Research School Network: CASE – Through the generations A chance encounter in his old school caused Alan Edmiston to see CASE afresh and through the eyes of a child

A chance encounter in his old school caused Alan Edmiston to see CASE afresh and through the eyes of a child.


To say lockdown has reduced the number of school visits I have been able to make would be the understatement of the century! As a consequence, since September, I have spent more time on Zoom talking to teachers in Poland, South Africa and New Zealand than I have to those in the UK. Yet one of the strange outcomes of this unprecedented time has been that I have been able to start supporting the secondary school I went to as a child.

For the past 27 years I have lived and brought my family up some three miles from the school I went to as a child. It was just before the start of lockdown when the Head of Science from the same school, Sam*, got in touch to ask for support with CASE. CASE stands for Cognitive Acceleration through Science Education and is an intervention project comprised of some 30 enrichment lessons. The activities encourage the development of a climate of social construction alongside the promotion of a culture of higher-level scientific reasoning among students in Years 7 and 8. In a previous blog (Click here to read), I wrote about how I personally became involved in CASE and the impact that it has had upon me. Sam’s reasons, however, were very different from mine as ​‘I was simply sent by my Head of Department because he thought it would do me good’.

Sam’s story became clear once I called in for a chat to discuss how I could help her with CASE; She explained that she wanted to introduce it into her school for the simple reason that as a child her class had been taught CASE and loved it. Her memories of those lessons from 15 years ago were very fond and it was clear that those CASE lessons had had a lasting impact. She smiled as she related how for the first time in her school experience she had been given the opportunity to think for herself, without the pressure to give the ​‘answer in her teachers head.’ She relished the opportunity to work in groups and to talk to her peers as they tackled the problems given to the class without the need to hand in her book at the end of the lesson. Such a start to her secondary science career seemed to have ensured not only her academic success but also her desire, once a teacher, to provide a similar experience for the pupils in her charge.

At this point our stories became entwined for when she mentioned the school she attended – I knew who her CASE teachers would have been! For it was one of the first schools to ask me for help in the late nineties and the two teachers who participated, Jack and Jim *, opened my eyes to the impact that CASE could have in the lives of all involved.

Although the school was very different to the one where I started teaching CASE – suffice to say they lay poles apart in the league tables at the time. At the time that did not really matter to me for what stood out about Jack and Jim was the time they spent planning, and reflecting upon, their CASE lessons.

Looking at Sam it was really strange to see her as the fruits of those CASE labours. On the way home I started wondering about those pupils that I had tried CASE with at the same time and where they would be now. I am convinced that because of my use of CASE, and CAME (Cognitive Acceleration through Maths Education), they would be able to articulate a view of learning that was both collaborative and dialogic in nature, one where their voices and their questions mattered. Indeed my recent experiences of CASE as part of the Strategic School Improvement Fund (SSIF) Science project have convinced me, if that was needed, of the value of such a enriched learning diet at the start of their secondary science career.

_{*names changed for protection}

_{Alan Edmiston is an Educational Consultant, who has worked extensively on the CASE and CAME programmes and has worked alongside Carmel R&D for SSIF Science and Maths. Alan can be reached at Research@​bhcet.​org.​uk}