MOST TEACHERS REACH A PERFORMANCE PLATEAU WITHIN A FEW YEARS ACCORDING TO RESEARCH

 

Most teachers reach a performance plateau after 3-5 years

Little evidence that teachers improve  much  after a couple of  years

Comment

Alex Quigley , a teacher,  writing  in The Guardian this week ,reminded us    that the author, Joshua Foer, originated the term ‘ok plateau’ in his popular science book, Moonwalking with Einstein, on the subject of improving memory. He used it to describe that common autopilot state when you have habitually mastered the basics of a task, but despite being skilled you stop really improving to reach expert status; you simply plateau in performance .Teachers are as prone as any other profession to this state.  Indeed evidence, from Rivkin, Hanushek and Kain (2005) (see below), is that after the first couple of years teacher quality reaches a plateau and teacher experience beyond this point has a negligible impact upon student attainment. This,  Quigley correctly claims, clashes with our basic presumptions about experience in teaching and it should certainly give us food for thought.

So, what is the evidence, more generally, about the impact of experience on teachers performance?

Experience does make a difference—especially at the beginning of a teacher’s career. On average, teachers with some experience are more effective than brand new teachers.

(Kane,Rockoff and Staiger (2006). “What Does Certification Tell Us About Teacher Effectiveness?” NBER Working Paper 12155.)

 Teachers improve the most early in their careers. One study found that “close to half of the teacher achievement returns to experience arise during the first few years of teaching.”   (Clotfelter, Ladd, and Vigdor (2007). “How and Why Do Teacher Credentials Matter for Student Achievement?” CALDER Working Paper)

 The shift from no experience, to some experience, makes the biggest difference. One study found that “the bulk of the experience effects occur during the first year,” while another noted that “the effect of moving from being completely inexperienced to having a full year of experience” matters most.

(Harris and Sass (2007). “Teacher Training, Teacher Quality, and Student Achievement.” CALDER Working Paper ) Boyd, Lankford, Loeb, Rockoff, and Wyckoff (2008). “The Narrowing Gap in Teacher Qualifications and its Implications for Student Achievement.” NBER Working Paper 14021

However, most teachers reach their peak after about five years in the classroom. Teachers gradually reach plateau after 3-5 years on the job.

(Clotfelter, Ladd, and Vigdor (2006). “Teacher-student matching and the assessment of teacher effectiveness.” National Bureau of Economic Research)

As one study put it,“ there is little evidence  that improvement continues after the first three years.”  (Rivkin, Hanushek, and Kain (2005). “Teachers, Schools, and Academic Achievement.” Econometrica, 73(2), 417-458.)

Another found that, on average, teachers with 20 years of experience are not much more effective than those with 5 years of experience. (Ladd, Helen F. (2008). “Value-Added Modelling of Teacher Credentials: Policy Implications)

Some studies suggest that effectiveness actually declines toward the end of a teacher’s career. For example, the most experienced high school maths teachers in the States may be less effective than their less experienced colleagues and even their inexperienced colleagues.

(Ladd (2008); Harris and Sass (2007))

Teacher performance varies at all levels of experience. Individual teachers tend to improve with experience, but not all teachers begin their careers with the same skills or rise to the same level.

(Xu, Hannaway,and Taylor (2009). “Making a Difference? The Effects of Teach for America in High School.” CALDER Working Paper 17. National Center for Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Research)

The fact that a fifth-year teacher is more effective than she was in her first year doesn’t mean she’s more effective than all first-year teachers.  In fact, research shows that some less-experienced teachers are more effective than teachers with more  experience.

(Sass, Hannaway, Xu, and Figlio (2010). “Value Added of Teachers in High-Poverty and Lower-Poverty Schools.” CALDER Working Paper 52)

One study found that when layoffs are based on seniority alone, about 80% of the novice teachers who get pink slips are more effective than their lowest-performing colleagues who remain. (Goldhaberand Theobold (2010). “Assessing the Determinants and Implications of Teacher Layoffs.” Center for Education Data & Research, University of Washington-Bothell)

There is limited evidence, but not consensus, that returns to experience vary based on how a teacher is assigned over the years—by subject, and by how long they teach the same grade.

