Examination of Witnesses (Questions 280-299)
PROFESSOR BILL
BOYLE, PETER
DUDLEY, ROGER
SHIPPAM, PROFESSOR
ROSEMARY WEBB
AND DR
DOMINIC WYSE
20 OCTOBER 2008
Q280 Paul Holmes: There are two
points there. First, there is no science strategy, but at Key
Stage 2 the kids have always done better in science than in the
two areas where there is a strategy. Is that not a bit strange?
Secondly, the lesson from Ontario, where we have just been for
a week, is that it has a light-touch curriculum and trusts the
teachers as professionals. Canada in general, and Ontario in particular,
does massively better in the Programme for International Student
Assessment studies than the United Kingdom does.
Peter Dudley: One thing that Ontario
does is to be clear about what counts as progress. It is really
important, if we want a national curriculum, that we should be
clear about what counts as progress.
Q281 Chairman: What does that
mean? Do we not know what counts as progress?
Peter Dudley: Absolutely. That
is what I am saying.
Q282 Chairman: You said that they
know what counts as progress, as if we did not.
Peter Dudley: No, it was not a
comparison with what we do not do, but a comparison with a light-touch
curriculum. But one of the things that they have kept there is
that exemplification—
Q283 Chairman: So you can evaluate
progress and get progress with a light-touch curriculum.
Peter Dudley: I did not say that,
either. I think we should have a national curriculum and that
it should emphasise the things that the national strategies emphasise,
and that we should know how to put the curriculum together so
that it is broad, balanced, provides rich experiences for children
and develops them as confident, motivated, engaged learners. Part
of that—an essential requirement—is that we are really
clear about what counts as progress. Part of what we are doing
at the moment, for instance, is helping teachers to see progress
within and through national curriculum levels, which in the past
have always been blocks of two-year intervals of children's learning.
That is important.
In terms of science—
Q284 Chairman: So you have done
it all in three disparate chunks and not reformed the curriculum
across the piece, because you believe it should be holistic and
continuous. That is not why the Government have introduced the
reforms, is it? You have a bit here, a bit over there and a big
hole in the middle.
Peter Dudley: The national strategies
are non-statutory and are not the national curriculum. We are
charged with helping teachers to teach the national curriculum
in the most effective way that they can. So we respond to changes
in the curriculum and curriculum reform in the same way that schools
do, from that point of view. Coming back to science, it is interesting
that, as you say, science has always been higher in terms of Key
Stage 2 test results than literacy and mathematics. I presume
that that is probably why there was not a strategy for science
in the first place. But if you track the changes in science improvement,
it correlates closely with the improvements in literacy and mathematics.
There is quite a strong argument that children are better able,
as a result of improved literacy and mathematics, to understand
the science and express their scientific thinking.
Q285 Paul Holmes: Bill, were you
keen to come in on that?
Professor Boyle: I was just waving
animatedly when I heard the word "effective" in relation
to assessment because it is interesting that we have suddenly
decided, 20 years down the road, that there are other forms of
assessment than the assessment of cognition. It would be quite
revolutionary if somebody decided to follow a route of formative
teaching and learning, and if we broke away a little from the
summative route that we seem to be completely glued to. That might
address the issues of pedagogy that clearly occupy the majority
of people in this room. To fulfil the remit of being a truly formative
teacher—one who understands that learning is focused on
children's development and progress—a teacher has to understand
learning development steps. From our observations and research,
such a programme of professional development is sorely needed.
There is a bit of a dichotomy in my mind about this. I often hear
about teachers being deprofessionalised by the strategies, which
might be partly true, but I also think that teachers are made
a little bit comfortable by the fact that they can now spend a
lot of time doing test revision and test practice, which saves
them from thinking. I am looking for reflective practitioners.
To go back to the beginning of this ramble about the affective
domains, that is how you introduce lifelong learning—you
start looking at intrinsic motivation. Yes, it equates with personalised
learning, but, 20 years down the road, let us give formative teaching
and learning a chance. It used to be called formative assessment
under the task group on assessment and testing, way back in 1988.
