Disadvantage can have a huge impact on a child’s life chances. Education data shows that underserved pupils start school behind their more advantaged peers, have lower attainment outcomes at school, and poorer opportunities for continued education once they have left school. This not only impacts their education but can also affect their mental health, confidence, self-esteem and self-worth.
With this in mind, we are delighted to announce a new series of six twilight webinars. Led by Rachel Macfarlane, our lead advisor for underserved learners, we will be joined by guest leaders from across the county to explore various aspects of impactful inclusive practice for underserved learners.
Dates for your diary - twilight sessions
26th September 2024 Who are your underserved learners and how can you better use data to ensure the inclusion of underserved learners?
12th November 2024 How to ensure that all learners have a sense of belonging at your school.
12th December 2024 How to grow the status and sense of self efficacy of underserved learners.
20th January 2025 How to tackle unconscious bias amongst staff about the potential of underserved learners.
4th March 2025 How to develop impactful relationships with underserved families.
1st April 2025 How to develop a culture of equity rather than equality.
How much will it cost and who is it for?
Each session costs £59* for as many colleagues as you wish to attend from your school. If you sign up in advance to attend all 6 sessions, the discounted price is £299* per school/setting (with a further discount for the 2nd, 3rd, 4th etc. schools in a MAT.)
*prices excludes VAT.
These sessions will run from 4pm to 5.30pm and are designed to support a multitude of educational professionals, including senior and middle leaders, SENCOs, Pupil Premium leads, EDI leads, phase leaders, teachers, trustees and governors.
Visit the HFL Hub for more information and to book:
As pupil rolls begin to fall, a recent episode of the Headteacher Update podcast, hosted by Helen Frostick, saw two small school headteachers, Rachel Jones from Kingsley St John’s Primary School and Tara McGovern from Therfield First School, sharing their strategies for effectively marketing a small school.
A small school leader of nine years, Tara contributed to one of the briefing sessions within the HFL Education Small Schools’ Programme where she presented a case study and shared her insights as a professional already working within a small school. Our Small Schools’ programme provides the opportunity for leaders to share experiences and explore opportunities for their small schools.
Within this podcast episode, both leaders share their quick wins and long-term strategies for effectively marketing a small school. From being active on social media to maintaining a prominent presence within the community, this episode provides some great tips at a time where marketing schools is becoming ever more important.
Now in her ninth year as headteacher of a small village school with only 64 pupils, Tara McGovern shared how her school is “bursting at the seams and thriving….as a direct result of lots of marketing and PR” .
We are delighted to share the reflective journals produced by the third and final cohort of schools on our Great Representation programme.
Each of the participating 27 schools wrote a reflective journal, telling the story of the activity they have engaged in and their learning around race equity over the course of the 2023–4 academic year.
The programme has been a key part of our work at HFL, since 2021, to progress an anti-racism agenda and plans are underway to bring together leaders from schools in cohorts 1 and 2 of the programme for a new race equity programme in 2024–5.
The 2023–4 reflective journals edited by Rachel Macfarlane, Lead Adviser for Underserved Learners at HFL Education and Michael Catchpool, District School Effectiveness Adviser for North Hertfordshire at HFL Education, can be accessed below.
Download and share with your colleagues, governors, students, carers and parents.
We hope you find the book inspiring and interesting and that it assists you in your anti-racism work.
If you’d like to know more about our work around race equity and anti-racism, and the benefits it can bring to your school, visit Race equity and anti-racism page, email the Wellbeing team wellbeing@hfleducation.org or call 01438 544464.
The HFL Education and Rethinking Assessment partnership project focused on collaboration in the classroom and aimed to support and develop approaches to assessment and pedagogy which promoted equity and a sense of belonging to all children.
We used to not be able to do a lot of things (in maths) but now, with Mrs George’s help, we have caught up to the class. We don’t need to be taught differently anymore.
Year 4 pupil, Aboyne Lodge Primary School, St Albans
Back in September 2023, HFL Education launched the new Mental Maths Fluency Intervention (securing facts to 20) with eight schools – this included one secondary school, two Education Support Centres and five primary schools.