(Ost, Ben (2009). “How do Teachers Improve? The Relative Importance of Specific and General Human Capital.” Cornell University)

 

Conclusion.

In teaching experience helps, but it doesn’t tell the full story—and it certainly  doesn’t guarantee excellence. As one study of more than a half-million students concluded, “experience is not significantly related to achievement following the initial years in the profession.”

You would have thought that Continuous Professional Development (CPD)  should be able to address this challenge. But part of the problem, according to Quigley (an English teacher at Huntington School, York)  is ‘ our system of continuous performance development ’.

He writes ‘This system is tied to targets and professional standards that actually inhibit conscientious teachers taking risks and experimenting with new teaching strategies. We set targets, either consciously or subconsciously, so that we may meet them, regardless whether they genuinely improve our practice or not. Gone is the regular critical feedback of our first couple of years. We move into autopilot, often even entering a state of professional inertia.’

Teachers, Schools, and Academic Achievement Steven G. Rivkin; Eric A. Hanushek; John F. Kain Econometrica, Vol. 73, No. 2. (Mar., 2005), pp. 417-458.

 

http://personal.us.es/emidiaz/index_files/Rivkinetal2005.pdf

TEACHING QUALITY AND CONTINUING PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

TEACHING QUALITY AND CONTINUING PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT 

Lessons from the London Challenge?

Comment

Research from the London School of Economics for the  Sutton Trust has shown that English schools could move  into the world’s top five education performers within a  decade if the performance of the least effective 10% of  teachers were brought up to the average. So, how do we improve the quality of teaching in our schools?  The Teacher Development Trust cites research from New Zealand on the impact of high-quality CPD on the education outcomes of children, where children taught by teachers on high-quality CPD programmes were improving twice as fast as those in other classes. The  improvement is more pronounced for those deemed in  the 20% ‘least able,’ who made improvements four to six  times as fast as their peers. The important point here is that CPD has to be high quality. Sadly,historically, much CPD hasn’t been high quality. Simply sending teachers to an occasional external course will have little or no effect on them, or  on student outcomes, for that matter.  Thomas Guskey has identified, in his research on evaluating CPD,  that impacts of CPD must be measured  through children’s outcomes. Schools have to be led by the evidence on what works to improve their pupils’ education.

Currently, there is a growing body of resources for schools to draw on. The Sutton Trust’s Pupil Premium Toolkit, the York Informed Practice Initiative (YIPI) and the Teacher Development Trust’s Good CPD Guide web site are all very  useful in this respect.

Stephen Twigg, the Shadow Education Secretary, believes that we can learn much from the London Challenge about effective CPD. So, what can we learn? He writes: (Teaching Leaders Quarterly-March 2013):  ‘There are three policy lessons.  We need a system of challenge and support. Stick without the carrot might make popular headlines but it will  do little to change the outcomes of the children served by  underperforming teachers. London Challenge advisors set clear and ambitious new standards. But they did so by working in collaboration with teachers to get buy in. Second, working across schools underpinned the programme. Teachers would receive training from high performing colleagues in other schools. It is clear that being in a different setting was an important aspect for  learning new and improved ways to teach. Third, the evidence from Ofsted’s evaluation of London Challenge found that where teachers were trained on improved teaching and learning strategies, this led to lasting legacies in their schools. Crucially, the impact was not only felt by schools in receipt of the support from  partner schools, it was also felt by host schools.

Note 1

The Logical Chain (Ofsted, 2006) noted that: ‘Few schools evaluated the impact of CPD on teaching and learning successfully’ a situation that appears not to have changed much.

Note 2

Thomas Guskey (2000) introduced a significant focus on evaluating CPD through the impact it had on learning outcomes for young people.  Guskey sees impact as being achieved at five potential levels:

participants’ reactions

participants’ learning

organisation support and change

participants’ use of new knowledge and skills

student learning outcomes

Crucially, he argues that we need to pay attention to all five levels of impact if the goal of improving classroom learning is to be achieved, especially levels 2 – 5.

