ENGLISH LANGUAGE PAPER

We work tirelessly to change the lives of those affected by bullying and we know we make a difference. We see it in the way young people engage in our projects, how we empower them to Make a Difference and how they develop confidence and learn new skills.

By developing a positive ethos across a whole school/organisation community, we can create an environment that meets the emotional, academic and social needs of pupils and staff. Creating an anti-bullying and respectful ethos is a powerful way to Inspire Change.

Our Youth Ambassadors are a dynamic team of young volunteers working together to help deal with the issue of bullying. They are committed and dedicated and all have a passion to Make A Difference in their local communities. The programme is open all year round and you can join wherever you live and whatever your background and interests are.

P7

whaT Can TeaChers reallY learn From masTerCheF?

FEATURE

“as students begin to understand the science of learning, it’s important to explicitly teach students practical methods of retrieval to help them play a more independent role as active participants in their own journey towards long term retention of learning.”

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P20

The Final CounTdown: PasToral PreParaTion For Year 10 inTo Year 11

WHAT CAN TEACHERS REALLY LEARN FROM MASTERCHEF?

Is teaching a lesson the same as cooking a meal on Masterchef: The Professionals? Whether it is or it isn’t, Adam Boxer has a few useful takeaways…

By Adam Boxer

HWRKMAGAZINE.CO.UK MAY 2022// HWRK MAGAZINE // 07

P50

The Power oF homework

PEDAGOGY

How have some of the issues of homework been combatted?

Many teachers are less inclined to set homework due to the problems that are commonly associated with it. However I have identifi ed some of those issues below and provided ways in which I have attempted to combat these issues in my own classroom.

Issue 1 - The disadvantage gap

It is common knowledge that pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds are less likely to have a quiet working space, are less likely to have access to a device suitable for learning or a stable internet connection and may receive less parental support to complete homework and develop e ective learning habits.

These di culties may increase pupils’ abilities to do homework and do it well. As a result, these are the ways in which we have tried to combat the issue and close the disadvantage gap in our department:

KS3:

Students with a physical booklet do not require a computer or the internet as all the information they need to be able to do the tasks are within that booklet.

KS4/5:

Show My Homework quizzes need an electronic device and a reliable internet connection. However, students know they can come up at break, during lunch or after school to the History rooms to use either a device or facilities in the school library. Furthermore, when writing exam answers we enforce that all answers should be handwritten therefore a device is not required.

Issue 2 - Marking

Another reason why some are hesitant to set homework is due to the marking load implication. However, there are ways in which we can work around this as we can see below:

KS3:

Homework is commonly self or peer marked at the beginning of the lesson. However, if I do not have time for this, I would live mark students’ homework whilst they are working independently on the main task.

KS4/5:

Quizzes are marked by Show My Homework and students get to see what score they achieved automatically, accessing immediate feedback. I always check who got the highest in the class and then I reward them accordingly the following lesson.

Nevertheless, Exam questions are marked by teachers to provide detailed feedback on their application skills of the knowledge. I work in a school whereby departments get to set their own marking policy under the three pillars of quality presentation, feedback and response.

In my department, as HOD I have banned the marking of classwork but what must be marked is all exam questions and assessments. As a result of a workload-friendly policy to marking feedback, marking exam questions done as part of homework does not act as an additional load.

Issue 3 - Chasing students up & setting detentions

Chasing students that have not done homework is my biggest bug bear however there are ways we can minimise the chasing and the consequence implication of not doing the homework.

In my school we have centralised detentions, which means individual teachers do not need to use their own time to conduct a detention. If your school does not have a centralised detention system maybe have a departmental centralised detention, whereby each person each week conducts the detention.

We used to have departmental centralised detentions before our school adopted centralised detentions which worked perfectly.

Issue 4 - Lack of motivation & discipline

If we can deal with the problem of lack of motivation, then issue 3 almost becomes non-existent. Being able to do work at home is a key skill students need to develop, there will be times in their career whereby they will need to fi nish o work at home.

However, they will be more inclined to do this due to the reward of pay at the end of the month as well as having greater maturity. Nevertheless, at this present time students need to be able to practice delayed gratifi cation and know that the feeling of motivation may not always be present but that is when discipline kicks in.

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P10

Closing The gaP wiTh QualiTY FirsT TeaChing

“We need to think about how we can improve not just how we can evidence what we are doing for these pupils.”

FEATURE

That means starting with some detective work.

