Ambitious Alternatives Changing the Narrative of Disadvantage

Disadvantage and poverty are always correlated with negative educational outcomes, but do they need to be? Dr David Armstrong shows how some innovative programmes are turning that around and creating ambitious alternatives.

Girl in blue shirt sat at front of class

One of my roles at PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers) is as the lead Partner for the world’s largest education programme for marginalised girls. We deliver it for the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID), and it’s called the Girls’ Education Challenge (GEC). The overall aim of the GEC is to educate over 1 million marginalised girls in 18 African and Asian countries. We’ve been doing this work with DFID since 2012. It’s a huge agenda, a massive challenge, and I’m very proud of what the programme has achieved (see girlseducationchallenge.org for an overview).

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      string(327) "... young people to learn moreabout the world around them though; they themselves express an ongoing desire tolearn about global issues.The Department for International Development (DfID) conducted a poll of youngpeople aged 11 to 16 on the subject a few years ago. The report showed that ofthose people polled, 79 ..."
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      string(5622) "34Vol 3.6School Leadership Todaywww.teachingtimes.comLeadingLearningGlobal educationDiogenes Laertius, Greek philosopher (AD 220) once said: “I am a citizen ofthe world”, as he looked at his life in a wider context. The concept of globalcitizenship is not a new one, but in our present time we have the ability forthis to become a reality. Christopher Columbus and co. would be glad tohear that the journey for information to travel across the world today no longer needtake weeks, days or even minutes as technology has made the world seem increasinglysmaller. This globalization has caused increased focus on interdependence,interconnectedness and cultural diversity meaning that today more than ever, theworld is a part of our everyday local lives.Young people are aware of global events, and understand that issues and eventsacross the globe affect them too. Globalization is one of the most significant changesGlobalisingeducationCan effective global education be conveyed from within theclassroom walls? Cliff Manning discusses how we cantranscend geographical barriers to nurture a generation ofglobal citizens.35Vol 3.6School Leadership Todaywww.teachingtimes.comLeadingLearningGlobal educationtaking place in societies around theworld today, and it is vital that the futuregenerations are educated to become globallyconscientious learners; to acknowledge andunderstand the enormous variety of culturesand information that exists on earth.The global citizenBeing a ‘global citizen’ incorporates aframework of values including understanding,concern and respect for others and the naturalworld. Today’s youth will face decisions on awide range of issues for which people havediffering, contradictory views worldwide. Todevelop as global citizens all young peopleshould have the opportunity to engagewith these issues, starting in the educativeprocess. Encouraging young people toexplore potentially debatable and emotive issues can encourage them to develop theirthinking skills, contributing positively to their information processing, reasoning, enquiry,evaluation and creative thinking development.It is not just educators who recognise the need for young people to learn moreabout the world around them though; they themselves express an ongoing desire tolearn about global issues.The Department for International Development (DfID) conducted a poll of youngpeople aged 11 to 16 on the subject a few years ago. The report showed that ofthose people polled, 79 per cent wanted to know more about what is happening indeveloping countries, with 54 per cent believing that they should learn about theseissues in school.According to the same report, the majority of young people currently receive thisinformation through electronic methods of communication; resources such as theInternet or television that they have become familiar with in the home environment.There is little doubt that technology can have a vital impact on this learning process.The role of schoolsThe curriculum and schools have animportant role to play in helping pupilsmake sense of the complexity of the worldand their place in it. If we want to create aworld of global citizens, then education isa priority. Most schools might teach someform of citizenship, or include it as part ofPSHE. However, this does not have to bean additional subject; it is an ethos that caninvolve all those in the educative process– it can be promoted in class through theexisting curriculum. It covers such a widerange of topics, it can be incorporatedacross the curriculum; learning about otherbeliefs in RE, the environment in geographyand biology, and other cultures andsocieties in history and languages.Educators should take theseopportunities to encourage children andyoung people to explore, develop andexpress their own values and opinions,whilst listening to and respecting other people’s points of view. This will in turnencourage a wider appreciation amongst young people of the world around them.Cherry Duggan, Head of Schools and Communities, WWF said: “Young peoplewill shape the future of our world. They also have a huge influence, here and now.Working with teachers means together we can encourage and support young peoplein building the knowledge, skills and values to safeguard our world.”Educators should take theseopportunities to encouragechildren and young people toexplore, develop and expresstheir own values and opinions,whilst listening to and respectingother people’s points of view.“”36Vol 3.6School Leadership Todaywww.teachingtimes.comLeadingLearningGlobal education Teaching through technologyA feasible way of accessing these valuable learning experiences is through technology.The growth of the Internet has provided a valuable source of information and internationalcommunication with free teaching resources, VoIP and endless reference sites.Social media has the ability to take this one step further as a hub for learning,sharing thoughts, and to collaborate on or voice their support for a cause or campaign,putting them in the position to be able to affect change.The possibilities go beyond entertainment to educate, inform and connect peopleregardless of their background, culture or religion. This is where technology can havea large part to play, helping bring the world into the classroom in an easily accessibleand understandable format. It breaks down the traditional walls, and opens channels ofcommunication, allowing them to collaborate and broadcast videos, podcasts and blogs.As a safe social network, at Radiowaves weare lucky to work with a number of"
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Leadership

