Learning Lessons

Volume 3 Issue 1 October 2011

Author: T Sherrington

Editor: J Breen

The Spirit of AfL Bringing Formative Assessment Alive in Every

Classroom @ KEGS

This purpose of this issue of Learning Lessons is to support teachers

in taking their bearings as we proceed on our journey to embed

formative assessment in our everyday practice. As we explore the

various aspects of our ‘Zest for Learning’ statement it is crucial to

recognise the central role AfL plays in outstanding classroom

practice. Importantly, it is the 'spirit of AfL' that we are seeking to

embed. We should not think of formative assessment as a series of

activities that we dip into, or show-case lessons that we turn on

when necessary; truly embedded AfL should manifest itself in every

lesson, in the minutiae of every student-teacher interaction as it

becomes ingrained in our educational philosophy at a fundamental

level.

There are, of course, specific activities and strategies than enable us

to develop our AfL practice but it is always the spirit of AfL that we

are searching for. The distinction is described well by Marshall,

Carmichael and Drummond in ‘Improving Learning How to Learn,

Mary James et al, (2007). In their research they found that there is a

definite difference between lessons in which teachers run through a

series of set-piece ‘Afl activities’ and those where the teacher models

this practice at a more intuitive/philosophical level. Importantly,

they suggest that where the ‘spirit’ of AfL predominates, lessons are

more successful than those that only follow ‘tick-box’ procedures –

the ‘letter’ of AfL. Teachers who capture the spirit of AfL, talk of the

value they place on pupil autonomy – this is a key characteristic of

the ‘spirit’ vs ‘the letter’. An example might be where a teacher

spontaneously, naturally encourages students to discuss and share

the successful features of a piece of work—the success criteria— as

opposed to always giving out a ‘tick-box’ template with pre-set

criteria determined by the teacher without student input.

Significantly, the research also found that teachers who appear more

ready to embrace the spirit of AfL, when asked to identify

impediments to learning, tend to proffer their own responsibility for

“Teachers who know about AfL strategies and choose not to use them, are choosing to widen the achievement gap in their classrooms” Dylan Wiliam

motivating or helping pupils. These teachers see the potential

to improve learning outcomes as coming from within them; it

is in their power to do this. By contrast, teachers who do not

fully embrace the AfL spirit, tend to look outside their own

practice for the impediments to learning;

This ties in with the wealth of research evidence into effective

learning by Hattie (eg Hattie, 2004) and the ideas promoted by

Dylan Wiliam; it isn’t the school, the Headteacher or the class

size that makes the most difference—it is the teacher.

Actually, it is the teaching. Further more, the aspects of

effective teaching that make the very biggest difference

according to Hattie include effective feedback and questioning

which are fundamental elements of AfL.

The implication is clear enough. If we all strive to embrace the

spirit of Afl in our everyday practice, we will become more

effective teachers. More than that, given that a wealth of

anecdotal and research evidence points us in this direction, it

really is an imperative for all of us to embrace the spirit as far

as we possibly can; it isn’t an option to say ‘no thanks; not for

me’! It is just a question of how far and how fast we can go.

The Research Publication of King Edward VI Grammar School, Chelmsford www.kegs.org.uk

“Teachers who capture the spirit of AfL, talk of the value they place on pupil autonomy.” (in Mary James et al)

The KEGS ‘Zest for Learning’ Jigsaw:

Have you got the spirit? Each subject has different learning modes that work best and teachers have personal preferences and styles but here is a list of

questions you might find helpful in prompting you to think about your own practice. If you feel you often adopt these strategies

without thinking too much, then you are likely to be someone for whom the spirit of AfL comes naturally. However, that normally

emerges after a period of planned experimentation. For example, once it becomes second-nature to insist that every student

answers every question in pairs before sharing with the class – instead of responding to students putting their hands up—it seems

ludicrous that you ever did anything else. However, the first step is to make the decision that this is how you will ask questions

from now on. In all of these areas, a deliberate plan to adopt the strategy is the fore-runner to developing the practice to the

point that it is routine.

The Tools of AfL: some routines and some bits of kit.

Think—Pair –Share: ensure everyone answers every question, with time to think, time to

struggle, and space to say ‘I don’t get it’ if they need to.