We need to understand what the barriers to learning are for those pupils within YOUR context before we make decisions around how our approach to teaching and learning might overcome them. It can be easy to assume pupils experiencing deprivation will have poorer language skills, a less-developed vocabulary or will struggle to self-regulate.

There is evidence this can be true of pupils from these backgrounds, but without exploring what our pupils can and can’t do we could end up setting the bar too low or focusing our energies on something they just don’t need as a priority.

For example, in a group of 10 pupils I mentored, all of whom were identified as being higher prior attainers, six were also identified as ‘pupil premium’. These pupils were articulate, had high aspirations and goals for post-16, engaged with a range of learning activities outside of school and, on the whole, enjoyed being in school and learning.

What this group needed most were practical ways to access materials and

12 // HWRK MAGAZINE // MAY 2022 opportunities to get quick feedback to see their next steps. These could sometimes get lost amongst their other priorities such as their paid employment and supporting parents with younger siblings.

This approach provided them with the material means to succeed and the reassurance they were on track, helping them to manage their time to focus on the things they found more difficult.

If our focus had been on vocabulary or we’d enrolled them onto additional after-school interventions, it could have placed them under additional pressure which would not have helped with their learning.

Equally, if the school decided selfregulation was the key, then alreadyindependent pupils could find themselves restricted in how they worked, making their use of time less efficient. It is therefore important we really understand what issues they are facing before we decide on what those ‘best bets’ will be.

This is also true within our classroom practice. Good diagnostic testing will ensure we identify what it is our pupils of all backgrounds may be struggling with and can then address this. Even though all pupils may benefit from a focus on vocabulary or reading, blanket approaches may not help everyone effectively so diagnosing literacy needs is essential, making use of data which tells us exactly what our pupils are struggling with.

Is it decoding, comprehension, reading or writing fluency which might be the barrier, and if so, what is it we can do to address those on a whole school, class, or individual level?

Diagnostics at subject level are also crucial, identifying the gaps in foundational knowledge, rooting out where misconceptions may be residing and really clarifying what it is our pupils already know and can do.

High quality formative assessment should run through everything, alongside those formal opportunities to assess, bringing to light information that might challenge or surprise us.

That also means staff must have a good understanding of the content of their subject and the steps and processes needed to be successful at different stages. Time should be devoted to this if we want to

@hwrk_magazine understand how to close gaps and enable students to achieve.

Once we understand the issues, we then need to explore how we might go about addressing them, returning again to those ‘best bets’. That includes considering how we sequence our curriculum, how we create opportunities for pupils to practise applying knowledge, how we utilise spaced learning so pupils have to think hard about what they are retrieving and ways we can build on their prior knowledge.

If we have a strong understanding of pupils starting points through our diagnostic processes, we will then be in a better position to develop responsive teaching, enabling us to adapt our explanations, our questioning, and the scaff olding we use to address the needs of all.

There is a huge amount to unpick there though, and leaders need a clear understanding of the strengths and areas for development across the school too in order for teachers to make the best use of these diff erent aspects.

They need to decide on the key priorities as a whole school and ensure that all staff have a shared understanding of the main focus and what it is they mean by Quality First Teaching in their context.

Staff also need to be given time to refl ect, refi ne and feedback, engaging in defi ning what that means in their classroom for their pupils too. Leaders and teachers also need to keep a sharp eye on how these choices are impacting upon groups of pupils as well as individuals, giving them a better chance of closing those attainment gaps, returning us again to that ongoing diagnostic process we use day-to-day in our classrooms. We need to think about how we can improve not just how we can evidence what we are doing for these pupils.

Having this detailed understanding can also create opportunities to stop less eff ective practices where needed and to concentrate on building in more of what their pupils need, be that modelling, other types of scaff olding or probing questions to get all pupils thinking hard.

The challenge here of course is no two cohorts or groups of pupils are likely to always need the exact same things, so schools need to build adaptative expertise and responsive teaching, rooted in subject knowledge, to allow teachers to react to that changing picture.

Coupling Quality First Teaching with well-placed and evidence-informed interventions, plus good relationships with pupils and parents, means we might be in a good position to really make a diff erence to those pupils who need it the most.

If we can identify what pupils from less-advantaged backgrounds need, what barriers they experience and how we might overcome them, we will be on track to ensuring the best quality teaching and learning for all does indeed come fi rst.