In December 2023, feedback from schools about impact so far was positive:
“I believe the 1:1 tutoring, and the practice sheets and scaffolding, have boosted students’ confidence.”
The Thomas Alleyne Academy (secondary school)
“The teaching guidance had clear steps, so I knew what was coming next. It also included the practice opportunities and games, all in one place. One pupil now has techniques (strategies) they can use and is able to identify which is the best to use. Children are more confident in their ability and were able to access KS2 maths papers, which they could not before the intervention. They also scored 25/30 in a KS1 maths paper; they were unable to access this in the past.”
Central Primary School
At the end of the of the initial launch period, staff at Aboyne Lodge Primary School in St Albans were certain they would be continuing with the programme and had identified further pupils to complete the diagnostic assessment with.
During the spring and summer terms, I received occasional updates from the school about the impact and success of the programme so in July, I visited the school to have a chat with Joanne George (SEN teaching assistant), Rachel Lockwood (Year 4 teacher) and a couple of their pupils to find out more.
How the Mental Maths Fluency Intervention worked for Aboyne Lodge Primary School
So far, nine pupils from Year 3 to Year 6 have accessed the programme. However, more have completed the diagnostic assessment.
Rachel and Joanne shared that the initial assessment has been useful to:
identify starting points for children they recognised as having significant gaps,
pinpoint specific, less-secure areas for children struggling to keep up with age-related expectations or whose progress had slowed.
Closing specific gaps
Conducting these progressively designed diagnostic assessments has identified small but significant gaps in some pupils’ base fact knowledge that was starting to have a ripple effect on other learning. These pupils received some ‘gap filling’ sessions, either with their teacher or teaching assistant, rather than the full programme.
Example of notes made during the diagnostic assessment
Grouping children for a series of intervention sessions
For pupils identified as having more significant gaps, they took part in the intervention. To implement the programme, the school identified pupils to take part in 1:1 or 1:2 sessions with Joanne once a week.
Where similar gaps were identified between pupils, teaching took place in pairs.
After each session with Joanne, pupils’ personalised intervention plans were updated with information for the class teacher, and independent tasks provided for the pupils to complete daily.
Example of a personalised plan
Strategies to build pupil independence
Facilitating the daily independent work has been a challenge and getting pupils (and their class teachers) into a routine of completing it took time. In the Year 4 classroom, time was set aside, either first thing in the morning or 10 minutes before home time, to complete the tasks.
The Year 4 pupils told me they liked taking responsibility for completing the tasks (and enjoyed reminding their teachers that they needed to do them!) They reflected that they felt the tasks were not too difficult for the brain to work out but not too easy either. They liked completing them on their own, but they sometimes helped one another.
Top tip from Joanne: Get the children into the habit of leaving their folders on their desks just before home time to remind them to do the independent tasks first thing in the morning. This way, it’s there and waiting for them as they arrive at school.
Teacher guides and practice sheets
For Aboyne Lodge, the teacher guides and practice sheets have been the most used resources so far.
Page from the Mental Maths Fluency Intervention teaching guidanceRelated independent practice
Fluency slides
The fluency slides have been dipped into within intervention sessions and both Joanne and Rachel feel that the next step is to integrate some of the resources into whole class maths lessons.
The school uses White Rose resources to support their maths curriculum and follows the Mastering Number programme. Multiple assessments have shown that number magnitude (the relative size of numbers) and understanding where numbers sit on a number line, is a persistent common gap.
Integrating rehearsal of this concept into fluency sessions using the provided resources from the intervention programme has been identified as a possible next step and would be a manageable way to make greater links between the intervention and the classroom.
Impact of the Mental Maths Fluency Intervention so far
Both the children and the Year 4 teacher felt that the programme had had a positive impact.
Rachel Lockwood, the Year 4 teacher, felt that progress in all aspects of pupils’ maths learning was evident with the pupils accessing the programme ‘leapfrogging’ some others in the class.
