Reclaiming our profession: Getting teachers better

1. Reclaiming our profession:Getting teachers better Robert Coe Northern Rocks 2014 Saturday, 7th June Leeds

2. Getting teachers better • What does ‘better’ look like? • How do we get better? • How will we know if we have?

3. What does ‘better’ look like?

4. If you want to be a better teacher, • Do you know what aspect of your practice you should work to improve? • Do you know what you should do to improve it? • Can you actually do this? • How will you know if it has improved? (‘should’ = ‘most likely to lead to benefit’)

6. Danielson Frameworkhttp://danielsongroup.org/framework/ • Planning and preparation • Demonstrating Knowledge of Content and Pedagogy • Demonstrating Knowledge of Students • Setting Instructional Outcomes • Demonstrating Knowledge of Resources • Designing Coherent Instruction • Designing Student Assessments • Classroom environment • Creating an Environment of Respect and Rapport • Establishing a Culture for Learning • Managing Classroom Procedures • Managing Student Behavior • Organizing Physical Space • Instruction • Communicating with Students • Using Questioning and Discussion Techniques • Engaging Students in Learning • Using Assessment in Instruction • Demonstrating Flexibility and Responsiveness • Professional responsibilities • Reflecting on Teaching • Maintaining Accurate Records • Communicating with Families • Participating in the Professional Community • Growing and Developing Professionally • Showing Professionalism

7. Teacher Professional Standardsshould • Be based on best evidence about pedagogy, teacher effectiveness, learning theory • Reflect diversity of teacher needs (one size doesn’t fit all) • Include protocols for demonstrating when they are met that are • Clear and operationalisable • Consistent across different raters, schools, etc • Demonstrably predictive of valued pupil outcomes

8. What we want teachers to learn (good pedagogy) may depend on … • Different career stages • Initial • Developing • Expert • Different teaching/leadership roles • Class teacher • Subject leader • Senior leadership • Different teaching aims • Cognitive/intellectual • Affective/emotional • Social • Behavioural • Different subjects • A level history • Early reading • Adult vocational numeracy • Different phases • Early years • Primary • Secondary • FE • Different contexts • Social mix • Attainment levels

9. Evidence-based standards for effective teaching? • Evidence about relationships between teacher skills, knowledge & behaviours and ‘effectiveness’ • Evidence about what can be changed (and how) • Based on ‘best’ theories of • Pupil learning • Pedagogy & teaching effectiveness • Behaviour change (individual, institutional, systemic) • Most important: does focusing on these things lead to improvement?

10. www.educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/toolkit Impact vs cost Most promising for raising attainment 8 May be worth it Feedback Meta-cognitive Peer tutoring Early Years Homework (Secondary) 1-1 tuition Effect Size (months gain) Collaborative Behaviour Small gp tuition Phonics Parental involvement Smaller classes ICT Social Summer schools Individualised learning Small effects / high cost After school Mentoring Homework (Primary) Teaching assistants Performance pay Aspirations 0 Ability grouping £0 £1000 Cost per pupil

11. Knowledge of research Put these in order of effectiveness: • A one-to-one numeracy intervention (two 15-minute sessions per week, delivered by teaching assistants) for Year 2-6 pupils who are struggling with numeracy (outcome: maths) • Nine weekly one-hour sessions where Y7 pupils below L4 read and discuss an age-appropriate book, with tools and resources to encourage reading for pleasure (outcome: reading) • A four-week summer school programme (between Y6 & 7) for pupils who had been predicted to achieve KS2 below Level 4b in English, focussed on poetry and writing (outcome: writing). • Y6 & 7 teachers trained to deliver a programme to help low attaining pupils plan, monitor and evaluate their writing using memorable experiences, eg trips and visitors (outcome: writing).

12. Learning theory • In what ways does understanding depend on knowledge? In what ways does knowledge depend on understanding? • Give an example of a common misunderstanding of a key concept you have taught. How might you address it? • How can teachers make it most likely that students will remember what they have learnt?

