I have always worked in challenging schools. At first this was by chance, but now I can't imagine working anywhere else.
In 2013, I had just taken up my first substantive deputy head post when I saw the Future Leaders Trust mentioned in an email. After researching a little more, it caught my interest. I have always appreciated learning from spending time at other schools, and additionally it would give me a support network of other like-minded people. Most importantly, it would help me to have the greatest possible impact on my school and students.
So here I am now, deputy head at Harry Gosling Primary School in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. Harry Gosling is a two-form entry community school with a nursery. We have 472 pupils on roll with 56 per cent eligible for free school meals, considerably higher than the national average. The school serves a predominantly Bangladeshi community and nearly all of our children speak English as an additional language.
Most children enter our school working well below age-expected levels so we have to work hard to make sure that the children leave prepared for secondary school.
When I joined Harry Gosling the school wasn't failing – we had great teachers, a new leadership team, and a lovely community – but we knew our children could do better.
For my Impact Initiative as part of the Future Leaders programme, I decided to work to raise attainment and accelerate progress across the school, with a particular focus on certain vulnerable groups who were not achieving as much as other children.
In this article, I will discuss three main aspects of my work throughout the year:
- The introduction of an aspirational, “no excuses" culture through the setting of high standards.
- Professional development with a particular focus on improving marking.
- Using assessment effectively.
High standards
My first step: get all staff on board with our new “no excuses" culture. Our first INSET day of the year gave me the opportunity to focus on this through introducing staff to some of what I learned on my summer of training with Future Leaders. For example, I learnt a lot about a child's prospects if they do not achieve a Level 4 at the end of primary. While most teachers are vaguely aware of this, it highlighted for me the real importance of primary teaching for a child's future.
Passing this vital awareness on to Harry Gosling staff was key in encouraging them to adopt the “no excuses" culture in every day teaching.
Additionally, I introduced “Tweak of the Week", a strategy to choose and develop an aspect of school life every week. This is a strategy I picked up from another participant on Future Leaders. I would email out the tweak at the beginning of the week, explaining the logic behind it and how to make it work. We would then discuss it at briefing, encouraging all teachers to try it out in their classes. Tweak the Week helped ideas to become school-improving habits – and more than that set the stage for an overall raising of standards over the course of the school year.
After the INSET day, I maintained a focus on our “no excuses" high attainment culture through the introduction of regular meetings with maths, English and EYFS leaders to discuss attainment and progress in their subject. We used these discussions to adapt their action plans, support specific teachers and plan necessary professional development.
Through our appraisal system we also set aspirational targets for vulnerable groups of children, made clear to staff from the very beginning of the school year in order to encourage them to become more aware of these children and take responsibility for their outcomes.
At first, staff were apprehensive about the targets being so high, but I shared data from the previous year which showed that several teachers in the school had made the same levels of progress we now expected. This showed that the targets were attainable in our school context.
Professional development
The second core aspect of my Impact Initiative was professional development. I have already mentioned planning subject-specific professional development with subject heads; I also delivered whole-school professional development during our weekly after-school meetings, which all teachers attended.
Ensuring that all students get good-quality feedback on their work is vital in raising overall attainment levels, so I made improving marking a particular focus of these sessions.
I met with groups of children to find out from them how current marking helped them to improve and what would help them even more. Children said that they often didn't have time to respond to the feedback they received. In response, I introduced a system whereby teachers would include a point for improvement in their marking.
At the beginning of the next lesson children would be given time to look back at their work and make corrections in light of this point – they loved it as they had the chance to work with a green pen!
In order to give teachers more personalised support to improve their marking, I introduced a system of regular monitoring. Some staff were concerned about being monitored so frequently, which was a natural reaction. However, by making this process transparent and sharing the criteria being used, their concerns were reduced. I monitored books with the member of staff present, allowing me to give them immediate feedback face-to-face rather than on a piece of paper and making it clear that I was on their side.
If a member of staff needed to improve they were supported by a colleague, who would show them some of their own marking, mark with them and give feedback during informal meetings after school.
This approach empowered both the teacher being supported and their colleague supporting them to improve their marking and giving of feedback. The real success of marking improvement was the immediate impact it had on the children, which the staff recognised.
Effective assessment
To help the children who most needed to achieve more, we had to know who they were. To do this, Harry Gosling needed to make more effective use of assessment information. This became the third key element of my Impact Initiative.
We increased the frequency of assessments from three to five points during the school year, meaning that analysis of and discussions about progress took place more frequently. We also assessed earlier in the year, allowing us to target support as quickly as possible.
At each of these five assessment points, I met with teachers to identify children who had made little or no progress and establish a plan to support them. Working with the teacher responsible for closing the gap between vulnerable groups in the school, we incorporated a range of strategies to ensure that they made the progress they needed to. These strategies included employing support teachers, focusing on these children during lessons and working more closely with parents. We also identified any differences in progress between subjects to help plan professional development for the term ahead.
These changes to assessment made a real difference to our students. We were able to pick out a group of year 6 children who, by the winter break, were not on track to get a Level 4.
Through knowing who they were, we were able to establish individualised plans to give them the support they needed. Gradually their confidence grew and as a result so did their achievement. By the end of the year, they had all attained the Level 4. It was great to see them really proud of themselves, and to know that we were sending them to secondary school with the best possible chance of success.
This pattern of improvement was reflected in results across the school. In the EYFS, 3.5 per cent more children achieved a good level of development. In key stage 1, a higher percentage of children attained Level 2b in all subjects. In key stage 2, the percentage of children achieving Level 4 increased in nearly all subjects.
We had a 14 percentage point increase in reading, a four percentage point increase in maths, a 24 percentage point increase in spelling, punctuation and grammar, and a 12 percentage point increase in reading, writing and maths combined. Across the rest of the school there were improvements in the progress made and the percentage of children attaining age-expected levels in all subjects.
Conclusion
Our focus this year is to continue making progress, while also embedding changes to the national curriculum and assessment. By carrying on the great work we've been doing already, I know we have the potential to improve our students' achievements even further.
If I had to give one piece of advice to other senior leaders looking to follow a similar plan, I would say to really focus on how we as teachers are working. Through concentration on improving teachers' practice, all of us at Harry Gosling now work more effectively. As a result, I am confident that we are making a real difference to the students in our care.
- Leanne Gray is deputy headteacher at Harry Gosling Primary School in east London.
Future Leaders
Future Leaders is a leadership development programme for aspiring headteachers of challenging schools. To apply or nominate, visit www.future-leaders.org.uk. The Future Leaders Trust is also recruiting for Talented Leaders, a programme to place exceptional school leaders into headship roles in the areas that need them most. Apply by November 17 via register.future-leaders.org.uk