Following Guskey, Goodall et al investigated the range of evaluative practices for CPD.  Using Guskey’s levels as a framework, they found that schools lacked experience, skills and tools to evaluate the impact of CPD.

(Acknowledgments to the  Teacher Development Trust)

COULD SAT APTITUDE TESTS- DESIGNED IN THE US- HELP UK HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS DEVELOP A FAIRER SYSTEM TO MEASURE POTENTIAL?

Could   they help UK Universities select students more fairly?

Comment

Universities are keen to ensure that they have a clear idea of a students potential in deciding admissions and not simply to rely on exam results.  Measuring potential is not easy and cant really be done by looking at a students application (UCAS) form, contrary to the claims made by some admissions tutors.

They have looked across the Atlantic for inspiration  looking in particular at the SAT  aptitude test (the SAT Reasoning TestTM) as a tool in the selection of candidates for admission to higher education (HE) either as a standalone tool or one used in conjunction with GCSEs and AS/A2 levels  to determine admissions.

SAT are multiple-choice tests required for admission by several top US universities (although they are not the only test available). It is sometime assumed  that SATs are similar to GCSEs or A levels . They are not. They are basically  IQ tests designed to measure potential rather than to measure what you have learned  at school.

So if SAT tests are supposed to measure potential, do they do this effectively? There is much debate about this.  However, given that a cottage industry  has developed in tutoring students to help them pass  the SAT there  are grounds for doubting  that the tests truly measure potential.  SAT questions are quite particular and the skills to answer them are not often taught in schools. Hence the  cottage industry ,selling textbooks and extra tuition Students wanting to take SATs must usually register independently, pay for the test and travel to an SAT test centre. For rural students, the nearest location may be  some distance And then there is the problem of revising. Poorer students inevitably are disadvantaged.

In the UK, back in 2005, the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) was commissioned to evaluate the potential value of using an the SAT Reasoning TestTM as an additional tool in the selection of candidates for admission to higher education (HE). This five-year study was co-funded by the Department for Business, Innovation, and Skills (BIS), the NFER, the Sutton Trust and the College Board. The primary aim of the study was to examine whether the addition of the SAT® alongside A levels is better able to predict HE participation and outcomes than A levels alone. And  whether it  might help identify students with the potential to benefit from higher education whose ability is not adequately reflected in their prior attainment.

The study found that of  the prior attainment measures, average A level points score is the best predictor of HE participation and degree class, followed by average GCSE points score. The inclusion of GCSE information adds usefully to the predictive power of A levels. In the absence of other data, the SAT® has some predictive power but it does not add any additional information, over and above that of GCSEs and A levels (or GCSEs alone), at a significantly useful level. But  could the SAT® identify economically or educationally disadvantaged students with the potential to benefit from HE whose ability is not adequately reflected in their A level results; and  could the SAT®  distinguish helpfully between the most able applicants who get straight A grades at A level.

The study  also found ‘no evidence that the SAT® provides sufficient information to identify students with the potential to benefit from higher education whose ability is not adequately reflected in their prior attainment.’

In addition  ‘the SAT® does not distinguish helpfully between the most able applicants who get three or more A grades at A level. The SAT® Reading and Writing components do add some predictive power for some classes of degree at highly selective universities, but add very little beyond the information provided by prior attainment, in particular prior attainment at GCSE.’

So it is pretty safe to conclude that the SAT is no panacea for measuring student potential and would have limited utility for Higher Education Institutions in this country to help them design a fairer admissions process that fully takes into account an applicants potential.

Use of an aptitude test in university entrance: a validity study Final Report-3 December 2010- NFER-Sutton Trust

http://www.suttontrust.com/research/use-of-an-aptitude-test-in-university-entrance/

WHAT ARE ACADEMIES OBLIGED TO TEACH? AND JUST HOW AUTONOMOUS ARE THEY?

WHAT ARE ACADEMIES OBLIGED TO TEACH?