1. https://www.suttontrust.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/2teachers-impact-report-fi nal.pdf 2. https://www.suttontrust.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/2teachers-impact-report-fi nal.pdf Slater, H., Davies, N. M., & Burgess, S. (2011) Do Teachers Matter? Measuring the Variation in Teacher Eff ectiveness in England. Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics.” https://bit.ly/ecf-sla 3. https://www.cambridgeinternational.org/support-and-training-for-schools/teaching-cambridge-at-your-school/great-teaching-toolkit/ 4. https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/education-evidence/teaching-learning-toolkit

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P48

assessmenT in mFl: isn’T There a BeTTer waY?

CURRICULUM

We can deduce then that it is not that teachers want to spend less time concentrating on speaking but more that they want to be able to devote more time to more authentic communication. At the very least, teachers want their students to be rewarded for authentic communication in the exam without the need to artificially squeeze in grammar features that don’t occur in real life conversations.

This is may be a fault with the mark schemes. The role-play element of the exam is arguably redundant as time goes on, presenting exchanges such as booking a hotel room or buying concert tickets which would more than likely be done online without the need for any interaction in the target language. But the photo-card elements of description and sharing opinions and a general conversation across several themes seem sensible and appropriate to enable candidates to develop answers and share a range of structures. It is the demands of the mark scheme which requires the jumping through hoops.

What do we need?

We need an assessment model which is in line with age-related expectations, given curriculum constraints, and that also rewards the kinds of real-life interactions that would be useful in real life.

This is probably a conundrum faced by exam boards for all subject areas – how can we authentically test a wide spectrum of knowledge, whilst showing progression over time, but also instil the key skills and attributes of those expert learners? Is it ever possible to create an assessment which rewards those skills of a true historian, a real mathematician?

I’m mindful that the perfect assessment model for languages probably doesn’t exist and that exam boards, restricted by requirements set out by Ofqual, can only seek to change so much when designing exam content and marking criteria.

However, what is painfully apparent is that GCSE results in MFL are historically far lower than other options subjects. How can this be, when it is the same students taking the exams? Surely, we aren’t producing a nation of students that can access the material of a Geography paper and secure a grade 9 but can’t replicate that success in French?

We must ask questions of the current assessment processes, to ensure that in the first instance, our students aren’t short-changed out of the grades they’ve worked hard for, nor that they are discouraged from the rich and diverse experiences learning a language offers in place of securing better grades elsewhere.

We need to level the playing field and that doesn’t have to be through starting again but tweaking what we do have and ensuring it serves our purposes best.

“the Speaking assessment for the current GCSE is not suited to a good natural linguist, but is suited more to someone who is good at memorising chunks of language”

PEDAGOGY

Discipline is doing what you know you should do in the absence of feeling motivated. But how can we help students become more disciplined & motivated to do homework? I believe it is in helping students build good habits. Here are a few tips that I got from Harry Fletcher’s book: Habits of success:

How to encourage students to start?

1. Give clear instructions that make starting sound easy

2. Help students commit to a plan of doing homework by planning WHEN and HOW they will act e.g. I will do homework immediately after school. I will study alone in the school library or join homework club. If I am invited to go out and see my friends, I will wait until have fi nished my homework. I will share this plan with my parents to keep me accountable.

3. Share models e.g fi rst examine the model, then see if you can do the similar task.

4. Set a default e.g if you are unsure about what to do then use your how to guide.

5. Revisit past successes e.g your homework task is almost identical to what we did in class today, the one where you got all the questions right.

HWRKMAGAZINE.CO.UK “The Education Endowment Foundation has also found that homework has a positive impact (on average +5 months) particularly with pupils in secondary schools.”

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P59

is TeaChing ParTTime reallY suCh a good idea?

IS TEACHING PART-TIME

REALLY SUCH A GOOD IDEA?

Is teaching a family-friendly profession? Many have gone part-time to seek that elusive balance between work and life. But does going part-time actually pay o ? Sherish Osman isn’t convinced…

By Sherish Osman

@hwrk_magazine

HWRKMAGAZINE.CO.UK

“I guess it’s natural to feel unsettled and lost when part of your life changes. Should I feel guilty for feeling this way? Should I feel lucky to be working part time?”

MAY 2022 // HWRK MAGAZINE // 59

CONTENTS

FEATURES

07. WHAT CAN TEACHERS REALLY LEARN FROM MASTERCHEF?

What do top chefs and teachers have in common?

