Long have we seen the rise of science and computing programs ostensibly designed for girls in our schools, and although this seems to be working for science, this does not appear to be the case for computing. In 2014, approximately 40% of entries for the ICT exam were from girls – but 5 years later, they don’t seem to be taking up computing in the same numbers. Computing, it would appear, is not alone in this respect. The Durham Commission reported this week an overall downturn of entries in Media, Film, the Performing Arts and Design Technology, and is a crucial read for any teacher! 

In its annual analysis of GCSE entries, the Wise Campaign this year reported that entries across the UK in Design & Technology were down significantly once again for both boys and girls, the latter by 29% – although, as with computing, those girls that did take these subjects consistently outperformed boys. We seem to be in danger of losing female talent.

It’s clear, we still have a long way to go for girls and not a lot of time to fill that widening digital skills gap.

A Microsoft report on “How role models are changing the face of STEM” stated: “The number of UK girls interested in STEM increases when they have role models compared to those who do not (30% of girls without a role model report an interest in STEM subjects, versus 41% with role models) The reverse is also true, that having a role model significantly reduces the number of UK girls who say that they are less interested in STEM subjects (43% of girls without a role model are less interested in STEM subjects, versus 28% of girls with a role model)” 

Where are the female role models in our schools? 

Dig deep into the Initial Teacher Training (ITT) data for 2018-2019, and you might spot a few differences between male and female role models in certain subjects. Whilst most STEM subjects were equally represented by men, others were not. There were significant differences in Computing ITT trainees where 68% were male and 32% female last year, and there were still fewer women teaching Physics (29%). What’s that saying…’If you can’t see it, you can’t be it?’.

Gender stereotypes in GCSE entries across a range of arts have also grown over the past five years, with an emergence of a bigger gap between the numbers of boys and girls taking GCSE music and performing arts, blamed largely on the EBacc. Interestingly, 74% of ITT trainees in drama were female. Perhaps ‘seeing it’ and ‘being it’ works both ways.

What about our leadership? Yes, we have female leaders in STEM and other subjects, and yes, we have amazing computing role models I hear you cry… and I entirely agree. But, these sadly appear to be the exception rather than the rule, as a quick look at the School leadership in England 2010 to 2016: characteristics and trends DfE report published in 2018 will show you. 

As their analysis pointed out, one reason for this could be the speed of career progression for women, or rather the lack of it. They state: “… career progression to both first leadership and headteacher roles was on average faster for male teachers than their female counterparts”.

How can we make sure we seek the best talent regardless of gender?

The answer, I believe, is to make sure we continue to fight stereotypes within our schools, in lessons and in professional contexts. The truth is, we need both men and women equally represented in areas of leadership, and as role models for our young people across all subjects. Sadly, at the moment, there are still far too many imbalances. With around 3 out of 4 school teachers being female, we should not be short of talent…. So, why not go and check out your staff room. I bet there is loads in there.

For further reading and practical advice to close gender gaps in your school, visit The Gender Equality Collective website.

Formation

Having begun as a software house in 2006, Derventio entered the education sector with a visionary desire to improve schools, colleges and training organisations in such a vibrant and rewarding industry. Managing Director, Stuart Reece had previously successfully designed and written education languages software that were used in a range of organisations. A conversation with Sir Mark Grundy (now CEO of Shireland Collegiate Academy Trust) identified the need for software to support schools in their efforts to achieve improvement and maintain high standards. Mark commented that edtech should not to be used for the sake of it, but instead, should be a key tool to efficiently improve standards in education and have clear measurable outcomes. This is at the heart of the software being offered by Derventio Education to schools, colleges and training organisations.

Developing Edtech

Initially, Derventio developed electronic self-evaluation forms that were developed to support schools with their inspection preparations and ongoing school improvement. This allowed multiple senior leaders to collaborate on live working documents. The functionality, based on customer requirements, was later expanded to include staff appraisals, improvement planning, lesson observations/monitoring and managing continual professional development. The integration of these key processes has enabled a strategic approach to improvement which has seen hundreds of schools choose SchooliP.

With improvement planning applicable to all phases of education and the private sector, product offerings were expanded. CollegeiP was developed to support further education colleges and for universities, there is UniversityiP. A particular highlight is the recent development of Alto supporting the Ministry of Defence with Alto, a solution that facilitates the management of training portfolios and education provision. Working with a diverse range of institutions has led to a comprehensive customer base that has furthered a detailed understanding of education. Derventio appreciate that the world of education is constantly evolving and; therefore, enhances its software based on customer needs.

