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Working in partnership with pupils and parents
This chapter considers:
- the move towards making learning more personalised
- the increasing importance of listening to the voice of pupils and involving them as active participants in learning
- the growing appreciation of what can be achieved by schools and families working in partnership.
These three elements: personalising learning, pupil voice and parental involvement, are examined in relation to their significance for pupils for whom learning involves particular challenges.
The previous chapter looked at some of the ways in which schools are changing, in terms of their growing diversity, the move to schools working collaboratively with each other, and the expectation that schools will combine with other services and organisations to become the centre of their communities. Alongside these developments, the changing needs of children and young people were touched on, too. Before moving on in subsequent chapters to look at how partnership working is evolving in different educational settings, this chapter considers the fundamental relationship between staff and pupils, and between schools and families.
Pupils as Partners in Learning
Learning in school is no longer viewed as an experience where teachers are the active participants in the process and pupils the passive recipients. The students of today expect to be given a degree of choice as to what they study and how they learn. This reflects a general trend in society, from professionals deciding on the services clients should receive, to people being consulted about the services they want and how they would like them to be provided. In education, this movement gathered momentum when the idea of personalised learning was first introduced.
Personalising learning
In 2004, when David Miliband was Minister of State for School Standards, he gave a speech in which he described how personalised learning might become the defining feature of the education system. He described it as providing an education to every child, âwhich is tailored to their unique learning styles, motivations and needsâ. This was published as a pamphlet by the DfES (2005) and the above quote appears in the Foreword. Two years later, Christine Gilbert (before becoming Her Majestyâs Chief Inspector of Schools) was asked to lead a government review into what the personalisation of teaching and learning might look like. In her report, 2020 Vision: Report of the Teaching and Learning in 2020 Review Group (DfES, 2006b), Gilbert confirmed that personalised learning has a central role to play in transforming the education service in England. The report went on to say that the link between learning and teaching is strengthened if pupils and parents are seen as partners in the process.
When the idea of personalising learning first came to the fore, it was greeted with some degree of scepticism. There were understandable concerns that it would involve trying to provide an individual curriculum for every pupil. As the understanding grew of what was involved, the fears diminished. For many years, educationalists have been interested in Gardnerâs (2000) idea of recognising several types of intelligence, as well as the notion that people have different learning styles. Both of these ideas led to a greater awareness of the need to treat children and young people as individuals who have their own interests, abilities and characteristics. Every child matters, as the Green Paper of that title pointed out, and every child should matter equally, so that learning is tailored to individual needs. It has been accepted that pupils who have special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) may require a more individualised approach because of the nature of their learning difficulties. Personalising learning for every pupil is a step on from this. Indeed, it is conceivable that, if personalised learning for all really takes root, there would not need to be a separate category for pupils with SEND, as all pupils would have their needs met in the most appropriate way. This in no way suggests that every type of help, including learning at a different pace, benefiting from the support of therapists or having specialist equipment, would no longer be available, but that there would be no need to single out pupils with SEND in the way that it is done at the moment.
There are very close links between personalising a pupilâs learning experiences and listening to the voice of the child. The more studentsâ voices are heard, the more likely it is that a curriculum can be delivered in a way that meets their needs and encourages them to take an active interest in their learning, both now and in the future. With the pace of change in all areas of life, it is essential that school is seen as the beginning of a personâs education and that learning is accepted as being a lifelong activity.
The rise of âPupil Voiceâ
There has been a gradual shift over many years to recognising the importance of listening to the views of children. The growing interest in pupil voice is demonstrated by the rise in the number of student councils across primary, secondary and special schools, as well as other ways in which the voice of the child is being given increasing importance. In educational terms, a childâs perspective brings another dimension to teaching and learning, shedding fresh light on the learning process and helping pupils to be motivated by feeling part of that process.