Globalising education

15 Mar 2012

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      string(336) " Inventing and making things is a great way to tap in to students’ creativity and help them develop new skills that might seem overly technical or boring if they were taught out of context. Oliver Quinlan highlights some great initiatives that are inspiring students (and teachers) to develop their innate desire to create and invent."
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      string(5626) "Back in 1739, Jacques de Vaucanson created and began exhibiting a new invention. Le Canard Digérateur or ‘The Digesting Duck’ was a machine made to imitate a real duck as closely as possible. Its wing alone was made of over 400 moving parts, and it could flap these wings, drink water, eat grain, and mimic the process of digestion all the way to the final event.History is full of these kinds of inventions—to modern eyes they are strange but fascinating. They show the compulsion that people have had for hundreds of years to make, our need to create and invent. As David Orr says, ‘We all begin life with a will to leave a mark no one else has left’.1 We can see this in children from the earliest experiments with drawing and writing, to brick building and construction, through to teenage experiments with identity and fashion.In recent years, the range of digital tools available to anyone to make has expanded enormously. While consumer devices such as tablets and laptops have become increasingly sealed and unrepairable boxes, a backlash against this has led to powerful technologies that young people can make with. Devices such as the ‘Makey Makey’ allow even young children to get started creating powerful electronics that interface with a computer. The simple circuits with batteries and bulbs have made way for customised controllers for computer games. Low cost hardware devices, such as the Raspberry Pi computer and BBC micro:bit have allowed children to program their own hardware and create their own devices, with low barriers to entry programming languages such as Scratch, powering ideas both on screen and in the physical world.Children and young people are using these technologies to make amazing things that address problems they and their communities face. Every year the Apps for Good awards showcases such projects. A stand out entry for me was a small group from Wick High School who created an app to help farmers in their community in Scotland to manage livestock information. These young people used their technology skills to create a product with real potential that serves a need for the people around them. At the CoderDojo Coolest Projects event this year, I met children who were using their technology to make things they cared about. One group had set up a system to keep their house plants watered when they went on holiday using little more than a micro:bit and some small water pumps. Another pair of girls from Bulgaria had created a small robot that would follow them around to keep their possessions close by when they were playing in the local park. Others had created robots to carry heavy loads in the workplace, a system to help find missing persons in the background of photographs on social media and interactive stories to encourage girls to explore and challenge gender stereotypes.There is a lot of discussion about the shortage of technology professionals, and the need for more young people to fill vacancies as professional programmers. It would be easy to think that learning computing and programming at school was just useful for people interested in this specialism. However, all of these projects show that programming and digital making skills can provide opportunities for young people to make solutions to problems in all sorts of areas of their lives.To return to the Digesting Duck, it was put on display to the public and many people were wowed. It must have been fairly obvious that it was an artificial construction, but people could not understand how it worked. It would eat a mixture of water and seed and excrete a mixture of bread crumbs and green dye that really did look very authentic. The answer, unsurprisingly, was that it faked it. Hidden beneath the floor was a network of pipes and machinery that took in the seed and sent out some pre-digested seeds prepared earlier.This anecdote really isn’t that different to how most people see computers. We may joke about them being stupid when they don’t quite behave as we want them to, but generally we perceive them to be very clever machines. How they reach this appearance is usually well hidden from observers, but fundamentally all they do is perform very basic maths. The catch is that they can do this really, really fast. What they do is fundamentally something almost anyone could do, but they do it so many times, so quickly that is appears to be a different level of achievement. Computers can help us achieve amazing things, but only if we are able to express problems and processes for solving them in very particular ways.Once you understand this concept, our technology-supported world really starts to look quite different. This is one of what Seymour Papert called ‘powerful ideas’ that can be used as ‘tools to think with over a lifetime’. Once you realise that every seemingly amazing thing a computer does is just basic maths being performed very quickly, it becomes clearer that you can use a computer to achieve your own amazing things, if you just learn how to describe them in the right way. Papert was an educator who saw the early potential of computers and created the Logo programming language for children to explore them. He built on Piaget’s theories that children need to work with ideas concretely early on before they can begin to explore them in a more abstract, intellectual way. What Papert saw in computers, and particularly simulations, was the potential for them to make concepts that are usually only accessible in an abstract way to be something children could manipulate concretely.A familiar"
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Digital Learning

