The Cambridge Primary Review Trust

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Marvellous teachers

As a head I want to do all that I can to enable a happy school and ensure that our children have the time of their lives, love learning, and are inspired and aspirational.

I rely on our teachers to make this happen. Recently I have found myself focusing on nurturing their  wellbeing and asking how we enable teachers, as well as pupils, to ‘love learning, be inspired and aspirational’? How can we get the pride and passion back into the profession and use it to have a positive impact on teacher recruitment and retention? One of the aims of CPRT, wellbeing, can help here. Lately we have been prioritising this aim to help us to consider how to re-engage our learning communities with the benefits of a broad and rich curriculum.

Eighteen months ago Seabridge became the lead school for the Keele and North Staffordshire Primary SCITT (KNSPS) and as part of our recruitment drive we’ve been creating an advertisement  with our children focusing on what makes a ‘marvellous’ teacher. We have used Neil Baldwin (Nello), who comes from Newcastle under Lyme, and is the subject of a BBC award winning film Marvellous as our inspiration. His story is inspiring and the film is a great tonic.

In its final report, the Cambridge Primary Review recounted (pp 147-50) what children told the review team they looked for from their teachers. Similarly, and inspired by Neil Baldwin, our children have come up with their own versions of the ‘marvellous’ teacher.  When they think of Baldwin they speak of optimism and a ‘can do’ attitude. The staff at Seabridge have been moved by our children’s expectations of the profession. These have made us pause and take a moment to consider not only what makes for a marvellous teacher, but through the endeavours of such teachers what makes for a marvellous curriculum.

On reflection, and this should not be a surprise, Neil’s story and our children’s hopes have many connections with the aspirations of CPR and CPRT for an effective and purposeful primary education. The CPR/CPRT aim of wellbeing is about attending

… to children’s capabilities, needs, hopes and anxieties … and promoting their mental, emotional and physical wellbeing and welfare … Caring for children’s wellbeing is about inducting them into a life where they will be wholeheartedly engaged in all kinds of worthwhile activities and relationships, defined generously rather than narrowly. It is about maximising children’s learning potential through good teaching and the proper application of evidence about how children develop and learn and how teachers most effectively teach … It requires us to attend to children’s future fulfilment as well as their present needs and capabilities. Wellbeing thus defined is both a precondition and an outcome of successful primary education.

As a CPRT Alliance School, we have developed links with Keele University and KNSPS. This has led to a series of research breakfasts for senior leaders. Both KNSPS and the research breakfasts have focused on the wellbeing of staff and children alike through a broad and balanced curriculum.The research breakfasts provide much needed time to sit and think, discuss and reflect. They have  helped to rekindle my passion and confirm why I love teaching so much. At each breakfast we consider a research paper from CPRT.  Our most recent event focused on the curriculum and assessment, with a discussion of Wynne Harlen’s CPRT research report  on assessment, standards and quality of learning.

We considered how best to prioritise the time to deepen our subject expertise across the entire curriculum. Subject expertise has been recognised as an essential ingredient in being a good teacher by evidence from CPR and many other sources. (Children themselves told the Cambridge Primary Review team that ‘good teachers know a lot about their subject’). We agreed that teachers need time for reflective practice and opportunities to discuss pedagogy and share ideas practice as without this they cannot build professional resilience. The ‘culture of compliance’ criticised in the CPR final report (pp 495-6) has, for many, stripped away their informed creativity, so why don’t we apply to teachers those CPR-evidenced principles that we know are so very enabling for our children?

To achieve this we must invest time and energy in nurturing the well-being of our teachers, so that they can continually develop their professional knowledge and expertise across a curriculum informed by disciplined creativity, one that is broad and balanced while also mindful of teachers own wellbeing.

At Seabridge we have been focusing on fine tuning core subject planning and delivery and refining our marking and feedback to allow us to deliver a curriculum which is more relevant and engaging. We have been busy prioritising and taking the opportunity to highlight the aims and purposes for each subject in order to ensure we have a curriculum which pursues key strands rather than merely a busy curriculum ‘full of stuff’.

This won’t be a quick fix, but the evidence of CPR/CPRT helps us to base our work on informed evidence rather than simply a sense of what works.

