Evaluation of the Two Year Key Stage 3 Project - Communities and ...

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Huxbear SchoolThe case study visit took place in Autumn 2006. The school began its Opening Minds programme in2002 and the first cohort of pupils were in Year 11 at the time of the visit. The first cohort of Two YearKey Stage 3 Project pupils were however in Year 9.Huxbear school is a mixed, 11-16 school located in a white working class area of outer London. Theintake of the school, drawn from up to 80 feeder primary schools, has relatively low levels of priorattainment and high levels of eligibility for free school meals. Despite levels of attainment and progress,as measured by the DfES value added indicator, below the national average, attainment at Key Stage 3and 4 has been improving and the school is now oversubscribed.The school began offering an innovative curriculum to Year 7 pupils prior to joining the Two Year KeyStage 3 Project. The school took part in the RSA Opening Minds programme, offering an integratedcurriculum to Year 7 pupils for ten (out of 25) one hour lessons per week. The ten Opening Mindslessons were taught by one or most often two teachers. This competence-based programme includedelements of history, geography, technology, music, art, RE and ICT. Pupils were however taughtEnglish, mathematics, science and French under a conventional 3 year Key Stage 3 programme. It wasfelt that, owing to the accountability function of Key Stage 3 tests and historically low levels of KeyStage 3 attainment at the school, it would be difficult to gain support, for example from the LEA, for anintegrated programme incorporating core subjects.The Opening Minds programme involved teaching a series of projects, each lasting for half of a termtaking, for example, a historical or geographical theme but incorporating art, music and other subjectsinto that study project. The teaching team were therefore required to act as generalists and wouldreceive in service training from specialist teachers within the school. Opening Minds teaching could bedaunting but also rewarding as teachers moved out of their traditional disciplinary area.The integrated Year 7 programme was then followed by condensed courses in Year 8 and Year 9.Although pupils lacked some subject knowledge at the start of Year 8, it was felt that this wascompensated for by, for example, the independent learning skills and team work skills they hadacquired.While in the earlier years of the Opening Minds programme teachers had been very careful to map theschemes of work onto the National Curriculum, on joining the Two Year Key Stage 3 Project they hadfelt able to be more flexible in the programme of study for Year 7. In addition the Senior LeadershipTeam had made it clear to teachers that the over-riding aim for Key Stage 3 was for pupils to be readyfor Key Stage 4.79
ANNEX G - OTHER EARLY ENTRANTS TO 2005 KEY STAGE 3 TESTSSome schools in England that were not participating in the Two Year Key Stage 3 Project chose to enterat least some of their Year 8 pupils for the Key Stage 3 tests in 2005 and it is interesting to compare thetest results of those entrants with the results of other pupils. The total number of pupils entered early formathematics and English are shown in Table G1.Table G1 - Number of early entrants to 2005 Key Stage 3 testsMathematicsEnglishPhase 1 Project schools 1271 1370Phase 2 Project schools 42 31Non-Project schools 6162 6070At many schools, the number of early entrants was very low. For example, in English some 357 schoolsentered only one pupil early for the Key Stage 3 English tests. It is perhaps therefore more instructive tofocus our attention on pupils attending schools where at least 10 pupils were entered early for the testsas this may be indicative of a school policy on early entry.In order to make a fair comparison between schools entering pupils early for Key Stage 3 tests andthose entering pupils when in Year 9 it is important to differentiate between schools that entered thewhole year group for the tests and those that chose to enter a smaller proportion of the year group as thelatter group may have chosen to enter only those pupils they believed were likely to do well in theirtests.Table G2 and Table G3 show the type of schools that entered at least 10 pupils early for their Key Stage3 mathematics and English tests, differentiating between schools that entered at least 90 per cent oftheir cohort and those schools entering less than 90 per cent of their Year 8 cohort.Focusing first on Table G2, we see that among those schools entering at least 90 per cent of the cohort,the only Project school to choose to do so was a grammar school. Among the 24 non-Project schoolschoosing to do so some 13 were either grammar schools, middle schools or City Technology Colleges.While some 8 non-Project comprehensive schools chose to enter at least 90 per cent of the Year 8cohort for the mathematics test, no Phase 1 Project schools did so.A policy of entering only part of the cohort early for the mathematics tests was more common amongcomprehensive schools.Table G2 - Types of schools entering Year 8 pupils early for 2005 Key Stage 3 mathematicstestsSchoolsentering at least90% of Year 8pupilsPhase 1 ProjectschoolsNon-projectschoolsComprehensive CTC Grammar Middle0 0 1 08 4 9 3Schoolsentering lessthan 90% ofYear 8 pupilsPhase 1 ProjectschoolsNon-projectschools5 0 0 423 1 0 380
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RESEARCHEvaluation of the Two YearK
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CONTENTSEXECUTIVE SUMMARY 21. EVALU
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nationally expected level for pupil
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For schools operating an accelerate
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2.2 Attainment and attitudesThe tim
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could follow a Year 7 and Year 8 Ke
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Figure 2 - Percentage of Project sc
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The analysis of Key Stage 3 results
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Table 4 - Proportion of pupils achi
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Figure 4 - 2005 Key Stage 3 mathema
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Table 6 - Proportion of pupils achi
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SummaryIn the case of English, when
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4.4 Attainment summaryThe analysis
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to 8 these were in the opposite dir
Page 31 and 32: Figure 10 - Percentage of Year 7 pu
Page 33 and 34: 6. ANALYSIS OF CASE STUDY DATAAs ha
Page 35 and 36: Table 9 - Operationalisation of the
Page 37 and 38: 6.1 Overall viewsMost, though not a
Page 39 and 40: Points of interest for the higher s
Page 41 and 42: The key advantage is opening up Key
Page 43 and 44: 6.3 ProgressionNevertheless, findin
Page 45 and 46: would no longer exist. Both of the
Page 47 and 48: However, as a colleague noted, even
Page 49 and 50: Most commonly the freedom was used
Page 51 and 52: Phase 2 Project and Phase 2 Compari
Page 53 and 54: A11 - Key Stage 3 attainmentProject
Page 55 and 56: A20 - Reported number of books in t
Page 57 and 58: The variables listed below were inc
Page 59 and 60: Table C1 - Final model for Year 7 M
Page 62 and 63: Table C3 - Final model for Year 7 E
Page 64 and 65: Figure C2 - Year 7 English Optional
Page 66 and 67: Table C8 - Final model for Year 8 m
Page 68 and 69: Figure C4 - Year 8 mathematics high
Page 70 and 71: Table C11 - Final model for Year 8
Page 72: Good teachersMy teachers make sure
Page 75 and 76: ANNEX F - CASE STUDY SUMMARIESPhoeb
Page 77 and 78: Abbotswell SchoolThe case study vis
Page 79 and 80: Elsiemaud SchoolThe case study visi
Page 81: Henryson SchoolThe case study visit
Page 85 and 86: Table G5 - Key Stage 3 Mathematics
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