Formative Assessment Task Options
of Content
Option one: Planning for successful implementation
Programme framework statements covered
Implementation
‘Learn that’
9.1. Implementation is an ongoing process that must adapt to context over time, rather than a single event. It involves the application of specific implementation activities and principles over an extended period (e.g., implementation planning, ongoing monitoring).
9.2. Successful implementation requires expert knowledge of the approach that is being implemented and the related area of practice (e.g., behaviour), which is shared amongst staff.
9.3. Implementation should involve repurposing existing processes and resources (e.g., governance, data collection) rather than creating a separate set of procedures.
9.4. Effective implementation begins by accurately diagnosing the problem and making evidenceinformed decisions on what to implement.
‘Learn how to’
Plan and execute implementation in stages by:
9.a. Ensuring that implementation is a structured process where school leaders actively plan, prepare, deliver, and embed changes.
9.b. Making a small number of meaningful strategic changes and pursuing these diligently, prioritising appropriately.
9.c. Reviewing and stopping ineffective practices before implementing new ones. Make the right choices on what to implement by:
9.d. Identifying a specific area for improvement using a robust diagnostic process, focusing on the problem that needs solving, rather than starting with a solution.
9.e. Providing credible interpretations of reliable data that focus on pupils’ knowledge and understanding.
9.f. Examining current approaches, how they need to change, and the support required to do so.
9.g. Adopting new approaches based on both internal and external evidence of what has (and has not) worked before (e.g., pupil outcome data and research-based guidance).
Introduction
As you develop in your career as a leader of teaching you may discover that some of your biggest challenges come not from generating new ideas for improving provision or for generating enthusiasm about new developments; rather they come from ensuring that developments are implemented rigorously, with fidelity to your original intentions, and have deep roots so that they become sustainable over the longer term.
You will significantly increase the probability of successfully implementing change if you adopt a planned, systematic approach. This task is designed to focus your attention on some of the essential activities you should undertake prior to the introduction of any new teaching strategies in classrooms.
EEF: Putting Evidence to Work – A School’s Guide to Implementation1
The above publication is essential reading for leaders who wish to ensure that changes they introduce take root and flourish. You should download and read the report (use the link at the bottom of the page) and its recommendations before you undertake this task.
You should focus on the importance the report attaches to establishing the ‘active ingredients’ of any planned changes, i.e., those elements of the planned change that must be implemented with fidelity. An example of an active ingredient might be that as part of a new approach to behaviour management a school determines that all teachers must go through each of the steps detailed in the classroom behaviour management policy before requesting external support with behaviour management. In this instance it would be essential for the person leading the change to not only convey this message but to provide further specific detail of what the policy might mean in practice. This might mean, for example, a requirement that all teachers explain the behaviour policy to the pupils at the start of their lesson so that pupils are aware of what is expected of them.
Task one: Planning for successful implementation
The focus of this task is on how to plan effectively for the implementation of change.
Stage one: Identify an area of the curriculum or a pedagogical approach in your subject area that you wish to improve in order to raise pupil performance. You may choose a relatively small aspect, or it could be a practice that pervades the delivery of your subject across the whole school, but you should focus on a real issue.
Examples: the use of scaffolding to develop essay writing skills in GCSE English; introducing new strategies for developing pupils’ retrieval skills in primary maths; anticipating and responding to common pupil misconceptions in ICT.
1 EEF (2019) Putting Evidence to Work – A School’s Guide to Implementation. Available at https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/education-evidence/guidance-reports/implementation [accessed 22.07.2022].
Stage two: Complete the Planning for Implementation checklist below. This is designed to prompt your thinking about the factors you will need to consider, and the challenges that may arise when implementing your planned change.
When you have completed the Planning for Implementation checklist, arrange to meet with your in-school performance coach to discuss your responses. Following or during your discussion, make amends to your checklist where appropriate.
Stage three: Reflect on your responses to the Planning for Implementation checklist and use this to complete an Implementation Action Plan using the template provided below.
When you have completed your Implementation Action Plan, submit this to your leadership mentor.
Planning for implementation: checklist
Guidance: Use the prompts below to help clarify your thinking about the nature of the problem you have identified; your evidence that it is a problem; and your initial thoughts on possible improvement strategies for addressing the problem. You should make brief notes in the response column against each prompt; you will use these later to support your development of an Implementation Action Plan.
