Primary First Issue 16

PrimaryFirst The journal for primary schools Issue 16 £5.00

“We walk - but children dance.”

National Association for Primary Education

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Editorial On the 3rd of May a substantial number of parents up and down the country kept their children away from school for the day.

The purpose was to send a clear message to the government that the growing number of national assessments in primary education had reached an intolerable level and that this was unacceptable to families. The unprecedented action is all the more impressive when we consider its spontaneous nature.

The mobilising of parental opinion was achieved solely through the use of social media.

Where Early Years Means Business RICOH ARENA

COVENTRY

Sadly, there are many reasons why so many parents have joined the majority of teachers in opposing not only national testing but the attitudes displayed by politicians towards primary schools and the educational practice they espouse. This is little to do with party politics since a cross party consensus has been evident for many years. Underlying everything there is one highly significant reason for the clash between the elected government and those whom they serve - it is a matter of unrealistic expectations of young children.

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Governments are rightly concerned with the economic wellbeing of the country and the need for a skilled population which can deliver productivity in a competitive world. Almost inevitably, attention and policies are centred upon the delivery of young people well equipped for the world of work by secondary schools, colleges and universities. The earlier years of education are seen and frequently described as a preparation for secondary education and the pressure from government has been to prescribe subject content in primary schools which is more appropriate to older pupils. And not only prescription, the formal acquisition of knowledge and skill must be learned and tested at a younger and younger age.

Are you aN Early Years practitioner?

Editorial Editorial Board

John Coe Peter Cansell, Stuart Swann, Robert Young

Primary First magazine is published three times per year by the National Association for Primary Education.

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We must hope that it will not be much longer that governments will cling to their failed policies. The divide between the advantaged and the disadvantaged continues to widen. The parents’ action in May can help politicians see sense. Primary education can do so much more, and for the national economy also, if young children are taught in ways which match the reality of their nature and not simply in ways which ape the adult world. The primary curriculum is to be thought of in terms of activity and experience rather than of knowledge to be acquired and facts to be stored. In these ways the children put down strong roots of learning and the results will be evidenced in the lives of everyone in future years.

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The too ready assumption is that young children are simply miniature versions of adults and that the quicker they are assimilated into the adult world the better. But they are not; before adolescence and, for some years after that, primary children see the world differently to adults and they think differently as well. Their life is one of immediate and direct experience, it is now that matters and they seldom look back or far forward. The six year old girl learns to read not so that she can access the secondary curriculum but because reading opens up a new world of pleasure and excitement. Children learn about life and themselves as they assemble detail. They don’t abstract or look for an overview until much later when they have acquired a ground-base of awareness through their experience.

For the primary child the world is a small place and the things that a child knows and cares about are very large.

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To SPaG or not to SPaG? Perhaps that is the question...

by Colin Richards

CONTENTS 03.

Editorial

24.

Review: Learning to be Literate.

05.

Colin Richards enlists the support of Charles Dickens in attacking SPaG

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Review: New Perspectives on Young Children’s Moral Education.

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Young children and adults are very different says Pam Jarvis

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Terry Wrigley wants to bring the children back in.

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Researcher Margaret Clark considers baseline assessment and school readiness

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The NAPE European Project.

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Carey Fluker Hunt’s Book Page

Former Staff HMI, Colin Richards asks that we should come clean about assessment.

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Does Class Size Matter? The Schiller Memorial lecture given by Peter Blatchford

We are so mired in the absurdities of the current accountability regime that too often we fail to see just how bizarre they are and how educationally counter-productive they are likely to be. Take Gibb’s beloved SPaG. As ever, or almost as ever, Dickens got it right when he commented on the grammar teaching of his day (and unfortunately ours?) in Dombey and Son.

“It was Mr. Feeder’s occupation to bewilder the ideas of Dr Blinker’s young gentleman. The young gentlemen were prematurely full of carking anxieties. They knew no rest from the pursuit of stony-hearted verbs, savage nounsubjunctives, inflexibly syntactic passages, and ghosts of exercises that appeared to them in their dreams. Under the forcing system a young gentleman usually took leave of his spirits in three weeks. He had all the cares of the world on his head in three months. He conceived bitter sentiments against his parents or guardians in four; he was an old misanthrope in five….and at the end of the first twelvemonth had arrived at the conclusion, from which he never after departed, that all the fancies of the poets, and lessons of the sages, were a mere collection of words and grammar, and had no other meaning in the world.”

Back to the future?

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Cute Little Aliens?

Why young children don’t think like adults.

by Pam Jarvis

As adults, we tend to think of young children as little versions of ‘us’. However, during the twentieth century, psychologists began to raise the possibility that children’s modes of thinking might be quite different from adults’.

As we move into the twenty first century, neurological research begins to indicate that this analysis was correct.

And although the child brain was incompletely modelled by early theorists, it is becoming quite clear that its construction is, in many ways quite alien to the adult’s; the key difference being the much greater plasticity of the child brain.

Babies’ brains have far more neurons than adults’, but far fewer connections. The early development of the brain involves an extensive neuronal connection programme as children interact with their environment, and those neurons that do not connect to others during this process shrivel and eventually die. Around the time of adolescence, the brain begins its last big project: pruning superfluous neurons in the prefrontal cortex, and creating more intricate links between those that remain.

This is the area of the brain which deals with impulse control and the management of social behaviour, and it is therefore likely that this finding will eventually lead to better understanding of the complex emotionality of the teenager. The human brain is not fully neuronally mature until the individual is around 25 years of age.

Some amount of plasticity remains in adult brains and neuronal development continues on a much less extravagant basis until death; however, the most dramatic changes occur within the early developmental period. An analogy that I frequently use with my students is that a newborn baby is like a brand new personal computer- it comes equipped to run certain programs in certain ways, but these programs do not yet have any contents beyond the manufacturer ‘freebies’. Of course a baby’s brain is infinitely more complex than a personal computer, and does not only go on to store contents, but to link concepts together in infinite networks through the intricate neuronal pathways that are built through experience within and upon the environment.

Our current understanding of how the human brain constructs itself during the developmental period suggests that this happens via what is termed ‘embedded mental representation’; i.e., that we

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incrementally memorise and co-ordinate our experiences.

This generates an increasing ability to organize thought, gradually resulting in the ability to manage incoming information and locate it within memory in increasingly sophisticated neural networks. This results in increasing ‘metacognition’: thinking about thinking. As we become more expert at this we become able to use such networks to focus attention without becoming distracted by the intrusion of non-relevant thoughts. This requires ‘inhibitory behaviour’, and the younger children are, the more difficult they find this; their thoughts are far more susceptible to interference than those of adults, due to the immature networks across which they travel.

This fundamental adult/ child difference is not always recognised in policy and practice, however. In England, the current state education system expects children in the sixth year of life (between the fifth and sixth birthday) to demonstrate phonic competency in reading, for which a statutory test is imposed. While neurologists do not yet have a complete picture of how reading develops, they have ascertained that it requires a considerable amount of inhibitory behaviour, and that it is gradually encoded at a very deep level in the brain. Magnetic Resonance Imaging shows fundamental differences in neuronal activity when novice and expert readers decode a text, and the act of reading requires the reader to simultaneously: •

Control the eye so it moves in the direction of the relevant language. Some languages are written left to right (e.g. English), some right to left (e.g. Arabic) and some vertically (e.g., Chinese)

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Convert a visual stimulus into sounds

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Make meaning from the decoded word

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Hold that meaning in memory sufficiently to allow the reader to make overall meaning from the text as a whole

The intricacy and depth of the neuronal activity required to simultaneously engage in such complex operations suggests that testing at such an early age is unlikely to accurately predict later reading competence. Additionally, the isolation of phonics within the testing process forces the learner to demonstrate competency in only half of the operations utilised by fluent readers; it is not yet clear how

this might impact upon the way that subsequent neuronal connections may form in response to ‘training to test’.

When we further consider the neuronal immaturity of young children, the quest that was recently undertaken by the British Government, to formulate a ‘baseline’ assessment for four year olds that could accurately predict future progress seems even more ridiculous. It is hardly surprising that after much public funding had been fruitlessly pumped into tilting at this particular developmentally ill-informed windmill, the whole project had to be abandoned.

In conclusion, the way that education policy is currently constructed for young children in England is, in analogy, rather like running an episode of ‘Bake Off’ where the judges are asked to adjudicate on the contestants’ products two minutes after they go into the oven.

Politicians do not seem to grasp (to continue the cake analogy) that children are not ‘small cakes’, but actually as different from the adults they will become as cake batter is from the fully baked product. This not only suggests that many contemporary early education policies are shockingly ill-informed, but in terms of children’s natural neuronal difference from adults, also discriminatory and therefore contrary to their human rights. This could of course, eventually lead to claims for compensation for psychological damage suffered by a whole generation forced in early childhood into what had, at that time, already been identified as highly developmentally inappropriate situations. It is hoped that policy makers will decide to engage in appropriate consultation with developmental experts before this dystopian prospect becomes a reality.

