Let's Start From The Very Beginning

ACE (A Curriculum For Excellence) and AiFL (Assessment is For Learning) are a few of the buzz words that have permeated teaching environments over the past few years. Since the launch of A Curriculum for Excellence in November 2004 by the Scottish Executive many educationalists have analysed the curriculum to put children at the heart of learning and teaching to enable all young people to become successful learners, responsible citizens, effective contributors and confident individuals (Scottish Executive 2006).

By redefining learning and teaching this changes how we address assessment to ensure assessment fits

‘the purposes of learning, using techniques which are well chosen to support learning, inform planning of next steps and give a good basis for reporting of progress.’
(Scottish Executive 2006)

The initiative AiFL supports ACE where teachers review their assessment procedures to make them more in tune with learning and teaching through carefully questioning, planning and sharing the results. The importance of AiFL as a major pedagogy in all classrooms was put forward by the Scottish Executive (2006) who proposed that all Scottish Schools would be aware of AiFL by 2007.

This awareness is well and truely imbeded in our schools and any teacher who looks puzzled when met with the acronym AiFL has surely had no interest in current educational initiatives. If 2007 was the proposed date for awareness when will the date for all teachers implementing AiFL into their classrooms be? If it has not already started than now is the time to change the way assessment is used in the classroom so that:

‘learning and teaching are at the heart of an effective curriculum.’
(Scottish Executive 2006)

Assessing How Children Learn Not What They Learn

AiFL is the buzz word in staff rooms and meetings where different methods of formative assessment are being implemented for the benfit of children to ensure that assessment is at the heart of learning. This is all fine but there is not point is assessing children if the method of teaching does not meet their learning styles. Over the past months I have put myself on the line to ask children to assess my teaching methods. Before I hear you ask, I have not gone down the line of 'rate my teacher'. The evaulations the children made were more reflections on how successful or unsuccessful they were due to the way that I taught. This gave insights in their different learning styles and how one style does not fit all. Over the next few days I am going to give a more indepth analyses of my study of learning stlyes mixed with current theories in the hope that someone will take onboard this 'how' rather than the 'why' as a starting point with children.

Group 4 - Last Lesson

Today's lesson was taught to you with only the teacher talking. How easy was it to follow the instructions? Did you need to ask for help? Would you want all your lessons just to be talking?

Group 3 - Last Lesson

Today's lesson was taught to you with the teacher talking and notes on the board. How easy was it to follow the instructions? Did you need to ask for help? Was this the best way for you to learn?

Group 2 - Last Lesson

Today's lesson was taught to you using only notes and no teacher talking. How easy was it to follow the instructions? Did you need to ask for help? Would you want all your lessons just to be notes?

Group 1 - Last Lesson

Today's lesson was taught to you using notes, teacher explaining and the whiteboard for demonstrations - the all singing and dancing way. How easy was it to follow the instructions? Did you need to ask for help? Would you want all your lessons taught this way?

Group 4 - Creating A Report

Today's lesson was taught to you with the teacher talking and notes on the board. How easy was it to follow the instructions? Did you need to ask for help? Was this the best way for you to learn?

Group 3 - Creating A Report

Today's lesson was taught to you with only the teacher talking. How easy was it to follow the instructions? Did you need to ask for help? Would you want all your lessons just to be talking?

Group 2 - Creating A Report

Today's lesson was taught to you using notes, teacher explaining and the whiteboard for demonstrations - the all singing and dancing way. How easy was it to follow the instructions? Did you need to ask for help? Would you want all your lessons taught this way?

Group 1 - Creating A Report

Today's lesson was taught to you using only notes and no teacher talking. How easy was it to follow the instructions? Did you need to ask for help? Would you want all your lessons just to be notes?

Group 4 - Using Yahoo Mail

Today you were taught some tools in Yahoo Mail where you only had written instructions to follow. How do you think you managed this lesson?

Group 3 - Using Yahoo Mail

Today you were taught some tools in Yahoo Mail where Mrs Tonner talked used the whiteboard to demonstrate. You also had written step by step instructions to refer to. How do you think you managed this lesson?

Group 2 - Using Yahoo Mail

Today you were taught some tools in Yahoo Mail where Mrs Tonner only talked. How do you think you managed this lesson?

Group 1 - Using Yahoo Mail

Today you were taught some tools in Yahoo Mail where Mrs Tonner talked and wrote key points on the board. How do you think you managed this lesson?

What way was best?

Last week each class in L7 were taught different ways to find out which style of teaching produces the best results. Group 1 took the whole 40 minutes to complete their lesson which was purely listening. Many children required help due to not remembering steps. Group 2 only took 20 minutes as due to the visual help written on the board. Most help was either reassurance or tecnical issues. Group 3 surprised me as they had no teacher help and purely written instructions. The majority of the children whizzed through this lesson with a few requiring help due to not reading the instructions carefully. Group 4, who had instruction sheets, teacher input and the whiteboard for demonstrations completed the lesson in 10 minutes. Only 2 children required support due to not paying attention or reading the instructions. This reduction in time was very exciting as it highlighted that more could be achieved in a lesson if the correct method of teaching is used.