10. CLOSING THE GAP WITH QUALITY FIRST TEACHING

Strategies for all, that advantage those who need them the most.

14. 5 WAYS TO MAkE NEW TEACHERS FEEL WELCOME

How to ensure teachers can hit the ground running when they join a new school.

EDITORIAL 05. WILL WE EVER HAVE IT CRACkED?

PASTORAL

20. THE FINAL COUNTDOWN: PASTORAL PREPARATION FOR YEAR 10 INTO YEAR 11

Tips for Pastoral Leaders on laying the groundwork for a successful Year 11.

25. SAFEGUARDING TRIAGE

Strategies for making sure Safeguarding is covered from all angles.

PEDAGOGY

30. THE POWER OF HOMEWORk

What is the point of homework? Is there a particular way we should be doing it?

37. HOW I TEACH… REVISION

The science of revision and how to teach it in the classroom.

CURRICULUM

44. HOW TO ANSWER… AQA GCSE ENGLISH LANGUAGE PAPER 2

Strategies for tackling questions on AQA GCSE English Language Paper 2

48. ASSESSMENT IN MFL: ISN’T THERE A BETTER WAY?

How assessment in MFL should really look.

54. WHAT SHOULD I DO WHEN A PROMOTION CLASHES WITH MATERNITY LEAVE?

Making the most of maternity leave when promotion opportunities arise.

EXPERIENCE

59. IS TEACHING PART-TIME REALLY SUCH A GOOD IDEA?

An exploration of the delicate balance between home-life and career.

62. HOW TO BE A HAPPY TEACHER:

Tips for maximising your happiness and wellbeing as a teacher.

REVIEWS

64. BEHAVIOUR: THE kEY TO UNLOCkING SUCCESS IN SCHOOLS? Book Review: The Behaviour Manual: An Educator’s Guidebook by Sam Strickland

hwrkMAG A zine.co.uk // MeeT The TeAM CONTRIBUTORS

WRITTEN BY TEACHERS FOR TEACHERS

Adam Boxer

@adamboxer1

Adam is Head of Science at a North London Academy and he blogs at achemicalorthodoxy.wordpress. com. He is a co-founder of Carousel Learning, a holistic online quizzing platform aimed at improving student retention in all school subjects.

Zoe Enser

@greeborunner

Zoe Enser was an English Teacher for over 20 years and is now working as the Specialist English Adviser for The Education People and an ELE (Evidence Lead in Education) for the EEF (Education Endowment Foundation) in the Kent area. She is also the co-author of Generative Learning in Action and the upcoming CPD Curriculum: Creating the Conditions for Growth, both written in collaboration her husband, Mark Enser.

Omar Akbar

@UnofficialOA

Omar Akbar is a science teacher of 17 years in Birmingham and the author of several edu-books, including “Teaching For Realists: Making The Education System Work For You And Your Pupils”.

Phil Naylor

@naylorsnatter_

Phil Naylor is Deputy Head at an academy in Blackpool and is the creator and presenter of the Naylor’s Natter podcast, where he interviews teachers and school leaders to discuss pedagogy, curriculum and school leadership.

Andrew Atherton

@__codexterous

Andrew Atherton is a Teacher of English as well as Director of Research in a secondary school in Berkshire. He regularly publishes blogs about English and English teaching at ‘Codexterous’ and you can follow him on Twitter @__codexterous

Sadie Thompson

@missmclachlan

Sadie Thompson is Head of German at Thornden School in Hampshire. She has been teaching for 11 years and as well as flying the flag for German, she also teaches Spanish to Key Stages 3 and 4. Sadie has a keen interest in educational research and is currently Deputy Director of HISP Research School.

Sam Strickland

@strickomaster

Sam is the Principal of a large all-through school, the organiser of ResearchED Northampton, and author of The Behaviour Manual: An Educator’s Guidebook, published by John Catt (2022)

Hetty Steele

@HettyLSteele

Hetty Steele is a PhD student and Head of Drama at a comprehensive school in Bishop’s Stortford. Hetty also contributes regularly to to Litdrive UK and to MTPT Project - a UK charity for parent teachers.

Claudi BenDavid

@MBDscience

Claudi is a Chemistry teacher at a North London academy. They are a massive nerd for all things T&L, blog regularly at notmatthew.blogspot.com, and aren’t nearly as miserable as they look.

