Category: School Governor

A geodesic dome that can be used to grow vegetables throughout the year.

http://dome2dish.com/dome/

Research published in a recent report from the National Foundation for Educational Research finds that the proportion of teachers who are considering leaving the profession has risen from 17% to 23% over the past year.

“Protective factors associated with retention include job satisfaction, having adequate resources, reward and recognition, and being well supported by management.”

Interviews with a self-selecting sample of disengaged teachers indicate that “workload is at the centre of why teachers are considering leaving. This is often perceived to stem from two main drivers – policy and inspection. According to interviewees, a high workload is associated with
two other negative outcomes – poor health or feeling undervalued – which leads to teachers wanting to leave.”

The research found “no evidence of any influence of a school’s proportion of free school meal pupils, academy status or region on intent to leave the profession“.

“Maths teachers and senior leaders have high levels of engagement and are less likely to be considering leaving. Conversely, science teachers, and experienced male teachers have a heightened risk of leaving.”

What’s the problem in science? And why experienced male teachers? It’s a fact that we have only one male teacher.

Reference:
Lynch, S., Worth, J., Bamford, S. and Wespieser, K. (2016). Engaging Teachers: NFER Analysis of Teacher Retention.Slough: NFER.

Reference: Primary school accountability in 2016 – A technical guide for primary maintained schools, academies and free schools. Department for Education. January 2016

Headline measures of school performance to be published in 2016 are:

• the percentage of pupils achieving the ‘expected standard’ in all three of English reading, English writing and mathematics at the end of key stage 2.
• the pupils’ average scaled scores – separate measures for:
  # English reading at the end of key stage 2;
  # mathematics at the end of key stage 2.
• the percentage of pupils who achieve at a high standard in all three of English reading, English writing and mathematics.
• the pupils’ average progress from key stage 1 to the end of key stage 2 – separate measures for:
  # English reading;
  # English writing;
  # mathematics.

Continue reading “Primary school accountability measures”

An earlier post explained how the expected standard is set for national curriculum assessment tests. Scaled scores are used to enable comparison from year to year.

• 80 is the lowest scaled score that can be awarded.
• 120 is the highest scaled score.
• A pupil awarded a scaled score of 100 or more has met the expected standard.

Teacher assessment uses the concepts of ‘working towards the expected standard’, ‘working at the expected standard’ and ‘working at greater depth within the expected standard’. As explained at the bottom of the page here, there are no scaled score equivalents for these concepts.

Tests for key stages 1 & 2 are developed using test frameworks. There is a framework for each subject in each stage; this sets out:

• what will and won’t be assessed by the test;
• how each element of the subject will be assessed;
• the structure of the test;
• the standard a child will be expected to achieve in the test.

Once a test has been developed, the standard is set for it by two panels of experienced teachers operating independently of each other. The ‘bookmark process’ is used: items in the test are ordered by difficulty from easiest to most difficult and the panels use their professional judgement to decide whether two-thirds of pupils working just at the expected standard would answer each question correctly. The resulting score represents the expected standard on the test. It corresponds to a scaled score of 100.

Scaled scores are used because the difficulty of the test will vary slightly from year to year. The actual scores obtained by pupils – the raw scores – are converted to scaled scores. A scaled score of 100 will always represent the expected standard on the test. Pupils scoring 100 or more will have met the expected standard on the test.

Writing in Governing Matters, the magazine of the National Governors Association (NGA), Clare Collins comments that the role of the vice-chair of a school’s board of governors often involves little more than waiting to step in when the chair is unavailable. She makes the following suggestions for how the role could involve much more.

Succession planning is important for long term stability of the board. If the vice-chair were the planned successor to the current chair, who should arguably have a fixed term of office, time in the role could be used actively to develop knowledge and capability in preparation for becoming the chair. Continue reading “A role for the vice-chair of governors?”

Writing in The Guardian, English teacher Andrew Tharby suggests that bringing feedback to the forefront of everything that is done in the classroom can reduce the time spent marking and improve the quality of feedback for students. He gives three examples.

The five-minute flick. Check through a cross-section of books to assess how students across a range of abilities performed in the previous lesson. If they have produced a piece of writing, begin the next class by showing an example from one student and critique it together. Guide the class through the editing process to model an improvement together. Individuals then edit their own work with this example in mind.

Gallery critique. Students move around the classroom critiquing one another’s work using Berger’s “kind, specific, helpful” mantra, along with a plentiful supply of post-it notes. Not only do students receive detailed feedback from a number of peers, they also learn from reading each other’s work.

Live marking. As the students are working, call them up one-by-one to discuss their work and feedback both verbally and with symbols.

Three review groups have looked at how to reduce the workload of teachers in these 3 areas:

• Marking Policy Review Group – to look at marking practices in schools that are raising standards successfully while reducing marking workload
• Planning and Resources Review Group – to consider the effect of lesson planning and use of resources in schools
• Data Management Review Group – to develop principles for good data management in schools, including how to monitor pupil progress

The groups published their reports on 26 March 2016:

• report from the Marking Policy Review Group
• report from the Planning and Resources Review Group
• report from the Data Management Review Group