Learning Walks Term 2: November to December 2012

Once again I would like to give a huge thank you to everyone for all their hard work and professionalism.  We are continuing to make progress with our teaching and learning.  Students are getting a terrific deal and high quality lessons are being taught day in day out across the whole school.

We are being increasing consistent in our application of routines.  This helps give students a common experience that helps support their learning and development.  As the new term begins in January please make a concentrated effort in using DNAs, learning intentions and success criteria.  We have witnessed these techniques being used in all areas in the school over the last term and they really do make a difference in setting the tone for the lesson and framing the learning that is to take place.  If we are all consistent in applying these routines it makes teaching easier for allow us as the students know what to expect and they will respond accordingly.

Teaching is often about building relationships with our classes.  It is really important for us to have high expectations of our students and to manage their behaviour positively rather than reacting to issues when they arise.  This term we saw lots of good practice here; with teachers showing warmth and using humour to set boundaries.  Instructions were being given with clarity and teachers were stopping to check that students understood what was expected of them.  Some teachers are making excellent use of the suggestions on the desk mats. Some colleagues are making really good use of the traffic light cards in the planners.

Over the next term let's have a real push in being consistent in ensuring that we set homework regularly and that we are ensuring that students record this in the planner.  This is important as the planner is a key document for home school communication.  Often parents think homework is not being set when in fact it is.  The issue is that it is not being recorded.  If you choose to use blogs or Edmodo for setting homework please use this as a supplement to the planner.

Finally, it is important that we consider carefully how we plan to monitor how well our students are  understanding what we are trying to teach.  Again we have seen some really good practice in this area demonstrated by colleagues this term.  Think about how you can get feedback from the students as the lesson progresses.  Traffic light cards, post-it notes, no hands questioning, getting students to ask other students questions all help here.  Before handing work in ask students to check and correct their use of capital letters and punctuation.  You could persuade your head of department to by you a class set of green and pink highlighter pens.  Students can use them to identify parts of their work they think are strong (green for go!) and parts they think they could develop (pink for think!). You could even ask them to suggest an improvement.  We all spend valuable time marking.  Make sure your students appreciate this hard work.  Not by asking for their sympathy but by making them act on your comments. If you have asked them to underline titles, get them to do this at the start of the next lesson.  Ask them to write you a note telling you what they are going to try to do better.  Then next time you take their books in you can let them know how well they did against the challenge they set themselves.  

Literacy News (3: 17th December 2012)

Thank you to the ICT and Business Departments who welcomed us for last week’s Literacy Learning Walks. We spent time in KS4 classrooms and noticed many areas of good practice in supporting our students’ literacy needs and development.

Displays and classroom environments:

·         Some very effective use of classroom display such as definitions of key words and terms.

·         Student work on display: high quality and clearly produced with care and awareness of the importance of presentation.

Active teaching of Literacy-related skills

·         Students are given examples of the written texts they are expected to produce and are encouraged to use these as models.

·         Some excellent one-to-one support was given to students who were structuring essays: discussing the best ways to start an essay.

·         Literacy Mats which focus on success criteria.

To think about:

·         How can we best support students’ understanding of exam and assessment-related terms and writing styles, especially when they become more complex as we move towards higher grades? Students (and teachers!) have to demonstrate a very wide range of literacy-based skills such as: annotation, analysis, evaluation, report, design, contrast. Would the preparation of support materials for KS4 planners be helpful?

Literacy News (2: 30th November 2012)

Thank you to the PE department who welcomed us for this week’s Literacy Learning Walks. We enjoyed spending time in KS3 lessons and seeing the display work in a KS4 classroom.

It was also wonderful to see student Leaders teaching younger children using instruction skills: could it be that when we give students responsibility we are helping to develop their understanding of how to organise and present their ideas?

Displays and classroom environments

·         New Key Stage Four displays which gave a range of key words and ideas to develop students’ understanding of how to structure and develop written work. There were a wide range of options for students to choose from, enabling both challenge and support.

Active teaching of Literacy-related skills

·         Strong focus on understanding performance-related vocabulary and key terms. For example, students’ verbal descriptions of rugby skills were always followed up with the requirement to give technical terms (this is a regular mini-plenary after each practical activity).