Prompts Response
Why do you want to introduce this change? In what ways are pupils failing to achieve the standards expected of them?
What evidence do you have that change is necessary? You will need this evidence to justify your plans to colleagues, senior leadership, etc. Consider the questions below:
§ What data sources have informed your judgments, e.g., progress data? Staff feedback? Pupil voice?
§ How do you know that this evidence base is robust? For example, how might internal evidence provided by teachers vary according to their level of experience? How might you allow for this?
§ Can you accurately pinpoint, and communicate to others, the specific aspects of pupils’ knowledge and understanding that could be improved?
Corroboration:
How will you check if your analysis of the issue is accurate? Which other perspectives might provide valuable insights? Consider:
§ discussing with team members
§ discussing with line manager
§ discussing with a colleague at another school
Identifying possible solutions:
There will usually be a number of different possible approaches to bringing about the changes you desire.
§ Can you describe, in headline terms, one or two possible strategies?
§ Can you provide examples of possible active ingredients of these strategies?
§ Can you explain why you have opted for your chosen strategy?
§ What external research underpins or supports
your chosen strategy? (Refer to the programme reading materials for possible sources; the EEF website is also a useful starting point.)
§ Could you repurpose existing resources/practices rather than introducing new ones?
Introducing your strategy to your team members: Where, when, and how will you do this? Think about each prompt below and then make your decision and provide a rationale for your choice.
§ As an embryonic idea that you wish to discuss?
§ As a firm proposal(s) you wish colleagues to discuss and feed back on?
§ A different approach to the two above?
Implementation action plan template
Experience tells us that many good ideas fall by the wayside, not because they are poor ideas, but because their implementation was poorly planned. Drawing up a robust action plan will help ensure that your good ideas are successfully implemented.
The template is divided into four phases:
1. Problem analysis/solution generation. In this phase you should indicate when/how you will seek out explanations for the cause of the problem, e.g., why do pupils find it hard to multiply fractions? You will also indicate your method(s) for exploring possible strategies to address the problem. You may also indicate how you will use other professionals as sources of expertise.
2. Preparation for implementation. In this phase you should identify key actions to be undertaken prior to the actual implementation. These might include explaining your plans to colleagues, training relevant staff, developing new resources, purchasing new equipment, securing external support, etc.
3. Implementation. This is the phase when your ideas will be put into practice in classrooms. You may wish to document which group(s) of pupils will be involved, how long the period for trialling new materials will last, when and how you will monitor the impact of the changes you have introduced, how staff will be supported during the implementation process, and if there will be ongoing staff training.
4. Evaluation. You should indicate in your plan the methods you intend to use to collect evidence of the impact of your initiative on pupil performance and teacher development. The greater the range of evidence you collect, the more secure will be any conclusions you draw.
Completingthetemplate
The template has four columns:
1. Actions to be taken. These should be described in headline terms.
2. Who is involved? Briefly list the individuals/groups affected by or responsible for each of the activities.
3. Timeframe/when? Indicate in which half term, approximately, you anticipate specific activities will take place.
4. Support needed. Indicate any individuals or organisations, internal or external, that you may go to for advice or expertise, e.g., your school’s SENDco or the local teaching school.
Use the template to record each significant activity you plan to undertake at each phase; you should expand the table if you need to insert additional lines. We have provided an example (from a primary setting) of the sorts of thing that you might record in each phase. You should refer back to your Planning for Implementation Checklist; this will provide you with useful prompts on activities to be undertaken during the problem analysis/solution generation phase.
Phase
Problem analysis/solution generation
Brief description of the issue:
Actions to be taken
Example: Analyse the data from the last three data drops.
Preparation for implementation/ specifying the active ingredients
Example: Staff meeting to launch headline outcomes from maths data analysis
Who is involved?
Timeframe/ when? Support needed
Subject Leader Autumn One Deputy Head to help with data interpretation
Subject Leader End of Autumn One
Implementation Example: Provide individual coaching for staff as required.