Dr. Pam Jarvis became a graduate psychologist in 1995.

She is a programme or module leader for a variety of modules within the Institute of Childhood and Education of Leeds Trinity University.

Copyright of this article is retained by the author.

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Baseline Assessments and School Readiness: why ignore the evidence from research Margaret M Clark Visiting Professor, Newman University Background The Department for Education stated that commencing in 2016 all children in reception class in England were to be tested on a form of baseline assessment, conducted in English, within six weeks of starting school. The assessment was to use one of three commercial baseline assessments identified by DfE, Early Excellence, CEM and NFER. These three were selected from a larger initial number and it was proposed that a single score from one of these measures should be used to calculate a child`s progress by the end of primary school when compared with others with the same starting point. It was also to hold schools accountable. Many professionals recorded their opposition to this policy. On 24 February 2016 at an invitation research seminar held at Newman University eight research papers were presented considering the available evidence on baseline assessments (see newman.ac.uk/24feb/4560 for summaries). On 3 March 2016 in a letter signed by Eric Lui at DfE to Christine Blower of NUT it was announced that this policy would not be implemented in 2016 as it had become clear that the scores from these three different measures could not be compared; something that should have been clear from the outset. However, it is important to note that a commitment to some form of readiness measure and accountability remains government policy.

Much of what I wrote in a series of articles on baseline assessment in the Education Journal is still relevant: An article by my colleague, Louise Wormwell was entitled: `Baseline Assessment: who made the final cuts and why? (258: 16-18). My three articles were: `The language of young children on entry to school as measured by baseline assessments: Why ignore the evidence from research` (2015, 244: 12-16). `The views of teachers on the proposed baseline assessments on entry to reception class: their purpose and the dangers` (2016 259:14-16). `Baseline assessment: what research is telling us’ (261: 10-12).

Shortly after our research seminar, this series of articles in the Education Journal`s research section, and growing disquiet in the teaching profession, there was a rumour that the Government might scrap its plans for the baseline assessment it was planning to introduce in 2016.

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10 The research evidence In the first of my articles in the Education Journal I outlined selected researches from 1970s and 1980s which should have provided insights for contemporary policy on the assessment of young children`s language, the effect on young children`s scores of the context and the particular adult involved in the assessment.

See Understanding Research in Early Education: the relevance for the future of lessons from the past (Clark, 2005), where in chapter 3 I critique the researches of Tough, Wells, Tizard and Hughes and in chapter 8 report my study in The West Midlands. For each research not only is the sample identified but also those not included, thus the reader can assess the extent to which the findings of each research remain relevant in the changed child population in England today. Tough`s study was one referred to in The Bullock Report. The following quotation from A Language for Life (DES, 1975:53-54) has relevance in the present context: `But there is a range of uses which children from “educating” homes seem to have developed more extensively than children without these home advantages`. It is stressed that such abilities are important for learning in the school situation.

A child is at a disadvantage in lacking the means to explain, describe, inquire, hypothesize, analyse, compare, and deduce if language is seldom or never used for these purposes in his home…(p..54) Already at three years of age there were statistical differences between the nursery and non-nursery disadvantaged groups. Another significant finding for current proposals for assessment of young children was the effect of the context, for example, of probing on the level of children`s answers, as without probing the advantaged group scored more highly than the less advantaged group; however, there was considerable overlap between the groups. Tough made the observation that when retelling a story the young disadvantaged child had a mean length of utterance twice as high as in other situations, showing they were able to remember sequences and reproduce the story line with much of the detail. It should be noted that this was in situations where the story was repeated to a companion in a meaningful context.

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This research predated the work of Donaldson who showed that even in Piagetian type experiments the context influenced children`s apparent competence. In his critique of Tough`s studies Wells commented that what seemed important for sustaining dialogue was, `the presence or absence of genuine reciprocity and collaboration`. In his own research Wells stated that one of the most important features in the homes of children whose success could have been predicted early was `the sharing of stories`. This he suggested, in relation to literacy development, is more important than any early introduction to features of print` (see Clark 2005, chapter 3). He also stated that `stories have a role in education that goes far beyond their contribution to the acquisition of literacy` (Wells, 1986: 194).

There is space here to draw attention to only one other of the researches reported in Clark 2005 (see chapters 8 and 9). In my research in The Midlands in 1980s we not only considered the various reception classes as contexts for learning, but also the apparent competence of young children from different ethnic minority backgrounds depending on how they were assessed.

Some assessments were with radio microphones in free play contexts or in the classroom, with peers and with teachers. Others were in `contrived` situations, to ensure that the more able children were `stretched`, possibly beyond what might have been available to them in the naturally occurring settings. Children with difficulties were given an opportunity to show their competence when the demands were quite specifically tailored for them. Within our sample we had some children whose mother tongue was Punjabi who were assessed on The Preschool Assessment Instrument (PLAI) devised

by Marion Blank, in both English, and Punjabi. On that test the children`s responses to questions of different levels of complexity are recorded: matching perception, selective analysis of perceptions, reordering of perception and reasoning about perception. Incorrect answers are categorized as ambiguous, inadequate or irrelevant. Significant within the current debate are the following: 1.

Children`s competence appeared very different depending on the context in which the assessment took place.

2.

Many children when in conversation with their peers showed a level of ability to reason not apparent in other contexts or with an adult.

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On testing there was a difference between the scores of the youngest and oldest children of significance to those planning their learning environment.

4.

Among the children whose mother tongue was Punjabi there were children competent in both languages, but others showing only a limited competence even in their mother tongue, a fact that might not otherwise have been appreciated by the teachers.

There is now a revised edition of PLAI, PLAI2 and we hope to assess reception class children of different ages and mother tongues on this within our current research.

Any assessment of children`s competence on entry to school should take account of research evidence from studies such as these. Any single measure, whether by observation or by a test, could so easily underestimate children`s abilities. There needs to be sufficient breadth to give a fair reflection of the children`s current development and include measures shown to be good predictors of progress. Baseline and school readiness tests with mainly simplistic tests of literacy and numeracy, for example, may neither be good measures of present competence nor good predictors of progress.

Yet we are in danger of having even more money invested in such commercial tests, adopted by schools, with parents encouraged to believe that coaching on such measures are the best ways of making their young children `school ready`.

For a fuller discussion of baseline tests see Wrigley and Wormwell, `Infantile accountability: when big data meet small children` (2016 in press). Children start in Reception class in England at anything from four to five years of age, and Primary 1 in Scotland at a slightly older age and are expected to be `ready for school`.

In many higher performing countries children do not start school until the age of six or even seven, are not subjected to tests in the very early stages, and are not regarded as failures if they cannot read by the age of seven, as often happens in UK.

Assessing readiness for school or schools` readiness for children Often attention has centred on the deficiencies of the child in the learning situation and the inadequacies of the parents (Clark, 2016). As early as 1970 Bernstein stated that: Compensatory education implies that something is lacking in the family, and so in the child, and that as a result the children are unable to benefit from schools (53-54)… We should stop thinking in terms of compensatory education but consider instead most seriously and systematically the conditions and contexts of the educational environment (55).

This view still permeates much of the discussion on baseline assessment in UK and The United States.

On May 9 2016 in Metro (the free newspaper), the heading of a news item was 1 in 3 pupils `not ready for school`. `Almost a third of four-year-olds are not considered to be ready for the classroom, a report found`. In this State of Education report, by schools` leaders service The Key, it is further claimed that `Lack of social skills (79%) delayed speech (78%) and deficient self-help skills/resilience (69%) are believed to be the most common reasons for children not being at the expected level when they enter school’. It is claimed that: More than half of the 1,188 primary school leaders surveyed also said that under-prepared pupils are arriving with reading (58%), writing (56%) and numerical levels (55%) below the standard they would expect. Speaking about the findings Fergal Roche, The Key chief executive, said, `School leaders are already struggling to retain staff and manage their teachers` workload, so add thousands more pupils arriving illprepared for the classroom to the equation, and the burden placed on our schools is huge`. (See (http:// www.careappointments.co.uk/care-news/england/ item/39558-tens-of-thousands-of-children-lacking-inschool-readiness-new-report).

These responses say much about the expectations being placed on teachers, and children on entry to primary school, by the regime of testing and accountability in England. School readiness seems now

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to be claimed to be measurable by testing the young children`s competence on entry to primary school aged four to five years on very limited aspects of reading, writing and numeracy; no account is being taken of the many more important attributes shown by research to influence children`s readiness for learning. Parents may be encouraged to see these as priorities, and thus be tempted to purchase the many commercial programmes widely advertised to ensure their children are `school ready`. In her dissertation on Perspectives of school readiness: the experiences of practitioners and children, Cottrell having reviewed the recent research literature on school readiness, claims that school readiness is defined in research as not only the cognitive skills, but the physical, socio-emotional and language competence required in order to cope with the demands of the classroom. It is clear that there are still disputes as to whether the focus should be on the child being school ready or the curriculum such as to meet the needs of the individual children (Cottrell, 2015. www.vulnerability360.wordpress.com).