Eve Draper

@EveDraperGeo

Eve Draper is a Teacher of Geography and an ITT mentor in East Yorkshire. She loves all the usual Geography teacher cliches like maps, hills, the sea and a good walk!

Amy-May Forrester

@amymayforrester

Amy is Director of Pastoral Care (KS4), Head of Year 10 and an English teacher at Cockermouth School.

Sherish Osman

@sherish_o

Sherish Osman is a Lead Teacher (in charge of research and development), and English teacher at a school in West London, as well as a mother to two boys aged 2 and 5. She is the MTPT Family Friendly Lead at her school, working on making the school more family friendly with their policies for parents. Sherish is also the Design Associate for Litdrive, as well as the Educational Content Creator for Lantana Publishing.

Emily Folorunsho

@MissFolorunsho

Emily Folorunsho is Head of History in an inner-city 12 form entry school in London and is also a lead practitioner, SLE and governor. Emily co-authored the Collins Black British History Teacher Resources and is passionate about promoting diversity in the curriculum and making History meaningful and relevant to students.

HWRK MAGAZINE PUBLISHED BY STAFFROOM MEDIA LTD 5 Hackins Hey, Liverpool L2 2AW, UK E: enquiries@staffroommedia.co.uk T: 0151 237 7311 EDITOR Andy McHugh PUBLISHING DIRECTOR Alec Frederick Power DESIGNER Adam Blakemore MANAGING DIRECTORS G Gumbhir, Alec Frederick Power

EDITORIAL: WILL WE EVER HAVE IT CRACKED?

Right now, I’m knee-deep in curriculum planning for next year. I already have a well thought out plan, but I’m still not happy with it. The sequence of topics needs to be tweaked again. Actually no, the topics are fi ne, but I do need to make sure to include more extended writing. Hang on though, will they know enough by that point to be able to write well enough on that topic? I’d better make sure they’ve got enough facts behind them fi rst. No, actually, they need to engage with some real-world issues fi rst to hook them and see the relevance of what they’re learning. But… but…

As Mary Myatt has already mentioned before, curriculum is a never-ending story. But it’s not the only one. Schools have a habit of pursuing more and more, no matter what has just been achieved.

It’s a noble aim and I’m as guilty as the next person when it comes to refi ning and reiterating everything to try to make it as good as it could be. Our students deserve it and I, like most teachers, see teaching not just as a job but as a vocation. We’re drawn to trying our hardest for others.

But at what point do we say to ourselves “actually this is really good, let’s just keep doing this. It doesn’t need to be improved”?

After all, there is a cost to everything we try to implement. We have limits on curriculum time, planning time, sta ng, school budgets and quite simply the number of hours in a day. Add to that the fact that teachers deserve as much of a break as anyone else. We can’t just keep adding more and more to our to-do lists. Something has to give. But what?

Here’s a list to choose from. It’s not an easy task for you, but give it a go anyway. Assuming nothing else changes in the education system, which of these would you personally ignore for two years straight, in your own school setting, giving you time to focus on all of the rest properly?

• Pastoral care • Quality of teaching • A well-sequenced curriculum • Staff wellbeing • Examinations

It isn’t easy. I’d even go so far as to say that if any one of these goes missing (even if just for two years), then like a house of cards, the rest will come crashing down too.

So, we keep them all. But if we keep them and they are less than perfect, they could have a negative impact on the other pieces of the puzzle. There’s a moral imperative then to do everything we can, within our power and within the constraints of time and space, to ensure that everything is as good as it could be. It’s a balancing act though. At this end of the year, sta are exhausted, have one eye on the summer holidays and in many cases are up to the eyeballs in exams and last-minute revision classes.

I’d bet that your middle leaders have many of the answers though. They’re the ones on the ground who have implemented this year’s new policies and procedures. They’re the ones who have identifi ed the crunch points when it comes to assessment data windows, parents’ evenings and deadlines for everything in between.

Ask middle leaders what they would keep, what they would bin and what they would adapt. It probably won’t lead to wholesale change (and it probably doesn’t need to), but it might just be enough to ensure that the wheels keep turning as we journey onwards, as we’ll be in a better position than we were this time last year.

We’ll never have it cracked, but that’s ok. We’re always going to be chasing perfection, whatever that means to us, because we aren’t doing it for us, we’re doing it for our students. It does take its toll, both physically and mentally, but it’s also why we do the job.

Andy McHugh

Editor | HWRK Magazine