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Monitoring teaching and learning

If engagement is to be used effectively within the teaching toolkit it has to be in the repertoire utilised by teachers.

Watch the video. Three teachers are talking about curriculum planning and delivery and the engagement of children with autistic spectrum disorders.

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Tools for

assessment (1)

teacher testing girl’s ability to find things at desk
Activity
As leader of learning through engagement in your school, you need to establish processes that cover assessment of need, teaching, learning, monitoring of progress and evaluation of outcomes for pupils. The sequence outlined on the next slide provides you with some tools and approaches to these processes using observation and assessment with the Engagement Profile and Scale. It is also available on the Schools Network Complex Learning Difficulties and Disabilities Research Project website.

Tools for assessment (2)
Activity
Sampling: conduct a sampling exercise across your school. You might, for example, choose to make up the sample of classes from different key stages or particular groups or classes that represent the range of children's learning difficulties or disabilities.

Aim for five observations. Decide if you will need:

  • The same or different amount of time in each observation, depending on circumstances;
  • Whether to have another adult also observing at the same time;
  • Whether to use video or photographs;
  • How you will record what you observe.
Techniques for monitoring
Activity

The most common and practical way to conduct observations is to use time sampling. You carry out repeated observations of the same task or activity to identify progress. To find out more about
time sampling and recording formats, read:

Structured observations

Activity
The Engagement Profile and Scale will give you information that will directly inform interventions for the children. You should also read the following short papers on other techniques:
Inter-rater reliability check
Triangulation
Validity

What did you find out?
A sharper focus
Activity
Looking through the material you have collected, how does it inform you about any development of the school's systems for assessment of need, teaching and learning, monitoring progress and evaluation of outcomes for children?

Consider what steps may need to be taken to move practice in the school to be more focused on children's engagement in learning.

Watch the video of teacher Sandra Boardman talking about targets and assessments in her English lesson at Brookfields School, Berkshire.

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