After so many years of compliance teachers need to know that it’s acceptable to draw on their passion and pedagogic repertoire, not just the ring binder. Using the aims and principles of CPR and CPRT has encouraged us to move forward in our thinking. It has given us the language to use in order to enable and engage teachers, explore CPR aims such as pupil wellbeing, engagement, empowerment and exciting the imagination.

For school leaders, a culture of engagement and autonomy is needed alongside a level of trust based on professional dialogue. If we don’t allow time for this to happen our teachers might as well be programmed robots.  We need to invest the time to build relationships between teachers, teachers and children, teachers and leaders and teachers and the curriculum: everyone needs to feel valued and relationships in a school are paramount if we want to foster a climate of trust. If we don’t get this right nothing will flourish.  Children, curriculum and teachers all need nourishment.

Our research breakfasts give leaders in our locality the time and space for thinking , while reading and discussing CPR/CPRT evidence gives us collective energy and a license to explore, and being informed deepens our sense of well-being.  If our teachers to grow and become those marvellous teachers that our children deserve they need such opportunities, living their conviction to support and justify a rich curriculum which provides the breadth and balance, inspiration and thirst for lifelong learning that our children need.

In this, school leaders must be the role models. Notwithstanding OFSTED grade descriptors on outstanding effectiveness of leadership and management, take heart from how one of our children put it: ‘a child’s mind only explores how far a teacher allows it!’ This is very close indeed to that famous Cambridge Primary Review quote (final report, p 296): ‘Pupils will not learn to think for themselves if their teachers are expected merely to do as they are told.’

So come on leaders, let us lead with optimism and imagination to ensure our teachers have time to grow and flourish, develop their subject knowledge and cultivate their passion. We know that a ‘one size fits all’ approach doesn’t deliver what children need. At Seabridge we started by making time for research and professional dialogue between teachers and school leaders, and made their wellbeing a priority in the school development plan. Teachers are the essential ingredient for ensuring our children succeed. Mind you, if Neil Baldwin has anything to do with it our school will have no teachers left! He has already signed one of our teachers up to play in his football team.

Sandra Mitchell is headteacher of Seabridge Primary School, Newcastle under Lyme, and a member of CPRT’s Schools Alliance. Seabridge Primary School is within CPRT’s West Midlands network. If you would like to support the development of the region’s activities please contact the coordinator, Branwen Bingle.

 

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Primary science: the poor relation?

We are reminded by Ofsted of the qualities of an effective science education in their 2013 report Maintaining Curiosity, where the best science teaching observed

  • was driven by determined subject leadership that put scientific enquiry at the heart of science teaching and coupled it with substantial expertise in how pupils learn science
  • set out to sustain pupils’ natural curiosity, so that they were eager to learn the subject content as well as develop the necessary investigative skills
  • was informed by accurate and timely assessment of how well pupils were developing their understanding of science concepts, and their skills in analysis and interpretation so that teaching could respond to and extend pupils’ learning.

But regrettably not all primary schools, and probably not even the majority, are offering this quality of experience to their children regularly. The reasons are well documented in the Wellcome Trust’s 2014 report Primary Science: is it missing out?, and the CBI’s Tomorrow’s World: inspiring primary scientists in 2015. At the heart of this lie issues of leadership and accountability. Taking the pressure off science by the removal of statutory tests at the end of primary education in England in 2009 was a move generally welcomed by the science community to address concerns that science teaching had become defined and restricted by those tests. But it resulted in leaders taking broadly two different approaches to science.

Some enthusiastically embraced the new opportunities and freedom to enrich their pupils’ science experience, particularly through practical, enquiry-led teaching.

Others – often those in leadership positions – disappointingly perceived science as less important than the other core subjects of English and mathematics; a tendency noted in the Cambridge Primary Review’s final report. This situation continues today in many schools. In over half the schools visited in Ofsted’s 2013 review, the leaders ‘no longer saw science as a priority’ and its status has declined visibly. In those schools, science has become the poor relation.

This results in an all too familiar picture in these schools: a lack of planning for learning, unclear ideas about what achievement looks like that can be shared and understood by children, inadequate monitoring of the quality of science teaching and a lack of time and resources allocated to it, and little commitment to subject-focused professional development.