Two new researches provide important evidence for the debate on school readiness of young children around five years of age, at least for the formal testing and expectations placed on them currently. In his article, `School starters` vision – an educational approach`, Wilhelmsen (2016 in press) questions whether the level of visual development and gender differences may influence how pupils react, behave and learn in school. He claims this ought to have an impact on our expectations with regard to young children`s school performance, stating that school starters have a less mature visual acuity at a close reading distance than at far distance. The second research, a population study by a team at UCL led by Professor Courtenay Frazier Norbury, claims in a Press Release on 17 May 2016 that, `Approximately two children in every Year 1 class will experience a clinically significant language disorder that impacts learning`. The study due to be published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry found that children with unexplained language disorders have higher social, emotional and behavioural problems, with 88% failing to achieve early curriculum targets.

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The future of baseline and school readiness testing in UK DfE announced that the plans for the baseline assessments for reception classes in 2016 to act as measures of progress would be postponed following the publication of a research questioning the comparability of the 3 different reception baseline assessments used in the 2015 to 2016 academic year. (http://gov.uk/government/news/reception-baselinecomparability-study-published). DfE stated it would now consult with stakeholders. I was therefore surprised to find, that schools can still use on-entry assessments in 2016 to 2017. On 14 April (on Gov.UK) schools were not only encouraged to sign up with approved providers, but DfE will cover basic cost of approved baselines. It should be noted that not only are the three previous providers listed but a fourth has now been included GL Assessment (http://www.gl-assessment.co.uk/ products/ baseline-reception-baseline-assessment).

On their webpage GL Assessment reports not only that they are a recognised provider, but that `Baseline and now brand new Baseline Progress enables teachers to assess children on entry to school (Reception/P1/Y1) and measure their progress in literacy and mathematics at the end of the same year`. Why one may ask is this further commercial provider now included at a time when it had been claimed that stakeholders would be consulted. I noted on GLs webpage mention of Reception and Year 1, but also Primary 1 (the first class in primary schools in Scotland), suggesting they may have their sights on a wider child population!

I was disturbed to see new plans being outlined in Scotland for national testing of children in Primary 1 (there are no reception classes in Scotland). The Herald on 5/19/2016 carried the headline, `Plan for youngest pupils to sit hour-long school tests`. Concern had been expressed by the National Parent Forum of Scotland. On investigating this further I find that the National Improvement for Scottish Education was launched by The First Minister on 6.1.16, one of whose priorities is to improve attainment for all, particularly in literacy and numeracy. Of relevance here is the statement that the aim is that every child is ready for school and able to succeed. At P1 it is suggested that a short assessment will focus on a range of early reading, writing and numeracy skills:

For example, recognising sounds, letters and common words. In numeracy this could include ordering numbers and grouping 3D objects (see gov. scot/Resource/0048/00484452).

It is to be hoped that the teaching profession and parents in Scotland are able to influence the outcome of any such plans.

Concluding comments In an ongoing research at Newman University we have been gathering information relevant to baseline assessments of young children in reception class as proposed by the government. A significant initial finding was that in three schools with a total of 117 reception children assessed in 2015, 52 children speak at least one other language; 16 different languages in addition to English are spoken by children in these four reception classes. Yet, the government`s plan was to assess these children within six weeks of starting in reception class in English with a single score on one of three measures EE, CEM or NFER used to map their progress and to make the schools accountable. It took a research project reporting in March 2016 Reception baseline comparability study (Standards and Testing Agency) for the government to decide not to proceed with its plans. The conclusion of the research was: We therefore conclude from this study that there is insufficient comparability between the 3 baseline assessments to enable them to be used in the accountability system concurrently (20).

There was a Press release on 7 April 2016: https// www.gov.uk/government/publications/receptionbaseline-comparability-study. In communicating their decision not to proceed with the planned scheme in 2016, DfE stated that it was still committed to assessment in reception; that they would continue to give schools the option to use the baseline assessments next year, although they will not be used for accountability. It was also stated that, `over the coming months we will be considering options for improving assessment arrangements in reception beyond 2016/17 and will engage stakeholders in that work`.

In spite of this statement we now find that not only is

funding still available for the three approved providers, but a fourth provider has been added to the list.

One must be suspicious as to whether its goal of finding an on entry single baseline test of school readiness has been abandoned by DfE, with the aim not only of monitoring children`s progress but making teachers accountable. It is important that decisions are based on evidence rather than political dogma, or the pressures of commercial providers, now in Scotland as well as in England.

References NB See www.newman.ac.uk/24feb/4560 for summaries of eight recent researches on baseline assessment and references to their publications. See Clark 2005 and Clark 2016 for full references for quotations cited in this article. The details for the four Education Journal articles cited, three by Clark and one by Wormwell, are provided in the text. Online publications are also referenced in the text.

Clark, M. M. (2005) Understanding Research in Early Education: the relevance for the future of lessons from the past. Second edition. Abingdon: Routledge.

Clark, M. M. (2016) Learning to be Literate: insights from research for policy and practice. Revised edition. Abingdon: Routledge.

Wilhelmsen, G.B. (2016) `School starters` vision- an educational approach`. Improving Schools 19(2). In press.

Wrigley, T. and Wormwell, L. (2016) `Infantile accountability: when big data meet small children`. Improving Schools. 19(2) in press.

Margaret Clark Dr. Margaret Clark is Emeritus Professor at Newman University. Trained as a primary teacher her career includes teaching in Scotland, Research Officer for the NFER and teaching at Jordanhill College of Education.

Her latest book, Learning to be Literate is reviewed on page 24.

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The Book Page The Harder Facts of Life by Carey Fluker Hunt We live in a wonderful world and the urge to share the best of it with children can be very strong. As parents and teachers we focus on the ‘positive’ and the books we offer children reflect this. Picturebooks, in particular, are awash with empathetic animals intent on making the world a warm and fuzzy place. But I’m not objecting to feel-good creativity: far from it. Snuggling with a storybook is one of the greatest pleasures on the planet, and I’m as delighted as the next person by bears who keep the dark at bay with nightlights.

But even when the lanterns are lit, the darkness has a habit of intruding. It’s tempting to turn Picturebook Land into a ‘happy zone’, but when the TV shows war and rioting and drowned toddlers on beaches, that temptation is misplaced. Children pick up information everywhere. Along with imaginative fantasies and escapist fun, we need to offer them a safe and constructive way to grapple with ideas that may seem daunting. And that means helping children to understand their feelings and those of other people; to think creatively; to see another person’s point of view: in short, to gain the kind of skills they’ll need to face the darkness in this world, courageously, and deal with it.

I’ve made it sound as if picturebooks are nothing but a cuddly distraction, which isn’t true. Every child should have their fill of the fantastical and quirky, and imaginative warmth is more important than a cold, hard diet of realism. But picturebooks are one of the most powerful resources we possess for engaging children of all ages in thinking and talking about the questions that really matter, and we are not helping anybody by prioritising the ‘cute’ at the expense of more challenging material.

So here’s a small selection of the best ideas picturebooks. All benefit from adult introduction and support, particularly if your family or class isn’t used to books of this type, but children respond well to them – almost hungrily, in fact.

Little Beauty by Anthony Browne explores a gorilla’s friendship with a kitten, with sophisticated illustrations that repay close observation and a deceptively simple text. The story was inspired by primate language studies and encourages questioning. What does friendship mean, and is it a purely human concept?

Is it wrong to be angry? And how should animals be treated? Good for sharing from 3+ Rose Blanche by Ian McEwan and Roberto Inncocenti introduces readers to an ordinary German child caught up in the confusion and horrors of the Second World War. With its detailed, historically-accurate illustrations and unflinching honesty, this book can be upsetting for adults. But the story is told with a gentle care that demonstrates the potential for human kindness as well as brutality, and children are able to engage at their own pace with the more complex layers in the text. For children aged 7+ Chillingly relevant, both to the wider world and the dramas of the school playground, Armin Greder’s The Island takes an unflinching look at xenophobia and its consequences. With an almost savage intensity, Greder conjures a bleak, monochromatic space and inhabits it with hulking villagers. Into it comes a stranger: a naked man who ‘isn’t like’ the rest of them. Do the villagers turn him away? Well, no, they don’t. But as they march him across the island, it’s hard to see evidence of compassion, and the lies and whispers that follow the stranger’s arrival are genuinely shocking. For older children aged 10+

To find out more…

If your children enjoy getting their teeth into these books, you can search online for similar titles. The reviews in Books for Keeps or on the BookTrust website may help.

Carey Fluker Hunt is Creative Development Manager at Seven Stories, the National Centre for Children’s books based in Newcastle Upon Tyne. Carey writes in a personal capacity.

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The Christian Schiller Memorial lecture

This is an account of the lecture given by Peter Blatchford which aims to stay close to the content of the talk. The presentation started with some observations made in a small infant school class of 18 children (originally published in ‘The Class Size Debate’ a book by Peter Blatchford, 2003).

Does Class Size Matter?

