Watch the lesson: look at the learning and how the teacher shapes it

3. Write a narrative as you watch

4. What feedback would you give?

5. What training issues arise?


Implications for your school?

Thinking Time


4: Using data to improve teaching


Data

1. What data do you use at your school?

2. How do you use it?3. Do teachers teach better as a

result?4. How do you know?


PROVOCATIONS


1. There’s too much data2. ‘Data’ is an unhelpful word: call

it ‘information’3. Make it simple and personal – in

markbooks, in pictures4. Interpretation of data isn’t

enough: think of it as a tin-opener

5. The prevailing question should be: ‘What are you doing as a result?’


TASK

1. Look at the ‘Raise’ data: what are its key messages?

2. Look at the subject self-evaluation: does it marry up with Raise? What are the main implications for you?

3. What would you now do as a result? What advice to Head of Department? What monitoring? What observation? What training?


Grasping Nettles

1. When has information suggested that a teacher’s teaching was going wrong?

2. What did you do?3. What did you say?4. What happened?5. What are your tips for ‘tricky

conversations’?


Implications for your school?

Thinking Time


5: Stretching & challenging most able students


PROVOCATIONS


1. AG&T focus isn’t elitist: it’s inclusive

2. Use a broad range of data (CATS, NFER, FFT, Departmental recommendations)

3. Be clear about ‘gifted’ v talented4. Create a culture of scholarship:

‘Thursday talks’, debating, early Oxbridge visits, Extended Project

5. Enrichment is important, but so is the teaching: use students for feedback


EXAMPLES


Teachers involved in identification: but all data viewed sceptically


Regular updates to staff …


Our Sixth Form provision …


So what do you do for AG&T students at your school?

What’s the impact?

Thinking Time


Today: the content …

Session 1: Exploring the changing context: changes to the National Curriculum and Ofsted Session 2: Ensuring the basics: re-visiting whole- school numeracy and literacy and making them happen Session 3: What great teaching looks like: a practical exercise Session4: Using data to monitor the quality of teaching Session5: Ensuring provision for AG&T students


KEY MESSAGES

1. It’s about what we teach and how we teach it: we can all get better

2. Data is merely a tin-opener3. Great teachers make the implicit

explicit4. We’re not making tins of baked

beans: some things will work and some things won’t

5. Fundamentally it’s about our values

Raising Your Game



Geoff BartonHead, King Edward VI School, Suffolk

Tuesday, April 11, 2023

www.geoffbarton.co.uk/teacher-resources (95)

Documents

Whole-School Leadership of Teaching & Learning. Raising Your Game Whole-School Leadership of Teaching & Learning Geoff Barton Head, King Edward VI School,