Evaluation phase Example: Analysis of final data; comparison between baseline data and end data
Subject Leader Spring One to end of Summer
One
Subject Leader and Summer Two Deputy Head to provide external
Staff Team view of data
Option two: Developing teacher skills in addressing pupil misconceptions
Programme framework statements covered
Howpupilslearn
‘Learn that’
3.7. Regular, purposeful practice of what has previously been taught can help consolidate material and help pupils remember what they have learned.
3.9. Worked examples that take pupils through each step of a new process are also likely to support pupils to learn.
‘Learn how to’
Support colleagues to help pupils learn by:
3.e. Explaining how misconceptions develop and sharing approaches to prevent them forming (e.g., by talking to experienced colleagues).
3.f. Highlighting the importance of sequencing lessons so that pupils secure foundational knowledge before more complex content.
3.g. Providing examples of how to structure lessons to ensure that pupils experience a high success rate when attempting challenging work (e.g., with scaffolds to support success being removed over time).
Introduction
“One characteristic of effective teachers is their ability to anticipate students’ errors and warn them about possible errors some of them are likely to make.”2
One of the most important skills subject leaders need to acquire is the ability to support colleagues to help pupils learn. In order to carry out this role effectively, subject leaders need to have:
§ a deep knowledge and understanding of how pupils learn
§ a very good knowledge of relevant research into how pupils learn and the underpinning evidence base. Acquiring this knowledge and understanding better places the subject
2 Rosenshine, B. (2012). Principles of instruction: Research-based strategies that all teachers should know. American Educator, 36(1).
leader to lead, persuade and engage colleagues in developing their pedagogy, whilst lending authority to the guidance they offer.
§ a range of strategies for supporting colleagues to effectively implement desired changes to their pedagogy
If you are to meet the requirements of bullet two above, it is essential that you are secure in your understanding of the key ideas/principles Rosenshine espouses, before you begin the process of trying to persuade colleagues to implement some or all of his suggested principles and strategies. We suggest, therefore, that before you complete the task below, you will find it helpful to read, or re-visit, Rosenshine’s work on how pupils learn, available at:
Principles of Instruction: Research-Based Strategies That All Teachers Should Know, by Barak Rosenshine; American Educator Vol. 36, No. 1, Spring 2012, AFT (accessed 27.09.21)
In addition, below are links to two sources which provide examples of the application of Rosenshine’s principles in practice, which may be helpful to those wishing to deepen their learning.
Secondary: Applying Rosenshine to the secondary classroom – The Early Career Hub (chartered.college) (accessed 26.07.22)
Primary: Rosenshine’s principles of instruction applied to the teaching of spelling | Herts for Learning (accessed 27.09.21)
Reminder:
Misconceptions are distinct from knowledge gaps (where pupils know nothing about a topic) and from errors (for example, a spelling mistake): they are beliefs which conflict with what is to be learned.3
Task two: developing teacher skills in addressing pupil misconceptions
For this task you should work through the stages below. Before completing stages one and two, you should meet with your performance coach to discuss how you might best approach the stages.
Stage one: Identify a common misconception that pupils frequently make in your subject. In choosing the misconception, try to identify one that plays a critical role in pupils’ further learning and understanding; most importantly, you must be able to explain why you regard this misconception as critical/fundamental to pupil learning. Ideally this will be a topic you and your colleagues will be teaching in a few weeks’ time. You may wish to discuss your choice of misconception with your colleagues or ask them for their suggestions.
Stage two: Research teaching strategies that help to avoid the misconception occurring. You
3 Chi, M. T. (2009). Three types of conceptual change: Belief revision, mental model transformation, and categoricalshift.In International handbook of research on conceptual change (pp.89–110).Routledge.
might research them by:
§ asking more experienced colleagues and/or effective practitioners for their advice
§ contacting your local teaching school hub and asking what resources/support/advice they are able to offer
§ discussing the issue with other participants on this programme and sharing ideas, e.g., through a web conference
§ contacting subject support groups, e.g., the National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics (NCETM)
Stage three: Prepare a document, maximum length 400 words, titled ‘Strategies to help pupils avoid misconception X’. Divide your document into two parts:
a) A brief summary that outlines the nature of the misconception and its implications. It will be helpful, but not essential, to provide an actual example of the misconception, i.e., an example drawn from a pupil’s book or their practical work.
b) Proposed strategy (or strategies) for preventing or responding to the misconception. Below are some generic strategies teachers have utilised, but the list is by no means exhaustive. The choice of strategy will depend upon the subject in question, the nature of the misconception, the ages of the learners, and context-specific factors:
§ scaffolding the learning in order to ensure pupils do not progress to the next stage of their learning until they are secure in the topic you are focussing upon
§ providing examples of the misconception in the work of previous pupils, e.g., highlighting a passage to explain the difference between analysis and evaluation (secondary ‘A’ level history)
§ providing checklists, e.g., does every sentence end with a full stop (primary writing)?
