teaching

Pass it on…keep it simple, stupid

theprimaryhead5 Comments

092015_1358_Passitonkee1.jpg

I am not sure what prompted @HeyMissSmith to tweet:

I am coming to the conclusion the more complicated people try to make teaching the worse it gets.

But I am inclined to agree. In fact I would go further. The more complicated people try to make ‘the entire world of education’ the worse it gets. It is a deceptively tricky thing to manage however. Education is a tangled mass of issues (chopped and divided up into sub-issues each with their own mind-map of interconnecting categories, reference points and progress measures) that impact on the day to day practitioner who is just trying to make it to the school bell with their sanity intact. One can often be forgiven that education is essentially about: teaching children stuff.

It sounds so simple don’t it?

Children don’t know things…We do…Pass it on.

The problem, I think, is that somewhere along the line we began to worry that it was too simple a premise. You know when you ask a child a question that you know they know the answer to and they really struggle with it. Then they eventually, squint up at you and slowly vocalize the answer (remembering to cleverly lilt their voice upwards at the end as if to suggest it was ‘only a question’ should they get it wrong) and you say ‘Yes, that is the answer, it’s easy isn’t it! I think you were expecting it to be harder but there, you see, you did know it.’ That’s what education is like. It is as simple as you think it is.

But lots of people haven’t been satisfied with this and they’ve slightly tweaked the formula:

Children don’t know things…We do…Pass it on…In a special way that only I know about…Here, I’ll write it down for you.

Suddenly we are swamped with everyone’s simple way of passing it on that couldn’t possibly fail. And that would be fine. But education is a broad church. There are lots of subjects. And each one comes with expert opinion on how to pass it on the best. Before you know it, you are carrying around multiple approaches for multiple subjects and, due to the fact that they each consider themselves to be the most important thing to pass on, you become overwhelmed as you try and compress all of them into a single day of lessons. Not to mention the other areas of education that soon became passed on by the experts: behaviour, teaching styles, assessment strategies, feedback strategies, etc.

Multiple ideas for every facet of education have wormed their way into school culture. None of them necessarily bad, when explored on an individual basis, but when viewed collectively, they muddy the water, like some weird educational homeopathy.

It is, or course, the job of leaders to ensure that teachers are not forced to work in a complicated mess. But it is often these school leaders who zealously create over-complicated blue-prints that must be obeyed, distorting the formula thus:

Professionals don’t know things…we do…follow this plan.

At best, leaders are enablers: defining a vision and supporting individual teachers to be effective for their individual class. At worst, they are short-sighted architects: building their empire upon quicksand and distorting ideas for improvements into self-serving goals.

We need to reclaim the simplicity and subtlety of education.

So, in an extraordinary display of arrogance that seemingly feeds into everything I claim is wrong with education, let me present you with my own formula that will help you:

You know what is needed…Keep it simple…Make it work.

This can be applied to every stratum in every school. What’s more, I’ll prove it to you in less than one
two, okay, three sentences.

Governors

Know the school, the people in it and what needs to be done. Don’t just know the school through meetings and minutes: visit, observe, listen and learn, in short: add value. Support and challenge because you’re behind the school and you know the context.

Senior Leaders

Don’t have any long-winded or stupid ideas that are more work for everyone else than for you. Be clear about the school’s goals and allow everyone to care as much as you. Be respectful and loyal to your team and help people become better.

Middle Leaders

Know what else is going on in the school to help put your priorities in perspective. Listen to people and, if necessary, adapt your every-day expectations whilst keeping your overall expectations and your chin up. Help other leaders secure their goals – it’s not a competition.

Teachers

Understand that many facets of teaching (marking, planning, data analysis) are tactics that you can use to help children learn more effectively than if you don’t use them. You can always get better so let those around you help you. Most of all, keep it simple: kids don’t know stuff…you do…pass it on.

Support staff

Believe that you can make a difference to a teacher’s effectiveness by the role you play in their lives – look out for them and they’ll look out for you. Remember that your role is to support learning, not prop it up. You deserve to be invested in too, so, if you haven’t been on training for years or if all you do on insets is take down displays, make some noise.

Heads

The whole school is in your hands but remember, you’re a head teacher; you’re not God or Chuck Norris, so tread carefully, be nice and know it’s not really all down to you. And try teaching once in a while. All of the above and oh, stop writing bloody blogs.

So there you are…pass it on.