·         Clear focus on the value of students’ speaking and listening skills. For example, in a badminton lesson, students gathered in pairs to discuss their progress, making use of key words and phrases outlined by their teacher.

If you would also like to display the Marking Codes in your classroom and/or stick copies in students’ books, please don’t forget that they can be found in Staff/Staff Resources/Literacy Resources/Marking and Assessment Support.

The Literacy Resources folder in the Staff/Staff Resources area also contains:

o   a Writing Skills folder containing Non-Fiction Writing Guides

o   a Reading Skills folder containing guidance about DARTs activities

o   copies of Literacy Mats and a range of subject-specific materials, grouped under subject area

o   a 2012 Literacy Guidance folder containing copies of INSET materials, overviews given to Departments and outlines of the year.

Literacy News (1: 22nd November 2012)

Thank you to Louise Marsh for providing us with the first of our literacy updates.  In addition Louise has also found some helpful guidance on Ofsted entitled  Notes on the new Ofsted framework: how to be outstanding; just follow the link!  http://www.guardian.co.uk/teacher-network/teacher-blog/2012/nov/19/new-ofsted-framework-how-to-be-outstanding 

Thank you to the English and PHSE Departments who welcomed us for our first Literacy Learning Walks. We were lucky enough to spend time in KS4 and KS3 classrooms and noticed many areas of good practice in supporting our students’ literacy needs and development.

Displays and classroom environments:

• Wide range of displays of key words, sentence starters and essay structures
• High-quality, beautifully-presented student work, often side-by-side with professional work which highlighted our students’ strengths and similarities
• Key skills for the subject with the main features/key words highlighted

Active teaching of Literacy-related skills

• Strong focus on understanding exam-related vocabulary and words which were likely to feature in the upcoming exams (e.g. discussion and explanation of the words “deduce” and “infer”)
• Modelled answers which were used to unpick Skilled and Excellent criteria
• Dictionaries and thesauri which are easy-to-access

Assessment and feedback

• Marking codes on display in some classrooms
• Feedback which responded to written accuracy

If you would also like to display the Marking Codes in your classroom and/or stick copies in students’ books, please don’t forget that they can be found in Staff/Staff Resources/Literacy Resources/Marking and Assessment Support.

The Literacy Resources folder in the Staff/Staff Resources area also contains:

• Writing Skills folder containing Non-Fiction Writing Guides
• Reading Skills folder containing guidance about DARTs activities
• Copies of Literacy Mats and a range of subject-specific materials, grouped under subject area
• 2012 Literacy Guidance folder containing copies of INSET materials, overviews given to Departments and outlines of the year.

Learning Walks Term 1: September to October 2012

Thank you to everyone that took part in last term's learning walks.  They are an essential part of our practice and really help in 

• enabling students to see teachers supporting each other
• sharing best practice 
• giving us all a feel for what is going on around our school.  

Just to reassure you we are not grading learning walks.

Last term has been an excellent start to the learning year.  There are a lot of excellent things going on and the quality of learning and teaching is continuing to improve.  Thank you for all of your hard work and your commitment to developing best practice.

Our evidence shows that behaviour around the school and particularly in lessons is very good and we have seen high levels of engagement among students.  Incidences of poor behaviour affecting lessons have been rare.  We have to continue to be consistent in our approaches to managing classroom behaviours and would encourage all staff to use the 'hands up' signal when gaining the attention of groups in years 7 and 8.  Please continue to be rigorous with ensuring that uniform is correct and insist on students wearing their jackets.  It is this attention to detail that helps reinforce our high expectations and aspirations for our students. All colleagues made a tremendous effort with this at the beginning of the year and I am sure this attention to detail contributed in better student attitudes.

The strongest lessons have been characterized by really effective planning.  In many lessons learning objectives have been clear and shared with students helping them know what they are trying to learn and clarifying how they are going to learn.   We have seen prompt starts to lesson and good use of 'do now activities' or DNAs.  These have helped settle classes and get lessons off to a purposeful start.  However, as with many things consistency is key to ensuring that students meet our expectations and we do need to continue to embed DNAs, learning objectives and success criteria in our practice.

