Spending the Pupil Premium:
Strategies to Improve
Learning
Steve Higgins
s.e.higgins@durham.ac.uk
School of Education, Durham University
Signposts for Success – Effective Intervention for
Children Looked After
17th October 2012
Hertfordshire Development Centre, Stevenage
Sutton Trust Report on Spending the Pupil
Premium: Toolkit of Strategies to Improve
Learning
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Why we wrote it
Best ‘buys’
Worst ‘buys’
Learning
How might we use
it?
http://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/toolkit
The pupil premium
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Aims:
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to reduce the attainment gap between the highest and
lowest achieving pupils nationally
to increase social mobility
to enable more pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds
to get to the top Universities
to provide additional resource to schools to do this
to support looked after children
£600 in 2012-13 for fsm1 pupils; rising to £900 in
2013-14 and £1200 in 2014-15?
1
any child registered for fsm in the last six years and all looked after children
Resources and learning
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Above a minimum threshold –
no simple link
More money ≠ more learning
There is an association but
weak and complex
Conclusion: spending more
won’t guarantee benefit- no
simple solution
The question
How should a school
spend any extra
‘discretionary’ budget to
achieve maximum
benefits in learning?
The Bananarama Principle
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It ain’t what you do it’s the way that you do it…
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So how do you spend £600/pupil to “get results”?
Or, what does the evidence say is a good
investment or a poor investment for learning?
It ain’t what you spend but the way that you
spend it…
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Resources and learning
Smaller classes?
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Complex evidence- no clear link with class size
and achievement
Experimental trials suggest
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Classes need to be less than about 17
And teachers need to change the way they teach
But teaching assistants not as effective
The maths:
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£600 x 20 pupils x 3 classes = £27,000
50%+ on fsm = 1 extra teacher per 3 classes
Class size reduction from 30 to 23 – not enough
One-to-one tuition
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Highly effective
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The maths…
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I hour/ day over at least 6 weeks
Support for class teacher to re-integrate
6 weeks x 5 days x 1 hour = 30 hours
4 days teacher time (more effective with an
experienced teacher)
Approx £800
May work if you use pairs and target pupils only
need it once a year – expensive but effective
What we tried to do
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Summarise the evidence from meta-analysis about
the impact of different strategies on learning
(attainment).
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Apply quality criteria to evaluations: rigorous designs
only
Estimate the size of the effect
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As found in research studies
These are averages
Standardised Mean Difference = ‘Months of gain’
Estimate the costs of adopting
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Information not always available
Best ‘buys’...
Toolkit
Toolkit
Worst ‘buys’...
Toolkit
Summaries
What is it?
How effective is it?
How secure is the
evidence?
What do I need to
know?
Approaches and effect size estimates
0.8
0.7
0.6
Effect size
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
-0.1
Approach
Toolkit
Overview of value for money
Promising
10
May be
worth it
Effect Size (months gain)
Feedback
Meta-cognition
EY intervention
Peer tutoring
1-1 tutoring
Homework
0
£0
Summer
schools
Phonics
Parental
involvement
Learning Individualised
Sports
learning
styles
Arts
Performance
Ability grouping
pay
Cost per pupil
ICT
Smaller
classes
After
school
Not
worth it
£1000
Teaching
assistants
Issues and limitations
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Based on meta-analysis – averages of averages
Conversion to ‘months progress’ is a rough
estimate
Intervention research is compared with ‘normal’
practice which is varied
Not ‘what works’ but what has worked – ‘good
bets’ to support professional evaluation and
enquiry
Key messages
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Some things that are popular or widely thought
to be effective are probably not worth doing
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Ability grouping (setting); After-school clubs; Teaching
assistants; Smaller classes; Performance pay
Some things look ‘promising’
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Effective feedback; Meta-cognition and self regulation
strategies; Peer tutoring; Homework (for secondary
pupils)
Feedback
“… we have each been
asked several times by
teachers, ‘What makes for
good feedback?’—a question
to which, at first, we had no
good answer. Over the
course of two or three years,
we have evolved a simple
answer—good feedback
causes thinking.”
