VIEW FROM THE CLASSROOM
Understanding how children feel about their learning
Tell us about your school
We’re a single form entry primary school in the small town of Arundel, West Sussex, with just over 200 pupils, with a small number (5.8%) eligible for free school meals. Our vision for the school is ‘faith, hope and love’, and we aim for all our pupils to be given the widest range of learning opportunities. Encouraging independence and personal responsibility for our children so they can achieve their best is particularly important to us.
We have always been keen to encourage our children to reflect and talk about their learning, but the 2019 Ofsted EIF meant there was less focus on collecting so called ‘progress data’ and much more on understanding each child in terms of where they were, and where they needed to go next. To do this effectively, we needed to understand how children felt about their learning.
So you wanted pupils to be more involved in assessment?
I
n the latest in our ever-popular View from the classroom series, this month we’re delighted to hear from Andrew Simpson, Headteacher at Arundel Church of England Primary School, who explains how a change in the school’s approach to assessment has led to multiple benefits for staff and pupils alike.
Yes, absolutely! For some time, I’d been uncomfortable with the amount of assessment we did to children, and I wanted to shift things to where our assessment was done with the active involvement of our pupils. We wanted them to become better at reflecting on, and talking about, their learning. We felt it would help them to remember more and help them develop a broader sense of what it means to learn.
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www.education-today.co.uk
However, we knew that simply getting them to write about it would not engage them, so we needed a different approach.
How did you start?
The children enjoyed creating videos - we’d seen this in the pandemic. So we decided to ask children to create videos where they would talk about their learning. In terms of technology, we are lucky to have 30 Chromebooks in each class which provided the necessary hardware for the children. We then used Tapestry, an online learning journal which we used in EYFS and KS1, to provide the software for the children to upload their videos. Tapestry had a specially designed version of their software for use by children, which meant that even younger children would be able to upload their videos.
We decided to focus on RE, a subject which had been harder to teach during the lockdowns. Also, as a Church of England school, RE was particularly important to the school’s vision and values. We began work with our Y6 pupils as we felt that helping them to develop as more ‘ active learners’ would be a valuable skill for secondary school.
How did your year 6 children react to creating the videos?
They really enjoyed creating the videos. Children uploaded their work to their own Tapestry
October 2023
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