Google Ed! Exploring, mapping and
searching curriculum and
assessment….
Anne Looney SDPI 2008
ceo@ncca.ie
Exploring
The press for reform…
 The student experience
– Failure
– Non-participation
– Non engagement
 Evidence that the quality of teaching matters
 Evidence that it matters more for students with special
needs and with English as an additional language
 Public accountability for public services
 Knowledge society/ahead of the curve
 Inclusion
– The discourse of the problematic
And the press against
The stretch factor in Irish education
The normative power of policy
The rich, the poor and the nervous in-between
About Mother and Other
Tradition and nostalgia
Complex educational structures, complex policy
context
 Policy inertia….
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Explore YOUR context/setting
Any other sources of press?
Who is winning?
Mapping
Compass points
 Inclusion
 Report Card Templates
 Project Maths
 Key Skills/School Network
The classroom of diversities…
 Greater ability range
 Special needs
– general
– specific
 English as an additional language
I teach science, not special ed…..
 The cosmopolitan teacher?
– Subject specialist
– Static measures of success
– Changing student profile
 Teaching regardless…
– Teaching to the middle
– Teaching to the top
– The ESRI findings on pace of instruction
International experiences…
 System-wide and deep response
 Resourcing is for the system not the ‘group’
 An emphasis on data and evidence
Or
 Ad hoc response
 Resources short-term and ‘targeted’
 No or poor monitoring
Teaching for inclusion
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Is
Is
Is
Is
Is
Is
teaching for success
teaching for learning
teaching for understanding
teaching for progression
teaching using evidence and feedback
GOOD teaching……
Teaching for exclusion
 Is teaching to the test
 Is teaching to the text
 Is teaching for coverage
 Is teaching fuelled by guesswork and hope
 Is BAD teaching….
Differentiation
 the most complex and technical aspect of the
teaching craft
 neglected in teacher preparation?
 seen as static – getting the level/pitch right
 Dynamic, demanding and sophisticated
Differentiation is
HIGHER LEVEL TEACHING!
Some differentiation challenges
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The
The
The
The
The
question
question
question
question
question
of
of
of
of
of
place
pace
range
choice
additional support
One of the biggest challenges… is to teach
differentiation strategies……
To the students
Who
Who
Who
Who
Who
Who
may
may
may
may
may
may
be used to learning in the middle
be used to ‘hiding’
be used to an easy pace
‘passenger’
not have talked about learning
want the answers, not the questions
Futures…
 achievement gaps
 concerns for teacher quality
 collapse of public education
 Disaffected student groups
OR…
 International praise for achievement standards
 Students with strong commitments to schooling
 High quality teaching force
100 year-old wisdom….
What the wisest and best parent
wants for his own child, that must
the community want for all its
children. Any other ideal for our
schools is narrow and unlovely;
acted upon, it destroys our
democracy.
John Dewey. 1899, p.5.
Report Card Templates
 With three networks of primary schools
 In support of the statutory requirement to report to
parents
 To work with draft national report card templates
– Reporting to parents at two points in the school year
– To report the results of standardised tests
– To develop a shared language of student achievement
 Schools as change sites
 Principals leading change processes
Senior Cycle work
Senior Cycle
– phase one syllabuses
– short course on enterprise
– transition units
– flexible programmes of study
Key Skills
After 30 years of teaching, they pushed me to innovate
and to really look at what it was like to learn in my
class….
