Search

Many students still leave school without a good grasp of basic literacy, despite the negative implications for future educational and labour market outcomes. We evaluate a programme that involves changing how resources are used within classrooms to reinforce the teaching of literacy. Specifically, the programme involves training teaching assistants to deliver a tightly structured package of materials to groups of young children. Further, we compare the effectiveness of computer-aided instruction using available software with the paper equivalent. We implement the experiment in the context of a Randomised Control Trial in English schools. Both interventions have a short-term impact on children's reading scores, although the effect is bigger for the paper intervention and more enduring in the subsequent year. This paper shows how teaching assistants can be used to better effect within schools, and at a low cost.

Lesson Study is a popular approach to teacher professional development used widely in Japan. It involves a small group of teachers co-planning a series of lessons based on a shared learning goal for the pupils, with one teacher leading the co-constructed lesson and their colleagues invited to observe pupil learning in the lesson. The team then develop their practice further, based on feedback. Some of the features of Lesson Study have been adopted, in a variety of formats, in the U.K. A team at Edge Hill University developed a Lesson Study programme combined with a Talk for Learning content focus, which involved a team of three teachers collaborating to plan, teach, (informally) observe and analyse the impact of teaching on pupil response and progress. Each teacher identified two 'case pupils' in their own class who appeared to be underachieving, and the observation focused on these pupils. The aim of the intervention was to raise pupil attainment by improving teacher effectiveness. This evaluation tested the impact of a particular version of the Edge Hill programme on pupils' Key Stage 2 (KS2) outcomes. Three teachers from each participating school attended five training sessions from September 2013 to July 2015. Each term, they completed one Lesson Study cycle where one of the team taught three co-planned 'research' lessons while the others observed pupil learning, interviewed the case pupils after each research lesson, and met with the teacher to review their practice. Each year, at least one Lesson Study cycle focused on literacy, and at least one on maths; at least one cycle focused on a Year 4 class and one on a Year 5 class. The programme was evaluated using a randomised controlled trial of schools in the South West, East Midlands, and North West. Teachers in 181 schools (teaching 12,747 pupils) took part. The primary outcome was a combination of KS2 maths and reading test scores for pupils who were in Years 4 and 5 in the first year of the trial. The process evaluation involved observation of teacher training, analysis of surveys, school visits, and interviews with participating teachers and senior leaders. Methods, impact evaluation, process evaluation, and findings are discussed herein.

This report looks at the future for English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) learning in the content of new immigration policies, the recovery from coronavirus, and Adult Education Budget devolution. Drawing on desk research and stakeholder interviews in the West Midlands region, the report considers key questions for the sector and policy makers, including: (1) What is behind ESOL policy in England? (2) Who needs ESOL? (3) Who learns ESOL, and who is missing out? (4) What are the implications of changes to immigration policy for the demand for ESOL? and (5) How should the ESOL sector respond? The report highlights that the potential benefit of ESOL to the UK economy is often ignored and sets out the following key findings: (1) ESOL policy needs a stronger emphasis on economic and social integration; (2) Learning opportunities must meet diverse needs; (3) Barriers to ESOL need to be addressed through flexibility in funding and provision; (4) AEB funding needs flexibility to meet needs and skills agendas; (5) New immigration policy will affect the language profile of new arrivals; and (6) Demand for ESOL may shift to higher levels and vocational needs. The report recommends that policy makers and ESOL providers should keep track of changes in learner needs and demand, and be ready to adapt and respond, and suggests some areas for the development of policy and practice: (1) Provision should reflect different needs and motivations for learning English, with routes open between formal and less formal learning provision to meet changing needs. Local ESOL hubs can play a role in joining up a varied local learning offer; (2) Providers should work with local stakeholders to develop an enhanced ESOL and vocational learning offer; (3) Multiple strategies are needed to address barriers to participation in ESOL learning, with funding supporting community and workplace delivery, and an enhanced online learning offer for those learners who can benefit; and (4) Eligibility for fully-funded ESOL should be extended to excluded groups, to ensure early access to language learning, which benefits learners, society and the economy. [Additional funding for this report was provided by the Barrow Cadbury Trust.]