United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC)
The trend towards taking more note of childrenâs views was given impetus by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), which was ratified in 1989 and came into force in England in 1992. This is an international treaty for childrenâs rights, which has been agreed by almost all the UN member states. UNCRC gives children and young people a specific right to be heard and to be listened to.
Key points: UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC)
UNCRC has 54 articles that give young people up to the age of 18 specific rights. The key provisions are:
- the right to a childhood protected from harm
- the right to an education
- the right to be healthy
- the right to be treated fairly
- the right to be heard.
UNICEFâs Little Book of Childrenâs Rights and Responsibilities (2007) contains a summary of the articles in UNCRC.
Some of these rights are similar to the five outcomes of ECM. They are also reflected in the DCSFâs (2007) The Childrenâs Plan: Building Brighter Futures; in the Scottish Governmentâs approach Getting it right for every child (2006); Northern Irelandâs Our Children and Young People â Our Pledge: a Ten Year Strategy for Children and Young People (Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister, 2006); and in the approach of the Welsh Assembly Government, where its work with children and young people is structured around seven core aims based on UNCRC.
Every five years, the UK Government has to report on its progress to the United Nations (UN). In November 2009, the government published the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child: Priorities for Action (DCSF, 2009d), which is its latest plan.
The UK Government coordinates UNCRC, working with the devolved administrations in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. When the government published its Priorities for Action, the Childrenâs Commissioners for England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales issued a joint statement welcoming the governmentâs achievements to date, while stressing that much remains to be done.
One of the governmentâs Priorities for Action is to continue to make children and young people more aware of their rights. The primary-aged pupils at Hounslow Town Primary School in London, are very aware of UNICEFâs Little Book of Childrenâs Rights and Responsibilities (2007) and have used it to design their own charters.
Case study: Hounslow Town Primary School
Hounslow Town caters for 450 pupils aged 3â11. It is about to expand to become a three-form entry primary school. It has a very high proportion of children for whom English is an additional language (EAL). It is one of three primary schools in the borough that has a Centre for statemented pupils. The one at this school caters mainly for pupils who have moderate learning difficulties (MLD).
Like the school as a whole, the Centre has had several increases in size and it has recently been moved from being on the fringes of the school to occupying a more central position. As the Centre has grown, staff have been careful to take a personalised approach to each childâs needs, so that pupils spend varying amounts of time in peer group classes, combined with receiving more intensive support within the Centre. The move to the middle of the building has made it easier for pupils to feel fully included in all aspects of the life of the school.
The UNICEF booklet (2007) is displayed in every classroom. This has helped pupils to become familiar with it, so that they have been able to make suggestions about a charter for their own classes. These charters specify the class rules in terms of rights and responsibilities. Each classroom has information displayed in a similar manner. As well as the charter, there is a Council Display Board with the names of class representatives and information about the current topics being discussed.
The school has gained The Rights Respecting School Award (RRSA), which was started by UNICEF UK in 2004 and is now running in more than 1000 primary and secondary schools in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. It helps schools to use UNCRC as a values framework, contributing to many aspects of a schoolâs work, including community cohesion, sustainable development and the global dimension.
Hounslow Town Primary is an example of a school that has not only done some imaginative work on pupil voice, but which has also embraced change in a number of ways. It has daycare provision run by a private provider, a nursery and a childrenâs centre all on-site. It is the hub school for a cluster of 17 schools in an extended schools consortium. The extended schools coordinator has her office in the school and is line managed by the head teacher, Chris Hill, who says the school has always accepted the need for change and tried to respond positively to it.
Following on from their work on class charters, the pupils at Hounslow Town used the same idea to work together on creating a playground charter. This is shown as a photocopiable resource in Chapter 6 (Figure 6.1).
Tellus surveys
As further evidence of the feeling that more needed to be done about listening to children and young people, the Children Act (DFES, 2004a) created the position of childrenâs commissioner, to have someone whose sole job it is to listen to children and to represent their views and interests on the wider stage. In addition to the commissionerâs work, the Tellus surveys are another method of ...
