Inclusion is high on the education agenda. It’s a key focus for teachers, leaders, policymakers and, now, school inspectors.

The new Ofsted inspection framework places significant emphasis on inclusion, making it one of six main areas that schools will be assessed on.

Chief inspector Sir Martyn Oliver has said that he hopes this will help to “shift the dial” on inclusion in the same way that Ofsted’s previous framework, introduced in 2019, did for curriculum.

“When Ofsted put curriculum front and centre in our approach, the dial shifted. We saw schools and other providers really prioritising substance,” he said, in a speech at the National SEND and Inclusion Conference earlier this year.

“The importance of curriculum remains - we must not lose sight of that,” Oliver added. “But I now want to do the same for inclusion.”

It’s a welcome aim. But what exactly does Ofsted mean when it talks about “inclusion”?

Whereas it was once a given that “inclusion” referred primarily to supporting pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) in mainstream schools, the term has now become a much wider umbrella in education policy and discourse.

Ofsted’s new evaluation area, for instance, widens the identification to firstly include socio-economically disadvantaged pupils (those eligible for the pupil premium), followed by pupils with SEND, pupils known to children’s social care and “pupils who may face other barriers to their learning and/or wellbeing”, including through having a protected characteristic.

This is an incredibly broad scope, which means that schools may need to revisit not just how they define “inclusion” but how they support children with such a diverse array of needs, backgrounds and potential barriers to learning.

Ofsted suggests some generic principles to help with this, including “setting high expectations” and “early and accurate assessment”. These are things that schools are likely to be doing already.

It is not enough, though, to assume that effective inclusion will happen simply by continuing with business as usual.

Inclusion ‘by design’

The Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) guidance on “Special Educational Needs in Mainstream Schools” describes the need for high-quality teaching that is “inclusive by design”.

But what does inclusion “by design” look like?

According to the EEF, evidence shows that teachers should prioritise “familiar but powerful strategies” and deploy these in a purposeful way. It suggests thinking about inclusion by design in terms of the old public health slogan that recommends eating five portions of fruit and vegetables a day.

Using this as a starting point, the EEF has translated the best available evidence in five key areas of teaching practice.

While the focus here is on supporting pupils with SEND in mainstream classes, I think the “five a day” approach is also a promising place to begin when thinking about how to meet the needs of all the pupils who fit within Ofsted’s broader definition of “inclusion”.

1. Explicit instruction

We must move beyond caricatures of explicit teaching as “chalk and talk”. Instead, it more accurately describes the use of clear and succinct language when explaining concepts, along with consistent checks for pupils’ understanding.

Yes, the approach is teacher-led, but explicit instruction should lead to guided practice, followed by independent practice, and can be easily adapted to suit pupils’ needs.

For example, when teaching fractions in maths, additional use of visuals like fraction bars can be a simple adaptation to explicit teaching. When pupils are then doing some independent practice of fraction problems, we can prompt the use of visuals or manipulatives.

This style of teaching isn’t old-fashioned; it is responsive and typically highly effective.

2. Scaffolding

The term “scaffolding” is well known, but less commonly practised with shared understanding. Scaffolding best describes the use of a carefully selected, though temporary, array of verbal scaffolds (such as structured “Think-pair-share” activities), visual scaffolds (such as a graphic organiser), and written scaffolds (such as an essay-writing frame).

Scaffolds should be used when pupils are taking on challenging multi-step tasks, like extended writing, where the scaffold can build confidence and help them to manage their cognitive load.

However, once pupils can tackle most of the task unaided, we must actively withdraw the scaffold.

For instance, in English using paragraph structure scaffolds can support early essay efforts, but these should be removed once pupils are able to structure ideas and make more sophisticated points with increasing independence.

3. Cognitive and metacognitive strategies

“Cognitive strategies” is a fancy phrase for tools that help us to learn more effectively. For instance, if pupils are grappling with a tricky word problem in maths, breaking the question down using a “chunking” strategy will help all pupils in their thinking, but may support those who are struggling most of all.

Metacognitive strategies, meanwhile, are approaches that help pupils to plan, monitor and evaluate how they tackle a tricky task. For example, a pupil undertaking revision can be encouraged to create a checklist of key topics, before colour coding these as a way to monitor their own progress and make it easier to prioritise weaker areas.

These approaches are more likely to support struggling pupils, but every pupil can benefit from them.

4. Flexible grouping

Flexible grouping can be used as an adaptive response to in-class assessment. For instance, pupils who are struggling to understand place value in Year 1 maths can benefit from extra modelling and teacher-led explanation in small groups, while more confident pupils grapple with a different problem.

Even within existing ability groups, a genuine flexibility to adjust groups for different topics or tasks is likely to ensure that teaching is more inclusive by design.

5. Using technology for learning

Some technology can be used to support learning, such as speech-to-text tools that assist pupils to process their ideas. However, it’s important that any tech supports you utilise are rooted in sound pedagogical principles, such as scaffolding or explicit teaching.

For instance, using a visualiser to model and scaffold writing is likely to be a promising approach. But anything that feels “gimmicky”, such as programmes that rely on “gamification”, should be looked on with scepticism.

Evidence shows that these strategies make high-quality teaching inclusive by design, so they should be routinely available to every pupil who struggles. They also complement targeted interventions, amplifying the effects.

Other factors, such as the sensory and physical set-up of classrooms, may also contribute to better inclusion. But high-quality teaching can be a focus for schools without the need for new and expensive resources, regardless of how many more pupils fall under our definition of inclusion.

Alex Quigley is the author of Why Learning Fails (And What To Do About It)

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