Academies and Free schools do not have to follow the national curriculum. But… and its quite a big but..

‘Academies must teach a broad and balanced curriculum’,  and there are a number of statutory and other requirements.

Key statutory requirements

 ‘Academies are required to have a broad and balanced curriculum which promotes the spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical development of pupils and prepares them for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of later life.’

For pupils below key stage 1 (i.e. reception and nursery), academies are required to follow the Early Years Foundation Stage.

Summary of requirements under the funding agreement

While academies are not required to follow the National Curriculum they are required to ensure their curriculum:

includes English, maths and science;

includes Religious Education, although the nature of this will depend on whether the school has a faith designation;

secures access to independent, impartial careers advice for pupils in years 9-11; and

includes sex and relationship education (SRE).

Academies are required to take part in the following assessments:

 

Early Years Foundation Stage Profile (in reception);

Teacher assessments at Key Stage 1;

National tests at Key Stage 2;

Teacher assessments at Key Stage 3; and

All relevant monitoring arrangements as prescribed by the Secretary of State.

 

Are the curriculum requirements the same for all academies?

No. ‘Prior to September 2010, some funding agreements required academies to follow the National Curriculum Programmes of Study in English, maths and science (and in some cases ICT). We (DFE) will be writing to those academies to say that we will not enforce those contractual provisions.’

(I assume that the DFE has already  informed the relevant academies about this)

Source Academy Curriculum Fact Sheet, DFE, up dated December 2012

 

Remember,  Academies and Free schools are ‘autonomous’ in the sense that they have certain freedoms, over the curriculum, pay, etc  and are ‘freed’ from local authority bureaucracy but each school, nonetheless,  is subject to a Funding Agreement with the DFE . The funding agreements are essentially contracts between the Secretary of State and the organisation which establishes and runs the school ( ie ‘the academy trust’) . This varies between schools. So Academies are  still subject to central controls, and, of course, Ofsted inspections. Although Lord Adonis wanted the DNA of independent schools transferred to academies it would be something of a challenge  to argue that academies are as autonomous  or ‘free’ as independent  schools.  Could, for example, the Secretary of State object to the appointment of a governor in an independent school? I think not.

Academies are charities run by  an academy trust. But they are what is termed  ’ exempt ‘charities. So , rather than being regulated by the independent Charities Commission  they are regulated  by the Secretary of  State . Indeed, the Secretary of State prescribes membership of the trustee body in some detail. So’“exempt” charities in this case  at least  may be  operating in an even more regulated and much  more highly politicised environment than is the case for conventional charities

http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/leadership/typesofschools/academies/open/b00219097/academyfactsheets/academycurriculumfactsheet

ANDREAS SCHLEICHER JOINS CALLS FOR BETTER PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT IN TEACHING PROFESSION

 

The importance of  teachers  continuous professional development

Four elements needed for success

Comment

Teachers are being challenged to transform educational outcomes, often under difficult conditions, says Andreas Schleicher of the OECD in a recent  article for Huffington Post

No matter how good the pre-service education for teachers is, it cannot be expected to prepare teachers for all the challenges they will face throughout their careers.

All this underlines the need, Schleicher says, to better support and encourage teacher participation in continued professional development and to ensure that professional development really matches teachers’ needs. The OECD identifies several aspects as central to success:

‘First, well-structured and resourced induction programs can support new teachers in their transition to full teaching responsibilities before they obtain all the rights and responsibilities of full-time professional teachers. In countries such as Finland, once teachers have completed their pre-service education and begun their teaching, they begin one or two years of heavily supervised teaching. During this period, the beginning teacher typically receives a reduced workload, mentoring by master teachers and continued formal instruction.

Second, effective professional development needs to be ongoing, include training, practice and feedback, and provide adequate time and follow-up support. Successful programs involve teachers in learning activities that are similar to those they will use with their students, and encourage the development of teachers’ learning communities.

Third, teacher development needs to be linked with wider goals of school and system development, and with appraisal and feedback practices and school evaluation.

