Planning for improvement to ensure the best learning experiences for pupils
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Background
Ysgol Gyfun Gymraeg Llangynwyd is a Welsh-medium school in Bridgend local authority. There are around 683 pupils on roll, of which around 118 are in the sixth form. Almost 16% of pupils are eligible for free school meals, which is lower than the national average of 20.2%. Around 30% of pupils come from Welsh-speaking homes.
Context
In embedding the principles of the Curriculum for Wales, the school has focused on ensuring consistency and developing effective pedagogy. In order to realise this, staff professional development systems were refined, along with monitoring and evaluation process, in order to align them and ensure a regular cycle of evaluation and improvement and provide the best learning experiences for pupils.
What the school did
Leaders realised that gaining an accurate and current picture of the standards of the existing provision was vital to be able to design and implement a professional development programme that responded to the needs of staff while realising the objectives in the School Development Plan. Whole-school digital systems were developed to gather the findings of all monitoring activities at all levels in a consistent manner, including learning walks, scrutiny of work, focus groups and opinion questionnaires. A whole-school monitoring calendar is shared so that Senior Area Leaders and Department Leaders can plan timely activities and ensure a balanced overview across areas and groups of pupils. This allows central access to comprehensive and transparent information at any time during the year to examine the impact of whole-school strategies and areas to be developed further which, in turn, feeds into the staff training programme.
Leaders ensure that the school develops and refines systems regularly, making consistent use of feedback from staff and pupils. Through whole-school collaboration, the ‘Gwers Llan’ structure was developed, which is used consistently across the school. An agreed structure such as this promotes positive attitudes to learning among pupils, as consistent expectations reduce the cognitive demands placed on them as they move from one lesson to another. With all teachers using an agreed structure, monitoring systems allow leaders to identify if there is any aspect that needs to be strengthened, ensuring that it, in turn, forms part of the professional development programme. The school has planned appropriate time for training and professional development activities by building an extra lesson at the end of the day on Thursday once in every three-week timetable cycle. During this session, the professional development programme can be achieved without detracting from the time that departments and areas have to discuss pedagogy and act on whole-school requirements.
Leaders recognised the need to develop an ethos of continuous self-reflection among staff to ensure that all teachers are keen to take advantage of opportunities to increase their knowledge, skills and understanding regularly. As a result, performance management arrangements were adapted to focus on the continuous development of the individual while maintaining close alignment with the outcomes of self-evaluation and monitoring processes. Setting objectives is an open and supportive process where staff and leaders are given an opportunity to discuss and refine them in line with the development plan during the autumn term. A recording document is developed, namely the Continuous Professional Development Plan, which is practical for staff to administer. This document is a six-year overview to ensure that the objectives chosen are constructive and support continuous development. A focus is placed on teaching and learning when setting objectives, with an emphasis on progress rather than pupils’ attainment. Staff are expected to co-operate on an annual research activity as part of the process. This has led to more confident and innovative practitioners who are willing to experiment, reflect and disseminate any successes and challenges seen in their work with their colleagues through the ‘Llwyfan Llan’ activity. The importance of the Continuous Professional Development Plan is reflected by providing time every half term for staff to update it.
Effect
As a result of these activities, the school fosters the enthusiasm of all members of staff and encourages them to be curious about learning and to improve their practices continuously to provide the best learning experiences for pupils.