Improving pupil literacy and numeracy through effective teacher self-evaluation
Information about the school
Gilfach Fargoed Primary serves the community of Gilfach near Bargoed in the Caerphilly local authority. There are 155 full-time pupils between the ages of 3 and 11 years on roll. Around 30% of pupils are eligible for free school meals, which is above local and national averages. Approximately 15% of pupils have additional learning needs and a very few pupils have a statement of special educational needs. Nearly all pupils are of white British ethnicity and come from homes where English is the main language.
Context and background to sector-leading practice
Rigorous self-evaluation procedures, involving the entire school community, ensure a continually evolving and improving climate for all stakeholders.
Leaders monitor progress against the school development plan extensively on a regular basis to evaluate the success of initiatives. Robust self-evaluation and improvement planning strategies are regular features of the school’s activities and an important element of the work of all staff. Particularly effective elements include listening to learners regularly, focused lesson observations and learning walks, thorough book reviews, and a robust attention to data.
Description of nature of strategy or activity identified as sector-leading practice
The senior leadership team (SLT) initially identified the following key areas that make up effective self-evaluation:
- Observing Teaching and Learning
- Work Scrutiny
- Listening to Learners
- Data Analysis
- Consideration of Stakeholder Views
- Planning Scrutiny
- Analysing the Quality of the Learning Environment
Built into these key areas is the progress of learners. Leaders pay rigorous attention to monitoring this progress and assessing the impact of interventions.
Leaders undertake a detailed annual programme of self-evaluation activities, which identifies the action, the persons responsible and the impact on self-evaluation. All members of the school community are involved within this self-evaluation programme, with their roles clearly identified. As pupil progress is prioritised above all else in the self-evaluation process, the programme includes the school’s extensive assessment procedures. Leaders schedule key activities to take place at regular intervals, which have a specific and meaningful impact on the self-evaluation process. Each assessment task that staff undertake, either standardised or in-house, results in specific targets or actions to support school improvement and pupil progress.
Staff track each pupil’s progress in detail, and monitor those in danger of missing targets or whom the school considers as “Vulnerable Learners” even more closely, and form part of regular pupil progress discussions during staff meetings. Staff test each pupil who receives an intervention half-termly, and use the results of these, as well as information in respect of progress, to assess the effectiveness of each intervention and to provide additional, individualised targets for that pupil. Performance management targets link directly to challenging targets in terms of pupil progress and whole school improvement.
The school has strived to enhance the role of governors in the self-evaluation process, and now holds an annual day where all staff and governors meet to review the school development plan, ensuring that governors are actively involved in school self-evaluation.
The detailed ‘Listening to Learners’ programme, which analyses responses and provides meaningful data to support self-evaluation, as well as the other work on stakeholder views, ensures that every member of the school community informs self-evaluation effectively.
What impact has this work had on provision and pupils’ standards?
There have been significant improvements in standards of literacy and numeracy over the last year. For example, in September 2014, approximately 24% of pupils had a reading age below their chronological age. By September 2015, this figure had more than halved.
Pupils on interventions made significant improvements:
Foundation Phase
In the autumn term, of those pupils receiving literacy interventions, 65% made better than expected progress in respect of their reading ages. One hundred per cent made better than expected progress in numeracy.
Key Stage 2
In the autumn term, of those pupils receiving literacy interventions, 77% made better than expected progress in respect of their reading ages. Ninety per cent made better than expected progress in numeracy.
Striving to ensure that learners have, at the very least, good levels of competency in literacy and numeracy resulted in the school’s national test results being significantly above expected. It is above that of the local authority, family of similar schools and the South East Wales Consortium for >95 standardised scores in every year group except one, which has been specifically targeted for extra intervention.
How have you shared your good practice?
The school has shared its good practice within its cluster of similar schools.
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