During lessons students are often active and engaged and there have been lessons where learning has been personalized and independent with students being stretched and challenged.  Good use has been made of AfL techniques such as no hands questioning and using mini whiteboards and traffic light cards to check understanding.  Also tools such as the online stop watch has been used to good effect to ensure that tasks are time bound ensuring good pace within the lesson.

Departments are making strong inroads in addressing literacy and are supporting learning by focusing on key terminology and are supporting this with wall displays and desk mats.  However, as with all things we are on a journey with this initiative. We need to continue to develop our approach by looking beyond spelling and key words by developing strategies to extend writing and by challenging students to answer questions using formal language.

Finally, thank you for all your hard work and for all the support that you give to our students.

Student guide to learning at Cheney

We all work hard to do the best we can in the classroom.  And you know what - it is appreciated!

Here Cheney students tell us about their experience of learning.  And the sub-text is they greatly value what we do!

Learning Walks: Week Beginning Monday 18th June 2012

This week the best lessons showed some really excellent practice; with students being stretched and challenged.  The following key ingredients were witnessed in all classes where students were learning most successfully:

• §  The teacher was very well organised and the lesson was thoughtfully planned.
• §  Classroom routines were well established with high expectations and students understood what was expected of them.
• §  There were positive relationships between the teacher and the class.
• §  Tasks and activities were well matched to the students’ learning.
• §  The students were being challenged to think and learn.
• §  The teacher had planned thoughtfully how to assess how well the students were doing.

What is clear is that where routines and high expectations are not well established students were less well focussed and the learning was hampered by some low level disruption.  This even happened where tasks were well thought through and were matched to students’ abilities.  It is important that:

• §  Colleagues ensure that bags are put on the floor, or stored in appropriate spaces.
• §  Colleagues insist on silence when they are presenting to their groups.
• §  Teachers review seating plans if behaviour is not where they want it to be.
• §  Teachers direct the TA’s in their lessons.

There are lots of tools and tricks we can use to constantly assess how students are doing.  However, as I have suggested above, it is best to use these regularly and build them into classroom routines and this can take time.  For example, if you are going to insist on no hands questioning, you will have to persevere with this until it becomes habit both for you and your students.  Initially they will continue to put their hands up and you will have to constantly reinforce your standards until it becomes second nature.  Some suggestions to help develop strategies for minute by minute assessment are:

• §  Use lollipop sticks to randomize who answers a question (this could be an electronic version).
• §  Use mini white boards to see pupils thinking.
• §  Use the traffic light cards in planners to see who gets it – totally, a bit or not at all.
• §  Ask students to nominate the next person to answer a question.
• §  Ask a student to repeat or build on what the previous person said.
• §  Chose a student to summarize the main learning from the lesson (just let them know they will be doing this at the start).

Finally, thank you for all your hard work.  I know it is close to the end of the year and we are still all working really hard.  But it is this relentless drive to be the best we can be that means our students do get a ‘good deal’ from us. 

We are what we repeatedly do.  Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit. Aristotle

Learning Walks: Week Beginning Monday 14th May 2012

This week twelve different lessons were seen.  The best learning was active, purposeful and challenging, giving opportunity for analysis and reflection.  This was good to see.  Some lessons could have been more effective with:

§  less teacher talk

§  more challenging activities for students

§  further planning for questioning activities to prevent students from being passive during discussion work

The effectiveness of learning varied between lessons, therefore we have to work hard to ensure that we have as much consistency as possible as we try to ensure that all students have first class learning opportunities. 

We have a really clear learning and teaching policy that we have branded Agile Teaching.  This can be found in our Agile Teaching Handbook.  This is a really useful document that not only sets out our policy but also gives guidance on PLTS and sets out teachers’ and students’ expectations for learning entitled Cheney Expects.  Further to this document we have updated our homework policy.  These documents are available on Agility the Blog! http://cheneyagility.blogspot.co.uk/   

In addition we have tried to supplement our own learning and teaching initiatives by distributing multiple copies of Jackie Beere’s The Perfect Ofsted Lesson and Jim Smith’s The Lazy Teacher.  I am raising this because I believe that Learning Walks are evidencing that learning happens best when we apply the principles of formative assessment sometimes referred to as assessment for learning.  This is the approach to teaching that we have adopted through Agile Teaching.  Thus it is important that we are all familiar with our policy and build its principles into our planning. 

