I have but one piece of advice for school leaders seeking to initiate professional discussion on learning and teaching in their schools, or looking to revamp their learning and teaching policies: just give out Rosenshine's 'Principles of Instruction'.
Three years ago we embarked on the process of revamping our Learning and Teaching Policy in Markethill High, based on research we undertook at the time and our own understanding of what we believed to be excellent practice in Learning and Teaching from our own professional discretion and experience. The result was the formulation of our '6 Principles' for high-quality learning and teaching.
1:
Effective Learning and Teaching must be embedded within a constant and
unrelenting framework of ‘Stretch and
Challenge’;
2:
Effective Learning and Teaching will be facilitated greatly by planning for,
and embedding, effective questioning
within the classroom, and ensuring that oracy
reflects high quality academic register;
3:
Effective Learning and Teaching requires effective
modelling, breaking complex processes into steps, providing time to
check understanding and making sure pupils have opportunities to ask questions;
4:
High Challenge Activities to support effective Learning and Teaching in the
classroom will act as a scaffold
to allow all pupils to reach our high expectations;
5:
Effective Learning and Teaching should allow for (monitored) independent practice to allow for mastery through
differentiation by outcome;
6:
Formative assessment and feedback
will help plan for, implement and evaluate effective Learning and Teaching
strategies.
As mentioned, we were starting to dip our toes in the water as regards research at that time, so it is not surprising that the Policy makes reference to Bjork's 'desirable difficulties', spacing, interleaving, testing etc. We were also (and still are) fans of the writing of people such as David Didau, Shaun Allison and Andy Tharby.
Yet, sadly, Rosenshine's 'Principles of Instruction' escaped our attention at the time. It is therefore somewhat comforting to see overlap in our own Policy and the instructional principles outlined by Rosenshine. However, there is no getting away from it. Rosenshine's paper on Instructional Principles probably makes Learning and Teaching Policies somewhat redundant. It is powerful beyond measure. So much so, that as a school we now make reference to it in the introductory literature and job descriptions when we are appointing new teachers. Additionally, it sits in pride of place on our professional development website.
Rosenshine's 'Principles of Instruction' is based on the solid premise that education involves helping a novice develop strong, readily accessible background knowledge. Background knowledge is then connected through strong instructional support. The most effective classroom practitioners, according to Rosenshine's research and evidence base, undertake some experiential, 'hands-on' activities, but only after background knowledge has been acquired, rehearsed and overlearned to the point of automaticity. Theses premises - which can be found in one of the opening paragraphs of Rosenshine's document - ring so true with me in their declarations - whether implicit or explicit:
1: Subject-specific knowledge must precede skill;
2: Novices do not learn in the same way as experts, and pupils in our Key Stage 3 classrooms are most typically novices. As such, the acquisition, rehearsing and embedding of strong subject knowledge in long-term memory is a priority;
3: This is best achieved through explicit instruction;
4: Explicit instruction doe not exclude scope for some experiential, 'hands-on' activity, however, the latter could and should only be undertaken after background knowledge has been acquired, rehearsed and overlearned to the point of automaticity, thus ensuring the harnessing of working memory.
The latter point reminds me quite potently of Tom Sherrington's description of Mode 'A' + Mode 'B' instruction in his excellent book 'The Learning Rainforest' - the 80% / 20% model. We will be delighted to welcome Tom to Markethill High in August to present further on this topic.
Rosenshine goes into detail regarding his instructional principles, and implications for the classroom. The rest of this blog and my next three blog posts will pick up on some thoughts I had when reading them.
Principle 1: Begin a lesson with a short review of previous learning: daily review can strengthen previous learning and can lead to fluent recall
Sometimes I really think that we have got it all wrong with the notion of 'Plenaries' at the end of lessons, or 'exit passes' as they are sometimes called. Whilst working memory is indeed limited and restricted in terms of time we hold information there, what is the point in asking our pupils to recall something which they did 10 minutes prior? How often have we been advised by the 'powers that be' to do an activity whereby pupils are asked to spend 5 minutes at the end of a lesson to write on a post-it what they have learned and stick it on a chart on the way out? There are even schools which base their School Development Plans around the development of things such as 'Plenaries'. Wouldn't it make more sense to just continue with the learning until the very end of the lesson, and undertake the recall at a more pertinent time - like a few days later at the start of the next lesson when the prior knowledge gleaned in the previous lesson has most probably started to disappear from working memory? Surely our focus should be on 'entrance passes', not 'exit passes'? Because that is the time when effective recap will help, as Rosenshine outlines, not just to enhance and expedite automaticity, but also to harness working memory for the upcoming lesson. It is, in my humble opinion, no accident that Rosenshine frames this Principle with the phrase 'Begin a lesson with a short review' rather than 'End a lesson with a short review'. David Didau writes well about this very issue here.
Principle 2: Present new material in small steps with student practice after each step. Only present small amounts of new material at any time, and then assist students as they practice (sic.) this material.
Rosenshine makes the point that the most effective Maths instructors spent 23 minutes of a 40-minute period in lecture, explaining, questioning, demonstrating and using worked examples. By contrast, the least effective instructors spent just 11 minutes. Again, the implications of this finding - whether implicit or explicit - are significant. Those teachers who spend a significant amount of lesson time in explicit instruction (exposition, explanation, demonstration, questioning, whole-class rehearsal through worked example) are maximising opportunities for the harnessing of working memory. Indeed, the use of worked examples has been evidenced to reduce cognitive load. Studying worked examples may be more effective for learning than problem-solving itself, and particularly at the 'novice' stage. Explicit instruction therefore encapsulates not just the need for strong exposition, explanation and questioning, but also the need for effective modelling and use of worked examples, where complex elements of a problem are broken down and solved in a step-by-step manner. Two of my favourite writers on the topic of worked examples are Greg Ashman and Craig Barton. Their podcast on Cognitive Load is outstanding.
As a school, Markethill High has come to the conclusion that visualizers are one of the most powerful classroom resources to enhance opportunities for modelling and worked examples. We have seen them used to great effect in the Michaela School, Wembley, amongst other places. It is therefore our intention to procure professional visualizers for all classrooms in school. We are also really taken by Peps McCrea's excellent book on 'Memorable Teaching' and as a school we have explored various means to harness working memory in the classroom, including orienting attention, setting the filter and outsourcing working memory where applicable.
Part 2 in this blog series will look at Rosenshine's Principles 3-5.
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