The Curriculum Foundation has been asked to work with some schools in Ofsted categories to develop an approach that is based on a broader, more engaging curriculum rather than a narrow focus on literacy and numeracy. We are looking for schools that have already had success in getting out of a category by working in this way. If you have, perhaps we could draw on your expertise in two ways. Firstly to help develop and illustrate the approach. Secondly to act as a colleague head on the end of a phone to link to one of the schools we are working with. If you think you can help, let me know.
I set out our intended approach below. Please feel free to add to or comment on this.
Our approach
Many schools are put into the ‘special measures’ category for a variety of factors, but the basis is usually that attainment is too low because pupils have made too little progress. This can often be compounded by pupils’ unsatisfactory behaviour and attitudes. Reports generally point to the poor quality of teaching, and of leadership and management, as the reasons for this unsatisfactory progress.
Ofsted reports very seldom point to the inadequacy of the curriculum as the cause of poor progress, and yet it is often the curriculum that is at the root of the other factors. Tackling these other factors without tackling the curriculum is often the reason why many schools struggle to improve significantly.
When the learning experiences planned for pupils fail to engage their interest and imaginations, when they fail to connect with the pupils’ lives and experiences, when they fail to build on what those pupils already know and understand, when they fail to give them scope to think and act, when they fail to inspire and delight, then those pupils find learning difficult. Pupils become turned off from the process and do not apply themselves. In class, they seek other forms of diversion and amusement, and so their behaviour becomes bad and relationships fractious, or they do not come to school at all and attendance falls.
Some very good teachers can manage to engage pupils in a poor curriculum. Pupils who are well disposed toward learning can be engaged in a poor curriculum by most teachers. But in the case of most ‘special measures’ schools the curriculum has to be the best in order to engage the pupils and allow the teachers to teach. The curriculum needs to be designed around learning experiences that meet the new Ofsted criterion for an ‘outstanding’ curriculum: one that “provides memorable experiences and rich opportunities for high-quality learning and wider personal development and wellbeing. The school may be at the forefront of successful, innovative curriculum innovation…”. An ordinary curriculum will not be sufficient to get a school out of special measures.
There is not an ‘either – or’ between an engaging curriculum and one that promotes basic learning and high attainment. In fact, an engaging curriculum is the way to improve basic learning and achieve higher standards. The focus must always be on those aspects of learning that have caused these pupils to make inadequate progress. The route to that learning is through engaging the pupils’ interest and commitment. When pupils are engaged, they learn more, when they learn more (so long as that learning is properly focused on the right things) standards of attainment rise and so do test scores.
Through the right curriculum, other factors can be tackled. Teaching styles and approaches may need to be different in order to engage pupils in different sorts of learning experience. Yet teachers often find it easier to come to terms with this through a focus on the curriculum rather than their own ‘performance’. Being told that ‘you are not good enough’ at teaching can be very negative; being told that the curriculum is not good enough is, in a sense, much more positive. However it comes to the same thing: a change in practice.
We have found that when pupils become more engaged in their learning, their behaviour tends to improve, and attendance rises. With improved behaviour, relationships improve and so support even better behaviour and allow teaching to improve.
A good curriculum will focus on basic learning whilst also making provision for pupils’ personal development which includes their learning skills. This is at the heart of the approach. Where this happens successfully, the school’s provision for the ECM outcomes, an important aspect of the inspection process, also improves.
If senior management see their role as direct involvement in the quality of learning experiences, they can support this process, they can become really involved in the core purpose of the school, and so the quality of leadership and management also improve.
It is not being suggested that the process is without difficulties or that it is a magic wand that can be waved over a school to transform it overnight. However, it does provide a coherent strategy for improvement, and one that is based on what is most important within a school: what it is that pupils are learning. The approach is based on successful strategies for turning round failing schools used by people like Richard Gerver at Grange Primary in Derbyshire, Alison Hickson in Preston, Siobhan Collingwood in Morecambe Bay Primary, and Paul Carlyle in Hull. The approach has a history of success.
You may also have been part of this history. If so, please contact me at brianmale@curriculumfoundation.org