Whilst whole school priorities as a focus for professional development are important, research in 2014 by the Centre for the Use of Research and Evidence in Education indicates that pupils are more likely to benefit from subject focused professional development because it changes teachers’ practices by making links between professional learning and pupil learning explicit. This is particularly relevant to primary science where teachers frequently report that they lack confidence in their science subject knowledge to be able to provide their children with the inspirational experience that they seek. The number of primary teachers who may describe themselves in this way is potentially very large – estimates from the Campaign for Science and Engineering in 2015 indicate that only 5% of primary teachers have a science related degree – and for these teachers (in post and in initial teacher education), opportunities to engage with subject-focused professional development will be particularly important and valued. This is especially significant while the new curriculum in England is being implemented, with its increased emphasis on working scientifically, and on different types of enquiry with which teachers are not yet familiar.

This is not a time to be complacent. Putting efforts into planning an effective, rich and actively engaging primary science curriculum that embraces working scientifically – with opportunities to develop, use and apply children’s mathematical and literacy knowledge and skills at its core – will pay dividends. Research by King’s College London’s Aspires project reported in 2013 that by the time young people reach secondary school, they may already have disengaged with science.

But let’s not forget that science is in a strong position, with a vibrant community that offers a vast range of opportunities for leaders and teachers to take charge of their own professional learning journey and to make the most of primary science in their schools. More than any other subject, science has supporters in industry, charitable foundations and learned societies, all keen to help teachers to make primary science a stimulating and rewarding experience for all children. These opportunities include enrichment initiatives from the Royal Society partnership grants and the British Science Association, membership of the Association for Science Education (ASE), professional development through the National Science Learning Network, recognition of one’s own achievements through Chartered Science Teacher (CSciTeach) or the Primary Science Teacher Awards, and the achievements of your school through Primary Science Quality Mark (PSQM).

Taking advantage of these opportunities, there are numerous examples of inspirational science taking place across the country, commonly supported and championed by strong and insightful leaders who recognise the value of reflective professional development and the opportunities to learn from, and contribute to, the many thriving networks of those who are passionate about primary science – including members of CPRT’s Schools Alliance – and who understand the important contribution of science to wider school priorities, culture and ethos.

Cathy Dean, assistant headteacher at Queen Edith Primary School in Cambridge, a member of CPRT’s Schools Alliance with Gold PSQM, comments

‘Queen Edith was motivated to work towards PSQM because of the range of science already being completed in school and we felt that this should be celebrated. The year we completed the PSQM coincided with a Science and Technology Learning Saturday. For this event a working group helped to recruit members of the local community (including parents, university staff and other professionals) to come in and run workshops throughout the day for children and their parents.

We had a very positive response from children, parents and volunteers, and have then used some of those links to enrich our curriculum for future teaching. Completing the PSQM allowed the science subject leader to dedicate time to think about resources and teaching of science in the school and how this could be enhanced. Resources were reorganised and distributed, allowing science lessons to be practical and exciting. Staff meeting time was also dedicated to enhancing the science curriculum. It allowed the science subject leader to work closely with science leaders from other schools, enabling them to share ideas, resources and contacts.’

For this school, and many others, science is certainly not the poor relation.

Marianne Cutler is Co-Director of the Cambridge Primary Review Trust and  Director of Curriculum Innovation at the Association for Science Education.

We’d like to hear from you about the place of science education in your school. Has the new curriculum fostered a different approach? Have you taken advantage of some of the opportunities mentioned here (or any others) to develop your school’s expertise in science education? Please let us know your experience by commenting below.

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Supporting new teachers: snake oil, evidence or what?

Everyone knows that feelings of inadequacy are not helpful in the classroom. As soon as the tears start to roll, the learning stops. And the teaching too, because feeling inadequate is just as destructive of teachers’ ability to perform as it is of children’s.

It is depressingly easy to make a new teacher feel inadequate: one reason surely that around 40 per cent of us leave within the first five years of qualifying, according to Ofsted. Workload is the major issue of course, but combine a huge burden of work with the feeling that you don’t know how to do it properly and the result is … nail-biting anxiety, sleepless nights and finally, for many, departures for pastures less demoralising.

Here is just one example of the ease with which a new teacher can be forced to reach for the tissues. Recently I went on a reading course linked to the new curriculum. All was going swimmingly until, towards the end of the day, the trainer mentioned spelling – an area given a starring role in the new English curriculum. Now I had been feeling confident about spelling, courtesy of a respected website that has created weekly word lists, including rules, for each year group. It’s true that some of its choices are a little eccentric – ‘nondescript’ and ‘cohabit’ are not the words I would pick to teach eight-year-olds about prefixes – but never mind. At least I had one area of the curriculum sorted.