There was a lightness about the activities and a great deal of humour. The teacher joked with the children. It wasn’t that work was neglected, rather it was supported by a personal style of interaction. The teacher was able to maintain a running and public commentary on children’s work.

What have we learned from 50 years of research? by Peter Blatchford

The teacher was able to stay with one small group (who she felt needed her help) for more or less the whole session. They received sustained attention and received immediate feedback. Task allocation and preparation was very deliberate, responsive and individualised.

The teacher felt that the main advantage of having a small class was that she knew the children individually, and that this informed her teaching, e.g. in terms of questions to children. She was aware of who knew and who did not know something.

The teacher felt very strongly that hearing children of this age read individually in school was important. The small class allowed almost daily sessions in which there was a stress on individualised support at this crucial time in children’s reading development. This would not be possible in a larger class.

There was a noticeable contrast with the situation in another school involving a teacher in a large class of over 30. While the teacher in the small class spent little time on control, and there was little need to keep children on task. In the large class interactions with the children involved a constant battle to keep their attention on task. As a consequence the teacher was severe and the children subdued.

Of course these informal observations are not conclusive but they do reflect on the way that small classes can have a positive role. A positive view also comes from the STAR project in the USA, which we will look at later. The Principal Investigators on the project concluded: “Class size (reductions) should not just be a cornerstone, but the foundation of educational policy for the early education of America’s citizenry.” (Achilles & Finn, 2000) But there is also a widely heard negative view about class size reductions. A recent high profile expression of this was by Andreas Schleicher, the Head of the

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OECD PISA surveys. He argued there were 7 big myths about top performing school systems and myth number 4 is the view that small classes raise standards. He said: ‘...everywhere, teachers, parents and policy makers favour small classes as the key to better and more personalised education.’ and went on to argue that high performing countries (many in East Asia) have large classes so the size of a school class cannot therefore be important (BBC website 4th February 2015).

There is then a wide gulf between the experience of many involved in teaching on the one hand and much policy related commentary on the other hand.

Many in education see the value of small classes for teaching and learning but a completely different point of view suggests class size is unimportant. This disjuncture between the professional view and policy related commentary might be seen as the Class Size Conundrum (CSC).

It is interesting to compare the situation in the UK with that of the OECD generally. Average primary class size in the OECD is 21 pupils while in the UK the average is 27. Primary class sizes in the UK are the fourth largest in OECD. Across OECD countries the number of students per class tends to increase between primary and lower secondary education but unusually in the UK class sizes in primary schools (av 27) are larger than lower secondary schools (av 20). Currently in England there are concerns about the lack of school places and the fragmented state of local educational planning which are putting great pressures on schools, and resulting in increases in ‘super sized’ classes over 30 even for infant aged pupils (5-7 years), even though there is still supposed to be a legal maximum of 30.

East Asia reveals a different picture. In contrast to the West there has been a recent strong interest in smaller class sizes in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macao and other countries and regions in East Asia and Government and state led initiatives to reduce the number of pupils. This is very interesting when one considers that these regions regularly top the PISA international rankings of educational performance.

‘Small class teaching’ (SCT) or ‘small class education’ have become a strong force in an attempt to move

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also tend to have large classes. However these kinds from a teacher to learner centred pedagogy and part of cross country comparisons are flawed since an of Government educational reforms, e.g. in China association does not mean one can imply causality. (the National Outline for Medium and Long-term There are many reasons why high performing countries Education Reform and Development (2010-2020), in do well, e.g. parental support, cultural factors, private Hong Kong (the ‘six principles’), and in Taiwan ( the tutoring and so on. The McKinsey report is widely cited ‘spirit of SCT’). There has also been an emphasis on but its conclusions are based almost entirely on one professional development to support changes to small paper by Hanushek. Eric Hanushek is an American class teaching, something largely unheard of in the economist who argues that class size is a relatively West. This reflects the fact there are different aims to trivial influence on academic progress and that funds the West’s concern with academic performance. In the East there are worries that despite high performance on should be invested elsewhere. However there have been strong critiques of his work, e.g. by Ehrenberg et test scores, PISA results also show that Korean students al (2003) and Berliner and Biddle (2002). have the lowest expressed interest in mathematics, and Hong Kong students show Econometric analyses of class size low interest in reading for effects are increasingly central to One common strategy, as enjoyment (Lai, Blatchford & current views on class size and now in the quote from Andreas Dong 2015) dominate the literature in the West.

Schleicher, is to argue that There are some very sophisticated But what does the research tell class size can’t be important analyses of class size effects, e g us? Does it matter if primary Altinok and Kingdon (2012), but aged pupils are in large classes because high performing despite valiant efforts to address over 30? What have we learned countries on PISA scores also possible confounding factors the from 50 years of research? tend to have large classes. basic data sets are limited and often Research into class size can However these kinds of cross cross sectional. be considered in three stages. country comparisons are What might be called ‘first The meta-meta (mega) analysis by generation’ research considers flawed since an association John Hattie and published in the the connection between class book ‘Visible Learning’ has also had does not mean one can imply size and academic attainment; a profound impact. ‘Visible Learning’ causality. ‘second generation’ research is probably the most famous metaexamines class size and analysis in education, and the classroom processes, and ‘third generation’ research book is a best seller. It summarises 800 meta-analyses considers effective teaching in relation to class size. Let covering over 50,000 studies involving millions of us look at each of these in turn. subjects using a common metric of an ‘effect size’.

Class size is low down in the rankings of effectiveness The recent narrative about class size effects on of interventions - 106th. There are, though, problems attainment suggests that it is not important. Highly in interpreting findings from meta-analyses, e.g., due influential reports from OECD in Focus 13 20/12/02; to the over inclusion of studies, some of less quality, McKinsey & Company (2007); Gratton Institute (2012); and the mix of studies, e.g., primary and secondary. But Brookings Institution (Whitehouse and Chingos,2011) there is also a fundamental problem: is this a fair test? and the UK Sutton Trust Toolkit have led to the view Hattie compares class size with e.g. reciprocal teaching, that class size reduction (CSR) is not cost effective teaching meta-cognitive strategies, direct instruction, and the binary choice is between investing in smaller but these are distinctive methods of teaching; CSR classes or teacher quality. merely sets limits on number of pupils in a class.

However the evidence base for class size effects in An important point, not always recognised, is that these reports is often vague and unconvincing. One secondary analyses of the sort just discussed are common strategy, as in the quote from Andreas not dedicated studies. Cross country comparisons, Schleicher, is to argue that class size can’t be important econometric analyses and Hattie’s reviews all use data because high performing countries on PISA scores

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collected by other researchers sometimes for other purposes and not dedicated studies of the effect of class size. They are not necessarily wrong but it is odd that so much weight is attached to studies that don’t directly address the topic on which conclusions are made.

There are two main types of dedicated research design which can provide a firmer handle on class size effects. One is experimental (e.g., STAR) and the other is naturalistic longitudinal regression approaches (e.g., CSPAR).

The Tennessee STAR Project is of considerable significance. It represents the gold standard design for establishing causality in that it is a randomised experiment. Pupils and teachers at kindergarten to Grade 3 were assigned at random to three types of class within the same school: small class (around 17 pupils), regular class (around 23 students) and regular class with teacher-aide. At the end of each year pupils in small classes performed significantly better in reading and maths than pupils in both regular classes. Pupils from minority ethnic backgrounds gained most from small classes (Finn and Achilles, 1999, Nye, Hedges and Konstantopoulos,2000). There have been criticisms of the study, e.g., relating to attrition, cross over between groups, and the lack of baseline achievement measures (see Ehrenberg et al, Goldstein and Blatchford) but further statistical analyses broadly support the original findings. The STAR project is a very impressive piece of educational research.

Other American experimental studies, e.g., Primetime, the California study and SAGE are limited in their designs and are not as strong as the STAR project.

Unfortunately, equal weighting is wrongly given by many reviews and meta-analyses.

There has been little empirical research regarding class size in East Asia. One study commissioned by the Hong Kong government (Galton and Pell, 2010) compared CSR classes with control classes but teachers in the CSR classes also took part in professional development (PD) and it was not possible to distinguish the effects of CSR and PD. It was concluded that differences in academic outcomes between experimental and control classes were not marked perhaps because the Hong Kong teachers rely on textbooks and don’t change their teaching with fewer pupils.

The UCL Institute of Education study, CSPAR, was a multi method study that examined the effects of class sizes as they occurred naturally in schools across England (rather than controlling for class size as in experimental studies) and controlled statistically for potentially confounding factors, like student attainment levels. The study analysed the progress of the same pupils from school entry (the reception year, 4 yrs) to Y6 (11 years). There was a large sample - over 20,000 pupils - and their academic attainment and many other measures were collected at the end of each school year.

Sophisticated statistical analysis including multi-level modelling to control for confounding variables was conducted. There was also a careful study of classroom processes connected to class size differences, using questionnaires, interviews and systematic observation approaches.