And finally, there is need to re-examine structures and practices that inhibit inter-disciplinary practice and to provide more room for teachers to take time to learn deeply, and employ inquiry- and group-based approaches, especially in the core areas of curriculum and assessment.

In sum, Schleicher says ‘ the transformation of today’s teaching force requires smarter development of professionals. The significant rewards that come with better educational outcomes show that getting this right is worth it’

Schleichers views  reflect the strong focus now being placed internationally on improving  the quality of teachers and teaching  and in ensuring that teachers have access to high quality, continuous professional development throughout their professional lives. Research shows that  good and bad teachers have a very significant effect on student  outcomes, even  after taking into account socio-economic factors  (see Hanushek et al)

GOVE WANTS THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE TEACHING OF ENGLISH TO RETURN TO RIGOUR

Slap Down

Gove makes it pretty clear what he thinks of the National Association for the Teaching of English

Comment

Ian McNeilly, the head of the National Association for the Teaching of English, has said of the Government’s new English curriculum: “It is fantastic that Mr Gove has acknowledged that English as a subject needs to move into a different century. Unfortunately for all concerned, he has chosen the 19th rather than the 21st”. Such drollery  will have raised a smirk or two among English teachers.

When Michael Gove was reminded of this comment in   Commons education questions, on 3 December,he  said:  “I do not see anything wrong with having the 19th century at the heart of the English curriculum. As far as I am concerned, Jane Austen, Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy—not to mention George Eliot—are great names that every child should have the chance to study. As for the National Association for the Teaching of English, I am afraid that it is yet another pressure group that has been consistently wrong for decades. It is another aspect of the educational establishment involving the same people whose moral relativism and whose cultural approach of dumbing down have held our children back. Those on the Opposition Benches have not yet found a special interest group with which they will not dumbly nod along and assent to. I believe in excellence in English education. I believe in the canon of great works, in proper literature and in grammar, spelling and punctuation. As far as I am concerned, the NATE will command my respect only when it returns to rigour.” Ouch!

ENGLISH GCSES 2012-WHAT HAPPENED-AND WHO IS TO BLAME? NOT THE TEACHERS IT SEEMS.

GCSE   IMBROGLIO

Ofqual agrees that the system incentivises teachers to mark pupils course work ‘optimistically’

Accountability measures drives teachers ‘to predict and manage grade outcomes ‘

Comment

The league tables focus on the importance of  the  C/D GCSE borderline.

The government ranks schools by the share of their pupils getting a C in English, maths and three other GCSEs. The more pupils in the  school that have a C grade in these subjects   the higher the school will be   in the league tables. So, unsurprisingly, teachers are incentivised to spend time and resources concentrating on getting their pupils from D to the C standard. So what? one might ask. Well it means, broadly, that the most able pupils on the one hand,  and the underachievers , on the other , don’t get the support and attention they deserve from their teachers. These pupils are being short changed by the system. And teachers are put  under  considerable pressure to bump grades up from D to C, if they have the power to do so which,  of course, they do in teacher-marked “controlled assessments” ie coursework completed under strict classroom supervision . Remember, the English GCSE can be taken in such a way that the pupil has done everything except for teacher-marked “controlled assessments” in the final months. The reliance on controlled assessment – 60% of the marks in English GCSE – placed a big emphasis on the role of schools and the teachers who were doing the marking. The teachers actually knew what marks each pupil needed to move from D to C grade.  So, given this context, it is easy  to see how much pressure  was placed on the teacher to  give pupils  those marks that  were necessary  to secure a C grade.

Most of the controlled assessment work was submitted in the summer and examiners saw evidence of over-marking. This led to exam boards raising grade boundaries, meaning some pupils got poorer grades than expected. That is not really the teachers fault, of course. If the accountability framework demands that from them, then that is what they are bound to deliver.

Glenys Stacey, chief executive of Ofqual, is absolutely clear that the problem is the incentives teachers face.  She agrees too that it is not their fault. They are not cheating. They are marking papers ‘optimistically’ (her word). This is what Stacey said on the BBC R4 Today programme (2 November):

“Teachers are not making up marks here. They are doing their level best to do the best for their students and they are bound, given the pressures they are under, to take the most optimistic view..There’s an amount of tolerance… some lee-way in the marking. But if enough teachers mark up to that tolerance, mark up to that limit, then overall it has a national effect,” she added.

Interestingly Ofquals report  on English  GCSEs 2012 states:

“We have found evidence that this [the use of examination thresholds at grade C] can lead to undue pressure on schools in the way they mark controlled assessments. A recurring theme in our interviews with schools was the pressure exerted by the accountability arrangements, and the extent to which it drives teachers to predict and manage grade outcomes” (para 6.3).

Maybe there is a case, as Chris Cook of the FT suggests, for a finely graded score out of 100, given the problems attached to grading?

Ofqual Report-GCSE English 2012

http://www.ofqual.gov.uk/files/2012-11-02-gcse-english-final-report-and-appendices.pdf

Note

What is not clear is why the external moderators failed to pick up on the ‘optimistic’ marking, which is their job.

THE TECHBACC-THE NEW DIPLOMA? HOPEFULLY NOT

 

Labours Techbacc proposals seek to place vocational education centre stage

An important debate is now needed

Comment

Remember the Diploma? It was supposed to be the new qualification that helped bridge the yawning divide between academic and vocational qualifications.

The diploma was, in fact, the result of  a botched compromise in the wake of the rejected  Tomlinson proposals.(Tomlinson envisaged the demise of the A level-which  was politically unacceptable at the time) .

The diploma  never enjoyed even lukewarm support from most employers, top universities or the independent sector, despite much arm twisting from politicians and officials, who have done so much to undermine the integrity of our qualifications system through their interventions.

Tomlinson envisaged a bona fide inclusive diploma with genuine breadth. What we got instead was neither one thing, nor the other, designed by committee and not demand led.  As one prominent Headteacher said, in the early days of the diploma, when,  as anticipated by many, few were taking up the qualification, it   was   ‘ poorly conceived, poorly marketed and poorly implemented’.

Alan Johnson, when he was education secretary, should have set the alarm bells ringing when he said that diplomas were neither vocational nor academic qualifications-without quite getting round to  explaining what they actually were or why there was a need for them. Which group of key stakeholders ever got up and said ‘you know, the one thing we really need in our education system right now  is a qualification that is neither  academic nor vocational’ . In a desperate attempt to breathe life into an unpopular qualification that never had robust legs, politicians then over- sold it claiming that it might become the qualification of choice (Ed Balls) and even  replace the A level. In 2009 Ed Balls said “ Diplomas are popular with the people who matter in the job market – the employers,” That was  nonsense on stilts  at the time and is simply embarrassing now. (It seems that quite a lot of what Balls has said and done in the past has a habit of coming back to bite him).

Nobody doubts  the fact that our vocational and practical education is way behind our  major competitors and that we have an absurd  and debilitating divide between  academic and vocational qualifications.  But the diploma was an avoidable mistake. It was  not demand led, was  designed by committee, difficult to implement to a consistent standard across areas, was expensive and never won the confidence of key stakeholders. Politicians and officials do not determine a qualifications worth. The market does that. And the market spoke.

Labours new idea requiring a clear route to a gold standard vocational qualification at 18 called a Technical Baccalaureate deserves a closer look. It seeks to exploit the long standing concerns over how far we are lagging behind  in practical learning and how Goves Ebacc proposals have not much to say about vocational learning.  Labour   wants to ensure that employers are involved in designing  the new qualifications which is vital (this was  a claim made by the way before Diplomas were introduced-but employer interaction ended up getting a bit lost in translation)  Pupils will  complete a programme of work experience-again a sound idea- but work experience is worthless unless it is  part of a quality assured, structured arrangement  and supports the kind of soft  non-cognitive skills desired by  employers. Those getting the new award would also have to pass English and maths courses which sounds good-but this needs to be pitched right-so as not to put off a large section of pupils-but also to ensure that there is rigour there too.

One big problem, of course, backed by evidence, is that even now there are too few high quality specialist maths teachers around and far too few undergraduates taking STEM subjects. Many more good teachers will be required to satisfy this new demand, as well as high quality technical and vocational teachers- these cannot be conjured up at short notice-some long hard thinking has to go into how to meet this demand.

The Labour proposals, hopefully, will kick start an important debate which is long overdue.

 

Note

Labour also want the £1bn-a-year government-funded apprenticeships programme  to be run by businesses, rather than ministers

EDUCATION SECRETARY CONFIRMS THE IMPORTANCE OF CONTINUOUS PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Continuous Professional Development

Education Secretary tells Select Committee of the potentially transformative role of high quality CPD in raising standards

Comment

In a letter (3 Sept)  to the Chairman of the Education Select Committee, the Education Secretary , Michael Gove,  firmly endorsed the importance of Continuous Professional Development in the teaching profession,  its link to improving teaching quality and ‘ its potentially  transformative impact on standards’.

He wrote ‘I believe that that high quality professional development is a fundamental component of improving teacher quality’ Gove added that it was important that Headteachers had a clear idea of what works and that this is then embedded in schools. The Government’s role, rather than prescribing an hour’s  based approach, should be more about helping  schools to identify what works best . He listed in the letter ‘collaborative development of practice by groups of teachers, enquiry- based research, reflective practice, and peer support mechanisms such as coaching and mentoring’, which need to be embedded in schools to be effective.  He drew attention to the fact that there are examples of best practice in the growing network of Teaching schools and elsewhere.

There  is broad acceptance now, given the impact of high quality teaching on pupil attainment,  that high quality CPD is an essential element in any education  reform programme  and that  initial teacher training is just the beginning  of the journey in the professional development of teachers.

http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/education-committee/news/follow-up-to-teachers/

 

THE NEW QUALIFICATION ENVISAGED BY GOVE IS NO BACCALAUREATE

Perhaps the biggest disappointment about the whole GCSE reform announcement was  the name of the new qualification, that will replace the GCSE.

It purports to be a ‘ Baccalaureate’. It is ,of course ,no such thing.

To suggest that these revamped  GCSEs are a   form of Baccalaureate is, in itself, misleading. After all, that  suggests a  cross curricular approach to  studies, more teaching time to support pupils ,more self-motivated  individual study and project work,  none of which  is envisaged in this new  EBC qualification, or certainly not as announced this week. The term ‘Baccalaureate’  is used to make it sound thoroughly  european, cross cutting, and modern.

Those  who run the International Baccalaureate, and indeed who study it,  have grounds for feeling somewhat  peeved  by the antics of politicians  who bandy the term Baccalaureate around , in  such a  cavalier,  interchangeable ,and ,frankly, disingenuous, way.

Some hoped the qualification  would be called the O Level, others ‘ the Gove Level’. Imagine failing the Gove! It cant be  the  Ebacc  ,which we already have, of course,  as that  is not actually a   qualification,    even  though Ministers  insist on referring to the future qualification as the  Ebacc , adding  to the confusion.

The Ebacc, as we know it,  and have understood it until now  at least, is  a  measure of  the achievement (though not a qualification) of pupils who have gained GCSE or iGCSE passes, graded A*-C, in English, mathematics, two sciences, a modern or ancient foreign language and a humanity ( ie history or geography). It is seen as just one new piece of information included  in the achievement and attainment tables, aimed at encouraging schools to focus on core academic subjects.

The new qualification on the other hand  is  the English Baccalaureate Certificate ,or EBC.  Still with me? See the difference?

Jacob Rees-Mogg  MP   prompted  a few sniggers in the back row of the lower sixth form   when he   quipped: ‘The problem with EBACC is it sounds like a rather disappointing run of O-level results’   (or GCSE results for that matter).

Calling the  qualification a Baccalaureate is intended to transmit  the impression that this qualification is something that it clearly is  not, whatever its intrinsic merits,(and there are some real positives). So, its not a great start.