Getting to the heart of the learning conversation – co-constructing lessons with students

For several years now, our year 7 students have sat the NFER Cognitive Abilities Tests (CATs).

Every year, we would faithfully record the data, believing that a triple score of 101 or more should achieve five or more A* -C grades at GCSE.  However, by year 9, some students, who should have been on track to succeed in year 11, were falling by the wayside. These students – often boys – would become demotivated, disaffected and sometimes disruptive.  They were often orally articulate but struggled with literacy-based work. It was clear that something was going wrong.

Deeper data analysis

Using the work of educational consultant, Pat O’Brien, and some detailed but straightforward scatter graphs, we realised the importance of plotting each student’s individual test scores.  In particular, we compared their verbal and non-verbal scores to highlight students whose non-verbal abilities were significantly higher than their verbal.

Students with a non-verbal score of over 100 were often able to grasp concepts, make links and appear in discussion work to be vey able. However, in written work, they were unable to express themselves coherently. Members of our staff on the teaching and learning group took up the challenge. We identified each student in the school who had this profile and interviewed them to research their learning preferences. What they had to say wasn’t ground-breaking, but it did open our eyes to where we had been going wrong.

Lesson planning with students

These students told us that the difficulties that they fond with written work were getting started, sustaining interest, keeping on track, knowing what ideas to choose and not going off the point. The strategies they suggested included discussing the task beforehand, breaking it up into smaller parts, using pictures or video to help their understanding, using mind maps and structuring paragraphs.

The next step was a logical but unchartered step. Members of the teaching and learning group would each pair up with a student and plan a lesson together. After the initial shock of such an unusual proposal, the students were enthusiastic. They were soon co-constructing and soon evaluating lessons that valued their learning preferences. The students involved were in years 7-10 and the following subjects took part: ICT, geography, maths, history, French and catering.

All of the lessons focused strongly on practical work. Students told the teachers to talk less so that they could concentrate on the task in hand and activities to promote thinking skills were encouraged.  Nikki Roberts, an ICT teacher, co-constructed an introductory lesson on log software with two year 7s.

‘I suggested opening with an activity that I would demonstrate on the large screen. But they said ‘we’ll be bored by that. As soon as you show us the new program, we’ll want to have a go on it.’ So, at the beginning of the lesson, I told the class to try the program out for five minutes.  I then stopped them and answered queries. By the next lesson, they were further ahead. They’d tried things out and had gone on to things which I wouldn’t dream of introducing in the first lesson. . . Their enthusiasm carried them further’,

From student voice to learning partnerships

The challenge now is to ensure that we work with disengaged students to discuss the best strategies for their future learning, so that they are engaged and motivated.  We need to ensure that they continue to affect teaching and have direct ownership of the learning process.

More lesson co-construction is now happening with students from our recently created Teaching and Learning Student Voice Group. This body has also been involved in creating a teaching and learning charter.  The group meets with heads of department to formulate future policy, and they have put forward ideas for implementing the new National Curriculum and the future direction of homework. Co-construction of lessons is just part of the collaborative work that students and teachers are now involved in at Abbs Cross, so much so that we feel that the term ‘student voice’ might be better replaced by the term ‘learning partnership’.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Mr Nigel Franceschi is Associate Head Teacher at Abbs Cross School and Arts College, a co-educational 11-16 comprehensive school in the London Borough of Havering. His main responsibilities include strategic development of the curriculum and teaching and learning. At a wider borough level, he is a deputy head representative on the Havering 14-19 Strategic Partnership and has taken a leading role in the development of the Secondary Strategy and teaching and learning, including student voice, within the local authority. Prior to his senior leadership role, he was Head of Music and Head of Performing Arts at Wanstead High School in Redbridge.

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