When asked why she felt it had been so successful, she reflected that a big part of it was due to the increased confidence and self-belief of the pupils.
She felt this stemmed from both securing base fact strategies and from them repeatedly feeling successful when working independently.
Joanne George (SEN teaching assistant) felt that the programme was:
“Something that you can pick up and go with, but with the freedom to make tweaks when needed.”
Finally, one of the Year 4 pupils told me:
“We used to not be able to do a lot of things (in maths) but now with Mrs George’s help, we have caught up to the class. We don’t need to be taught differently anymore.”
We know that teaching assistants (TAs) are fundamental in the running of our schools. They are unsung heroes and are expected to do a lot – from teaching to finding a lost pencil, from providing a ‘magic’ wet paper towel for a bumped knee to inputting data into statutory reports.
The number of teaching assistants in our schools has increased dramatically over the last 25 years and in 2015, the EEF first released a guidance report on ‘Making best use of teaching assistants’ (1) and a key finding was:
‘The typical deployment and use of TAs, under everyday conditions, is not leading to improvements in academic outcomes.’
This led to headlines stating that TAs were high cost but low impact.
Pupil attainment outcomes are important but we also know that these outcomes are not the only aspect in a child's development we want the education system to impact upon. The pastoral care that schools provide has a huge impact on children’s outcomes and successes, and I believe this is an area of school life in which TAs have a major impact.
The changing role of teaching assistants
TAs are expected to support with teaching, and increasingly to lead teaching, in classrooms.
Teaching and/or supporting with maths learning is an aspect of the role that can cause a lot of anxiety.
I work with many TAs at training events and in schools, and when they hear I am a maths adviser, I regularly get told:
“Please don’t watch me. I am not very good at maths.”
“This isn’t going to be hard, is it? I was always rubbish at maths at school.”
“Maths is different to when I was at school.”
Many of the TAs I have met or worked with don’t have great belief in their own ability in maths and don’t have positive memories of learning maths at school. I would argue that many have maths anxiety.
In a report by the Centre for Neuroscience in Education at the University of Cambridge (2), maths anxiety is defined as,
“a negative emotional reaction to mathematics, which can interfere with the ability to perform mathematical tasks.”
Does it matter if those working with pupils have maths anxiety?
On page 4 of the report on understanding mathematics anxiety (2), there are several recommendations. A number of these talk about the impact of teachers, TAs or parents with maths anxiety on the children they support.
Teachers and parents need to be conscious of the fact that their own mathematics anxiety might influence student mathematics anxiety and that gendered stereotypes about mathematics suitability and ability might drive, to some degree, the gender gap in maths performance.
Hence, for parents and teachers, tackling their own anxieties and belief systems in mathematics might be the first step to helping their children or students.
Therefore, it does matter.
How to support people who are anxious about maths, to work effectively with children, needs careful consideration.
Scaffolding framework for teaching assistant – pupil interactions Making Best Use of Teaching Assistants, EEF
The idea of the framework is to ensure that TAs interact with pupils in a way that enables greater pupil independence. Teachers have the responsibility to set tasks with the correct level of challenge, and TAs should observe and then provide support.
This may involve suggesting self-scaffolding and if more support is needed, moving down through the layers. The further down the layers, the greater the need for dependence on an adult or learnt helplessness.
Sadly, I see and hear about many pupils who are highly dependent on adults and have very little independence.
If this is a model that is known to work, why are so many pupils dependent on an adult in maths lessons?
I would argue that this could be for several reasons.
One is that tasks are not being set with the correct level of challenge, considering pupils’ prior knowledge.
Another is that the support provided starts at the bottom of the triangle – with correcting or showing.
I think, on many occasions, this is due to TAs not feeling confident to prompt, give clues or provide a model that helps to explain the mathematical concept being taught. However, they want the pupil to feel successful and to get the answer correct. They may also want to mask their own anxiety.