Ofsted: Differentiation requires improvement

theprimaryhead1 Comment

At the moment, I feel a little bit like I’m between a rock and a hard place when it comes to commenting on Ofsted. Anyone who has been bored enough to read some of my recent blogs will possibly have picked up on the fact that I had a few issues with my recent lead inspector and the way in which she carried out the inspection. However, I do not want to come across as churlish, arrogant or unaccepting of the fact that my school isn’t anything else apart from amazeballs. So, whereas I am happy to critique the manner in which my school was inspected – as well as the particulars of some of the judgements made in the report – I do not want to diminish my professional voice for the sake of spiting my critics. I stand, resolutely, behind the sentiments in my recent Ofsted posts but there comes a time when you have to move on.

In fact, Ofsted is also trying to move on. @HarfordSean seems to be attempting an Ofsted face-lift of BBC proportions. As the beeb obsessive-compulsively wash and re-wash their hands clean of the sexist/racist/politically incorrect/unaccountable/bullying buffoonery of Jeremy Clarkson, so is Sean attempting to recalibrate Ofsted’s practices in the hope that rogue inspectors are a thing of the past and school leaders do not become slaves to Ofsted’s cliff edge inspection regimes.

Ofsted recently launched their own blog through which they will be updating us all on the various changes within the inspection framework. What’s more, you can comment and, if my experience of Mr Harford so far is anything to go by, I reckon they’ll listen. I want to be part of this debate and I don’t want my own negative experience to taint the validity of my opinions – let my voice be drowned out by the waves of better opinion, by all means, but I don’t want to be silenced by my own past vitriol. I’m a lover, not a fighter.

I have been thinking long and hard about what I would do if I were in charge of Ofsted. In conversation with Sean Harford at a recent meeting with other Twitter cronies, I expressed the opinion that I would rather see Ofsted become more supportive. Come in and judge us by all means, I graciously said, but if the school has weaknesses, why doesn’t the lead inspector come in, the day after the inspection, sit down with the Head and work on writing a plan that would sort it all out. That way, the school is being supported by someone who knows the context and has a (preliminary) relationship with the school already. If they know that their time is not restricted to the initial inspection period, it could encourage all lead inspectors to act responsibly and with respect.

It didn’t take Sean that long to reply. He promptly said that this wouldn’t work and for a pretty obvious reason: Ofsted cannot be seen to be prescribing or recommending particular approaches or practices. They are the diagnosis, not the remedy. I understand this. I think it’s a shame though, especially as there is now a commitment for more inspectors to be HMI, but, maybe my idea misses the point of Ofsted, or, maybe Ofsted has gone too far into the judgemental side of education to evolve that drastically. Either way, let’s just accept the fact that it ain’t ever going to happen.

Earlier in the aforementioned meeting, we learnt about the prospect of what ‘good’ schools could expect from September. They will get a visit from an HMI around every three years. This would be akin to a check-up: time for Ofsted to check the pulse of the school. A highly important point to remember is that the visiting HMI would not be coming in to judge the school from scratch. No, they would be assuming that the school was still good. So, whereas schools might not be too cock-a-hoop at the prospect of the visit, at least they will not feel as though they have to prove that they are good all over again. Of course, if the HMI decides that the school is not good (RI or outstanding – it works both ways, remember) they can trigger a full section 5 inspection. Hurrah! Well, interestingly, the HMI will continue to stay on for the inspection, so, similar to my idea, there will be someone who already has some real knowledge of the school to guide the subsequent inspection.

This is a big evolutionary step for Ofsted: Differentiated inspections. However, I think Ofsted could do better.

So, if my proposal of the lead inspector judging a school to be RI and then hanging around to help write the SDP is a couple of Minis short of the Italian Job, well, hang on a minute lads, I’ve got an idea.

Good schools get their own special Ofsted, so why shouldn’t RI schools get something different too?

You see, I have a problem with the way in which RI schools get inspected. RI schools are under too much pressure. Not only do they have their tailor made Ofsted improvement plan, but they are under pressure to get a multitude of other ideas and initiatives off the ground as well. Take the last two years: as well as, most likely, having to improve some serious issues around achievement, teaching, behaviour and leadership, RI schools have also had to implement some additional national changes: sports premium, British Values, 2014 National Curriculum, life after levels etc.

‘But so has every other school?’