The findings showed that literacy attainment was higher in smaller classes over the first two years of schooling. The class size effect was slightly larger than the differences between boys and girls, which we know to be significant. There was a similar effect for maths for the first year of schooling. Small classes benefitted pupils of all abilities but low achieving pupils gained more in literacy. Interestingly, the effect size was of similar magnitude to that found in the experimental STAR study in the US. So arguably the best and largest studies (STAR and CSPAR) therefore agree on the size of effect (about .25), and that effects are most marked in the early years of schooling after school entry. Smaller classes seem to benefit the most disadvantaged and low attaining pupils the most. It is often said that class sizes have to be less than 20 for any effect to be seen but the CSPAR was able to measure effects of class size across the full distribution of class sizes and no clear evidence of a threshold effect was found; the effects were broadly linear.

The UCL Institute of Eucation then followed up CSPAR with the DISS (the Deployment and Impact of Support Staff) study. Is an increase in the numbers of support staff an alternative to small classes? In the UK, Teaching Assistants (TAs) now make up a quarter of the workforce in primary schools, and spend much of their time in predominantly instructional activities with students (Blatchford. Russell and Webster,2012).

TAs have a major effect on pupil adult ratios.

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Positive findings have come from specific curriculum interventions given by TAs (Alborz et al, 2009), but the DISS project (Blatchford, Russell and Webster 2012) found pupils with more support from TAs over the year made less progress when compared to similar pupils with less or no support, even after controlling for reasons why pupils allocated more support (reflected in low initial attainment or special educational need). It does not seem that the increase in TAs is an adequate response to larger class sizes.

Despite the importance of the class size topic and the periodic concerns over rising class sizes, there are very few good dedicated studies of class size effects, and no recent studies; there is therefore a need for new first generation research.

Academic performance is obviously important but there is a need for research on other outcomes and processes. This takes us to second generation research - what can we conclude from studies of the effect of class size on classroom processes? Does class size affect the amount and type of teacher pupil interaction? The amount of student engagement in class? Again the research base is not strong. It is often anecdotal and reliant on teacher reports. There are few rigorous (e.g., systematic observation) studies (Finn et al, 2003). Finn et al (2003) point to a disagreement over whether effects are stronger on teaching or on pupils, and argue that the clearest effects are on pupil classroom engagement.

There were some consistent findings from the IOE CSPAR study. This component of the study used systematic observation methods recording moment-bymoment interactions and behaviour in large and small classes and found that in the final primary year (Y6) there was more teacher direct individual contact with pupils, both brief and more sustained, in small classes.

There was also more pupil talk to the teacher, both initiating and responding to the teacher (Blatchford et al, 2005).

Previous research has not examined possible interactions between class size and type of pupil such as low attainers and high attainers or pupils with special educational needs. The DISS study tackled this deficiency through another systematic observation study. There were a total of 34,420 observations of 683 pupils in 49 schools. A sample of eight pupils per

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class was observed in four year groups (Years 1 & 3 or Years 7 & 10). Observations of Maths English and Science lessons were made in blocks of 10 ten-second time intervals, with gaps of twenty seconds between observations to allow recording.

The study found that low attainers suffered more in large classes in terms of more off task behaviour and more teacher criticism. A very recent as yet unpublished analysis of differences in terms of level of SEN shows that those pupils in mainstream schools with statements for SEN or on School Action Plus also benefit more from smaller classes.

Recent OECD surveys indicate, contrary to their often reported conclusion that class size is not an important, that there are other advantages associated with small classes. The 2013 OECD Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) (which was published in November 2015) shows that: smaller class sizes are perceived as allowing teachers to spend less time managing the class and more time with each student.

The results also show that larger classes are correlated with less time spent on actual teaching and learning, more time spent on keeping order in the classroom and more time spent on administrative tasks. Larger classes are associated with a higher proportion of students with behavioural problems, which perhaps explains less time spent on teaching and learning activities.

Research on processes related to class size is very limited. Although much coverage of the issue focuses on pupil attainment only, the effects are likely to be multiple. It is important that research should consider outcomes other than the merely academic - outcomes such as the pupils’ attitude to learning, their enthusiasm and confidence, their ability to learn independently, their ability to think critically and to develop personal creativity and practical skills are possibilities. Important outcomes for teachers include the provision of individual help for pupils and the assessment of progress. What about the ethos of the class, the level of cooperation and, above all, the personal relationships of all concerned?

So does this help explain the Class Size Conundrum?

The lack of attention in much research to non-academic outcomes might help explain the disparity between teachers’ view of the benefits of small classes (which is based on a wide perception of pupil functioning) and

There are again lessons from East Asia. As we have more modest results from research (which has mostly seen, many countries in the region have high levels of focused on academic test results). school performance and large classes, but governments We turn now to the third generation of research on there want to change predominant teaching approaches class size, or, rather, the lack of such research. John (teacher dominated, high stakes exams, high pressure Hattie asks an important question: why are the effects on students, lack of creativity and independent of CSR often so modest (Hattie, in Blatchford et al, in press)? If more attention was paid to this question then learning) to more a learner centred pedagogy. As we have seen, this has been called ‘Small Class Teaching’ we could move beyond the arid debate about whether (Lai, Blatchford and Galton, in Blatchford et al, in press), CSR on its own is a good or bad thing. It’s important and has often been accompanied by professional to say again that CSR is not in itself an educational development to try and ensure that teachers make the initiative like other interventions with which it is often most of smaller classes. Educationalists working with unfairly compared: it is just a reduction of the number schools in Nanjing, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Taiwan of pupils in a classroom. There is a need to change have extensive experience of supporting teachers to teaching in relation to the size of class. enhance the effectiveness of SCT, as seen in a soon Posing the policy decision as being a choice between to be published book in English investment in CSR and investment (Blatchford et al, in press). in teacher quality is therefore too Our efforts should be Unfortunately in East Asia there simplistic. We cannot separate the has been very little empirical devoted to the development individual and the situational - it evidence and systematic of informed pedagogical is the interaction between the two evaluation. that is crucial. Our efforts should changes in small classes.

The Leverhulme funded ‘Class be devoted to the development What constitutes effective Size and Effective Teaching’ of informed pedagogical changes teaching in small classes? network is an international in small classes. What constitutes What opportunities are grouping of researchers who are effective teaching in small classes? currently exploring the interaction presented by small classes?

What opportunities are presented between teaching effectiveness by small classes? What do smaller What do smaller classes and class size. Outcomes other classes allow me to do differently allow me to do differently or than academic progress are being or better? And, if we are faced better? considered, e.g., like well-being. with large classes, how can we The aim of the international provide the best kind of teaching network is to advance understanding of the educational approaches? The view that teaching improves naturally effects of class size, and address the neglected topic with a change to smaller classes can be dismissed; of effective pedagogies in different sizes of class. It is there is evidence that teachers do not always change enabling researchers from the UK, mainland Europe, their teaching when faced with fewer pupils. Another East Asia and the USA to build a broader international approach is to draw on what we know about effective perspective, involving strategically important countries, teaching generally, e.g. generic principles of effective and offers a unique opportunity to share findings and instruction (Brophy, Everstson; Galton and Pell’s ‘six move the field on, with important practical benefits for principles’), and apply this to professional training education world wide. Insights from this work can be for small classes (this is what has happened in Hong found in a new book edited by Blatchford, Chan, Galton, Kong). But this could be supplemented by what Lai and Lee. research there has been on class size effects. Again A final thought about class size concerns the connection there has been little work on this but some have tried to develop informed pedagogical approaches in relation with pupils with special educational needs. In the UK to small classes ( Wang and Finn, 2000; Finn and Wang, and elsewhere there are long standing policies on the inclusion of pupils with SEN in mainstream schools. As 2002; Blatchford, Chan, Galton, Lai and Lee, in press; every teacher knows teaching pupils with SEN in large Galton, Lai and Chan, 2015).

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classes is a huge classroom management challenge.

TAs are commonly used to help but IOE research has shown that it is inappropriate to separate pupils with SEN from teachers. It is hard not to believe that pupils with sometimes complex learning problems would not benefit from smaller classes? This is after all typical in special schools. But again there is little research to help.

Conclusions • Class size IS important • Small classes for youngest pupils • Targeted CSR for older pupils (e.g. low attainers and those with SEN) • Plan carefully the deployment of TAs • Reclaim the class size debate from economists!

• Educators should develop and evaluate effective pedagogical strategies in relation to class size

Finn, J. D., Pannozzo, G.M., and Achilles, C.M (2003) The ‘why’s’ of class size: student behaviour in small classes.

Review of Educational Research 73, 3, 321-368 Galton, M., Lai, K.C., Chan, K. W. (2014) Learning to Teach Small Classes: Lessons from East Asia (Routledge) Harfitt, G.J. (2015) Class Size Reduction: Insights from Secondary School Classrooms, Springer Hattie, J. (2005) The paradox of reducing class size and improving learning outcomes. International Journal of Educational Research, 43, 387-425 Papers on the class size topic can be downloaded through the publications sub menu of www.classsizeresearch.org.uk Professor Peter Blatchford is Professor of Psychology and Education at the UCL Institute of Education. He directed a pioneering UK longitudinal research project on the effects of class size differences at reception, KS1 and 2 on pupil academic attainment and classroom processes.