Foolish thought! Suddenly, I hear the reading course trainer say ‘spelling lists’ and realise that he’s laughing. ‘You see,’ he says, chortling away, ‘spelling lists really don’t work. The children learn those 10 or 12 words but then they never use them again and so they’re forgotten. It just isn’t a good way to teach spelling. A much better way is to teach them is …’

Well, that was it. Feelings of inadequacy again. I’ve been teaching spelling badly; the children will fail their Sats spelling test and we will all sit in the classroom with the tears rolling.

On this occasion though, feelings of inadequacy were overtaken by ones of annoyance. If there is a magic recipe for spelling success, why is it a secret? Surely acquiring this knowledge shouldn’t depend on the random choice of a CPD course?

This doesn’t just apply to spelling of course, but to all areas of the curriculum. Why am I endlessly reinventing the wheel, clumsily and misshapenly, when out there somewhere is someone who knows how it ought to be done?

Finding that mystery expert should not have to rely on anxious trawls of the internet late at night while the bags grow long under the eyes. The web is an invaluable tool and the teachers who donate their lessons for free are generous, public-spirited people. But is downloading Ms Who-ever-you-are’s second-hand lessons really the way to ensure the best possible learning experience for children? After all, while much online content is excellent, quite a lot is shoddy, ill-thought-out and, occasionally, just plain wrong.

Nor should finding the mystery expert depend on dawn raids on school cupboards sifting through piles of commercial schemes in search of whatever is that day’s holy grail. Be it a guide to teaching division using a number line or how to take those first steps in programming, it must deliver its message in an engaging, efficient and easy-for-Miss-to-understand way. Many commercial schemes do just that, but quite a few are ill-conceived, out-of-date and, occasionally, just plain wrong. Hence the warning about snake oil vendors in CPR’s evidence to the Gove national curriculum review.

Of course, not so long ago, new teachers did not have to search for the needle in the curriculum haystack.  They were given sewing machines in the form of the primary national strategies.  As the final report of the Cambridge Primary Review points out (p 417), this suited us newbies because the strategies were ‘all about rules and this is precisely what novice professionals are more likely to need’.  But the Review went on to say (p 307) that the strategies’ bid for total control of what and how teachers taught may have helped those who were newly-qualified or insecure but it wasn’t right for mature professionals with the knowledge and experience to make their own decisions, especially as government prescription was not necessarily better founded than what was available commercially. Hence CPRT’s insistence on the need for ‘a pedagogy of repertoire, rigour, evidence and principle, rather than mere compliance’.

Yet is it outrageous or unprofessional to suggest that new teachers would benefit from a reliable source of expert guidance on what to teach and how best to teach it? Just because the national strategies fell into disrepute, becoming inflexible and monolithic monsters, does that mean we abandon all idea of helping our floundering novices, most of whom have had a mere year’s training?

With standards to be ratcheted up, the pressures on teachers can only increase – as, I fear, will the proportion that leaves within five years of qualifying. One way to tempt them to stay would be to ease the daily burden of having to invent oddly shaped wheels to bump around their classrooms. 

Stephanie Northen is a teacher and journalist. She was one of the authors of the Cambridge Primary Review final report.

In pursuit of CPRT Priority 7, quoted above by Stephanie (‘Develop a pedagogy of repertoire, rigour, evidence and principle, rather than mere compliance’), CPRT has commissioned two new research reviews  to extend and update the evidence on pedagogy provided by CPR. One is on children’s learning, the other on teaching. It is hoped that both will be published next term. CPRT has also embarked on a major project, supported by the Educational Endowment Foundation, on using dialogic teaching to increase engagement and improve educational outcomes among disadvantaged children. More generally, CPRT is working with Pearson, its lead sponsor, to develop CPD programmes which are professionally helpful and based on secure evidence. 

CALLING ALL NQTs. We would like to hear from other recently-qualified primary teachers about the kind of support they need in their first year or two of teaching and the extent to which their needs are met. Please let us know, either publicly by commenting on Stephanie’s blog below, or in confidence by emailing us. This information will help us to take forward CPRT’s professional development programme with Pearson and will also be valuable to those planning the activities of our regional networks. 

Contact

Cambridge Primary Review Trust - Email: administrator@cprtrust.org.uk