Improve student performance: how to help all students reach their full potential
One of the most rewarding aspects of international schooling is the range of students each school supports – however, this can also present a challenge.
International schools often face large amounts of pressure to improve student performance and help everyone reach their potential, including pressure for good results and demands from parents regarding their children’s outcomes.
How to support high-achieving students
Support is often discussed in terms of the students who struggle – and while that is essential, supporting high-achieving students is also key in improving student performance and empowering all students to thrive.
Differentiating learning
The diversity of international schools means they often require more flexibility than others. One way of providing this flexibility in the classroom is with differentiation.
Differentiation in the classroom means giving students different learning content or ways of learning based on their needs. It includes methods such as adaptive teaching, which is where a lesson is adapted based on students’ needs – such as the level of support provided or the pace of a lesson.
Differentiation is a great way to push high-achieving students, as it enables you to challenge them further than a standardised lesson might.
It enables all students to get the most out of a lesson, improving students’ academic performance and in turn outcomes.
Creating a learning plan for high-achieving students is one way to ensure these students are challenged and enables you to track their progress against the plan.
Encourage independence
Another way to challenge high-achieving students is by encouraging them to be independent, and by developing their independent learning skills.
This improves a student’s academic outcomes by ensuring they not only have a deep understanding of learned content, but also how they learn best.
For example, independent learning might make it clear to them what they struggle with and what they excel at, the studying and revision methods that work best for them, and what they actually need from their teacher.
Similarly, learning is most often assessed with exams, which are completed independently and in a vastly different environment to that of the classroom – this can throw students off and impact results, so being able to work and learn independently prior to taking exams can go a long way in improving academic performance.
Interdisciplinary understanding
Building a students’ skills to apply knowledge across subjects – such as how something learned in a history lesson might be relevant to a text studied in a literature class – has big benefits for academic performance.
This supports problem-solving skills as well as helping students develop a deeper understanding of learned content, which improves academic outcomes in itself.
Following on from the above example, understanding the social context behind a novel helps a student to better understand its themes and see it inside the society and time in which it exists, rather than just as a piece of literature in isolation.
This makes for better academic performance and improved outcomes.
Challenges to social, emotional and mental health
If students are experiencing mental ill health or other challenges to their social, emotional and mental health (SEMH), it will likely impact on their academic performance.
Any student can face these challenges, and a worsened performance in school is often a sign of a SEMH issue, such as bullying at school or parental neglect – affluent neglect, for example, is an increasingly common challenge for international schools.
Identifying and addressing these challenges as early as possible is the best way to improve student performance. As well as academic improvement, addressing SEMH challenges can also improve a student’s behaviour, mental health and overall wellbeing.
Inclusion and improving academic performance
Building an inclusive learning environment is key to increasing achievement for all. Inclusive education means a classroom where all students have the opportunity to learn and thrive.
While taking steps towards creating an inclusive classroom is beneficial for all students, it isn’t something that happens overnight. It’s key that students receive specific and targeted support, especially for students who are struggling or have special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).
Creating an individual learning plan for students who are struggling is key – this includes an overview of the challenges they’re facing and details about any remedial measures in place to improve their performance, such as a one-to-one learning intervention delivered by a teacher or teaching assistant.
A learning plan enables you to track a students’ progress against their plan and measure the success of any learning interventions.
Ensure every student reaches their potential
Tes Learning Pathways enables you to create individual learning plans to meet each student’s needs, so you can ensure everyone gets the chance to reach their potential.
The platform puts all your learning plans and extra support provision in one place – so staff don’t have to hunt through folders or try and fill gaps in information
With Learning Pathways, you can access ready-made and flexible templates for more streamlined creation and management of student learning plans, regardless of the student’s starting point or pathway. The platform enables you to:
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Record all adjustments and interventions in one place
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Maintain consistency with a single source of truth
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Review impact with visual data and timelines
The platform also enables more effective communication with parents by logging all communications automatically, allowing secure sharing of data and files and giving you the option to provide parents with access to their child’s plans and any updates.
This means you can demonstrate your impact to parents and show how you're investing in each child, no matter what their needs are.
Learn more about how Learning Pathways with our free guide and see how it can help you improve performance and inclusion at your school – so every student can reach their potential.
Originally published July 2024