Some references for IOE Class Size research Blatchford, P. (2003) The Class Size Debate: Is Small Better?

Maidenhead: Open University Press Blatchford, P. (2003) A systematic observational study of teachers’ and pupils’ behaviour in large and small classes.

Learning and Instruction, 13, 6, 569-595 Blatchford, P., Bassett, P. and Brown, P. (2005) Teachers’ and pupils’ behaviour in large and small classes: a systematic observation study of pupils aged 10/11 years. Journal of Educational Psychology, 97, 3, 454-457 Blatchford, P., Bassett, P. and Brown, P. (2011) Examining the effect of class size on classroom engagement and teacher - pupil interaction: differences in relation to prior pupil attainment and primary vs secondary schools. Learning and Instruction, 21, 715-730 Further class size references Blatchford, P. (2012) Class size: is small better? In Adey, P. and Dillon, J. (Eds) Bad Education: Debunking Myths in Education. Open University Press: Maidenhead, UK (ISBN 13:9780335246014 (pb); elSBN: 9780335246021 Blatchford, P., Chan, Kam Wing., Galton, M., Lai, Kwok Chan Lee, John Chi-Kin (Eds.) (in press) Class size: Eastern and Western perspectives. Book for Asia-Europe Education Dialogue Series.

Series Editor Kerry Kennedy, Routledge Ehrenberg, R.G., Brewer, D. J., Gamoran,A. and Willms, J. D, (2001). “Does Class Size Matter?” Scientific American, 285 (November) 32-40.

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Review by Robert Young

Review by John Coe

Learning to be Literate

New Perspectives On Young Children’s Moral Education

by Margaret M Clark published by Routledge

Developing Character through a Virtue Ethics Approach

by Tony Eaude, Bloomsbury Academic

Evidence based decision making is a tangible sign of our all too slow progress in achieving an educated community. There is widespread acceptance, both in and out of parliament, that policy should be rooted not in personal prejudice and opinion but in the facts of any given situation. Research becomes more and more important and it is at this point that we have to be extremely cautious. Is the quoted research a genuine and impartial inquiry or is there an underlying motivation which seeks an outcome which will simply confirm a previously held opinion? It has been wisely said that there is no value free research. Suffice to say that we should always consider who has funded the research when judging its impartiality. Equally important, how free were the researchers to do their work and were they free of censorship when they published their findings? Governments of all political colours must examine their consciences and the peer reviewed world of higher education remains our surest defence against the manipulation of evidence.

Professor Clark’s latest book takes a cool, primary trained, look at the insights gained from over fifty years of research into children learning the skill of reading. The result is a book which summarizes the evidence upon which our teaching should be based. The validity of published research findings is examined, often through consideration of the research design. Specific attention is paid to how far or, at times, how little the data justifies the published findings. The result is an impressive and entirely objective survey of the current body of knowledge concerning the teaching and learning of reading.

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In very many ways children need to be readers in order to access knowledge and skill right across the curriculum. It is understandable that methods of teaching reading have for many years been the subject of intense public debate and indeed there have been times when the advocacy of one method or another has reached hysteria. Margaret Clark applies her clinical eye to the strident claims that synthetic phonics are the key to progress and, even more ludicrously, that phonic awareness is the same as reading. The flavour of her book can be gained from her reportage of the research findings given here: There is benefit from the inclusion of phonics within the early instruction in learning to read in English, within a broad programme.

There is not evidence to support phonics in isolation as the one best method.

There is not evidence for synthetic phonics as the required approach rather than analytic phonics.

Primary teachers are under heavy pressure to concentrate upon the teaching of synthetic phonics as their first approach to beginning readers. But before we bend the knee to those who are so passionately convinced that they are right that they seek to direct our teaching we should examine the evidence. The findings gained from research are crystal clear and it is the evidence and not personal conviction, however strongly held, which should guide our work. This book supports our professionalism and it merits a place in the libraries of all schools and universities, particularly those engaged in initial training.

New Perspectives on Young Children’s Moral education is a wide-ranging text with an impressive academic compass embracing many different but related aspects of the world of the young child.

Its essential focus may be on the educational context for moral development and the role we can play as supportive adults both within the classroom and beyond, but on route the author takes us into a myriad of themes which impinge upon the child growing up in today’s society, including the changing landscape of societal values and child care, the significance of play and narrative in the forging of moral identity and the nature of the hidden curriculum in schools and its potential for shaping ethos, values and expectations.

In the context of the government’s current expectations with regard to the PREVENT agenda and the risks of extremist radicalisation, this is a timely text in its exploration of the complexities in socialisation and the pervasive role played by educational agencies on the one hand and peer groups on the other. Paradoxically, this book also has enormous resonance at a time when the government’s agenda in recent decades has become increasingly pre-occupied with the traditionally conceived core skills and their assessment at the expense of the wider curriculum, including personal, moral and social education. The author is doing us a great service in addressing part of the educational landscape which has become something of a poor relative!

The strength of the book resides in part in the particular personal biography the author, Tony Eaude, is able to invest in his work, a journey which has taken him into the primary classroom and headship as well as more recently into academic research as a Research Fellow in the Department of Education at the University of Oxford. Case studies derived from his own school encounters serve to illuminate key points, complementing the insights from his reviews of relevant literature. The latter is formidable in its range, providing the text with a very strong backbone of academic integrity.

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Develop for the ed Curricu 2014 lum

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The author does not shy away from the complexity of the issues he is addressing. There are no quick fixes in the world of moral education, no straightforward panaceas for transforming pupils into upright citizens. …moral education is more like a process or way of working, embedded within each subject and across the curriculum than a question of content.

For Eaude moral education is all encompassing, bound up with the very fabric of human institutions, the intricacies of human relationships, the models established by adults, the value laden emphases we communicate through everyday conversation as well as the particular messages we impart in the process of making ethical judgements. A key dimension is the manner in which we as adults support children to find the right language for reflection on the moral agenda and for articulating their perspectives.

The author also has some pertinent observations to make about the current pre-occupation with behaviour management, challenging the reader to think beyond the simplistic mechanisms of manipulating rewards and sanctions. …rewards and sanctions must be used carefully and be temporary like scaffolding, rather than props, if they are not to create dependence on extrinsic motivators.

The ultimate goal is to establish a sense of moral independence and human agency, rather than compliance and moral dependence.

This is a text which deserves scrutiny, not only by heads and teachers who want to reflect on and enhance further the moral dimension of their work in schools and are looking for inspiration, but also by students who are building up a repertoire of conceptual tools for addressing this critical but neglected area in education.

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Bringing the child back in

by Terry Wrigley

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Then there appeared a young man in some kind of uniform and both began to speak to me as if I were a thief whom they had caught redhanded: “What right do you have to read this trash to our children?”

And the young man went on to explain, in an instructor’s tone, that books for Soviet children must be not fantasies, not fairy tales, but only the kind that offer most authentic facts.

(Chukovsky, 1963: 115) The year is 1929, and children’s author Kornei Chukovsky is telling some funny stories to sick children.

The young man’s dogmatic response leads Chukovsky to think about the role of the imagination in developing the mind of the growing child, but also in the development of scientific understanding.

Charles Darwin was such a fantasy spinner in his childhood

that everyone thought him to be a worse fibber than Munchausen. (p117) He remembers an essay by a mechanics professor entitled The importance of fantasy to the engineer, and contrasts this with the narrow-mindedness of a new group of child development experts: ‘miserable theoreticians of child guidance, contending that fairy tales, toys, and songs were useless to children of proletarians.’

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One of these utilitarians had tried to protect her son from fairy tales, determined that he should ‘grow up a realist’ (p118). Unfortunately for her theory, her son persisted in being a child. As she describes, disapprovingly, in her diary, he began to spin fantasies from morning to night: a red elephant came to live in his room...

And with the first snow he became a reindeer, a little reindeer in a Siberian forest. And if he sat on a rug, the rug would immediately be transformed into a ship.

And any time, with the power of his childish fantasy, he could draw any animal out of the air. (p119) Chukovsky’s From two to five provides a salutary reminder for our own days of the perils of trying to eliminate childhood. This fascinating book has multiple examples of what happens when adults attempt to teach children things that are beyond them. In constructivist fashion, the children grapple to understand them with the tools and experiences at their disposal: “Daddy, when you were little, were you a boy or a girl?”

“Daddy, please cut down this pine tree – it makes the wind.”

Attempts to suppress childhood have occurred at various points in history. Chukovsky himself includes examples of high Puritanism in 16th and 17th Century England, when earnest guardians of the soul wrote stories for children about eternal suffering in hell.

‘They tried to make a sombre adult out of every child.’

(Chukovsky 1963: 108) At the height of industrial development, Dickens’ Hard Times opens with the words: Now what I want is Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else. You can only form the mind of reasoning animals upon Facts: nothing else will ever be of any service to them.

Clearly the ghost of Gradgrind can still be found wandering the corridors of the Department for Education.