Going back to the comments I often get from TAs I meet, especially the one about maths being ‘new and different’…
Maths as a subject hasn’t really changed – the number system is the same and calculations are no different either, but I would agree that maths teaching has changed.
If I think about the maths I was taught at school, and even how maths was taught when I was training to be a teacher, it was different. The focus now is on conceptual understanding, and learning how and why strategies work, rather than simply learning a formula or process and applying it.
What can be done to support teaching assistants who are feeling anxious about maths?
In the EEF guidance report (in part 4 of the summary of recommendations) (1), it states:
During lesson preparation time, ensure TAs have the essential ‘need to knows’:
Concepts, facts, information being taught
Skills to be learned, applied, practised or extended
Intended learning outcomes
Expected/required feedback.
This is a lot.
Teachers are time-poor and budgets and working arrangements often mean that teachers and TAs don’t have time to meet for this purpose. If a TA’s subject knowledge is insecure, they are anxious about maths and there’s a lack of time to prepare, supporting maths teaching can become overwhelming.
Developing subject knowledge in maths
Providing support and training to develop subject knowledge would be a good first step to build self-confidence.
As listed in ‘ten reasons to improve the use of teaching assistants’(1), “Upskilling TAs raises their professional profile and status and makes them feel more valued.” It also provides them with the knowledge, skills and vocabulary to provide prompts, clues and models that support pupils’ independence.
In an article by Cambridge Mathematics (3), high quality CPD / training is included in the “Virtuous Cycle”. This has been created by looking at what research suggests about effective utilisation of TAs in the maths classroom specifically. It recommends that,
“schools should consider the value of maths-specific training and professional development for TAs supporting mathematics lessons”.
A workable, cost-effective solution
The primary maths team at HFL recognise the need for high quality CPD for TAs, but we also recognise that school budgets are tight and releasing people can be tricky. So we have come up with a workable solution.
We are putting on a series of six 1-hour webinars over the autumn and spring terms.
Each session will focus on a domain of maths learning, for example, numbers, multiplication and division, fractions or geometry. Sessions will increase subject knowledge and conceptual understanding across the maths curriculum and provide practical ideas to take away and use straight away in the classroom.
The cost of the six-session package starts from £45 for one TA; only £7.50 per session.
We are keen to enable as many TAs to access this training as possible.
The cost for 2-5 TA places is £120. So if 5 TAs access the training, that works out at £4 per TA per session.
We appreciate it may not be possible to release 5 TAs at the same time so all sessions will be recorded and will be available to watch at any time.
For more information about the training and to book places, please visit the HFL Education Hub
References
EEF (uploaded 2021) making best use of teaching assistants guidance report
Carey, E., Devine, A., Hill, F., Dowker, A., McLellan, R., & Szucs, D. (2019). Understanding Mathematics Anxiety: Investigating the experiences of UK primary and secondary school students. Centre for Neuroscience in Education. https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.37744
I have written before about the powerful effect a teacher’s beliefs about a child can have on that child both positively (known as the Pygmalion effect ) and negatively (known as the Golem effect). In his seminal study Hattie revealed that teacher efficacy (literally a teacher’s belief about themselves or a school community’s belief about its collective power) has a huge impact on the impact that school can achieve. Previous research suggested that teacher efficacy can outweigh the negative effects of low socio-economic impact.
So what if teachers believed that the effective use of technology supported learning? What would that look like in practice and how would it impact on the young people
One Watford Primary Headteacher asked us to trial this in her school. How did we go about it and what was the impact on the young people?
So why are there so few references to use of technology in Pupil Premium statements? There are a few reasons why technology might be a useful tool in helping us combat educational disadvantage:
If you don’t understand the first time you can ask it the same question several times and it doesn’t get cross or assume that you’re not listening.
It can instantly provide the knowledge needed to plug gaps. This is particularly important in the current context of absence in schools.
It can work out precisely the aspect of a new concept that is preventing learning. So if we’re learning the perfect tense. Is it the verbs in avoir or how the endings are formed or even a more philosophical why is the perfect tense perfect. The technology can work this out and address this on a personal level that would take a longer time for me as the teacher to diagnose and then address.