Sustained Success

Success of Derventio Education is attributed to listening. As development experts, bespoke solutions are created to meet customer requirements and deliver satisfaction. Customer account meetings, with account managers with an education background, ensures regular conversations with senior leaders to determine development road maps. As a result, there is a heightened awareness of the demands of the sector and Derventio are able to stay ahead of trends in an ever-changing environment.

Despite appraisal being sometimes perceived as a mundane process, having an electronic portfolio of evidence is invaluable. Teachers and support staff are easily able to demonstrate their strengths and identify key areas for development. Ensuring teachers have the opportunity to develop their skills is paramount to advancing teaching and learning. Therefore; products have evolved focused on improving the quality of teaching and organisation improvement.

The Future

Education is moving towards a more collaborative approach with the creation of multi-academy trusts, groups and federations. As these organisations become larger, so does the need to align and create efficient systems. They allow increased purchasing power to make informed decisions. In recognition of this, Derventio’s solutions are evolving to cater to the needs of education and for greater collaboration.

The advancement of technology represents an exciting time. Having already embraced web-based tech and mobile development, the challenge is to create products to make organisations more efficient and avoid the repetition of processes in multiple systems. With the increased usage of mobile/tablet devices by educators, plans are afoot to increase the functionality of mobile applications. Increased functionality and links with a commitment to reduce teacher workloads and allow teachers more time to do their role of teaching rather than administrative tasks. Derventio is proud to be at the forefront of education and actively assist academic institutions to maintain their integrity and ensure the wellbeing of their staff.

For more information about SchooliP’s impact in UK schools, visit: https://edtechimpact.com/products/schoolip.

Of course, many of the most regular mistakes were of concepts that are hard to learn such as punctuation in the grammar, punctuation and spelling paper and fractions in the maths paper, but others are easily avoidable mistakes that often lead to unnecessarily lost marks. So, in reverse order, here is my run down of needless mistakes that, with a little practice, can help your students to avoid deducted marks. I’ve included free access to our Question Sets to help your students re-learn and refine their skills before the big day!

In fifth place we have a section from the grammar, punctuation and spelling paper, namely ‘ly’ adverbs. Children often come unstuck here because they have learned that most adverbs end in ‘ly’ and of course many do, but others don’t.

The reason I have picked this common mistake is not only because it’s easily avoidable but also because in the 2018 SATs paper, pupils were tested specifically on this understanding. The following Question Sets from Using and Identifying Adverbs and Express Time, Place and Cause using Conjunctions, Adverbs and Prepositions, will help to reinforce their learning and address this 5th place common mistake.

Coming in 4th place is from the reading test: namely not using the text to answer questions. In the SATs reading papers many questions include some information which the students have to read and use to answer the question.

In third place from the maths paper, we regularly see confusion with carried digits. Rather than a simple and avoidable mistake this is generally because of a lack of understanding of place value.

We often see children reversing or not adding carried digits, so if the ones column totals 41 they carry the one instead of the four, not recognising the 4 as having a value of 40. Here are a few questions that will help to teach them this concept and consolidate their understanding: Add Numbers up to 3 Digits using the Column Method.

Coming in a very close second, we have forgetting capital letters and not forming them correctly. If you had a pound for every time you’d reminded your class about capital letters you probably wouldn’t still be teaching! However, sadly, it’s a very common cause of lost marks. While news earlier this year suggested that markers will be more lenient with punctuation in 2019, it is worth getting your students to carry out some additional questions to refine their skills. Letting your students run through a few of our practice SATs Question Sets will hopefully help to avoid these lost marks.

And in first place… we have ‘not reading the question properly’. Nerves, worry about running out of time, whatever the reason, this is one of the main causes of lost marks and more importantly, unnecessarily lost marks!

When children skim read questions, they can easily miss key instructional words such as ‘not’. For example, answering ‘Which sentence is punctuated correctly’? rather than “Which is ‘not’…” Our Question Sets provide many of these types of questions, to teach children the importance of spending time reading the question carefully: Is There Life on Other Planets? Another example is with questions that ask for multiple answers. We regularly saw papers where the question has asked for ‘two examples’ or to tick all that applied, and only one was given. Try creating your own ‘reading papers’ on any specific topic by using Learning by Questions’ question collection feature. Simply select the relevant topic area and the Question Sets you want to take from and add questions from the list provided. Questions from our GPS Question Sets are correctly scaffolded to help them to develop the necessary experience.