13. How do we get better?

14. Broader argument • Teacher quality is what matters • We need to focus on teacher learning • Teachers learn just like other people • Be clear what you want them to learn • Get good information about where they are at • Give good feedback • Cultural changes are required to • Help teachers learn from each other • Give teachers ownership of their learning

15. Five Strategies of Formative Assessment(Wiliam 2011 Embedded formative assessment) • Clarifying, sharing and understanding learning intentions and success criteria • Engineering effective classroom discussions, activities and learning tasks that elicit evidence of learning • Providing feedback that moves learners forward • Activating learners as instructional resources for each other • Activating learners as the owners of their own learning

16. Clarifying, sharing and understanding learning intentions and success criteria • Attempts to describe these are either • Too broad to be well-defined • Too narrow to capture real learning • Must be operationalised with • Examples of behaviours that do / do not exemplify • Specific “tasks that elicit evidence of learning” • Therefore need to assess teacher learning • Does not imply evaluation/ranking/consequences

17. Explain what they should do • Demonstrate it • Get them to do it (with gradually reducing support) • Provide feedback • Get them to practise until it is secure • Assess their skill/ understanding How do we get students to learn hard things? Eg • Place value • Persuasive writing • Music composition • Balancing chemical equations

18. Explain what they should do How do we get teachers to learn hard things? Eg • Using formativeassessment • Assertive discipline • How to teachalgebra

19. What CPD helps learners? • Intense: at least 30 contact hours, preferably 50+ • Sustained: over at least two terms • Content focused: on teachers’ knowledge of subject content & how students learn it • Active: opportunities to try it out & discuss • Supported: external feedback and networks to improve and sustain • Evidence based: promotes strategies supported by robust evaluation evidence Do you do this?

20. How will we know if we have?

21. Why monitor teaching quality? • Strong evidence of (potential) benefit from • Performance feedback(Coe, 2002) • Target setting (Locke & Latham, 2006) • Intelligent accountability (Wiliam 2010) • Individual teachers matter most • Everyone can improve • Teachers stop improving after 3-5 years • Judging real quality/effectiveness is very hard • Multidimensional • Not easily visible • Confounded

22. Monitoring the quality of teaching • Progress in assessments • Quality of assessment matters (cem.org/blog) • Regular, high quality assessment across curriculum (InCAS, INSIGHT) • Classroom observation • Much harder than you think! (cem.org/blog) • Multiple observations/ers, trained and QA’d • Student ratings • Extremely valuable, if done properly (http://www.cem.org/latest/student-evaluation-of-teaching-can-it-raise-attainment-in-secondary-schools) • Other • Parent ratings feedback • Student work scrutiny • Colleague perceptions (360) • Self assessment • Pedagogical content knowledge

23. Teacher Assessment • How do you know that it has captured understanding of key concepts? • vs ‘check-list’ (eg ‘;’=L5, 3 tenses=L7) • How do you know standards are comparable? • Across teachers, schools, subjects • Is progress good? • How have you resolved tensions from teacher judgments being used to judge teachers?

24. School ‘improvement’ often isn’t • School would have improved anyway • Volunteers/enthusiasts improve: misattributed to intervention • Chance variation (esp. if start low) • Poor outcome measures • Perceptions of those who worked hard at it • No robust assessment of pupil learning • Poor evaluation designs • Weak evaluations more likely to show positive results • Improved intake mistaken for impact of intervention • Selective reporting • Dredging for anything positive (within a study) • Only success is publicised (Coe, 2009, 2013)

25. Key elements of good evaluation EEF DIY Evaluation Guide • Clear, well defined, replicable intervention • Good assessment of appropriate outcomes • Well-matched comparison group What could you evaluate?

26. www.cem.org Summary … @ProfCoe Teacher ‘quality’ needs to be evidence-based Focus on characteristics that help us improve Teachers learn the same way as other people Monitoring and evaluation are important, but hard Robert.Coe@cem.dur.ac.uk