At a recent conference on AI in education Anthoney Seldon posted,
‘If we are very wise in the way that AI is applied. It will solve the enduring problems that the third factory model of education never solved for example social mobility, which has been static or declining, it could massively help social mobility’.
Thank you to the Hertfordshire Chairs of Governors Panel for their time and great questions at their recent meeting as we explored together how AI and Edtech can support us in our journey towards Educational Equity.
Firstly, a big thank you to all those who serve our schools as governors. We probably don’t tell you this often enough but we are grateful for your energy, curiosity and contribution to our school communities. What you do matters, the areas you choose to focus on matter! Focusing on educational equity which might be summed up as the opportunity, ‘for children to write their own life story’ seems like a good place to start.
Here are some thoughts about questions you might ask to better understand how technology is contributing to equity in school:
How does our use of Edtech and AI align with our school priorities?
How much are we spending on EdTech?
Which platforms are the most effective? In every subject? How do we know?
What are the risks of using AI and Edtech in our school?
How are we mitigating for these risks?
Are there references to Edtech and AI in key policies? How are they referenced? Are all references negative?
What is the impact on disadvantaged students of our strategies such as bring your own device?
In a world where a series of de-personalised lesson slides can be downloaded in a single click, and where AI can script a generic model for writing, we run the risk of deskilling our most valuable assets: our teachers.
As advisers privileged to support schools throughout Hertfordshire and beyond, we frequently encounter a recurring narrative. Teachers report that many of their young writers are disengaged and unmotivated during writing lessons. Many even find the teaching of writing overwhelming or personally challenging themselves. Whether it is due to time constraints, the constant need to fill gaps from previous years, a demanding curriculum dominated by formal grammar instruction, or all of the above, we have heard it and continue to experience it first hand. Assessment data for writing also highlights the need for change.
The story continues with the very recent report from the Literacy Trust’s Literacy Survey, which explores children and young people’s writing enjoyment at school and in their free time. Sadly, it reveals that pupils’ motivation and enjoyment for writing is the lowest since 2010.
“Increasing evidence of a long-term downward trend calls for urgent action to reconnect children and young people with writing that promotes connection with creativity, self-expression and mental wellbeing.” – Literacy Trust 2024
ESSENTIALWRITING: Help is at hand!
The Primary English Team has been collaborating with school colleagues to develop and trial an innovative writing curriculum tailored for both teachers and children. This curriculum aims to enhance the knowledge, motivation, and confidence of teachers and children by exploring the craft of writing.
This close relationship with schools has provided us with valuable insight, allowing us to develop a clear philosophy with quality pedagogy and values that are built upon a strong evidence base.
The Rationale
So let us start with the why. Why Essential Writing? Why now?
ESSENTIALWRITING is a progressively sequenced writing curriculum for years 1 to 6, that is built upon the principles of writing for authentic purpose and audience. The curriculum is designed to teach and review children’s understanding of language choices, according totheir writing purpose, across the year and in subsequent years.
Allow us to elaborate...
Why am I writing and to whom am I really writing?
As much as possible, within every unit plan, children are encouraged to write for a chosen, authentic audience and are provided with time to publish and share their writing with their intended reader(s). These authentic reasons to write, and seeing these experiences through to the very end, can drive motivation, engagement and pleasure – not to mention a real and genuine care for the writing process.
Thank you to teachers at St Paul’s Walden, Hitchin who commented that, when trialling the plans:
“Children loved writing for a real purpose and were excited to receive a response and see the impact of their writing!”
“The quality and quantity of the work has improved massively!”
Sequenced and progressive
ESSENTIALWRITING has been developed to ensure complete National Curriculum coverage from year 1 to 6. Objectives have been mapped out across the year with opportunities to review key objectives from the previous year group embedded. Objectives build sequentially over the year with deliberate emphasis and repetition of core skills that children will rely upon the most within their writing.