I hope these examples are useful and that having the extra questions to practice on will give your students more confidence as they go into their SATs papers. Good luck! If you would like access to all the Question Sets mentioned in this article, and over 1,000 other Question Sets covering curriculum aligned topics in maths, science and English, register for a free account today.

Former British Prime Minister and now chair of the global Education Commission, Gordon Brown, has called the learning crisis the ‘civil rights struggle of our time’. World leaders are rightly calling on every sector to join the fight — to use all the tools and resources at our disposal to tackle this effectively. To win this struggle would prevent another generation from being deprived of basic abilities and reduce many drivers of instability and conflict.

Globally there is a shortage of about 69 million teachers and the teachers who are working in low or middle income countries are frequently under supported. Often they teach in rural, remote areas; many of the classrooms have poor learning materials and many teachers feel abandoned and can struggle to understand for themselves the content that they are teaching.

These are all very significant challenges, but not insurmountable. There is a global effort underway to tackle this, centred around UN Sustainable Development Goal 4 for 2030. On current trajectories the SDG4 target will be missed, but progress will be made towards it.

A social enterprise called Bridge International Academies, or Bridge, is focused on helping to achieve this UN goal of quality education for all in Africa and Asia. We serve communities living in extreme poverty and have helped to educate three quarters of a million children over the last ten years at nursery and primary level. Bridge is significantly improving learning outcomes by putting teaching best practice straight into the hands of local teachers around the world, using technology and in-person teacher training and coaching. The vast majority of the work Bridge does is with government teachers in government schools, and some of the work is in our own community schools and nurseries.

A Bridge teacher in class at Bridge International Academies.

After government teachers have been through an intensive up-skilling and training scheme, they are ready to use hand-held tablets that give them access to very high quality lesson guides based on their local curriculum. They are trained to use best practice teaching techniques. In addition, we support them with regular in-person coaching inside the classroom every one or two weeks. In this way, both technology and continuous professional development help these teachers to deliver more child-centred lessons that result in higher learning outcomes for children.

Our approach is to treat learning as a science as we implement best practice across all the schools we run or support. We are focused on how children learn, tweaking, adapting and iterating lessons and teacher training in the light of data and evidence, to make sure children learn as much as possible.

A government school classroom in Nigeria supported by Bridge training and technology.

By collecting information at scale on what lessons work best, and how children learn, local academics in-country work to improve lessons for all children. The approach means that not only can a few schools be served in a few areas but that tens of thousands of schools and millions of children can benefit anywhere in the world.

The use of technology to deliver quality education is bearing fruit in children’s lives. The results have been very encouraging. Kenyan pupils who sat their primary school leavers’ exam have surpassed their peers in other schools for the four consecutive years. In Uganda children have outperformed the national average in the two consecutive years they have sat the national exam. Children’s learning gains in Liberia, where we support government schools, showed pupils learning at twice the speed of their immediate peers. In Nigeria, a DFID report showed equity of high attainment at Bridge schools for children from all types of socio-economic backgrounds. Children in Bridge supported government schools are learning far more than previously. In India we are running community schools in the southeast region in partnership with the local government.

Social enterprises doing this sort of work is an idea supported by the majority of the UK public, and it’s also now part of the official UK Aid strategy for education. From the poorest regions of India to the low-income communities of Nairobi and even areas affected by the terrorist group al-Shabaab, well-supported teachers are thriving and making an impact.

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Microsoft Teams is a communications platform that combines file storage in the cloud with a suite of different apps all in one place. Being part of the Office 365 family, Teams can be set up for free as part of a school-based licence, which in turn makes it accessible for pupils and staff to collaborate online.

A screenshot of the Teams app in use in the classroom.

Share files

One its the biggest benefits is the ability to share files and assignments from a central storage base. Instead of having resources in a variety of different places, Teams can pull it all together, assisting in keeping content streamlined and organised. This means that pupils can locate key information quickly, whether that be in school or at home.