Tapping in to the Inner Inventor: The Importance of Making in Computing

8 Aug 2019

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      string(357) "... top 500, the researchers found. About half thisdifference is due to these schools having catchment areas with fewer disadvantaged pupils, but therest is due to social selection.Key Findings: ■ The first hurdle to social mobility rears its head even before a child starts school, with half a millionchildren – disproportionately ..."
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Leadership Briefing 11.07(127)"
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      string(5656) "Leadership BriefingLeadership Briefing – www.teachingtimes.comReports Summaries – a weeklyservice of essential summaries,in-depth reports and criticalanalysis that’s new and relevantto education, linked to originalsource documents.IMPOSSIBLE? SOCIAL MOBILITY AND THESEEMINGLY UNBREAKABLE CLASS CEILINGFOR POORER CHILDRENKeywordsSocial mobility,class ceiling,poorer children,family, wealth,disadvantaged,first choiceschool, freeschool mealsSummaryThis TeachFirst analysis of Ofsted data shows growing up in a poorer family hasconsequences throughout a child’s lifetime. The country’s lack of social mobility means newhurdles constantly appear at every stage of a child’s life, making it increasingly difficult forthem to break through the so called “class-ceiling”.Analysis of data shows 43% of pupils at England’s outstanding secondaries are from the wealthiest20% of families. It showed nine out of 10 parents felt it was very important that their child went to ahighly rated school. About 93% said attending their first choice school was key to their child’s future,and nearly three-quarters said they would appeal if they did not get their first choice school.The charity found over 85% of schools in the top 500 took a smaller proportion of disadvantagedpupils than lived in their immediate areas. In the average state school, 17% of secondary pupils wereeligible for free school meals, compared with 9% in the top 500, the researchers found. About half thisdifference is due to these schools having catchment areas with fewer disadvantaged pupils, but therest is due to social selection.Key Findings: ■ The first hurdle to social mobility rears its head even before a child starts school, with half a millionchildren – disproportionately from low-income backgrounds – failing to be school-ready by agefive in the last decade. ■ Even among those who clear the first hurdle, primary school presents a new challenge. By age11 just 35% of pupils from low-income backgrounds achieve the expected standards in reading,writing and maths, compared to 57% of their better-off peers. ■ The gap widens in secondary school as a higher proportion of poorer young people fall at thenext fence. Only one in three teenagers from low-income backgrounds achieves five GCSEs atgrades A*-C including English and maths, compared to twice as many teenagers from wealthierbackgrounds. ■ By Year 13, almost one in three 17-year-olds who are eligible for free school meals have failedto make it this far, meaning they are no longer participating in education. Only one in seven17-year-olds who aren’t eligible for this benefit have dropped out. In every region of the country,young people from low income backgrounds are less likely to become an apprentice than theirwealthier peersWeek Commencing 6th March 2017https://www.teachfirst.org.uk/sites/default/files/Teach-First-Policy-Report-Impossible.pdfhttps://www.teachfirst.org.uk/sites/default/files/Teach-First-Policy-Report-Impossible.pdfhttps://www.teachfirst.org.uk/sites/default/files/Teach-First-Policy-Report-Impossible.pdfLeadership BriefingLeadership Briefing – www.teachingtimes.comReports Summaries – a weeklyservice of essential summaries,in-depth reports and criticalanalysis that’s new and relevantto education, linked to originalsource documents. ■ Because young people born into families who are just about managing generally do not clear allof the previous hurdles, for every such young person who goes to university, seven do not. Andyoung people from better-off backgrounds are 5.9 times more likely to go to the most selectiveinstitutions. ■ For those young people who’ve battled against the odds and made it to university, the obstaclesdon’t stop there. Of those who make it to higher education, one in 12 freshers from a low-income background drops out each year; some 2,000 students in total. The figure for those fromwealthier families is nearer one in 20. ■ Even having made it this far, if a student from a low-income background graduates, they continueto face disadvantage, earning 10% less than their wealthier peers, even when accounting forsubject area and institution. Across all those employed in top jobs three years after graduation,privately-educated graduates earn £4,500 more than their state school counterparts. ■ Choosing further study over entering the workforce presents a different challenge. Russell Groupgraduates, who are more likely to come from wealthier backgrounds, are more than four times aslikely to do a postgraduate research degree after graduating as graduates from other universities. ■ • The difficulty young people from low-income backgrounds face in clearing these hurdles is whyonly 4% of doctors, 6% of barristers, 11% of journalists and 12% of solicitors have working-classorigins.Factors influence parental choice of school: ■ 85% of parents said the average grades that a pupil achieves at GCSE is important or veryimportant when choosing a school. There was little difference in how parents with different familyincomes answered this question. Whilst there was some variation across regions there was noclear pattern or a north/south divide. ■ 87% of parents say that a good or outstanding Ofsted rating was important or very important whenchoosing a school. Again, this figure barely varies regardless of where  in the country, or how welloff, parents are. ■ 93% of parents said their child attending their first choice of school was important or veryimportant to their child’s future. This varied little regardless of parents’"
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Leadership

