The planning and co-ordination for the progressive development of pupils’ skills
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Information about the school
Cefn Hengoed Community School is an English-medium 11-16 school maintained by Swansea local authority. The school is based in the Eastside of Swansea. There are 918 pupils on roll. Around 33% of pupils are eligible for free school meals. Around 10% of pupils are learning English as an additional language. The school has a specialist teaching facility (STF) for pupils with severe to moderate learning difficulties. The capacity of the STF is 20 pupils.
The percentage of pupils with additional learning needs (ALN) is around 47.4% of the overall school population. The proportion of pupils who have a statutory plan of additional learning needs (Statement/EHCP/IDP) is approximately 6% (including the STF).
The senior leadership team consists of the headteacher (appointed in 2017), the deputy headteacher, two assistant headteachers and two senior teachers.
Context and background to the effective or innovative practice
The planning for the progressive development of pupils’ skills is highly effective in Cefn Hengoed Community School. Leaders maintain a strong focus on improving the provision for pupils’ literacy, numeracy, digital, Welsh language and thinking skills. As a result, many pupils make strong progress.
The school has well-established approaches to the progressive development of literacy and numeracy skills across the curriculum and over the past two years has also been successful in coordinating and developing the progressive development of pupils’ digital skills. Leaders share high expectations with all staff and pupils, and have been successful in ensuring teachers provide authentic opportunities for pupils to apply and develop their skills in relevant subject areas.
Through its own quality assurance process, the school identified the need to strengthen pupils’ Welsh language and bilingual skills and this has been a strong focus. Leaders give high priority to the development of pupils’ Welsh language skills and ensure that all staff understand their role in developing this. As a result of this approach, the provision for Welsh language is a notable strength.
Description of nature of strategy or activity
Leaders and staff strive to provide pupils with purposeful and frequent opportunities to develop, extend and apply their skills across the curriculum. They recognise that many pupils enter the school with skill levels that are lower than expected for their age. Leaders in Cefn Hengoed have invested time and resources carefully to provide effective professional learning for their staff in order to develop the provision for the progressive development of pupils’ skills. Each subject area is supported well to develop subject specific resources.
The school employs Literacy, Numeracy, Bilingualism and Digital Competence Framework (DCF) Managers who meet regularly with the Assistant Headteacher with a responsibility for the coordination of cross-curricular skills, to evaluate and plan the school’s approach to cross curricular skills development. Both the Literacy and Numeracy Frameworks (LNF) and the DCF are mapped across all curriculum areas in order to plan for progressive skills development across Key Stage 3.
Each subject area works collaboratively and alongside the Literacy, Numeracy, Digital and Bilingualism Managers to ensure the planning for skills builds purposely on pupils’ prior learning and that opportunities to apply skills are progressive as pupils move through the school. There is a clear focus on creating authentic links between the cross-curricular skills and subject content to ensure lessons are meaningful and have a positive impact on pupil progress. Opportunities for pupils to apply and develop their skills are monitored closely by staff and leaders and this helps to ensure the progressive development of skills well. Leaders and staff regularly review and evaluate this approach and are continually sharing effective practice.
In addition, the school employs an enquiry based model for the development of cross-curricular skills where, following an evaluation of strengths and areas for development, each subject area trials a new initiative to improve an area of literacy, numeracy and digital competence. Best practice is shared with other teaching staff on a termly basis and, along with the other work being carried out, ensures that the progressive development of cross curricular skills is well planned and co-ordinated.
Critical thinking skills
In 2019 all teaching staff completed a self-evaluation exercise based on the 12 pedagogical principles set out in ‘Successful Futures’. This identified the need to enhance the opportunities to develop pupils’ critical thinking skills. Following a professional development session, each subject area developed subject specific resources and lesson activities to enhance the opportunities for progressively developing pupils’ critical thinking. Skills leaders worked with individual subject areas to improve teachers’ planning for the development of pupils’ critical thinking and the use of questioning. This involved creating rich and stimulating activities to encourage pupils to extend their thinking and explore different perspectives. For example, the English department developed an overarching critical thinking question for each unit of work. These questions were supported by smaller critical thinking activities designed to encourage pupils to take risks in their learning. Each subject area evaluated the success of their approach and shared their findings with the wider staff at the end of the academic year. The provision for thinking skills continues to form part of the school’s performance management cycle.