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Neoliberalism occupies childhood Current attempts to banish childhood are shaped by neoliberalism, albeit with a fair dose of neoconservative nostalgia thrown in. In our day, childhood must be utilised to provide a reservoir of human capital for the future. Even nursery education has to be justified in terms of economic benefit rather than the growth and wellbeing of children: More great childcare is vital to ensuring we can compete in the global race, by helping parents back to work and readying children for school and, eventually, employment (Department for Education 2013: 5).

Numbers form a mechanism by which this bizarre worldview is held together, and without them the spurious logic would disintegrate. Numbers appear neutral and therefore authoritative: they present to us as simply an unbiased reflection of the real world, untainted by theories or ideologies. They are anything but. Governance by statistical comparison is a consequence of neoliberalism and its reduction of all human activity to economic calculations. Numbers serve as the currency of New Public Management in which business sets the moral and organisational standard for all human activity.

The attempt to roll back progressive education Children have to be re-imagined and childhood made to disappear, which requires a reversal of nearly two centuries spent building pedagogical respect and understanding. We can trace a protracted struggle for childhood as a zone of freedom - Pestalozzi, Froebel, Dewey, Macmillan, Plowden and all the rest, as well as countless thoughtful, caring educators whose names are not in the history books (see Stewart and McCann1967; Lawrence 1952). The connecting principles include • keeping childhood free from economic activity • seeing the educative value of play • relating the child’s interest to society’s cultural inheritance • upholding the relationship between thinking and experience.

Neoliberal policy represents an attempt to replace pedagogy with effectiveness data. The primary school curriculum is compressed to speed up and intensify knowledge acquisition, based not on realistic engagement with the child’s interests but on logging the targets set by PISA winners and pushing them downwards earlier and earlier - Too much too young!

The open letter from 100 academics (2013) published under this headline warned education ministers:

Rather than using explanations to refine action, Gove’s national curriculum assumes that children can do nothing until they hear the rules. Rich experience is suppressed and literacy appears as bleached and dried up bones. As Michael Rosen (2012) jokes : We at Ruth Miskin Academy are pioneering Miskin Kick Score Incorporated where in the first year you play Un-Football, by playing without the ball.

The child becomes little more than a data shadow:

The lists of spellings, facts and rules will not develop children’s ability to think or encourage critical understanding and creativity. It takes no account of children’s age and will place pressure on teachers to rely on rote learning without understanding. Inappropriate demands will lead to failure and demoralisation.

When we frame the universe of discourse only in terms of children’s deficits in English and in phonological awareness (or deficits in any other area), we expel culture, language, identity, intellect, and imagination from our image of the child. (Cummins 2003:56-8)

Little account is taken of children’s potential interests or of the need for young children to relate abstract ideas to their experience, lives and activity.

Sadly for the policy makers, children do not disappear.

Recent weeks have seen an outburst of resistance from parents, as well as growing opposition from teachers. High-stakes accountability feels alien to real educational values and relationships – their reason for being teachers – but at the same time it has come to permeate teachers’ discourse and activity.

The new curriculum is narrow and unbalanced.

Excessive detail in Maths, Science and some aspects of English leaves little space for other learning.

Forget Pestalozzi’s adage learning by hand, heart and head! The necessary pedagogical and epistemological relationship between abstract knowledge and experience is cast aside in the name of global attainment ratings. Exploration, problem solving and engagement would take too much time - such is the impatience of the new accountability. Instead, knowledge is presented in summative form, as the labels for concepts rather than an engagement with the ideas themselves.

Under this regime, children acquire words as empty shells rather than learning concepts. We should remember Vygotsky’s warning: Direct teaching of concepts is impossible and fruitless. A teacher who tries to do this usually accomplishes nothing but empty verbalism, a parrotlike repetition of words by the child, simulating a knowledge of the corresponding concepts but actually covering up a vacuum.

(Vygotsky 1986: 150)

Infantile accountability: when big data meets small children The incorporation of Gove’s national curriculum into KS1 and KS2 tests this year, along with the attempted extension of standardised testing down to the start of Reception, has brought the system to the point of breakdown. The lack of coherence between tests, along with the increased pressures on children facing demands which are ill-matched to their age and development, have led to unprecedented protests from parents and a breakdown of legitimacy for politicians.

Imposing a raft of tests requires some semblance of continuity, so that the illusion is sustained that pupils can progress smoothly and reliably. It depends on the tacit assumption of evenly calibrated linear progress.

This is as ridiculous as a teenager estimating how much longer their newspaper round will take by calculating the remaining door numbers, when in reality numbers 2-12 form a compact terrace, 14-18 are mansions with

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huge gardens, and 20 is a high-rise block.

Nevertheless this is the tacit assumption underpinning the first two decades of primary testing, made even more absurd by the insertion of ‘sub-levels’ as if they were equidistant. It is significant therefore that a succession of challenges from research has made the assumption of smooth linear progress almost untenable.

Firstly, the various SAT tests align poorly with GCSE. Expert statisticians at Education Datalab (2015) have shown that only a third of pupils assessed as 2b at KS1 hit the predicted GCSE grade C, and most of these deviate from the expected path at KS2 or 3. Prediction is particularly unreliable for those with low initial attainment.

Secondly, Baseline Assessment had to be withdrawn because the scores generated by competing providers proved incommensurate, though the problems lie much deeper. Data shows that even the most experienced provider is wrong more often than right in predictions of a child’s future attainment (see Reclaiming Schools, 2016). The DfE didn’t even recognize the folly of using only English to assess children with EAL, or ignoring age differences at this stage of rapid development.

Government ministers are convinced that rapidly improving scores in the Phonics Check reflects better teaching and learning, seemingly unaware of the time spent practising how to read out phonically regular nonsense-words. The age factor alone makes this test meaningless: August-born children are twice as likely to fail as September-born (Clark 2015). In other words, they are probably not old enough. Furthermore, success in the phonics test does not appear to relate to subsequent KS1 Reading results. It is noteworthy that the phonics test results have risen dramatically, but with no change in the Reading results just a year later.

The final absurdity is KS2 Grammar, which rewards children for naming aspects of language use in which they were already competent before starting school (eg modal verbs such as should, can, might) but also for naming features which they are unlikely to use till much older, if at all (eg the subjunctive, semi-colons) (see Richmond 2016). The only use an 11-yearold is likely to make of the subjunctive is in the set

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expression “If I were you...” Tests like this are hardly likely to develop speaking or writing.

Why the discontinuity?

One reason for discontinuity of scores is that the successive tests cover different skills. The DfE’s own data (Department for Education 2010) shows that only half the variation in KS1 scores can be explained by the Early Years profile, even when comparing the reading component on both occasions. This is probably because they focus on different sub-skills: research has shown a poor correlation between pronouncing letters or words and reading for understanding, since comprehension requires a broader mix of knowledge and skills than simply sounding out (Muter et al 2004).

Broader personal development and play provide better predictors of, and better preparation for, later academic success (Whitebread and Bingham 2012).

Attempts are made to compare teachers’ effectiveness on the basis of ‘value added’, compared with standardized pupils proceding at standardized rates.

In reality, progress is systematically reduced by child poverty, chronic unemployment and hopelessness, while other children accelerate due to private tutoring, the absorption of professional parents’ vocabulary and possessing interesting books of their own. Children who start school with limited English tend to score low at first but speed up later. Where are the statisticians who can put a figure on these factors?

Beyond the general trends, there are also multiple individual differences which are simply that: individual differences – of temperament, attitude or personal interests, diverse responses to opportunities or barriers.

To ignore all these factors, real children have to disappear and be replaced by statistical means.

Not rungs on a ladder As Alison Peacock (2011) explains, learning is not like ‘rungs on a ladder’ but ‘a vastly complex process that stops and starts, leaps and sleeps, is both restless and endless.’ This is why she rejects simplistic measures of ‘ability’ or ‘potential’, promoting instead a ‘choice and challenge’ approach to differentiation which restores agency to the learner.

The complex system of levels and sub-levels has been formally abolished, but its ghost walks on. Politicians have charged schools with inventing a replacement, while simultaneously imposing new measurement tools to ‘hold schools to account’ – an impossible situation.

Not surprisingly, many schools are reinventing levels in a different form with the assumption that they should re-calculate progress every term.

Markers of progression It is time to reject bullying by numbers (Wrigley 2015), not resurrect levels in a different form. The real alternative lies in abandoning micromanagement through interminable lists of content and targets. A glance at Finland’s national curriculum (Finnish National Board of Education 2004) reveals broad aspirational statements for the end of each stage. For example, ‘good performance’ at the end of grade 5 (about age 12) includes ‘distinguish opinion in age-appropriate texts’ and ‘know how to read simple tables and diagrams’. 16-year-olds are expected to ‘find similar, congruent and symmetrical figures’ and ‘recognize typical genres of everyday, media and literary texts’.

Statements of similar breadth can certainly be found in England’s National Curriculum. For example, ‘infer characters’ feelings, thoughts and motives’ in Years 5-6.

