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.