It has never had a chance; perhaps we should give it one—he
says, as director of the Centre for Formative Assessment Studies.
Chairman: We do not mind a few commercials
here.
Q286 Paul Holmes: I was going
to look at the Rose review in the next session, but one point
of relevance is the strong argument that where you have high-stakes
testing, league tables and laid-out strategies for literacy and
numeracy, you get a lot of teaching to the test. You get an initial
rise in results and then a plateau, and there is a question as
to whether those results really represent children's ability.
PISA would suggest that they do not. Roger, Ofsted has produced
a report saying that it was worried that it was seeing a lot of
evidence of teaching to the test, but the Minister denied that
when we asked him about it. What is your opinion?
Roger Shippam: It is our evidence
that, certainly in years 6 and 9, there is a skewing of the curriculum
towards literacy and numeracy. Teaching to the test can mean two
things. It can mean that you are teaching to get youngsters to
be able to answer the test, or that you are doing more teaching
in that subject area to raise standards in a genuine way. Ofsted's
evidence suggests that where skewing is happening, teachers are
doing it for the best of reasons, in the sense that they are trying
to raise standards in what they perceive to be important subject
areas. We have evidence that there is skewing in the curriculum
in years 6 and 9.
Q287 Paul Holmes: Let me give
an example. The 15-year-olds in the first PISA study did reasonably
well, but they had left primary school before the literacy and
numeracy strategy, whereas the 15-year-olds in the 2006 PISA study,
who were the product of the literacy and numeracy strategy, did
worse. Are teaching to the test and dictatorial strategies working?
Roger Shippam: I would not like
to say that the outcomes of the PISA study reflect any particular
bit of the history of the youngsters who have gone through the
process, because the study looks at particular aspects of subjects,
which are not necessarily national curriculum areas of learning.
I would not be able to say whether the PISA study is affected
by the experiences of the youngsters.
Q288 Paul Holmes: Dominic, you
have not had a chance to answer any of those points. Do you want
to come in before we move on?
Dr Wyse: My feeling about the
test scores, particularly at Key Stage 2, is that there was a
plateau effect by about the year 2000—that was in our report.
We looked at various other reports so that we could compare statutory
test scores with other kinds of research, and we concluded that,
yes, there was—I support what you say from a different perspective—teaching
to the test. The national literacy strategy has been a very strong
control mechanism since its inception. I speak not just as someone
who has researched and written about this, but as someone who
was a teacher trainer and educator who attended various network
meetings and so on, some aspects of which were helpful. Overall,
I was struck by this control mentality. What worries me particularly
is that children's progress is being tracked so carefully—schools
and teachers micro-manage children—which happens throughout
the system. Returning to what I said before, that amounts to de
facto control of what teachers do, which I think is a serious
problem.
Q289 Chairman: Let us go back
20 years to the Education Reform Act and Ken Baker realising that
students were not performing half as well as everyone said they
were. A whole new system was introduced—someone must have
read The One Minute Manager, which said that if you cannot
measure something, you cannot manage it. Over those 20 years,
what are the milestones of change? With the national curriculum,
have we seen vast improvements in achievement and attainment or
surges of attainment followed by plateaus? Give us the milestones.
You know the history.
Dr Wyse: There was an incredible
amount of controversy over the idea of a national curriculum,
but I question the extent to which that data was analysed and
how it was played out. The Haviland book is interesting in that
regard. Clearly, that was a major moment. From then on, of course,
there were the strategies introduced in 1997. They have a history.
Q290 Chairman: By '97, how many
children were reaching the appropriate levels in numeracy and
literacy?
Dr Wyse: There was definitely
an increase in scores particularly from '97 to 2000—I cannot
remember the exact figures.
Q291 Chairman: Are you saying
that there was no increase between '88 and '97?
Dr Wyse: I would have to look
back at the figures.
Professor Boyle: They did not
have those standards then. The Government had just introduced
them in '97.