“Effective enactment of a progressive, sequenced curriculum, every lesson, every day, as a universal entitlement, offers far greater opportunity for all.” – Dan Nicholls
We understand the importance of a structured curriculum with high expectations for all children, and this is especially important for pupils currently experiencing disadvantage. We aim for new knowledge to seamlessly ‘stick’ to existing knowledge. This spiral curriculum is designed to introduce new concepts in manageable chunks and offer meaningful opportunities for application as children delve deeply into studying the craft of writing.
“When planning a curriculum, teachers and leaders should prioritise progression in knowledge of language and of its forms, usage, grammar and vocabulary. This knowledge, of the structures of language, can then be used by pupils across their spoken language, reading and writing.” - Research series: English, Ofsted July 2022
High-quality texts and written models
It goes without saying that this curriculum is centred around high-quality literature, and although ESSENTIALWRITING does use a wide range of engaging books, it is not a reading
curriculum. Our plans offer abundant opportunities for children to engage with texts through reading, discussion, drama and more; however, the focus is on writers having abundant opportunities to read the core texts as writers that notice the writerly craft.
The texts we have selected serve as rich inspiration, and by immersing themselves in these texts, children learn to deploy the techniques employed by authors and understand their impact on real readers. Rather than simply repeating content, a common pitfall in writing classrooms, children will now have the chance to analyse the choices writers make and the reasons behind them.
Or curriculum places a strong emphasis on the art of writing, leveraging our reading experiences to develop a deeper understanding of what constitutes effective writing. Through this approach, we aim to grow a generation of writers, who not only appreciate the craft of writing, but who also thrive in it!
Pitch-perfect!
While these diverse texts offer us a wealth of inspiration, from language models to sentence structures and idea inspiration, we acknowledge that they may not always be pitch-perfect or align with our desired success criteria. As a solution, we have developed teacher-written models tailored to each year group's programme of study. These models serve as guides, ensuring that teachers can deliver exemplar writing models that are responding to the needs and expectations of their pupils.
Oracy, drama and vocabulary development
The recent Ofsted English Subject report emphasised the significance of speaking and listening. It shared the importance of allowing children ample time to discuss their ideas before putting pencil to paper. The emphasis on oral rehearsal, reading aloud, and other opportunities to speak before, during and after writing, is woven throughout our approach. Just as we provide models for writing, teachers will also receive support in scaffolding children's spoken language and facilitating meaningful dialogue, too!
Agency
ESSENTIALWRITING deliberately builds in plenty of opportunities for children to feel agency within their writing. We know from research that this is absolutely crucial to enabling children to feel like real writers. This includes opportunities to write about what they know, what they like and what moves them.
Success criteria
The development of our very own success criteria also supports children on their journey toward self-efficacy, ownership and how their own language, grammar and structural choices can impact their reader.
To support teachers and children to connect all writing choices to the intended effect on the reader all ESSENTIALWRITING units contain examples of Pyramid Success Criteria. The pyramid is designed to show how all decisions are informed by purpose and audience and how the writer wants their reader to think, feel or understand something in a particular way. These success criteria are built over the course of the unit and referred to whilst the children are composing their final written outcome.
Personal, adaptive and responsive
At the beginning of this blog we explored the potential deskilling of our wonderful teachers as a result of technological advances, pre-made resources and lesson plans.
You may be thinking, “Well isn’t ESSENTIALWRITING doing just that?”
Yes, Essential Writing is well-resourced, fully planned and sequenced but its true strength lies in empowering teachers with a sense of their own agency. Our lesson plans are designed to directly address teachers, offering guidance on how to respond to their pupils’ learning in real-time and make necessary adjustments as the learning progresses. We provide ongoing support to help teachers continually assess and address the strengths and needs of their children, guiding them in adapting their teaching accordingly.
Now, more than ever, the teaching of writing demands significant change. We firmly believe that by implementing the right curriculum, employing effective pedagogy, and prioritising the factors that we know motivate children to write, we can usher in a transformational shift.
Similar to the process of writing itself, this is a journey—one we hope you will embark on with us!