Learning Walks: Week Beginning Monday 7th May 2012

Thank you again to everyone for their hard work so far this year.  Everyone is working hard as we prepare for exams and as we try to finish off BTEC folders.  Fewer lessons were visited this week and the length of this post will reflect this.

The question of how best to motivate our students is a key issue we all face.  Preparing for an exam or finishing off a course often provides a little extra motivation which helps us keep students focussed and involved in their work.  But this is not always possible; particularly if you are teaching Key Stage 3 where you have no such external motivators.

What is clear is that our students are most engaged and learn best when they are encouraged to get down to tasks quickly, when they are set challenging activities and are encouraged to be independent.  Admittedly this is no easy task, but colleagues have had success by:

§  finding ways to make things fun such as introducing games to promote learning

§  introducing competition and teamwork

§  finding leadership opportunities for students to take control of tasks or give feedback on tasks

§  being relentlessly positive, aspirational and by giving lots of praise

Learning has been less effective when there has been a lack of pace or challenge to lessons or when activities have not been matched to the abilities of the students.  In such circumstances students have passed up the learning opportunities made available to them.

If you have any top tips, fail safe games that could be used or anything that will add a bit of fun into a lesson then please post your ideas the comments section below.

Learning Walks: Week Beginning Monday 30th April 2012

This week’s learning walk focussed on 6^th Form. Once again I would like to thank those staff that had us visit their lessons.  It has been a really informative experience and it was great to see so much good practice.

Good practice was witnessed in terms of exam preparation including the use of individualised tasks, for example:

§  students working silently on different tasks depending on their personal progress through preparatory assignments

§  students being encouraged to reflect on their preparation and self-rate their readiness

§  analysis of exam questions focusing on collaborative decision-making regarding what ideas to employ (rather than actually answering questions – enabling students to cover a large number of questions and ideas quickly)

§  clear evidence of detailed understanding of the requirements of exam questions in the questions posed by students.

§  In some lessons fast-paced teacher-led whole-class teaching was clearly engaging more able students, and eliciting plenty of evidence of their progress, but seemed to leave those with less confidence unsupported. This gives us some things to think about.

Therefore, the 6^th Form learning walk does raise questions on how best we support students to become effective independent learners.  In particular how we develop practice to ensure that students are being given the targeted feedback they need to move their learning forward in a way that they are able to digest and take action on.

There was variation in the visibility of feedback on students’ work in their folders. There were some very good examples of marking in some subject folders – linked to assessment objectives, clear targets for improvement and reference to overall trends in improvement of an individual student’s written work. Often marked work was not prominent in students folders though; perhaps during exam preparation the relevance and usefulness of work with teachers’ feedback could be emphasised, with students encouraged to keep marked work in one place in their folders for ease of reference when working on new practice questions.  There was an excellent example of intervention in response to concerns over independent study in an AS subject where, a student who underperformed in a progress test was given a tracking sheet on which to log hours of work to be done out of lessons, with parents informed.  The result is that students weren’t always able to clearly articulate what they needed to do in order to improve their work, or how feedback from their teachers helped them to do so; although this was generally a strength across the lessons observed.

We probably need to do some thinking about how effectively we use our lesson time.  There were several examples of students working in silence on exam questions.  In many ways this is a purposeful use of time, the student has to do the question under supervised conditions and the teacher can monitor how they seem to be using that time.  For example, how much time do they spend planning, writing or day dreaming?  However, this work does come at the cost of ‘lost’ teaching time.  Also well motivated and organised students often create mock exam conditions to work on answers independently, but less organised students often need a structure to help them to this.  Once suggestion has been to provide a supervised study room which could be booked by subject teachers for classes to do mock questions at set times.  This might be a more effective use of time, but the subject teacher would lose the ability to make judgements by watching the students work.  Please put any thoughts on the comments section.

Finally, thank you for everything that you are doing, everyone is working hard and wants the best for their students.  This learning walk has thrown up some things for us to think about and by airing these ideas it will help us try to further develop and improve our provision.