Yes, but those schools have the luxury of time. Good or outstanding schools are not being chased up as regularly or rigorously by the local authority, HMI or Ofsted as their RI counterparts. As well as under seeing their own improvement measures, RI schools are expected to put in place any national change in policy or any rushed through government agenda at a pace that you will not find in good or outstanding schools. That is not to say that good or outstanding schools are resting on their laurels, but they do not have the same pressures as the RI school to get these things in place, working and evidenced ready for scrutiny.

So when Ofsted arrives, the RI school is not judged on what it was they needed to improve last time round. The inspection begins from scratch and everything is up for scrutiny. The previous report may get a look-in but so does everything else. This means there is less time for the inspection team to gain a full understanding of the school’s journey of improvement. Without taking the time to understand the context within which the school leaders are working, or the extent to which RI schools have put in improvement measures to tackle the overall quality and consistency of securing pupil achievement, teaching, behaviour and leadership, no Ofsted team can make a valid judgement on how far that school has moved forward.

So what I would propose is that for RI schools, rather than the midday phone-call and the SEF getting emailed the night before Day One, the lead inspector should visit the school. Maybe the day or week before. They should have a proper meeting with the Head: sit down with the old report, the data, the SEF and the school development plan and really attempt to gather as much information and context as they possibly can before they come in to judge. I think this process, in itself, would prove invaluable to the lead inspector as it would help shape the two days ahead. It would also make the school feel that they were getting a fair deal.

Day One would therefore be a tough scrutiny of progress since the last report. Day Two could then lend itself to either exploring weaknesses or things that weren’t adding up, or moving on to how the school was making progress within additional areas – including new government policy and initiatives. This differentiated approach would surely help RI schools move on, as well as diminish the power and possibility of a rogue inspector. If some of you are reading this and thinking that it all seems a bit like giving RI schools an easy ride, I have to say that I think just the opposite: your evidence will be under greater scrutiny. If you haven’t made progress, then there will truly be nowhere to hide.

So what do you say @HarfordSean? Is this a possibility? Or is it just the ranting of a Head who has been burnt and can’t move on?

Come back satisfactory, all is forgiven!

theprimaryhead7 Comments

EpicFail01The taking away of ‘satisfactory’ was meant to raise expectations. It was a canny move to signify that things had to get better. Teachers and schools could no longer rest on their laurels. From now on, if they weren’t good, then they weren’t good enough. You can see why, I mean would you be pleased if the answer to any of these questions was ‘it was satisfactory’?

  • How was the dinner I made you?
  • What did people say about the poem I read out at Gran’s funeral?
  • Was that just the best sex ever?

No, in all those cases, and in any other you probably care to mention, ‘satisfactory’ doesn’t quite hit the spot. So why, it was argued, should it be used to describe standards in education? More importantly, why would we be satisfied that children were getting a satisfactory education in our schools?

It was quite clear that something radical needed to happen to make us all buck up our ideas. We could have just raised the bar, turned the satisfactory dial up to 11, made it ‘one more’ harder to attain. We could have changed the interpretation of the word itself so that it was not seen as a ‘settling for’ judgement, but as an adequate description of getting the job done: no less, but certainly no more. But we went for something different: extinction.

Out of the ashes of satisfactory came a new judgement: Requires Improvement. This was a huge tonal shift in terms of what was, and what was not, now acceptable. After all, imagine receiving the response ‘I think if we’re honest, it required improvement’ to any of these questions:

  • How was the dinner I made you?
  • What did people say about the poem I read out at Gran’s funeral?
  • Was that just the best sex ever?

Suddenly, being satisfactory doesn’t seem quite so bad.

But hey, it’s all about the kids, and many of us agreed with the sentiment that satisfactory wasn’t good enough, so we rolled with it. A particularly shrewd move on the part of Ofsted was to not provide any descriptions for what being RI would look like. Instead, if it wasn’t good, it therefore required improvement. There were still guidelines for what inadequate provision looked like, to make sure that we knew the difference between ‘not good’ and ‘Christ alive man what are you doing?’

At the time I thought this was genius. Not because I thought more schools would now be judged to be requiring improvement (and therefore failing because being good was now the only acceptable status for a school) but because it would allow judgements to be tailored to the school. All schools are different and have their nuances; by not providing a one-size-fits-all-tick-list for things that are not yet quite right, I felt, would mean that an RI school would now have a carefully sculpted support plan that would fit their context.

We’ve lived without satisfactory since 2012 and, as a new government could be on the horizon, and as Ofsted itself is thinking about evolving, I’ve been evaluating the impact of life in the RI age. Whereas I still agree with the principle of satisfactory not being good enough and RI being individual to a school’s context I don’t think it has completely worked.