Q292 Chairman: I know, but are
you telling me that between '88 and '97 The Department had no
way of assessing whether things had improved, worsened or stayed
the same?
Peter Dudley: The children starting
the curriculum in '88, who were in year 2 in 1991, were assessed
through the first national curriculum assessments for seven-year-olds
using something called standard assessment tasks. That same group
of children was then not assessed again until they were 11, in
1995, when, as I said earlier, only 47% in mathematics and 49%
in English were attaining what those who worked on the TGAT report
and the national curriculum had set out in the curriculum as the
expected levels. That was the starting point and really the drive
for the introduction of the literacy and numeracy projects by
the previous Administration and then the strategies.
Professor Boyle: But TGAT never
anticipated that those levels would be set solely by summative
testing. It suggested an amalgamation of formative assessment
and summative testing. With all due respect, those figures—they
are correct—were for the first cohort that did the Key Stage
2 tests, which were the last ones to be developed, so they were
hardly standardised by the time they were taken by that cohort.
Furthermore, when the assessment tasks for the first cohort in
`91 were originally devised—I remember this intimately because
the Centre for Formative Assessment Studies at the university
of Manchester was involved in the development of those standard
assessment tasks—they were supposed to be packs of assessment
materials to be used by teachers when they thought that it was
right to do so. I am not talking about two-window, single-level
tests, but assessment materials to empower teachers to use them
when the children were ready. At the last minute, the Government
decided to switch to the paper-and-pencil tests.
Q293 Chairman: What year was that?
Professor Boyle: It was 1991.
Q294 Chairman: No one wants to
take us through from '97?
Peter Dudley: I can take it from
'97. In '97, in terms of English, 63% of pupils nationally attained
Level 4 and above—67% in reading and 53% in writing. In
mathematics, it was 62%. The numbers now are 81% attaining Level
4 and above. That is, I think, about 110,000 more pupils than
achieved the level in reading in '97. There is still a gap between
writing and reading, with 86% of children achieving the level
in reading and nearly 90% of girls achieving the level in reading.
The figures are 67% in writing and 78% achieving Level 4 and above
in mathematics. That is the difference.
Q295 Paul Holmes: Are you happy
that the levels they attain in the test at age 11 are realistic?
In 2000, just before I was elected, I was a year 7 teacher and
I was doing term reviews with a class that I taught. I was a form
teacher and for all the subjects it was obvious from the first
week that I started teaching that a good 20% to 30% of that group
of 30 year 7 pupils had got grades that were at least one grade—occasionally
two—above where they really were. There had been a lot of
teaching to the test, but they were not at that level in every
day functioning in the classroom.
Peter Dudley: I will make a couple
of comments on that. Certainly, the teacher assessments bear out
the test results in primary, particularly in years 6 and 2, where
there is very good knowledge and progression. One of things we
are doing—rather than focusing on years 6 and 2—is
working closely with teachers of years 1, 3, 4 and 5 to help their
understanding of progression. It is well documented that there
is quite a lot of learning loss between May—the summer term
in year 6 where children have reached the end of a programme of
study, are in a familiar environment and are working within a
curriculum with which they are also familiar—to September,
when they are in a very new environment. As you know, there is
quite a lot of learning loss between years 7 and 8 and years 5
and 6. The critical thing that we are doing through the assessing
pupil progress materials is setting out within-level very clear
exemplification, so that we can make progression across year group
and phases much more consistent and accurate.
Q296 Paul Holmes: It has already
been touched on once or twice—
Chairman: I will call you in a minute,
Bill. Bill was looking discontented.
Paul Holmes: This has already been touched
on by one or two people. I am interested in what the research
base is. It has been said, for example, that there was much research
on synthetic phonics and other ways of teaching and that the Government
just latched onto one, without looking at all the other research.
What is the research base that first led to the introduction of
the literacy and numeracy strategy and the later frameworks?
