Inspectors ‘will help to cut teachers’ red tape’

But experts warn staff could face even more paperwork after new CfE guidance

2nd September 2016, 1:00am

School inspectors will not hinder the government’s drive to free teachers from unnecessary bureaucracy by asking for reams of evidence from headteachers, Scotland’s chief inspector has indicated.

Education secretary John Swinney this week advised teachers to “focus on young people” and not to “fill a lever arch file with endless amounts of detail”.

He issued the advice as he launched new guidance designed to give “absolute clarity” to teachers about “what is and what is not required” under the Curriculum for Excellence.

In response, Bill Maxwell, Scotland’s chief inspector of education, told TESS: “I can absolutely give you reassurances that there won’t be a disconnect [between the new guidance and inspection]. Nowadays we have, on a number of occasions, seen inspection reports where effectively the main point of action has been about reducing bureaucracy and improving, streamlining processes.”

School inspectors were already undergoing training so that the new guidance would be embedded, he said.

Mr Maxwell added that it was now more than ever down to schools to make judgements for themselves about the amount of written evidence they should collect about pupils’ learning.

“Fundamentally, that comes down now to the professionalism of teachers and their leaders within schools…I don’t think it would be helpful for us to micro-prescribe that from the top,” he said.

Mr Maxwell spoke as the government also published benchmarks for maths and English for the first time, so schools can be clear about what learners hitting the different CfE levels should be able to do.

The guidance comes amid fears that teachers are becoming bogged down in excessive paperwork and red tape in the name of CfE. However, one expert in curriculum theory has hit out at Mr Swinney’s attempt to bring coherence to CfE, saying that the new guidance had added “new complexity”.

‘Contradictory’ guidance

Mark Priestley, a professor of education at the University of Stirling today called for the existing - “often contradictory” - CfE documentation to be replaced by a single set of detailed guidance (see box, “A new layer of complexity”, below).

Primary headteachers’ organisation AHDS has, meanwhile, questioned whether future inspections will actually reflect the new guidance. Only last week, Education Scotland issued a briefing to schools on the evidence that would be required before and during an inspection, said AHDS president Robert Hair.

Included in the list were samples of children’s work in literacy and numeracy, across learning, from each class. Inspectors also required information about children’s progress and performance over time and any available benchmarking data and information about how children’s achievements (including attainment) were tracked.

‘The government is talking as if teachers are in control of this agenda’

Mr Hair, headteacher of Kinloss Primary in Moray, said: “It’s early days. We need to wait and see what the next tranche of school visits by HMI brings and what their expectation in relation to evidence is and whether that is in line with what this advice is saying.”

Teachers commenting on Twitter said that senior managers would ignore the new anti-bureaucracy guidance because of “the need to be inspection compliant” (see box, “How the Twitterati reacted”, below).

Scotland’s largest teaching union, the EIS, has criticised “top-down management” from Education Scotland, councils and the Scottish government itself. EIS general secretary Larry Flanagan said: “The government is talking as if teachers are in control of this agenda. Saying that teachers are now empowered to challenge this is a long way from making sure local authorities and senior management in schools are in line with the message.”

However, Mr Flanagan said that the documents would bring some benefits. The new benchmarks would be particularly useful for schools and teachers, he argued.

Meanwhile, Ashley Abercrombie, a teacher at St Roch’s Primary in Glasgow, where the new materials were launched, said that the guidance would give teachers the confidence to have two or three pieces of strong evidence, as opposed to 10 folders of evidence. The new guidance was “succinct”, which meant it would be referred to by teachers frequently, she concluded.

@TESScotland

Key messages on CfE: what to avoid

When using Es and Os (experiences and outcomes):

Avoid writing overly detailed plans for the year ahead that limit your flexibility to respond to children’s and young people’s needs, interests and progression.
Don’t plan for individual Es and Os or spend excessive time writing detailed descriptions of learning activities.
Don’t “tick off” all the Es and Os separately.
Stop doing too many things at the same time. For example, in a primary school, don’t cover all of the eight curriculum areas every week.
Don’t spend time on interdisciplinary learning which does not provide opportunities to apply and deepen learning or is contrived.

When using new CfE ‘benchmarks’:

Avoid spending time on assessment activities which do not help to identify pupils’ next steps in learning.
Don’t over-assess learners or assess the same content repeatedly in different ways. Don’t create large portfolios of evidence.
Avoid putting undue pressure on learners with too many assessments in different subjects at the same time.
Don’t spend time writing long reports for parents which describe lots of classwork or use professional jargon.

‘A new layer of complexity’

This publication raises more questions than answers. I am heartened by a reinforcement of the message that bureaucracy should be reduced. It’s good to see a clear steer that assessment shouldn’t be driven by ticking off “experiences and outcomes” (“Es and Os”), but that these should inform planning; this is what they were designed for.

I am, however, left disappointed. There are inconsistencies. For example, the guidance talks about the primacy of Es and Os and benchmarks, but not the purposes, principles and values that should underpin curriculum development. These are subsequently highlighted in the appendix. The guidance seeks to simplify, but adds new complexity - the benchmarks - which may drive assessment in the same tick-box fashion as the Es and Os. Curriculum for Excellence has often seemed a shifting kaleidoscope of terminology and concepts; the tradition appears to continue.

Finally, the appendix lists much existing CfE documentation as current. This doesn’t seem in keeping with the call for a new narrative. It may be that subsequent guidance ushers in a new and simplified narrative. At present I don’t see this happening.

I offer two suggestions: first, abolish the Es and Os - the main cause of bureaucracy afflicting schools.

Other countries, such as Ireland, are moving away from this over-complex approach, while we are heading towards it.

Second, the often contradictory documentation that has emerged over time must be replaced by a single set of detailed CfE guidelines with a clear and consistent message about the curriculum and its development processes. We are not there yet.

Professor Mark Priestley, an expert on curriculum studies, is deputy dean at the University of Stirling’s Faculty of Social Sciences