Week Beginning Monday 16th to Friday 27th April 2012

Learning walks are up and running again and thank you to all colleagues that were visited over the last two weeks.  This term the leadership team will try to encourage colleagues to come round with us so you may find that you have two of us in your room.  We are doing this because we are trying to create more opportunities for teachers to see what happens outside their subject areas.  It is also a good opportunity for us to discuss what Leadership are doing when we are on a learning walk.  This is an attempt to make the whole process more transparent and hopefully it will help stimulate discussion about good learning and teaching.

I have merged the feedback from the last two weeks as we only did a limited number.  I also apologise for being slow in publishing our observations; I will try to be quicker next time.

There has been a lot of really good practice seen.  Lots of active and purposeful work is being done by students.  We have seen some really good examples of Learning Objectives and Success criteria being used.  Literacy has also been at the forefront of colleagues work with teachers ensuring that students understand subject terminology and key words.  It is clear that some students are having an excellent experience.  The challenge for us is to try to ensure that all students are active and engaged in their learning.  In several lessons it was the same pupils answering questions during discussion.  Here we need to try to use strategies to encourage all students to take part; this could be achieved by using a random name generator, lollypop sticks, getting students to nominate the next person to answer a question or simply only allowing a pupil to answer one question. Be confident about planning in some wait time and using no hands questioning techniques when holding discussions.

Finally; well done I really appreciate how hard everyone is working and how much of your time you give to your students, particularly those who are preparing for exams.

Learning Walks: Week Beginning Monday 23rd and Monday 30th January 2012

This report will cover learning walks lasting two weeks.  This is because only two walks were carried out during the week of the 23^rd and it would be too specific to comment on those seen and this is not in the spirit of what we are trying to do.  By combining both weeks we have been able to visit approximately 20 lessons.  Once again thank you to everyone that has been part of our learning walks.  We are seeing some really high quality practice and the process is leading to some excellent discussion about what makes great learning and teaching across the school.  Well done. 

Over the last week we have seen plenty of lessons where students have been really engaged and are enjoying their lessons. It is no surprise that when students have been enjoying their lessons they have also been learning.  This is made possible by some of the wonderful relationships we have seen between teachers and their classes.  Students have been learning best when they have been supported by their teachers to become fully involved in their tasks, whether this has been a practical or academic subject).  This has helped students be more independent and solution focussed in their learning and was more effective than lessons where students were dependent on teacher direction.  This dependency often makes keeping a purposeful pace to lessons difficult.  We have seen some really good examples of AfL.  Some excellent examples have been seen of teachers using strong questioning to check understanding and using effective feedback to help pupils understand what they need to do next.  In the best examples of practice this positive criticism is reinforced with plenty of praise to encourage the students to keep working to make the next step.

The most common words from the record sheet that reflect the type of learning we are looking for are; active, purposeful, independent and opportunity.  However, the term task driven was recorded more frequently than we would like.

20 lessons were visited.

Learning Walks from terms 1 and 2 as a Wordle

Click on the enlage to enlarge the Wordle.

Alite learning walk form

The form we are trialing has now been added to the key documents list on the right.

Learning Walks: Week Beginning Monday 16thJanuary 2012

Here’s wishing everyone a happy new year.  We have started our learning walks again.  Please see this as an opportunity to let the students see staff working together and supporting each other.  The format will be as it was last term.  We are trialling a new record form for our visits; I’ll try to post a copy on the blog so everyone can see – but do ask if you have any concerns.  This term we are going to be inviting other colleagues to join LT from time to time.  Going on a learning walk is a fantastic CPD opportunity.  You get to see our staff doing an excellent job and it is a great way of picking up some top tips.  Once again; thank you for being so positive about welcoming colleagues into your rooms.

Last week’s learning walks gave a really positive impression of the school.  Many lessons had a very positive and purposeful atmosphere.  Pupils were engaged in their learning and in many cases clearly enjoying their lessons.  This was facilitated by a lot of hard work and careful planning by colleagues.  There were lots of good examples of learning objectives being shared with students in a way they understood.  As a result students knew what they were meant to be doing and what was expected of them.  Students were also witnessed having the opportunity to present their learning to others and to peer assess work.  The three most common features highlighted on our forms were; active, purposeful and responsive.  Well done.

10 lessons were visited.