Masters of the Universe - Teacher Research at Cheney School

Coaching—changing the way that students view their learning?

Chris Garside, as part of her AST work, has been trained in coaching techniques, as a driver for such aims as raising student engagement, responsibility and ownership of their own learning. The key difference between coaching and mentoring seems to be that a coach will not attempt to provide ‘the answer’, or even suggest how the coachee should proceed; instead, the skill lies in asking the right questions. In her Action Research document, Chris quotes John Whitmore summarising the strategy like so: ‘Coaching is unlocking a person’s potential to maximise their own performance. It is helping them to learn rather than teaching them’ .

Chris’s research has centred on taking a fresh look at the types of personalised interventions that we currently put in place, notably at the C/D borderline for GCSE, and exploring whether or not coaching provides an alternative model with a greater chance of success. During the project, she employed the GROW model (Goals, Reality, Opportunity and the Will to commit), and found success in helping C/D borderline maths students to improve their performance through becoming more reflective and more able to take responsibility for their own progress. Through coaching, students were made to feel that they were in charge of their developments, and avoided the sense of ’having learning done to you’. To conclude a very thought-provoking and convincing piece of research, Chris states: “Whilst I

had hoped that coaching would have some impact on the students' attitude and learning I was surprised by the scale of the effect which the evidence for these three students seems to indicate.”, suggesting that coaching is certainly worth further action and investigation. For further info, see Chris!

Personalisation through Deep Learning

As part of the Masters programme, Sylvia Hawken has been looking closely at learning, particularly through experimenting with AFL and examining David Hargreave’s ideas around Personalisation and ‘The Deeps’. Essentially, Hargreaves suggests a framework of four ‘gateways’, through which schooling can be transformed and improved. These gateways are: Deep Learning, Deep Experience, Deep Leadership and Deep Support—see Sylvia for the details of these ideas. In her research, Sylvia reflected on the extent to which aspects of the Deeps such as the development of a strong and relevant Student Voice related to learning is being achieved, as well as considering the extent to which the school is successfully developing and refreshing AFL practice through the Agile Teaching project.