Phase one curriculum components
Subjects to
be reviewed
Biology
Chemistry
Physics
New subjects Short
courses
Other
developments
Social and
Political
Education
Social, Personal
and Health
Education
Enterprise
Psychology
PE framework
Origins…
 What we know about maths education in schools in
Ireland
– Maths learning
– Maths teaching
– Public mathematics
 What we know about maths education elsewhere
 What we know about change
Phasing of developments
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Bridging framework to link primary and post-
primary mathematics
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Phased syllabus changes at junior cycle and senior
cycle – 5 strands over 3 years
1. Statistics and probability
2. Geometry and trigonometry
3. Number
4. Algebra
5. Functions
Initial school group (24)
All other schools
Sept 2008
Strands 1 + 2
Sept 2009
Strands 3 + 4
June 2010
Changes to paper 2
(S1+S2)
Sept 2010
Strand 5
Strands 1 + 2
June 2011
Changes to paper 1
S3 + S4
No change in exams
Sept 2011
All strands in place
Strands 3 + 4 (*)
June 2012
Full changes to both
papers 1 and 2
No change paper 1
Changes to paper 2 (S1+S2)
Sept 2012
Full new syllabuses in all
schools
Full new syllabuses in all
schools
June 2013
New exam paper 2
Changes to paper 1 (S3+S4)*
New exam paper 2*
June 2014
New papers 1 + 2 in all
schools
New papers 1 + 2 in all
schools
Features of the change
 Teachers at the centre
– school-based initiative (regional spread of 24 schools)
– immediate start-up and ongoing involvement
– lesson development and evaluation
– feedback to curriculum development process
– linking with primary school teachers (5th and 6th class)
– contributing to professional development of colleagues
Features….
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Classrooms as the site of change
Monitoring and evaluation
System-wide reform
A BIG IDEA!
The Maths Bridge
 The first curriculum framework for primary postprimary transfer
 Will connect curriculum
 Will support teachers in connecting learning
 Will bring teachers together in both the
development and the trialling
 Will focus on AFL
 Will bring post-primary teachers into contact with
Micra T and Drumcondra Tests
Information on Project Maths
URL:
www.ncca.ie/projectmaths
Email: projectmaths@ncca.ie
Senior Cycle Developments: Key Skills
Students should be able to…
develop a line of reasoning from
prediction/evidence/conclusion
understand the need to isolate and control
variables in order to make
strong causal claims
Hypothesising and
making predictions,
examining evidence,
reaching conclusions
describe the relationship
between variables
point out the limits of co-relational reasoning
draw generalisations and be aware of their limitations
I now understand
Maths for the first
time
Key Skills
Teaching through skills is
infinitely preferable to
teaching students to parrot
Reminded me of
what we are trying
to do as teachers
Working together
helps you learn
better than on your
own
The main thing I
learned is that it is
not bad to make a
mistake as you can
learn a lot from
your mistakes
Students felt more
in command of
their learning, they
took greater
responsibility,
were more
positive, very
cooperative
Stopped working on
‘auto-pilot’
I liked listening to
my friends speak
French and having
conversations with
them in French.
It’s a lot more fun
than listening to
the same person
(the teacher) each
class.
Findings
 The five key skills are relevant to each subject
‘surprised how key skills appeared when structure
and methodology are changed’
 When key skills are the focus in planning for
teaching then teaching becomes more learnercentred
‘Using the key skills encouraged me to teach
specifically to the individual, now I am more
focused on the students not the content’
‘students take more responsibility, are more positive
and very cooperative’
 Teachers’ success in embedding the key skills relates to
their understanding and practice of the key skills
themselves
‘I stopped working on ‘auto-pilot, it made me focus more
on thinking about the lesson before going into class and
planning different approaches’
 The successful embedding of key skills requires
curriculum and assessment change
‘There is little point in teaching our subjects with key skills
embedded unless the method of assessment at the end
is also key skills compatible’
Feedback from the Key Skills Network
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Classes are more enjoyable for everyone
Group work needs to be planned
Students like well-planned group work
Relationships in the classroom are better
Longer class periods are needed
Students are reluctant to change at first, but are
glad when they do.
Map YOUR context/setting
Where are the sources of change?
Who is the focus?
Searching
Thinking about change…..
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Clarity of intention
Change happens all the time…
Change takes time
Change takes leadership
Change strategies must be agile
Evolution and support
Heat and light
Design for participation
Quality
Teachers