Mini-whiteboards: get feedback from everyone in the class- rights answers, wrong-answers,

alternative answers, misconceptions and cries for help. Create a risk-free wipe-clean

ephemeral space for trying out ideas and practicing.

Visualisers: provide instant feedback, model standards using current student work—as well

as being a versatile visual aid, eg for going over exam papers or showing stimulus material.

The ability to annotate and highlight resources or student work is powerful.

Assessment for Learning Self-Evaluation Statements

1 I routinely take time to establish what all my students already know or can already do and use

this to plan subsequent lessons and differentiation strategies.

2 I establish explicit success criteria for an extended task and share this with students before they

make a start.

3 If students are going to be given grades for work, I make explicit what is required for each grade

in advance.

4 I often use an all-student response system like mini-whiteboards so that I can see how each stu-

dent has responded to a question. (Do you have a set of whiteboards to hand at all times?)

5 I usually ask students to discuss answers in pairs or groups rather than asking for hands up and

use strategies that ensure all students answer all questions.

6 I usually select students randomly to answer questions instead of them putting hands up. (Do

you have lollisticks, dice, etc that help make this process easy?)

7 I routinely demand extended answers from students and ask them to explain why or how they

came to that answer.

8 I regularly use student exemplars to model learning outcomes e.g. using a visualiser. (Is there a

visualiser to hand at all times?)

9 I structure group work so that everyone has a role in the group, contributes to the task and has to

prepare to give feedback to the class if asked.

10 I routinely use peer and self assessment activities to help students gauge their progress and iden-

tify areas of uncertainty.

11 I give students opportunities to act on any feedback I give to improve their work including re-

drafting work, making corrections or re-running presentations or discussing wrong answers in

tests.

The beauty and the challenge of formative assessment lie in the

diversity of the concept. A helpful way to examine the concept

in the context of lessons is to think about Dylan Wiliam’s five key

strategies which are always worth revisiting:

• Clarifying, understanding, and sharing learning intentions

• Engineering effective classroom discussions, tasks and

activities that elicit evidence of learning

• Providing feedback that moves learners forward

• Activating students as learning resources for one another

• Activating students as owners of their own learning

This covers just about everything we might think of doing in a

lesson! Essentially AfL has three components:

First, learners need to establish where they are in their

knowledge and understanding.

“What do I know already?”

Then, they need to establish clearly where they want to go.

“What are the standards or skill levels I am aiming for?”

Finally they need to know how to get there from where they are.

“What, exactly, do I need to do now to make progress?”

Obviously, this goes beyond working harder; it is a technical

understanding of the specific learning required.

Crucially, these steps take the learners’ viewpoint— not the

teacher’s; our role is to enable students to make this journey; we

cannot make it for them. They might be able to do it without us -

but we certainly can’t go without them!

AfL @KEGS: Year 9 German

Students practice writing new grammar structures on

white-boards. They feel free to express their ideas,

sharing them openly with a partner, knowing any errors

will soon be wiped away. They then show their answers

to the teacher who receives instant feedback on how well

each pair has done. Various issues are discussed and

then the process is repeated; the second time around

there is evident progress—more sophisticated responses

with fewer errors.

Narrowing the gap between the

showcase and the routine:

‘Integrity means doing the right

thing when no-one is looking’ Alistair Smith. ‘Accelerated Learning’ Conference

AfL @KEGS: Year 8 Art

Students hang their paintings up around the class. (The

great bonus for Art is that the outcomes are immediately

visible -you don’t need a mini whiteboard to see how

every student is getting on all at once.) Each student is

asked to evaluate a number of other students’ work, on

the basis of the criteria that were discussed earlier. They

use post-it notes to peer assess, giving constructive

feedback. The students then return to their own pieces

and use the remainder of the lesson to act on the

suggestions and comments from their peers. The

teacher’s role is to facilitate the student-led progress.