(Black & Wiliam, 2003)
Meta-cognition and self regulation
strategies
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Teaching approaches which make learners’ thinking
about learning more explicit in the classroom.
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E.g. teaching pupils strategies to plan, to monitor and to
evaluate their own learning.
It is usually more effective in small groups so
learners can support each other and make their
thinking explicit through discussion.
Self-regulation refers to managing one’s own
motivation towards learning AND managing one’s
thinking and reasoning (cognitive aspects).
Peer tutoring
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Learners work in pairs or small groups to provide
each other with explicit teaching support. The
learners take on responsibility for aspects of
teaching and for evaluating the success of their
peers.
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Cross-Age Tutoring an older learner usually takes the
tutoring role and is paired with a younger tutee or tutees.
Peer-Assisted Learning Strategies (PALS) is a structured
approach for mathematics and reading requiring set
periods of time for implementation of about 25-35 minutes
2 or 3 times a week.
Reciprocal Peer Tutoring: learners alternate between the
role of tutor and tutee.
Effective strategies
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Effective feedback (needs trust)
Build learning relationships
Support social interaction and support
One-to-one tuition – with an experienced teacher
Small group collaborative learning
Is that it?
Have we solved
the problem of how
to improve
attainment?
The challenges (1): implementation
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These strategies have been shown to be cost-effective
in research studies
But when we have tried to implement evidence-based
strategies we have not seen system-wide
improvement (e.g. AfL)
We don’t know how to get schools/teachers who are
not currently doing them to do so in ways that are
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True to the key principles
Feasible in real classrooms – with all their constraints
Scalable and replicable
Sustainable
The challenges (2) : making it work for you
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This is what has worked (on average)
Where is there leverage for improvement in your
work?
Will it build capacity?
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For learners?
For teachers?
How will this apply to children looked after?
Research example: Letterbox club
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Once‐monthly personalised parcels posted to
children in their foster homes
Reading materials, story CDs, stationery and
mathematics games
7‐ 11 years, May to October
Aims to improve attainment levels in reading and
number skills
Booktrust, Leicester Uni, DfE
http://fileserver.booktrust.org.uk/usr/resources/516/queens-letterbox-evaluation-full-report-1-1-.pdf
Winter K., Connolly P., Bell, I. and Ferguson, J. (2011) An Evaluation of the Effectiveness of the Letterbox Club in Improving Educational
Outcomes among Children Aged 7‐11 Years in Foster Care in Northern Ireland, Belfast: Centre for Effective Education, Queen’s University
Belfast.
How will the Toolkit
develop?
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Next update planned for January – a more
dynamic resource with evidence of effective
practice based on rigorous evaluation
It will grow as the evidence base does; EEF
projects will help fill-in the gaps and expand the
scope
The EEF will also create practical examples of the
interventions backed up by evidence – e.g.
training, programmes and approaches that
schools can use
Links
The full report can be found on the EEF’s website:
http://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/toolkit/
With information about the background to the analysis:
http://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/uploads/pdf/Technical_Appendi
ces_(July_2012).pdf
The toolkit is recommended by the Department for Education:
http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/pupilsupport/premium/b00200492/ppst
rategies
Official information about the Pupil Premium and LA allocations is available at:
http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/adminandfinance/financialmanagement/
schoolsrevenuefunding/a00200697/pupil-premium-2012-13
Ofsted’s report is available at: http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/resources/pupilpremium
High
Impact
Low
cost
High
cost
Low
Impact
Key points
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What will you do?
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How will you connect this to learning?
How will you connect this to attainment?
BUT what will you stop doing?
For every complex problem
there is a solution that is
simple, neat…
and WRONG!
H.L. Mencken 1880-1956