Abracadabra (ABRA) is a 20-week online literacy program composed of phonic fluency and comprehension activities based around a series of age-appropriate texts. Four 15-minute sessions per week are delivered by a teaching assistant (TA) to groups of three to five pupils. This report summarizes the findings of a randomized controlled trial assessing the impact of ABRA on literacy outcomes for Year 1 pupils. The trial also assesses the impact of an offline, paper and pencil version of the same intervention (referred to here at "the non-Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) intervention"). There were 51 participating schools and 2,241 pupils at randomization, and a total of 48 schools and 1,884 pupils were included in the final analysis (84% of the initial pupils at randomization). The trial took place between October 2014 and May 2015. Fifty-one schools were randomly assigned to either receive some version of the intervention or to act as a "control" school delivering business as usual. In the schools receiving the intervention, pupils were randomized to receive one of the following options: (1) ABRA, (2) the non-ICT intervention, and (3) standard literacy provision. The process evaluation involved observing sessions to understand a variety of factors in the intervention. These included an evaluation of which elements contributed to successful implementation, the perceptions and experiences of TAs and project leads, levels of pupil engagement, and the mechanisms behind the estimated impacts. This was an efficacy study, due to the involvement of the developer in the delivery of the program. Key conclusions of this report are: (1) The children who received ABRA, or its offline alternative were found to make two and three months' progress in literacy respectively compared to the children who received standard provision. This positive result would be unlikely to occur by chance; (2) For both ABRA and the offline alternative, the impact for children eligible for free school meals and children with below average pre-test outcomes was larger than for all pupils; (3) Successful implementation contributed to a well-designed and delivered training program which emphasized fidelity and consistency, enforced by ongoing support from the project team; (4) The process evaluation found that both the ICT and non-ICT interventions may be best delivered in groups of similar rather than mixed ability. The process evaluation also suggested minor changes to the intervention to make it more culturally relevant to British pupils, and to remove some repetition in the non-ICT program; and (5) Future research will examine whether ABRA or the non-ICT intervention can be successfully delivered at scale, and will look at longer-term impacts through assessing Key Stage 1 data from this trial.

Powerful Learning Conversations (PLC) sought to improve the feedback that teachers give to pupils in Year 9, by training them to apply techniques used in sports coaching. It is based on the idea that feedback in sports coaching is often provided immediately after a task is performed, and delivered in a way that children are more likely to respond positively to. The training programme adopted a 'cascade' model: expert teachers were trained in the approach and then expected to disseminate their training to English and Maths teachers in their school. PLC was developed in the UK secondary school context by the Youth Sport Trust (YST) in collaboration with the University of Exeter. This feasibility pilot study was conducted in 20 schools between January 2014 and November 2014. It had two aims: (1) to explore whether the programme is feasible and ready for a full-scale trial, and (2) to explore the effect on children's attainment and other outcomes of the programme. Key conclusions include: (1) There was no evidence that the programme had an impact on English attainment; (2) The evaluation detected a positive impact on Maths attainment, but this result is not secure and we are not able to draw firm conclusions about the programme's impact; (3) Interviews and observations with teachers found the programme was implemented in different ways and with different levels of understanding in different schools. This could be avoided by ensuring the programme and its underpinning concepts are more clearly defined; (4) The intervention is not ready to be evaluated using a large-scale trial without further development. In particular, it is important that the programme is more clearly defined and less open to interpretation by teachers; and (5) If the programme is taken to a full trial it is recommended that paper-based tests are used. The pilot provided mixed evidence of promise. There was no evidence that PLC had an impact on English attainment. The evaluation did detect an impact on Maths attainment, which was equivalent to six additional months' progress over the course of a year. However, it is important to note that these results, particularly the Maths result, should be treated with caution. The evaluation did not provide evidence of a differential impact on pupils eligible for free school meals or pupils with a low prior attainment. The evaluation provided mixed evidence regarding the programme's feasibility. The training was well attended by teachers and they appeared to be engaged. Nearly all teachers who took part in the training found it interesting, engaging and relevant to their teaching, and believed that their school as a whole would benefit from the programme. The programme is likely to be affordable if it was delivered at scale.