§ using refutational teaching, i.e., stating the principle/theory/idea, and providing the evidence (facts) that support the principle/theory/idea. This is sometimes referred to as ‘right is right’. The key point about this strategy is that teachers should establish the facts with the pupils before tackling misconceptions about the topic. For a fuller discussion you may wish to access ‘How to help students overcome misconceptions’, available at:
GUEST POST: How to Help Students Overcome Misconceptions — The Learning Scientists (accessed 27.09.21)
§ reviewing the pupils’ prior learning – the weaker their prior knowledge, the greater the likelihood of misconceptions occurring. For a fuller discussion you may wish to access ‘Exploring the evidence: prior knowledge and pupil misconceptions’, available
at:
EEF Blog: ECF– Exploring the Evidence: Prior knowledge and Pupil Misconceptions
EEF (educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk) (accessed 27.09.21)
When you have completed your strategy document, upload it in Canvas to your leadership mentor within the timeframe identified.
Stage four: The final stage will be to implement your strategy. Before you do this, meet with your performance coach to discuss any outstanding issues, e.g., questions posed by your mentor.
Option three: Developing teachers’ subject knowledge
Programme framework statements covered
Subjectandcurriculum
‘Learn that’
4.2. School subjects are their own distinct disciplines which have reference points in disciplines and practices beyond the school.
4.3. The potential content of many subjects (especially literature, humanities and arts) is contestable and requires thoughtful, sustained review and engagement with that subject discipline.
4.4. Secure subject knowledge helps teachers to motivate pupils and teach effectively.
4.5. Ensuring pupils master foundational concepts and knowledge before moving on is likely to build pupils’ confidence and help them succeed.
‘Learn how to’
Support colleagues to design a carefully sequenced, broad and coherent curriculum by:
4.a. Ensuring colleagues recognise the inherent structures within subjects and identifying important knowledge, skills and concepts within them and the relationships between these components.
4.b. Emphasising the value of ensuring pupils’ thinking is focused on important ideas within the subject and that multiple opportunities are provided to revisit these ideas over time.
4.c. Sharing and modelling powerful analogies, illustrations, examples, explanations and demonstrations for colleagues to use in their teaching.
Introduction
“Great teachers understand the content they are teaching and how it is learnt. This means teachers should have deep and fluent knowledge and flexible understanding of the content they are teaching and how it is learnt, including its inherent dependencies. They should have an explicit repertoire of well-crafted explanations, examples and tasks for each topic they teach.”4
This task focuses upon how subject leaders can develop ‘great teachers’ with the capacity to meet Coe’s expectations above.
Before you commence the task, you may find it instructive to read the advice Coe offers to teachers, and to deepen your understanding of two critical concepts: ‘content knowledge’ and ‘pedagogical content knowledge’ (3 pages).
4 Coe, R., Rauch, C., Kime, S., & Singleton, D. (2020). The great teaching toolkit: Evidence review. Cambridge EducationAssociates.
You may access Coe’s work at 584543-great-teaching-toolkit-evidence-review.pdf (cambridgeinternational.org) (accessed 28.09.21)
Task three: developing teachers’ subject knowledge
For this task you should work through the stages below.
Stage one: Self-reflection
Use the checklist provided below to evaluate your current effectiveness with regard to developing and sustaining your personal subject knowledge.
Stage two: Team evaluation
Use the checklist below to evaluate your team’s current effectiveness with regard to developing and sustaining their subject knowledge. You may choose to complete this with team members or from your own knowledge of their practice.
Stage three: Curriculum analysis
Use the two checklists below to identify two or three areas of the curriculum for which good subject knowledge may be particularly critical.