AfL @KEGS: Year 11 RE

The class is preparing for an examination with very specific

guidelines for ‘six mark answers’ in response to questions

in the form: Some Christians believe that X is true. Do you

agree? Instead of writing answers directly, they first write

a mark-scheme for the specific question. They then write

their answer, swap with a partner and use their own mark

scheme to evaluate peer assess and give a mark out of six

to their partner, with associated feedback. The feedback is

then acted on to secure improvements. This process leads

to very strong responses, combining an interest in the

question itself with a deeper understanding of the

assessment process.

AfL @KEGS: Year 13 English

Students are asked to prepare short performances of their

chosen poems in groups. The aim is to use the

performance to demonstrate their understanding of the

meaning of the text, as preparation for a writing task.

Each group performs for the class before being asked to

self-assess how they could have improved. Crucially, the

groups are then asked to repeat their performances.

Without any direct teacher feedback, the second

performances are far superior as the self-assessment has

yielded significant improvement.

Year 10 students sharing ideas prior to feeding back.

References

Marshall, Carmichael and Drummond in ‘Improving Learning How to

Learn, Mary James et al, 2007

Hattie: Teachers Make a Difference: What is the Research Evidence?

University of Auckland, Australian Council for Educational Research,

October 2003

• Feedback activities should enable

pupils to understand how to

improve their work

• Teachers should systematically and

effectively check pupils’

understanding throughout lessons

Outstanding Teaching; OfSTED Framework 2012

The Tools of AfL: some materials, more routines and more kit

The Big Picture: topic overview, exam specification, project outline. Give students all the infor-

mation they need to learn independently.

Assessment Criteria: provide access to the most explicit criteria you can to enable students to

know about the standards they are aiming to meet. What, exactly, is required for an A* grade?

It shouldn’t be a mystery.

Exemplar Material: show students what an A* essay/paragraph/answer/composition looks like

in order to tease out the precise meaning of standards or assessment objectives

Time to act on feedback: ensure lesson routines include the process of acting on feedback

from marking, tests or peer assessment.

Feedback

In Hattie’s work, teacher-student feedback is identified as the

factor with the greatest impact on student outcomes. Naturally,

a key element of AfL practice surrounds the nature of feedback

and the way it is woven into loops of continuous improvement.

Observations and discussions with teachers and Heads of

Department suggest that a possible weak link in working with

students to secure exam success —and hence an area for

making gains— is in ensuring that feedback loops are closed,

especially with weaker students. What does this mean?

It is relatively straightforward to set out the standards. Now, at

every level, students should know the expected standards at

KEGS. Our new KS3 Assessment Criteria do an excellent job in

this regard. The next stage is then to make sure AfL strategies

continually provide both feedback to the teacher about how

each student is performing and feedback to the student about

how they are performing. This should flush out a set of ‘next

steps’ that the student needs to take. The crunch comes in

making sure that each student actually takes those steps. This

is what it takes to ‘close the feedback loop’.

This process shouldn’t be optional so, clearly, this is where

motivational factors come into play. If a student is highly self-

motivated, they will act on feedback and strive to improve.

Teachers obviously play a key role in fuelling that motivation –

with positive reinforcement of every gain coupled with a level

of expectation that is non-negotiable. AfL is not woolly and

wishful; at the sharp end the teacher-student relationship

needs to involve an unequivocal understanding that if we have

taken the trouble to map out the next steps in a student’s

learning, they had better take them!

AfL @KEGS: Year 12 Philosophy

Students, working in pairs and then groups, discuss

responses to a some stimulus material. Students are

asked to respond at random with names selected by being

picked from a pot of labelled lollisticks. The responses are

then organised to form a ‘spoken essay’ as exam

preparation, using the assessment objectives as reference.

AfL @KEGS: Year 10 Maths

Students work in groups to solve a series of linked

problems. They can choose the order of the problems, and

self-assess against solutions as they go along. Some

solutions are deliberately wrong to add challenge. The

process leads to a deep level of understanding and

highlights some students who are stuck and others who

are flying.

AfL @KEGS: Year 12 Physics

Groups of students have been asked to plot graphs from

data gained from an experiment. A range of numerical

skills are needed to scale the axes. In order to gauge skill

levels early in the course, each group’s graph is shared on

the visualiser and discussed. ‘Success criteria’ are agreed

and the next graphs produced are far superior.

Instant feedback from Y12 and Y10 Physics students