Simon

As previously noted, Simon was the most recently appointed member of the group and was primarily responsible for the delivery of a new business course within the sixth form. He had come into teaching from a business background, and was interested in translating this experience into education.

4.1.1.1 Hopes Starting this Project

Simon was very clear from the outset that he wanted to use student voice as a way of creating the most effective department he could:

I’ve got the overall or overriding agenda…of creating an effective department to enable learners to engage and achieve. And then the goal of being the Business Department with practice which is a response to pupil voice.

1.0-4

Simon wanted to develop a process that would challenge the students to come up with ways that would improve teaching and learning in his department. He had some doubts, however, about how able the students would be to deliver on this, the following quote giving a sense of this:

… how do they then have the knowledge of what works well? And what do we make in terms of the significance of their voice in relation to say the pedagogy etc.? And that’s the bit I’m struggling with… how much do we listen to what they want as opposed to what we know, or we’re told?

1.0-4

Simon was also clear from the outset that there would have to be a benefit to the student voice undertaken although he was initially unsure what form this might take:

I look at it from say a business perspective and I’ll say, ‘Well how are you going to do this? And how are we going to measure the success of that?’ And I do think that satisfaction surveys… there is going to have to be some benefits to the department and the school as well.

1.4-9

In the longer term Simon saw the most meaningful measure of success as examination results:

Teachers are under pressure to get results. Hopefully…it will improve results... And if they can enjoy their lessons more, they can engage more, and perhaps they will get better results.

1. 33-36

4.1.1.2 Some Professional Perspective

Simon came into the project with the view that student voice was not always useful. His references to this view were focused on what he described as formal or routine student voice:

I personally believe… that say formalized processes aren’t as effective as the informal process of just having a conversation with someone. I think that is much more important… I think that a lot of the time in schools they’re all very happy to go, ‘Here’s a questionnaire, blah blah blah.’ And then we write it down, it’s data, it goes and gets filed away, and nothing happens with it.

Simon associated this more formalized approach with management agendas and OFSTED, and considered it detached from what went on in the classroom:

And a more formalized approach to student voice is basically paperwork and I don’t think it has a great deal of influence within a lesson. I think it is just an exercise.

4.15-20

And I can see where the formal approach comes from, and I can see that people need this paperwork to tick this box. And OFSTED come in and you say, ‘Look what we’ve done.’ But I just think that in some respects it doesn’t mean a great deal.

5.15-21

Within Simon’s accounts there was also a sense of resentment of this sort of management led approach:

I think that if you have the one approach it’s always led by say the senior management who want some evidence from this one approach. Then I think it is like saying someone is taking the professional responsibility away from the teachers.

1.30-34

Simon’s view of management was that they needed to trust staff more with things like student voice:

Well it would have to come from the top of the school. And then there could be people or students that are interested in following it further within the subject areas… And I think in some ways it would take the whole ownership of their learning, and something I could do with my group.

5. 35-40

This also appeared to be his instinctive approach to running student voice with the students:

I would hope that it is more in terms of the generation of things from the student perspective, than it is a drive towards change. It could be that we initiate and say, ‘This is what we are looking at- have you got any ideas on that?’ And I do know that in reality there is going to be some direction, and I could provide that direction by saying, ‘How can we improve things?’

5. 26-31

It was suggested that Management should also ensure that there is a basic level of commitment and co-ordination across staff and departments, as without this there was the risk that individual staff would become less motivated over time:

If I am doing something within my subject all well and good. But if no- one else is, or if people are just doing another approach of say ticky boxes, ‘This is where we are.. great, happy days, I’ve done my student voice bit.’ Does that then negate some of the benefit of mine? And I think … You need a common approach throughout the school.

5.35-40 When it came to ideas about education, Simon saw learning as a social process:

The feedback within that, and trying to get them to learn from others… So in some ways it’s like.. I don’t know, proximal development in a way. Where they are all learning from the people around them, and in some ways trying to scaffold their whole answers into that framework.

4.0-6

The role of the teacher within this was very much fitted to the whole school attainment agenda:

And it’s just about building their skills, and their exam skills. That’s what they are tested on. That’s what they need to develop.

3.20-25

This approach was informed by Simon’s own school experience:

I think that in some way it is potentially a lot to do with what I believe they should be getting from it… It is what I would have loved to have had when I did my A-levels (laughs).

This idea of needing to guide the students to success is also illustrated by an instinct to come up with solutions and ‘strategy’:

So I wouldn’t say it’s fully collaborative. There is still me leading it, in say the design of the questionnaires and that.

3.9-15

No that was mine. I mean their thing was they enjoyed.. they wanted that immediate feedback, and they found it helpful when they were told as opposed to had to read it. So that was when I came up with the strategy that I have started to use.

4.11-15

Simon clearly believed that students, and not just teachers, were responsible for success in school.

It’s not really the way we were trying to change things in the lessons and trying to benefit in terms of teaching and learning style. I just think it’s the realization of, ‘Wow! This is what I have to do. We have to be responsible for our own learning.’

5.15-21

4.1.1.3 What Simon Did

Within the above context Simon was keen to develop a focus with students within his department that would support their learning and achievement as they moved towards their A-levels. He began by adapting an OFSTED questionnaire out of which emerged an issue with written feedback:

These are the percentages. ‘I always read feedback on my work.’. We’re looking at like 8 percent like ‘Strongly disagree’. And that is a key thing. ‘I always reflect on feedback on my work.’ Ahm.. some of them. And that was the thing that interested me. More reflect on it than read it. And then it was like, ‘ Ah well, we just look at our grade.’ And then think, ‘ Ah, we did well. We didn’t do well. We didn’t meet our target or we did meet our target.’

3.0-5 A focus group was established, and Simon was keen to get a reasonable

No, it’s open to anyone who want to come along… So I am quite open to anyone coming in… I mean I don’t want all 43 of them (laughs) sitting there, because then it’s like.. there’s no point. So we’ve got a full spread from each class.

3.15-20

The findings from the questionnaire survey were then introduced to stimulate discussion within the focus group:

‘Here’s the feedback from the questionnaire I got everyone to do at the start of term. What are feelings on it? What are you talking about? What do you think we could do? So why aren’t you reflecting on feedback? Why do you just like your mark? Why is your mark so important?’

3.0-6

This led to the group deciding to try and develop a better way of providing feedback on written work:

It was basically they came up with the idea. So we’ve said we’d do something, we’d try and work on something in the next session. So basically the next session is basically they’re coming with ideas about their feedback sheet based on what they already have. On ways to improve it and then we can discuss them.

3.0-6

Once a new approach was agreed it was then implemented for the entire cohort of students and Simon made the decision to track their progress over the subsequent two terms as new strategies were implemented. Simon saw this as something that they had evolved together, and that although it was frustrating at times for him personally it did develop in a way he saw as valid.

I mean I think the whole concept of evolution is probably the more important aspect. I’m looking at it.. even if it does frustrate.. I mean obviously the whole concept behind it is that you are constantly having to change. You constantly have to reassess, evaluate what is going on, and change direction in order to take everyone with you. And align them to what you want to achieve.