Firstly, politicians have not stayed out of it. Time after time schools have been told that there are more and more reasons why they are not good. The expectation that schools are responsible for solving all of society’s ills and challenges has allowed the apparently non-existent criteria for RI to grow exponentially.

Somebody decides that all infants should be able to read a list of words (some of them literally nonsense) in a test, if they can’t the school is not good. Someone thinks that schools should be teaching PE to a standard that will allow Team GB to win every gold medal at the next Olympics, if a school does not provide a medal winner they are not a good school. For some reason it is deemed important for schools to teach an un-agreed set of British Values, if they don’t (despite the fact that no one knows what these values actually are) they are not a good school. If the most vulnerable, damaged, and poorest children in our society do not make accelerated academic progress (it doesn’t matter about their emotional stability and well-being and how you are impacting upon that) the school is not good. If a school is not assessing pupils accurately (in a world where each school is now assessing pupils differently so who can say) then they are not a good school.

These are all areas that are highlighted in recent Ofsted reports. They are all reasons that can contribute to why a school is judged good or RI. But they weren’t in the rule book when we started the race. The world changes, I know. We have to adapt in order to meet the needs our children have in this rapidly changing world, I get it. But it’s not good enough to hang a school out to dry because at some point something either went wrong in one part of the country, or, something became a news story, and a politician decided that it was a school’s job to sort it all out. It is not fair that the lack of criteria within an RI judgement has become the stick by which to beat us with.

Secondly, the invention of RI and its misappropriation has damaged the psyche of education. It has allowed schools and teachers to become demonised too readily by politicians, the media and the public. Satisfactory may have been a dirty word behind closed doors but it had a level of acceptability to it as far as the public was concerned. In short, satisfactory schools were left alone to improve. Requires Improvement and its subsequent lack of clarity means that anyone can now get involved and lay claim to knowing why a particular school is failing. In reality this means that schools are sitting targets and anyone at any time can have a pop at them on whatever issue they’ve read in the papers that morning. Even the Prime Minister has encouraged parents to be ‘sharp elbowed’ and demand the best, not for all children, but for their children alone. This has undermined schools time and time again. The level of expectation for education is at an all-time high and yet respect for educators seems to be in the gutter. I can’t help but thinking it is partly because of this change in language coupled with a heightened sense that expectations – whatever they are – must be, should be, higher.

Finally, I have been reflecting on the use of RI in the classroom. I was talking to a Head on Friday night about making judgements in lessons. She pointed out that although no teacher was ever thrilled about being told their lesson was satisfactory, being satisfactory had never made a teacher cry. RI on the other hand…well let’s just say you better make sure tissues are in this year’s budget. Why is that? The Head I was talking to said that satisfactory was an important judgement to have in your arsenal as a supportive Head because it allowed you to take into account context. Even the best teachers go through rough patches for a myriad of different reasons, and quite often they’re personal. Yes non-teacher readers, teachers have lives and just like yours, lives are complicated, messy and sometimes painful. If a typically good teacher delivered a mediocre lesson you used to be able to use your discretion and say that it was satisfactory. Not great but no worries. If you were concerned you could go back in and observe again or you could casually drop in and see if things were ok – it was up to you – and nobody asked, as there were no great expectations to react to a satisfactory lesson observation. Now you judge it RI and what happens? Everyone wants to know what support plan you’re putting in place. Oh my God you’ve got an RI teacher what are you doing about it? Teachers know this. Teachers know that being judged RI has consequences. Without satisfactory it’s harder to enable the necessary subtleties needed to lead a school successfully, which, at times, means sensitively. I know we triangulate a range of evidence and that one RI lesson isn’t everything, but again, the emotional impact that being judged RI has on a teacher, I have to wonder, sometimes, is it worth it? As my colleague reflected on Friday, she was satisfactory for twelve years and never received the level of high risk scrutiny she would have done had the satisfactory been RI. Now she’s outstanding. Maybe she’d have been outstanding quicker? Maybe. Or maybe the pressure of RI would have finished her off along with half her teachers.

I still don’t have a problem with the concept of requiring improvement in itself. I just wonder if by removing the middle ground completely we were actually being set up to fail right from the start. It will be interesting to see how Ofsted develops and what our next government does to improve education and public perceptions of schools and teachers. I doubt satisfactory will ever resurface but there are times when I wish it had never gone away.