Pearson-Exploring-Effective-Pedagogy-in-Primary-Schools

Collaborative and group learning has been studied for some time, but collaboration requirespurpose and good content. Small-group work has been related to higher achievement(Veenam et al., 2005) but it has to be carefully managed. Effective teachers often allow childrento work in groups to think through their ideas and to present and make explicit their thinking.This includes to each other and peer tutoring (Whitebread et al., 2007). They assign roles withingroup work and see interaction as an integral part of learning (Gipps et al., 2000; Fosnot, 1996;Barron, 2003; Tolmie et al., 2010).Personalising and differentiating learning is equally important for groups and individuals.Classrooms with considered, purposeful differentiation ensure that learning can be scaffolded(Rojas-Drummond & Mercer, 2003) and has the variety and richness required to retainchildren’s interests and the right level of challenge. This requires teachers to have priorknowledge of their children’s learning levels, to plan for the next steps in learning and tomake links explicit within and across concepts (Bruner, 2006). This supports the case forshifting towards a more integrated approach to the curriculum (such as topic work) ratherthan a purely subject-specific approach (West & Muijs, 2009).Although direct teaching has an important place in the classroom, other strategies can promotebetter provocations to children’s thinking and these often depend on the quality of theinteraction between the teacher and the learner. Referred to as dialogic teaching and learning(Wells, 1999), it is a key feature of effective classrooms and is characterised by the use ofopen-ended questions to develop deeper level learning. It has been seen to be important inthe early years, where sustained, shared thinking has been found in effective practice(Siraj-Blatchford, 2002), and for older children (Muijs & Reynolds, 2011). These approachesencourage more analytical thought as children reflect, explain and argue through their thinkingand learning and problem solving, it also enhances children’s meta-cognitive skills (De Jager et al.,2005). This requires good content knowledge, instructional conversations (Andrews, 2011) andthe willingness by teachers to share the locus of control and authority (Alexander, 2006).In the last decade, Assessment for Learning has achieved great popularity (Black et al., 2003). Ithas an emphasis on feedback strategies that are formative and strong on delving into children’sunderstandings and extending their learning (Black & Wiliam, 1998; Arter & Stiggins, 2005).Evaluative feedback of this kind, examples of which are given in this report, helps childrento reflect on their learning through reviewing their work (Rittle-Johnson, 2006). It offersencouragement and promotes effort, especially when coupled with suggestions and strategiesto assist the learner to move forward in their learning (Dweck, 2000).The research on homework is mixed in the findings. However, there is a great deal of evidencethat suggests that if homework is meaningful (Trautwein, 2007), flexible to what arises in lessons(Cooper, 2006) and extends and deepens understanding of concepts and links with children’slearning experiences, it will enhance learning (Durden, 2008).40 | Exploring Effective Pedagogy in Primary Schools