Literacy and numeracy skills
The school employs a strong approach to the progressive development of literacy and numeracy skills across all subject areas through the use of the Literacy and Numeracy Behaviours. Significant time has been invested during staff meetings and INSET to develop a shared understanding of how reading, writing, oracy and numeracy skills should be taught and how these skills can be developed in individual subject areas. The behaviours provide staff with a clear understanding of how to support pupils to apply and develop their skills. For example, the school’s reading behaviours help ensure that pupils activate their prior knowledge, visualise and question aspects of what they have read as well as developing higher order skills such as evaluation, analysis and inference. Similarly, the school’s numeracy behaviours provide clear guidance to support pupils to solve problems in a range of contexts. The effective use of the Literacy and Numeracy Behaviours across the school is evaluated through the school’s quality assurance cycle and informs professional development for staff.
Welsh language skills
To improve the standard of spoken Welsh in Welsh lessons and across the school, the Welsh department has developed a common approach to the teaching of oracy: ‘point, comment, expand, question’. This is used by all Welsh teachers and has helped to improve the quality of pupils’ spoken and written Welsh. The development of pupils’ bilingual skills outside of Welsh lessons is a whole school priority and leaders have maintained a consistent focus on this aspect of their work through their quality assurance cycle. As a result, each subject area has a clear action plan for how they will develop bilingualism in their area in order to encourage natural and spontaneous spoken Welsh in a school where very few pupils speak Welsh at home. The Bilingualism Manager, alongside the head of Welsh, has also developed helpful phrases that are displayed in each classroom and in the canteen. Over the past year, pupils have used these phrases in lessons to increase the frequency of incidental Welsh used both inside and outside of the classroom. Regular use of these phrases are linked to Cymreictod points and pupils are rewarded through the school’s rewards policy for the frequent use of everyday spoken Welsh. This strategy has helped to improve pupils confidence in their use of Welsh, their understanding of Welsh culture and has inspired pupils to be enthusiastic when learning the Welsh language.
Cross-curricular and cross-sector working
Cefn Hengoed Community School works closely with its partner primary schools on common approaches to the progressive development of cross-curricular skills. The Literacy Manager has recently provided update training, for example, on the teaching of reading to cluster primary schools. In addition, the Numeracy Manager has developed a cluster calculations policy to promote consistency in the teaching of maths and numeracy across the cluster. Furthermore, the Welsh department has begun work on a cluster reading project with Year 6 classes that will inform the teaching of Welsh in Year 7 next academic year. This is in addition to the work to develop a consistent approach to the teaching of oracy through the ‘point, comment, expand, question’ technique that is used successfully by the Welsh department.
What impact has this work had on provision and learners’ standards?
The provision to support the progressive development of pupils’ skills is a notable strength of the school. There is a well-planned and co-ordinated approach that ensures that pupils build progressively on their knowledge, skills and understanding. Leaders consistent and strong focus on the development of pupils’ skills has led to effective provision that enables pupils to make strong progress.
Overall pupils’ attitudes to learning, the development of skills and particularly to learning the Welsh language are strong. Most pupils are motivated in lessons, engage positively in discussions and show strong speaking and listening skills. Many read and write for a range of purposes well and work confidently with number concepts. In addition, pupils are motivated to attend school and attendance rates have improved notably over the past year.
Many pupils who attend Cefn Hengoed Community School make good progress in developing their skills across all aspects of their learning. Generally, high quality teaching supports pupils well to develop their speaking, writing, numeracy, thinking, and digital skills.
How have you shared your good practice?
In addition to sharing practice with partner primary schools, Cefn Hengoed is also part of a school to school network with three other secondary schools in the local authority. This work involves a peer review system that this year, for example, includes evaluating the provision for literacy and the provision for numeracy skills in each school. Furthermore, the school is also part of a South Wales schools partnership with other secondary schools.