The Changing Mindsets project sought to improve academic attainment by supporting pupils to develop a growth mindset: the belief that intelligence is not a fixed characteristic and can be increased through effort. Previous research (Good et al., 2003; Blackwell et al., 2007) has suggested that holding this belief enables pupils to work harder and achieve better results. The project consisted of two separate interventions: (1) an intervention that taught pupils directly about the malleability of intelligence through six workshops, which were delivered by undergraduates from the University of Portsmouth, and four further sessions delivered by two local organisations: the Education Business Partnership, and Pompey Study Centre (now called Portsmouth in the Community); and (2) a professional development course that trained teachers on approaches to developing and reinforcing growth mindsets through their teaching. This course consisted of two half days of instruction. The project targeted Year 5 pupils in Portsmouth, Southampton and Hampshire. The delivery of the interventions was led by the University of Portsmouth and took place between January and May 2013. Key conclusions included: (1) Pupils who received the growth mindset workshops made an average of two additional months' progress in English and maths. These findings were not statistically significant, which means that we cannot be confident that they did not occur by chance. However, the finding for English was close to statistical significance, and this suggests evidence of promise; (2) Pupils whose teachers received the professional development intervention made no additional progress in maths compared to pupils in the control group. These pupils made less progress in English than the control group, but this finding is not statistically significant and we cannot be sure that it did not occur by chance; (3) Free School Meal (FSM)-eligible pupils who were involved in the professional development intervention gained a better understanding of the malleability of intelligence; (4) Intervention and control schools were already using some aspects of the growth mindsets approach. This may have weakened any impact of the interventions; and (5) Future trials could examine the impact of a programme that combines the two interventions and runs for a longer period of time. Findings from the process evaluation highlight some key issues relevant to future use of Mindsets in UK schools, including EEF target schools and pupils. These concern: (1) the appeal of mindset approaches to teachers; (2) the 'fit' of mindset with schools' ethos; (3) its relative simplicity and ease of use; and (4) understanding of the approach by pupils and, potentially, parents.

Mind the Gap sought to improve the metacognition and academic attainment of pupils in Year 4. There were two aspects to the intervention. The first involved training teachers in how to embed metacognitive approaches in their work, and how to continue to effectively and strategically involve parents. This training took place over a day and was provided by a consultant. The second component focused on parental engagement and offered families the opportunity to participate in a series of facilitated workshops where children and parents work together to create an animated film. Sessions were coordinated by a practitioner who helped participants to think about how they are learning, create learning goals and reflect on their progress; to be metacognitive about the learning process they were engaged in together. The families were offered 2 hours of workshops per week for 5 weeks (10 hours in total). The project targeted schools in four areas of England: Birmingham, Devon, London and Manchester. It was delivered by the Campaign for Learning, with assessments carried out by Durham University. Delivery started in September 2012 and finished in October 2013. The project was evaluated using a randomised controlled trial, which compared the interventions to a 'business-as-usual' control group. It is important to note that it was eligibility for the animation course, not participation, that was randomised, so the results must be regarded as estimating the effect of being offered the animation course (alone or in combination with teacher training, as appropriate) rather than participating in it. Among the key conclusions were: (1) The headline findings provide no evidence of a statistically significant impact of Mind the Gap on attainment; (2) The estimate of the programme's impact on pupils' metacognition was positive and statistically significant; and (3) Participating families and staff felt the intervention enhanced home-school relationships and strengthened the learning relationship between children and parents.

Three studies covering the tourism, chemical industry, and healthcare sectors in the European Union investigated patterns of cross-border mobility at the sector level. Special focus was on transparency of vocational qualifications and the relation between transparency and mobility. A serious lack of information on labor force mobility within Europe was found. Results indicated a low and stable mobility rate within the sectors studied, with the possible exception of the tourism industry. Highly qualified and relatively young males dominated the small group of European citizens crossing borders to work. The tourism sector included a group of young people willing to take low-skilled and low-paid jobs. Current information policies and practices in the European Union (EU) was too unsystematic to release the full potential of mobility. While the role of contact points and coordinators responsible for providing information on application of directives was important, their ability to react to direct questions from users was less developed. Actual contact with the coordinators was far more difficult than expected and highlighted the importance of upgrading information, especially Web sites. Discussion was growing at the sector level on the need for common European qualification standards and certificates. There were strong signals of a waking interest in increased transparency of vocational qualifications all over Europe. (Contains 24 references.) (YLB)

Research was conducted in Europe to determine the following: (1) the current situation in the chemicals industry in regard to transparency, recognition, and transfer of qualifications; (2) the obstacles to transparency and recognition of qualifications in the industry; and (3) the key areas for future action and possible measures to promote greater transparency and recognition of qualifications. The study identified current and needed patterns of mobility, European policy assisting mobility, and attitudes and practices of institutions and businesses. Data were gathered through an investigation of statistical evidence on cross-border mobility and a review of literature on mobility in the European Union (EU); an exploration of EU policy in the area of labor mobility and transparency and recognition of qualifications in the chemicals industry; and case studies on the attitudes and practices of 14 employers in the industry. The study found a small and fairly constant level of movement between member states, with mobility concentrated among professional and highly educated groups. In addition, there are no established qualification standards within the chemicals industry below the doctorate level. The companies believe that the lack of transferable qualifications is not a problem; instead, costs, language, and culture affect mobility. The study also found that although some initiatives have been started to promote cross-country mobility in the chemicals industry, they are still significant obstacles to people working in another member state and that further action may be necessary to promote labor mobility. (Contains 25 references.) (KC)