Dr Wyse: I will talk more about
the literacy strategy if I may. That is something about which
I wrote in 2000, 2001, and 2003. Essentially, I do not think that
there was a process of thorough and systematic review of research
and then, after that, action. There was a more ad hoc, after-the-fact
process of saying, "Well, we think this is informed by this
research and that research." One of the key things we are
getting better at, but need to do more of is to say, "What
is the research like now?" and, "How should we build
policy?" The key thing that has frequently been talked about
is that there was a lot of interest in school effectiveness and
improvement research at that time. David Reynolds visited Taiwan
and certainly the accounts I have read say that that was an influential
body of research. There seem to be areas that were popular at
the time—for want of a better word—rather there having
been a rather more systematic process of saying, "Okay, let's
look at the research and then build closely on that." My
feeling is that the national literacy strategy was more a professional
development initiative and was not particularly informed by research
in a systematic way. That is where some of the problems are. May
I just give two examples? The teaching of grammar, which is a
popular concern to many people, sometimes gets more attention
than it deserves. There was massive emphasis on that in the first
literacy strategy. Interestingly, there are still references to
the '98 framework for teaching in the new website materials. Obviously,
and sensibly, we do not want to throw the baby out with the bathwater,
but grammar is a good example. It was led less by a dispassionate
analysis of the evidence, and more by popular opinion.
Chairman: Bill, you wanted to come in.
Professor Boyle: Just a couple
of points. I was intrigued by Paul's question about level scores
in year 6 moving on to year 7. We must keep reminding ourselves
that when we talk about a level score, we are simply talking about
mark points that are accreted towards cut scores or level thresholds.
We are not talking about learning or about a pupil's deep learning;
we are just talking about racking up marks. Some interesting data
from a research study that we have just finished shows that in
year 6 classrooms in April, an average of almost 14 hours a week
or 56% of the available teaching time is spent on test preparation
across the three tested subjects. That is 56% of teaching time
in the April before the tests in May.
Q297 Paul Holmes: What do you
think about my point that we are seeing ever-increasing scores
for literacy and numeracy in the tests, but that we are going
backwards in the PISA studies? PISA tests the ability to apply
literacy and numeracy to everyday situations, which is true learning,
whereas the tests test what the tests test.
Professor Boyle: Absolutely. I
would always go down the route of deep learning. People ask me
whether I have any place for summative assessment, and I say,
"Yes of course. There is always a place for accountability.
It is important." But we have now gone so far down the road
of curriculum pedagogy being driven by preparation for tests that
there is very little rich learning, as our case studies are indicating.
It is a very poor state of affairs.
Q298 Paul Holmes: To return to
the research base for introducing the strategy, we had the 1998
strategy, and the 2003, 2004 and 2006 changes. Teachers in the
classroom have partly contradictory changing strategies, but there
has been a certain amount of evidence that national strategy advisers
from local authorities are not up to date with what is required
by various innovations and new strategies, and that they are giving
false steers to teachers in the classroom.
Peter Dudley: First, we know a
lot more now than we did 10 years ago.
Mr Stuart: What?
Peter Dudley: Well, it is an important
point. In terms of the approaches to pedagogy, the assessment
for learning research came out around the beginning of the strategies.
We know a lot more about how teachers learn, and the sort of approaches
to teacher learning that work. We meet national strategies consultants
who are employed by local authorities termly in order to ensure
that they are up to speed. In the coming year or so, we shall
focus on subject knowledge for mathematics consultants and others
in the wake of other evidence from Sir Peter Williams about the
need further to strengthen teacher subject knowledge.
Q299 Paul Holmes: But are the
changes in the strategies—there have been four policy statements
in eight years—clear enough about what supersedes what,
and what is required if local authority advisers in some places
are giving the wrong advice to classroom teachers?
Peter Dudley: Some people sometimes
get things wrong, but we try to ensure through continuing professional
development for consultants, consultants' training, and the monitoring
and evaluation that we do and others do on our behalf externally,
that that is not happening. We certainly have clear programmes
to ensure that strategy consultants and, increasingly, other members
of school improvement teams are up to speed with how things are
developing, why they are developing, and the logic of that development.
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