However they are buried under a mountain of detail: ‘convert a simple fraction such as 3/8 to a decimal fraction’ or ‘solve problems involving percentages eg 15% of 360’.

Broad aspirational statements provide important landmarks for teachers and pupils alike, whilst lists of detailed objectives are disorienting and demoralising.

References 100 academics (2013) Too much too young. Accessed in http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/letters/letters-govewill-bury-pupils-in-facts-and-rules-8540741.html Chukovsky, K (1963) From two to five. (Revised edition trans.

M Morton) Berkeley: University of California Press Clark, M (2015) Learning to be literate – more than phonics. https://reclaimingschools.org/2015/09/05/learning-to-beliterate-more-than-phonics/ (5 Sept) Cummins, J (2003) Challenging the construction of difference

as deficit: where are identity, intellect, imagination, and power in the new regime of truth? In P Trifonas (ed) Pedagogies of difference: Rethinking education for social justice. New York: RoutledgeFalmer Department for Education (2010) Achievement of Children in the Early Years Foundation Stage Profile. Research Report DFERR034 Department for Education (2013) More great childcare: raising quality and giving parents more choice. London: Department for Education Education Datalab (2015) Seven things you might not know about our schools. http://www.educationdatalab.org.uk/ getattachment/Blog/March-2015/Seven-things-you-mightnot-know-about-our-schools/EduDataLab-7things.pdf.aspx Finnish National Board for Education (2004) National core curriculum for basic education 2004. Accessed at http://www. oph.fi/english/curricula_and_qualifications/basic_education Lawrence, E ed. (1952) Friedrich Froebel and English education. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul Muter, V, Hulme, C, Snowling, M and Stevenson J (2004) Phonemes, rimes, vocabulary, and grammatical skills as foundations of early reading development: evidence from a longitudinal study. Developmental Psychology 40(5): 665:681 Peacock, A (2011) Why levels are problematic. Accessed at http://alisonpeacock.net/2013/09/why-levels-areproblematic/ Reclaiming Schools (2016) The delusions of baseline testing. https://reclaimingschools.org/2016/01/18/the-delusionsof-baseline-testing/ Richmond, J (2016) Testing grammar to destruction. https:// reclaimingschools.org/2016/05/10/testing-grammar-todestruction/ Rosen, M (2012) Dear Mr Gove. Marxism conference, London, July 2012 http://swpradiocast.bandcamp.com/track/dear-mrgove-marxism-2012 Stewart, W and McCann, W (1967) The educational innovators 1750-1880. London: Macmillan Vygotsky, L (1986) Thought and language. (edited by A Kozulin) Cambridge, MA: MIT Press Whitebread, D and Bingham, S (2012) School readiness: A critical review of perspectives and evidence. TACTYC Occasional Paper no 2. http://tactyc.org.uk/occasionalpaper/occasional-paper2.pdf Wrigley, T (2015) Bullying by numbers. Primary First, issue 12

Professor Terry Wrigley is Visiting Professor at Northumbria University. He edits the international journal, Improving Schools.

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Action Research

The Keycolab European project The National Association for Primary Education currently represents the UK in a two year action research project funded by Erasmus. Our partners are teachers in Spain, Romania, Belgium and Finland and the aim of the project is to disseminate successful primary education with particular reference to the competencies agreed by the European community. These differ in nomenclature to some extent, and the differences are thought provoking, from the subjects prescribed in the National Curriculum and are Linguistic communication, Mathematics, Science/Technology, Social for responsible consumption and health, Learning to learn and Autonomy, personal initiative and emotional development. The project in the UK is charged not only with reporting our best practice but with designing the evaluative measures to be used by all five partners across Europe.

It was decided at the outset that successful practice worthy of communication to our European partners would have to be based on teaching and learning characteristic of the school curriculum as distinct from the test driven and limited national curriculum in Britain. Accordingly the work of the project has been taken right outside the classroom where the narrowing and distorting pressures of frequent national assessment weigh too heavily. The project focuses upon learning activity in the outside environment away from the school building and is taking place

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through educational visits and journeys. We are aware that direct experience of this kind is one of the most effective ways of engaging and motivating children particularly those who do not respond to conventional pedagogy.

Children aged between eight and nine years old are involved with their teachers in six Oxfordshire primary schools selected in the light of their effective and well organised teaching through educational visits. It is important to stress that the schools are led by one of the head teachers and not by the director of the project. Once again this is a deliberate move in order to emphasize the professionalism of practitioners. Such professionalism which is essential to achievement of successful practice has too often been subdued in the face of a national requirement of teaching method such as the insistence upon synthetic phonics as the first approach to learning to read. The project embodies a confidence that good practice stems from the teacher alongside the child and not upon external direction.

Administration is kept to an absolute minimum. The participant schools are trusted to keep records only where these can contribute to effective teaching.

For too long our prime concern for the children we teach has been obscured by the time consuming accumulation of data which contributes more to a mistaken view of accountability than the lives and learning of children.

The first meeting of representatives of the countries involved in the project was held in Belgium in early February. It is pleasing to report that there was a general and wholehearted acceptance of the child centred view of learning advanced by the NAPE delegation. There was agreement that although the European competencies are expressed as discrete entities, ultimately all competences are indivisible within the child’s nature and being. This confirmed our decision that the UK project should be focused on direct experience in the environment and not on the teaching of separately organised subjects.

Teachers in the participant schools have contributed to the drafting of the evaluation document required by the project. This was considered by the partner countries at the second meeting held in Finland in June. The following extract from the draft will convey the essence of the project’s educational principles and the need for the assessment of progress to assist learning and not to corrupt it.

by teachers and parents to enhance children’s opportunities to learn.

Evaluative assessments of progress are best expressed as descriptive profiles and never subsumed into numerical summaries. The use of figures implies an accuracy which is spurious since assessment is never entirely accurate.

Children have a human right to contribute to the assessment of their own development.

When we assess the child, his or her age is more important than the organisational stage of education.

Further details regarding the progress of the UK project may be obtained from John Coe at nape@onetel.com or by telephone at 01865 890281.

Children should be assessed individually and never ranked one against the other. The informing philosophy underpinning our work is that of the European community --- cooperation and not the destructive force in education, competition.

Assessment is a vital part of teaching. It is only damaging when the results of assessment are used for accountability purposes.

Evaluation of progress is valuable to children in that it assists them to engage more fully in their own development and learning.

“The good school values the fact that each child is unique. No other child looks quite like her. No other child can write this poem, paint this picture, act, move, play music as she can. She occurs only once in time.

She will never come again. Cherish her.”

There must never be a backwash of assessment requirements into the curriculum which is defined as the process of teaching and learning.

The outcomes of assessment should be used

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Let’s come clean about

ASSESSMENT

by Colin Richards

Assessment in primary schools is a complete mess. The three base-line schemes have been found wanting; the national assessment specifications are believed to be unrealistic; the criteria for assessing writing at the end of KS2 have been heavily criticised; the removal of levels has led to massive uncertainty and confusion.

by Colin Richards

Why is this ? Is it the fault of politicians with predilections of their own remote from classroom reality? Partly. Is it the fault of the Department for Education staffed by civil servants who have never assessed, let alone taught, actual children? Partly. Is it the fault of the department’s educational “advisers” with their own educational and even mercenary agendas, involving conflicts of interest they never acknowledge? Again, partly. Is it the fault of Ofsted for making far too much of performance data in their overall judgments despite that data’s contestable reliability and validity? Yet again, partly. Or finally is it the fault of headteachers failing to challenge, and often compounding, the unrealistic demands made on their staff by ministers, the DfE and Ofsted?

The answer is yet again, partly.

But underlying all these partial answers is a fact that no one is really prepared to acknowledge. We need to acknowledge, not shamefacedly but honestly, the extent of our ignorance. We have no firm, reliable, systematic way of assessing children’s understanding. We can’t get inside their heads – thank goodness.

Like us they cannot fully articulate what they are thinking and learning to help us assess where they are. The way they develop their understanding is fearsomely complex, often idiosyncratic and far from fully or even adequately understood even after a century or more of psychological research. Our test instruments are crude and partial; no wonder the three base-line tests are not comparable. With our grossly imperfect testing “technology”, any tests designed for any age-group are going to be incomparable.

We are in a mess – largely of our own making because we have believed the myth of assessment and have failed to acknowledge the extent of our ignorance. At best the most we can claim is an intuitive, very partial and inevitable subjective form of assessment borne out of working closely with children - talking with and observing them on a day-to-day basis in class. That is all. That reflects the complexity of learning, the idiosyncratic nature of children and the very limited extent of our knowledge. This may be uncomfortable but it’s the reality. We, and the government, need to recognise it.

Colin Richards is Emeritus Professor of Education at the University of Cumbria. For many years he was Staff HMI for the school curriculum.

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The NAPE I-Spy Programme ...a complete range of over 50 titles are available

NAPE Dates for your diary To reserve your place: Email: nationaloffice@nape.org.uk Ring: 01604 647 646

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