Impossible? Social Mobility And The Seemingly Unbreakable Class Ceiling For Poorer Children

3 Mar 2017

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      string(5606) "which the teacher then needs to take into account when planning their teaching. It also means paying attention to who is going to need support to access the work and who is going to go through it faster and, therefore will need additional stretch. However, teachers, particularly those teaching in challenging circumstances, have to consider student’s preparedness for learning, and plan how to unblock the specific barriers for the individual students in their class. Understanding the context is important so that the teacher is able to design their teaching to take this into account. I have seen examples of London schools having spare clothes for their students because children arrive in school with wet clothes as they live in housing that gets flooded. Others have sleeping facilities because children are at risk of being made homeless, and others have behaviour management classes and sensory therapy rooms for students. In my own class there was a pupil for whom, as a class, we had negotiated that she could lie on the floor in lessons with a drink in her hand because that was the only way she could concentrate and not disrupt others. It worked for her, for the class and for me.Reflecting on the learning from the GEC, the factors affecting girls’ education across the globe are varied and context-specific. The issues affecting a girl living in a remote rural area where her teachers do not speak her home language are different to those faced by a girl living in an urban slum who is supporting her family by working. They are different for a girl who has never been to school compared to one who is in school. And they are different for a girl whose parents, although poor, value education for her and a parent who is forcing their daughter into an early marriage. In these difficult and diverse settings, the academic starting point often gets overlooked because the contextual barriers are so pervasive. However, if learning is the end goal, then the processes to help girls acquire that learning are not that different. The GEC projects work on both the academic and the social aspect. Our contextual framework for educational marginalisation helps projects consider the particular barriers that girls face in three aspects. Firstly, what stops them from learning in their family and communities. Secondly, what hinders their learning in their schools or other learning environments. Finally, what the blocks are at the system level, such as government policies that exclude young mothers or processes that employ inequitable recruitment and deployment of teachers. Here I focus on the second aspect, particularly in relation to academic outcomes. This is because, while great leaps have been made in getting girls and boys into school, getting them learning has been more challenging. Despite years in school, it is estimated 250 million children are not acquiring basic literacy and numeracy skills, leading to a declaration of a global ‘learning crisis’ (Pritchett & Beatty 2012).The GEC has a robust focus on literacy and numeracy outcomes. The baseline in 2012/13 showed shockingly low learning levels and, although by the end of 2017 results had improved, the pace of learning was slow. The GEC helped over 800,000 girls learn more in the GEC than outside it. However, girls were achieving reading proficiency at a rate of 45 words-per-minute by grade 6 ,whereas this benchmark should be reached by grade 2 (Coffey, 2017). Furthermore, learning was better in literacy than it was in numeracy. Knowing where you want students to beThe national curriculum in a country often sets the benchmark for what should be learnt in each grade. But with very poor learning levels and a school population comprising out-of-school children, the national curriculum becomes an unrealistic expectation in certain contexts. In the GEC, each project had a target of 0.2 standard deviations above the control group, in literacy and numeracy. This is how we defined where we wanted students to be. Through the control group methodology, we were able to contextualise this for the age and stage of learning, and the barriers particular to the setting the girls were in. Although target setting is not without its drawbacks, projects reported that it helped to focus them on evaluation and learning outcomes. This methodology enabled us to explore the features of the most effective projects and contribute to findings about what works to improve girls’ learning outcomes.The focus on curriculum coverage leaves those students who have not mastered the basics behind and likely to drop out. This led some GEC projects to develop their own resources to supplement and personalise the national curriculum to the contexts they were operating in. Some projects used individualised learning approaches to know precisely where their students were, what had been mastered and which learning objectives had yet to be grasped. Others took this data and brought local officials, communities, teachers, and students together to consider what the data revealed and how to bring about improvements. Seeing the data in relation to where they were and where the average was shocked parents and communities. This translated into successful school improvement and community action plans to improve the learning outcomes of their children.Knowing how to get thereAfter assessing where your students are and where you want them to be, the next logical question becomes how to get there. This is where a teacher delves into their pedagogical repertoire and considers what is the best"
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Special Needs

Meaningful Assessment at the Margins

10 Sep 2018