Before moving to stage four, meet with your in-school performance coach to discuss your responses to the checklists you have completed. Following or during your discussion, amend the checklists as appropriate.
Stage four: Developing a professional learning culture
Reflect on your responses to stages 1 to 3 and use these reflections to develop a draft policy document titled ‘Promoting teacher subject knowledge in Subject X’. In drafting your document, you may wish to consider the following:
a) Your role as the leader of teaching: how will you model best practice? How will you communicate the steps you have taken/will take to develop your personal professional learning?
b) Your expectations of your team members with regard to developing their subject knowledge: where, when and how will you convey these to them? How will they be rewarded for meeting your expectations? How will you monitor if your expectations are being met? How will you support team members in meeting your expectations?
c) How you might lighten the load on the team by sharing responsibilities: for example, could one member join a subject association, another attend moderation meetings, another join a ‘subject social media group’?
d) Are there opportunities for individual team members to update the rest of the team on both content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge developments?
e) How might you learn from other subject areas in your school/Trust/local authority?
f) How will you engender a sense of enthusiasm and excitement about this work?
g) What are your goals for the next academic year, and what steps will you take to achieve
them?
When you have completed your policy document, upload it in Canvas to your leadership mentor within the timeframe identified.
Self-review checklist: developing and sustaining my subject knowledge
Use the checklist below to evaluate how effectively you keep up to date with relevant subject knowledge. If you teach in a primary or special school and are responsible for leading teaching in more than one subject, you may wish to choose a subject that is content heavy or the one that you feel least confident with.
Prompts
Observations
In this column, indicate if you engage in the activity frequently, occasionally, or not at all. Then make a comment. For example, if you have put ‘frequently’, what is your evidence? If you have put ‘not at all’, what are the reasons for this?
I engage in subject-specific professional development in-school:
a) as part of curriculum planning
a) Frequently/occasionally/not at all
Comment:
b) through moderation processes
b) Frequently/occasionally/not at all
Comment:
I engage in subject-specific professional development with colleagues in other schools:
a) by attending subject group meetings organised by Academy Trust/Diocese/Local Authority/Other
b) through membership of a subject group such as the Geographical Association for geography teachers
a) Frequently/occasionally/not at all
Comment:
c) through membership of online teacher communities facilitated through Twitter, Facebook, etc.
b) Frequently/occasionally/not at all
Comment:
d) through attendance at examination board meetings and/or local moderation events
c) Frequently/occasionally/not at all
Comment:
d) Frequently/occasionally/not at all
Comment:
I engage in relevant professional development in order to increase my subject knowledge by:
a) planning time into my work schedule
a) Frequently/occasionally/not at all
Comment:
b) attending external training courses
b) Frequently/occasionally/not at all
Comment:
Subject team checklist: developing and sustaining subject knowledge
Use the checklist below to evaluate how effectively your team keep up to date with relevant subject knowledge. You may wish to do this at a team meeting or through individual meetings or a combination of both.
Prompts
Observations
In this column you will be making some overall judgments about your team.
Initially you should indicate if, overall, you consider practice to be:
§ a strength: high levels of engagement that result in a positive impact on teaching in your subject
§ uneven: some staff are engaged, others are not
§ a weakness: little or no activity of this nature is undertaken
Then make a comment to briefly explain your judgment.
Team members engage in subject-specific professional development in-school:
a) as part of curriculum planning
a) Strength/uneven/weakness
Comment:
b) through moderation processes
b) Strength/uneven/weakness
Comment:
Team members engage in subject-specific professional development with colleagues in other schools:
a) by attending subject group meetings organised by Academy Trust/Diocese/Local Authority/Other
a) Strength/uneven/weakness
Comment:
b) through membership of a subject group such as the Geographical Association for geography teachers
b) Strength/uneven/weakness
Comment:
c) through membership of online teacher communities facilitated through Twitter, Facebook, etc.
c) Strength/uneven/weakness
Comment:
d) Strength/uneven/weakness
Comment:
d) through attendance at examination board meetings and/or local moderation events
Team members engage in relevant professional development in order to increase their subject knowledge by:
a) planning time into their work schedules
a) Strength/uneven/weakness
Comment:
b) attending external training courses
b) Strength/uneven/weakness
Comment: