Have your say ... again.

So, it would appear that, to some extent, Mr Gove has listened to the myriad voices ranged against his EBC proposals.  Whilst we are still waiting for the dust to settle to see what actually has been lost and gained, there are two consultations that need to be done.

Consultation on Draft National Curriculum

Consultation on Secondary School Accountability

Just as I wrote when the consultation on the EBCs was announced "If teachers (and others actually involved in Education) don't respond to the consultation, then the DfE will have no evidence of the depth of feeling about the changes.  It's easy to send out disparaging tweets ... on twitter, but does take a bit of time to respond to the consultation.  If we care about education, we should be willing to put time in to making our views known."

I'm re-posting my suggestion for an activity that could be used in staff meetings to help groups of teachers respond to the consultations.

It would take about 1 hour to do for each consultation, but the time could be shortened if needed. 

Step 1: What does the consultation say? 

Split the participants into groups of (of between 4 and 8) and give each group a copy of the appropriate consultation document (printed onto single sided A4 paper) and a sheet of flip chart paper which had been split into 8 pieces.

Each member of the group is given sections of the consultation to read and then summarise on the flip chart pieces.  Each section had to be summarised on a separate piece of paper.

For the NC consultation I suggest the following sections are used:

• Section 1 - Background
• Section 6 - Aims of the National curriculum
• Section 7 - Programme of Study and Attainment targets (a big section!)
• Section 8 - ICT
• Section 9 - Equalities
• Section 10 - View of parents (or rather, should parents know what their children are learning at each stage of the NC)
• Section 11 - Implementation
• Section 12 - Phasing and disapplication

The other sections are mainly procedural - although section 2 is about the structure of the NC.

For the Accountability consultation more of the sections are relevant, but sections are generally shorter.  I suggest sections 2 - 13 will need to be read, but these can be shared out amongst the group so that everyone has an approximately equal amount of reading to do.

It should take about 15 minutes to read and summarise each participant section of the document.

Step 2: Putting it all together

Each member of the group uses their flipchart piece to summarise what they have read and learnt.  This will take about 20 minutes.  It would be helpful if the group didn’t discuss what they heard at this point.
 In this way the flipchart paper is rebuilt to provide an overview of the consultation as a whole. 

The group can now discuss the consultation, say what they thought, and suggest other possibilities, as well as share ideas between groups.  This could take quite a while depending on how vocal people are.

Step 3: Answering the questions

Helpfully, the Department for Education has provided a word document for responses (NC consultation, Accountability consultation).  Print these out onto A3 sheets of paper and put them around the room in numerical order.

The teachers can then wandered around, writing their answers and thoughts to the questions, discussing further with each other as they did so.  They don’t have to respond to every question – just those you’ve got an opinion about.

At the end of the session, collate the answers into the word document and email it to participants.  That way, when they answer the consultation they have got a starting point to work from.

This process can be adapted depending on how many people you have, or how much time you have. However, it is very important that teachers give their views on these proposals, and I hope that this simple activity will help you to do that by 16th April (NC) and 1st May (Accountability) .

It's what you measure that counts.

Asking which came first, the chicken or the egg is a question which has long entertained philosophers and scientists.

Likewise, asking which should come first, the curriculum or the assessment model, has provided much thought for educationalists.

This question has been brought to my mind once more by a number of events and twitter conversations. The first is the imminent closure of both the government consultation on the EBC, and the heads roundtable consultation on the curriclum. Both of which close for business on 10th December. If you haven't responded to the government consultation then you really should. The documents are on their website.  You might also like to compare the Heads Roundtable consultation document, and reply to that. Again, details are on their website.

There is a feeling amongst many educators that providing an excellent curriculum is where we should start in designing education. If we get the curriculum right, then everything else will follow.

As someone who is, and has been, involved in both the business of examining and in curriculum design I think that this is not the best place to start.  Inevitably the curriculum narrows (or expands) to what is measured.

One only has to think of the 5A*-C (inc English and Maths) which led to the rise of equivalent qualifications, early and regular entry to boost numbers. Or the reported reduction in some arts subjects with the introduction of the Ebacc as a performance measure.

Equally, removing science from KS2 tests did not always allow science to break free of the shackles of a stifling curriculum, instead it meant that science lost prominence in many primary schools and focus was given to English and Maths. Or at KS3, the removal of SATS wasn't always used by schools to develop innovative and engaging curriculum experiences for students. Rather, it allowed them to start KS4 a year early, even to the extent of entering stusents in module tests at the end of year Assessment (and the accountability linked to it) drives the curriculum.  To be fair, some schools did take advantage of the freedom the loss of exams at the end of year 9 gave them and created a new curriculum for their students.

I think that we need to think about what, and how, we are going to assess and use that to plan the curriculum.  This is 'Backwards Design' as outlined by Grant and Wiggins. (Thanks to @damianainscough for the link.)

In brief, we should decide what students should know, understand and be able to do. This then allows us to outline how students can 'show that they know', and only then should we plan the learning episodes that students will experience.  This is the opposite way round that learning is sometimes planned, often with a 'Oh, I know a really good activity we could do' sort of way.

To see how this might look in practice, the York Science project is currently attempting to design a KS3 curriculum based on the backward design principle, and I would encourage schools to get involved with that project.  

For those designing the EBCs (even though the consultation hasn't finished yet) and those who will produce specifications based on the EBCs, then it is important that they think about how the materials they are producing will be assessed. 

For those designing their schemes of work/learning then it is important to think about what you expect the students to know at the end of the scheme, how can they show this (and it doesn't have to be written - see 200 ways for some great alternative ideas), and only then, what are you going to teach to get the students to the end point.

The Science Teacher's Song book.

During #asechat last night the topic of songs to use in science lessons came up... well, ok, I brought it up.

I loved using songs during lessons (and now on CPD courses) often at the beginning to set the scene as the learners arrive or at the end when they're reviewing/reflecting on their learning.

Other educators obviously felt the same, and suggestions came in so I thought I'd collect some here.  The IOP PTNC email list also discussed songs to use in lessons a while ago - as you can see, Physicists have obviously given the topic some considerable thought.

If you have any other suggestions, let me know and I'll add them in.

Biology
Reproduction -  Grease 2
Let's talk about sex - Salt n Peppa
The Circle of Life - The Lion King
Breathe - Prodigy
Dry bones (the knee bones connected to...) 
The drugs don't work - The Verve
Food, glorious food - Oliver

Chemistry
The Elements Song - Tom Lehrer (to be played at every opportunity)
Opposites Attract - Paula Abdul (Electrolysis)
Mole day music video http://www.tes.co.uk/teaching-resource/Mole-Day-Music-Video-from-the-Virtual-School-6297022/

Physics
Under Pressure - Queen
Opposites Attract - Paula Abdul (electrostatics, or magnetism)
Collide - Leona Lewis
Defying Gravity - Wicked

Good Vibrations - Beach Boys 

Swing Low Sweet Chariot 

You spin me right round - Dead or Alive

Spinning around –  Kylie

Galaxy Song 

Nine million bicycles - Katie Melua 

Adjusted bicycle version! Correct Physics 

It’s electricifying - John Travolta 

Lightning – The Wanted 

Can u feel the force - The Real Thing

Supernova – Oasis Oasis

Supermassive black hole - Twilight 

The sun is a mass of incandescent gas - Dottie Evans 

Wonderful World – Louis Armstrong 

Chain Reaction – Diana Ross 

Atomic – Blondie

Quark song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0kXkWXSXRA

Danger High Voltage - Electric Six 

I've got the power - Snap! 

Sound of da police - KRS One 

He ain't heavy he's my brother - The Hollies (for gravity) 

Ray of Light - Madonna 

Spectrum - Florence and the Machine 

Moment like this - Leona Lewis 

Perfect moment - Martine McCutcheon 

Magic moments - Perry Como

Speed and Velocity - They might be Giants  

Why Does the Sun Shine? - They Might Be Giants

Somewhere over the rainbow - Israel Kamakawiwo Ole   Judy Garland

Speed of light – Coldplay 

Our Velocity - Maximo Park
Apply some pressure - Maximo Park
Starlight - Muse
Black hole sun - Soundgarden
Strange Charm - Hank Green
Large Hadron Rap http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j50ZssEojtM

The Particle Physics song (Higgs, Higgs glorious Higgs)


And good bands:
Astrocapella http://www.astrocappella.com/songs.shtml
They might be Giants 'Here comes science'
Kraftwerk

They want to know what you think ... I think.

We are currently about halfway through the Department for Education's consultation on the reform of the KS4 examination system.

Have you responded yet?

Lots of teachers that I've spoken to haven't read, much less responded, to the consultation.  The frenetic pace of the first half-term being one reason.  However, many teachers said that they hadn't responded because they didn't think they'd be listened to, so it would be a waste of time.

I can sympathise with this view.  Reading through the consultation questions it feels a little like we're being asked 'Which stick would you like me to hit you with - the ash or the oak?' rather than, 'Should I hit you?'

But, and it is a big but, if teachers (and others actually involved in Education) don't respond to the consultation, then the DfE will have no evidence of the depth of feeling about the changes.  It's easy to send out disparaging tweets about the EBCs (and other policies) on twitter, but does take a bit of time to respond to the consultation.  If we care about education, we should be willing to put time in to making our views known.  If we want students to have periodic tables, calculators or set texts in their exams we need to say so.   

I'm not going to comment on specific questions, but others have blogged about them, and about the EBCs in general.  See for example, from an English teacher's point of view by @panderson1979, or from a Headteacher's view from @johntomsett

On a recent course we looked at the consultation documents and discussed the questions.  To do this we made use of a cooperative learning activity that could be useful for departments to carry out in order to assist their teachers to respond to the consultation.  It would take about 1 hour to do well, but the time could be shortened if needed. 

Step 1: What does the consultation say? 

The participants on the course were split into groups of 5 and each group was given a copy of the 19 page consultation document (printed onto single sided A4 paper) and a sheet of flip chart paper which had been split into 8 pieces.

Each member of the group was given sections of the consultation to read and then summarise on the flip chart pieces.  The list shows who was asked to read what.  Each section had to be summarised on separate pieces of paper.

1. 2 pieces of paper for sections 2 + 3
2. 2 pieces for sections 4 + 8
3. 1 piece for section 5.1 - 5.13
4. 1 piece for section 5.14 - 5.25
5. 2 pieces for sections 6 + 7 

 The groups were given about 15 minutes to read and summarise their section of the document.

Step 2: Putting it all together

Each member of the group used their flipchart piece to summarise what they had read and learnt.  This took about 20 minutes.  It was helpful if the group didn’t discuss what they heard at this point (though to be fair, they were very keen to comment on the information).

 In this way the flipchart paper was rebuilt to provide an overview of the consultation as a whole. 

 There was then time for the group to discuss the consultation, say what they thought, and suggest other possibilities, as well as share ideas between groups.  This could take quite a while depending on how vocal people are.

Step 3: Answering the questions

 Helpfully (?), the Department for Education have provided a word document for responses.  I printed this out onto A3 sheets of paper and put them around the room in numerical order.

The teachers then wandered around, writing their answers and thoughts to the questions, discussing further with each other as they did so.  Some question got lots of responses (e.g. should there be tiering and should students be allowed to take calculators, periodic tables or set texts into the exam), others none.  However, as I pointed out during the session, you don’t have to respond to every question – just those you’ve got an opinion about.

At the end of the session, I typed the answers into the word document and emailed it to participants.  That way, when they answer the consultation they have got a starting point to work from.

This process can be adapted depending on how many people you have, or how much time you have. However, it is very important that teachers give their views on these proposals, and I hope that this simple activity will help you to do that by 10^th December 2012.

 

CLV festival 1

I spent today at the Cramlington Learning Village Festival of Learning.  300 participants in a maintained school.  Fewer big names than Wellington College perhaps, but more authentic teacher presenters I suspect.

I deliberately went out of my subject for my workshop sessions.  The second session I attended was 'Implementing Literacy Effectively into lessons'.  Here are my summary tweets from the session (written after the event):

#clvfest Literacy is vital to attainment and opportunities. Many definitions of literacy but includes reading, writing, speaking.

#clvfest Subjects don’t always think about literacy BUT if you’re a teacher IN English, you’re a teacher OF English @learningspy

#clvfest CLV aim to break cycle of poor reading and improve reading for all students, narrowing gap. Starting with year 7&8.

#clvfest Shared ideas about reading in participant’s schools. Discussion about value of silent reading for poor readers.

#clvfest Started to tackle literacy in Humanities and English but other departments involved.  e.g. word walls in Science and Art

#clvfest Some strategies developed from primary schools: VCOP http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6010767 PEE burger http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/4/151657/2058289/PEE-Burger-UPDATED.png

#clvfest other ideas include: vary length of text, discuss reading, position reading as part of school life, check readability http://www.niace.org.uk/misc/SMOG-calculator/smogcalc.php

#clvfest On World Book Day at start of every lesson each teacher read out part of a short story.  Kids (and teachers) wanted to know what happened next.

#clvfest In humanities there is a LOT to read. They’ve started to  use reciprocal reading strategies http://www.fresherschools.com/index.php/free-resources/literacy-resources/13-reciprocal-reading-group-cards

#clvfest CLV uses Accelerated reader in 7&8.  Organised by excellent librarian, progress monitored by kid’s English teacher and learning guide (tutor).

#clvfest Use different ways to practice spelling in different subjects.  Spell and sort in maths.  Read out terms – kids spell them and put them into correct groupings.

#clvfest Use a literacy marking criteria grid in all 7&8 subjects.  Marked out of 11!  Get simple number to track progress or target intervention.

Examiner Woes part 1

At this time of year, I am mostly to be found marking online scripts.

Examining is an important job, and one that I really enjoy doing - especially writing question papers.

However, at this point in the examining season, 2 weeks into electronic marking, I start to get a bit stir crazy.  So here are a few comments which, next year, you might like to pass on to your students.

1. Don't write anywhere except on the lines. If you need to write more, get additional sheets and use them.  It may be slightly different for different online marking software, but for the one I use it's a real pain to try and find the answer.  We can't flip over the page, or easily check at the bottom of page, or follow arrows and stars. Use extra paper.

2.  Get a decent pen.  The scripts are scanned, and pale inks just don't show up well.

3.  Data is plural.  That means that 'Do the data show....' is actually gramatically correct.  Your examiner  does not appreciate being told that they are wrong, or having the script corrected.  A smiley face doesn NOT make it better.

4.  If asked for 3 conclusions writing 'X does have an effect....', 'X doesn't have an effect...', and 'X could have an effect....' will not get you any marks.  Make up your mind and choose one.

5.  If you're going to write 'I can't believe you asked this' then make sure you get the answer right.

Invisible women

I was listening to an RSA podcast by Mark Easton about his book Britain Etc.  It sounded like an interesting read, and I will probably get it at some point.  If you don’t already know about the RSA podcasts then it is worth exploring the archive.  Every week they have a speaker (admittedly often with a book to sell!) who gives a 30 – 40 minute talk and then answers questions.  They have some really fascinating speakers, with many different view points, not all of whom I agree with.

However, it was a question from the audience at the end of the Mark Easton talk that has set me thinking.  It was from Christina, who represents ‘invisible women.  She asked ‘Where were the women in the book?’  And Easton obviously struggles to identify any named women in his book. Oops.

I like the idea that there is someone who represents ‘invisible women’.  A little like the Lorax who speaks for the trees.   Someone who asks the awkward question ‘Where are the women?’

The invisible women have been a problem in science for a long time.  It is well known that the path towards ‘scientist’ is a very leaky pipeline and there have been many attempts to deal with this, and to encourage more women to remain in Science, Engineering and Technology.

Last year, Ofsted published a report ‘Girls’ career aspirations’. One, slightly depressing, finding was:

Almost all the girls and young women who took part in the survey were open to the possibility of pursuing a career that challenged gender stereotypes, if the career interested them sufficiently. Their awareness of this potential, however, did not always translate into practice.  page 4

Ofsted visited primary schools as part of the survey, and they found that from year 3 children were thinking about what type of career they would like to do, albeit fairly stereotypical ones*. Further up the education tree, Ofsted also found that careers education at KS3 was weak, which made it difficult for girls (and presumably boys) to make choices which challenged their stereotyped ideas.

