Research School Network: Three simple ideas for the return to school Simple approaches that can help teachers on the return of pupils to school

As pupils return to school, what approaches must we prioritise? We have three simple ideas that can guide your thinking.

No assumptions

There are patterns that we can spot for ​‘learning loss’ at a national picture. We can see from evidence, such as the Sutton Trust Learning in Lockdown report, that some pupils don’t have accesses to devices, that many have struggled to engage, but also that some have excelled. But on a school or individual level, we really can’t make assumptions about the specific nature of any of our pupils’ learning. Therefore our assessment becomes paramount. As Alex Quigley says in his blog on Learning recovery and diagnostic assessment, ​“There will be learning losses and there will be learning gains.”

He goes on to say:

A number of other blogs from the EEF explore this idea of effective diagnostic assessment and are well worth a read:

Professor Rob Coe: Assessing learning in the new academic year Part 1 of 2 – three key questions for school leaders to consider

Professor Rob Coe: Assessing learning in the new academic year Part 2 – how school leaders can best support pupils to regain lost learning

Dr Jo Pearson, Head of Oldham Research School, and Helen Crowther, Principal of The Greetland Academy: ​‘Back to School’ – Meaningful and Manageable Assessment

Relationships

We know that schools are keen to prioritise relationships with pupils. The EEF’s Improving Behaviour in schools guidance report has some useful pointers towards strategies worth considering. One idea is to explore further this idea of ​‘relationships’.

The diagram above is adapted from the work of Simon Ellis and Janet Todd. Their book, Behaviour for Learning: Promoting Positive Relationships in the Classroom, is a comprehensive read which combines rigorous evidence with practical solutions, and one we’d highly recommend.

These three relationships, with self, others and curriculum are an interesting lens through which to view pupils’ behaviour. If we see any challenging behaviour it can be helpful to reflect in which of the above is the issue, or it may be a combination of them all. It can also inform approaches we take and even the language we use. In the current circumstances, we might ask how these have been affected and where likely challenges may lie.

Another helpful idea from the guidance report is the EMR method. It can be used as a way to think about relationships with pupils who may well be struggling.

Consistency

Recommendation 6 of the behaviour guidance report is ​‘Consistency is key’.

Maintaining consistency has been a challenge this year, but for many schools the fact that they have consistent classroom and whole school approaches has meant that some of the challenges were easier to tackle. Consistency will help your teachers too, freeing them up to focus on the challenges of effective instruction.

We wrote about routines for remote learning, but some of the ideas hold up for face-to-face, and Peps Mccrea phrases it well: ​“Routines strip out redundant decision costs, reduce the amount of novel information that we have to process, and make the most of our ability to think less about the things we repeatedly do.“

It is naïve to say that everything will remain consistent, but we can manage change in a consistent way, even at pace.

And beyond the return to school, consistency, relationships and no assumptions seems like a sensible approach anyway.