Marking rubric

The assignments tab is particularly useful for when teachers issue a new task or project, as a marking rubric containing success criteria can be attached alongside points for completion and submission dates. Within the same class, different sets of pupils can be assigned different tasks which supports differentiation in the classroom. This can be achieved all through one tab which makes it easier to administer and manage. 

Celebrate pupil achievements

The praise tab enables teachers to celebrate pupil achievements through digital badges and comments. This is an effective way of promoting inclusivity in the classroom by recognising individuals for their progress or effort. Pupils can keep track of which badges they have been awarded through the year and the reasons behind attaining each one. This is then shared on the class channel, helping to recognise individual successes among peers.

The praise tab allows teachers to celebrate individual pupil successes during lessons.

Learning can be transparent

Due to Teams being a digital hub for teachers and pupils, learning can be transparent for all. It engages pupils in new ways by giving teachers creativity to deliver content through text, video, voice, stickers and animated GIFs. This appeals to the 21st century learner as pupils can interact in a digitally social way, transforming the learning experience as dynamic, collaborative and fluid. With Teams, individual needs in a class can be addressed with the capacity to tailor content and resources to different groups. This allows progress to be maximised whilst encouraging productivity to get things done.   

Learning journey

Teachers can have more control over the learning journey that is taking place when using Teams. Being able to modify, change and filter posts and messages, this reinforces the need for establishing a safe and productive classroom environment all of which is achieved through Teams. The quietest of voices can be heard when encouraging pupils to interact through this platform as the social networking type interface makes it a familiar and appealing layout for pupils. 

Develop digital literacy skills

By using Teams, teachers can offer learning experiences that enable pupils to take ownership and develop digital literacy skills as they communicate and collaborate with peers. Differentiation and individual learning needs can be met when teachers develop assignments for either group or independent projects. This can be strengthened further when paired with other apps such as OneNote Classbook or Microsoft Forms. There are also opportunities for personalised learning as the platform can be set up to offer online intervention sessions which has the potential to support pupils who are finding concepts in class difficult to master. This subsequently prepares pupils for the future workplace in that they are using industry standard tools and practices to solve problems. 

Flipped learning

Lastly, Teams encourages flipped learning in a seamless and rich way. By integrating video services such as YouTube or Stream, pupils can be set out of class learning experiences all from the click of a tab. In addition to this, OneNote can be implemented for collaborative note-taking to gain multiple perspectives on topics, or to assist pupils in order to catch up following an absence. Regardless of subject, Microsoft Teams could be a cost saving solution to creating an inclusive digital classroom.

Though I’ve been teaching for over a decade in lots of different groups and guises, I too am starting a new role, taking over the Drama department (a department of one) to lead the subject for the next year. I’m not new to teaching like the NQTs, I feel I have my own style and plenty of experience. I know my subject well and the exams as well as you can. The school is not new, as I’ve worked here a year already, but what worries me is that I’m not the old drama teacher. See, everyone loved old Sir! He was funny and friendly and knew his stuff. He did fun lessons and achieved top results! The classroom feels like his, in a nice way, it’s filled with twenty five years of teaching. He’s even left me a kettle and a fridge in the little office.

So how can I make sure I am still myself, in a role that was once someone else’s? How does an NQT take the best from their mentor but not replicate them?

Being brave enough to be ourselves through:

‘But Miss used to do it like this!’

‘We usually sit in a different place!’

‘That’s not what Sir said!’ 

The teacher before me was undoubtedly successful and popular, I do not resent that. In fact it makes my job easier in that they have built a strong following and raised the stature of our often diluted subject. If anything, it is not a begrudging feeling, it is nervousness – how can I fill those shoes? I’ve spent a few weeks in summer agonising over lessons, picking through the old schemes, my own schemes, writing new schemes, talking to other people about their schemes, speaking to staff and students about existing routines and the usual this and that. Trawling twitter and reading plays. After a while I was all in a spin; too many comparisons. Some of this was useful, but after two weeks of the new term I realised, as I told the NQTs, you can’t do it all ‘new’ in the first term. 

The only innovation I needed was to trust myself. I’ll keep a few old things, use plenty of my own things and try a couple of new things. That’s it. It’s only been two weeks, but I’ve learnt that the only approval I need is from myself, and to treat this role like any other. Don’t try to be something that I’m not and enjoy my teaching. Enjoy the successes and learn from the mistakes as I would anytime, anywhere. 

Innovation is often mistaken for making everything new – innovate yourself, by sometimes being your old self!