Which set me to thinking, given the dismantling of the careers advice service, what classroom teachers could do to support all students in their future career choices, and open up a wider world of ideas to them.

Although focussed on increasing the numbers of girls studying Physics at post-16, the Institute of Physics publication ‘Girls in thePhysics Classroom: A teachers guide for action’ is a useful resource when thinking about promoting careers.  The publication suggests that relevance to ‘real life’ is an important factor in enjoyment and take-up of physics, especially for girls.  Using information about scientists and science careers is, I think, an ideal way of increasing the relevance of science to learners.

A recent twitter discussion about classroom displays, started by @hrogerson, led to a discussion about what could go on the walls. Shortly after this, @sciteachcremin wrote an interesting blog post about the displays that he is required to put up for his school. I think that many secondary schools are quite a long way behind primary schools in making the school environment a rich visual stimulus. Walk into any primary school and the displays are usually eye-catching, curriculum linked, and regularly changed. 

This then, dear reader, is today’s suggestion:   

Use classroom displays to highlight the ‘invisible women’ who work in science, technology, and engineering based careers. 

Make sure that ALL the students in your class know what different careers they can follow if they study science.  Help them to find out what it takes to be a radiologist, an accident investigator, a landscape gardener** and so on, and make sure that they know that it can be done by women, as well as men.

I run physics courses for teachers, and one of the things that I say a lot is that you need to make sure that the contexts used in physics appeal to everyone in the class at some point, and that those interests will be many and varied.  We can’t assume that you can pop in a reference to football and hair straighteners and BINGO you’ve contextualised the learning for everyone!  More on that another blog, perhaps.

In much the same way, in all science teaching, by introducing different careers, you begin to provide all the students in your class with role models and information about what they might do.  So if a student is interested in medicine, then it is worthwhile highlighting some of the other careers in the health service to them – after all they’re not all going to become doctors.

One of the difficulties here though is that as a classroom teacher we don’t always have the level of careers knowledge that we might like.  Luckily there are a whole raft of useful resources out there which can help. 

Future morph - website set up by the Science council to highlight different science and technology based careers.  There are sections of the site aimed at different age students, parents, teachers and careers staff.  Plenty of ideas here including this list of examples of careers linked to different science topics. 

Talent 2030 –Aimed at students, but useful for teachers.  Mainly engineering information, with a nice section of ‘Heroes’ showcasing some of the career possibilities. 

WiSET – Some interesting case studies from women at different stages of their careers, from apprenticeships to management and leadership.

NHS – If you’re not sure what jobs there are in the NHS apart from the doctors and nurses then this website will give you some ideas!

Steminist – US based, but does have a nice list of historical figures (most of whom you won’t have heard of, but should have) and interviews with women currently working in STEM careers.

And the final resource I'd like to highlight is This is what a scientist looks like. A very lovely collection of photos of people working in science, sometimes out in the field, sometimes not, to show what science looks like.  People from all over the world represented here. Scroll down to the bottom to get to the archives with hundreds and hundreds of photos and short bios about scientists!

So, go and speak for the 'invisible women' and maybe inspire all your students!

*  "In discussion about what they would like to do for a job, the youngest pupils talked about wanting to become teachers or vets (girls), footballers or pilots (boys). The Year 6 girls interviewed had a wider idea of what they might like to do with some already talking of science alongside nursing, teaching, police, armed services, care services, hairdressing and beauty work. Boys continued to prefer sports or applied technology vocations, a games designer being a popular notion. Around half (51 out of 112) of the Year 6 boys spoken to were thinking of these two areas. In contrast, only four of the 113 girls surveyed referred to sport (horse riding and gymnastics) while 43 were aiming at performing or graphic arts, or writing. Only five girls and six boys had no definite thought about a future job. No Year 6 pupil, girl or boy, wanted to be a nursery nurse or childminder although they all thought that these were ‘girls jobs’." Girls' careers aspirations, Ofsted, 2011, pg 7.

** all taken from Future Morph careers list.