Constant change is here to stay

why schooling is always about the future

Guy Claxton

Centre for Real-World Learning

University of Winchester

guy.claxton@winchester.ac.uk

Reasons to be forward-looking

• Education is what societies lay on to equip all their young with the knowledge, skills, attitudes and values they will need (and which cannot be reliably assumed to develop in the normal process of growing up) to flourish amidst the risks, demands and opportunities of the future, as they imagine it will be– i.e. relative to future conditions; not ‘timeless’– dependent on accurate imagination (e.g. Foresight project on Mental

Capacity and Well-being)– the future is always uncertain (Landscapes of Fear)– now more than most (or is it?)– the ‘comfort option’ of religion / authority is less available to many

An old idea…

…that has yet to fulfil its potential

It keeps appearing… and disappearing

• New Basics; Essential Learnings; Key Competencies; PLTS; Soft skills; Learning to Learn

• “The test of successful education is not the amount of knowledge that pupils take away from school, but their appetite to know and their capacity to learn.”

Sir Richard Livingstone, Oxford,1941

• “We need people who are able to function well in situations for which they were not specifically prepared”

Seymour Papert, MIT,1978

e.g. the new Australian national curriculum

• “All young Australians [should] become successful learners, confident and creative individuals, and active and informed citizens”– Successful learners

• “develop their capacity to learn”• “are creative, innovative and resourceful…enterprising and

use their initiative”• “are able to plan activities independently, collaborate and

work in teams”• “develop personal values and attributes such as resilience

and empathy…”

One school’s version…

“It’s our job not just to help children master literacy and numeracy but to prepare them for a very turbulent and complex world. We are failing if we don’t prepare them with the skills they need to cope with uncertainty; to cope with differing perspectives; to cope with working with different kinds of people; to ask good questions. Our children are at a very crucial age. We need to get those skills right into the DNA of the way our children think and learn – before it’s too late.”

Dr Simon Buckingham Shum, Chair of Governors, Bushfield Primary School, October 2011

Are We Serious?What does it take to do 21st century

education properly?

• Why is the idea that education is a preparation for the future for all such a contentious and vulnerable idea?

• Eight key features of a robust and practical Expansive Education

1. Broadening the goal

• Not OR but AND

• It’s hard to achieve escape velocity…e.g. Assessment for Learning

Yr before BLP Yr BLP started BLP yr 1 BLP yr 2450

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Combined Key Stage 2 total SATs points for primary schools with 3 years BLP experience

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GCSE points score for BLP schools from 1 year before start of BLP to 2010

Dr Challoner'sWestcliffPark HighWalthamstowPark ViewLandau ForteSt Paul'sBay HouseGeorge Pindar

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2. Benefits for ALL

• Not selection but inclusion

• 50% are not too unintelligent to ‘win’

• “It has proven easier to retrain a plumber to be a programmer than to retrain a manager”

Richard Sennett

“Successful” students are losing too – meet Emily

• I know I’m bright, and that I’m going to get good grades. But I worry I’ve become a tape-recorder. I worry that once I’m out of school, and people stop handing me information with questions, I’ll be lost.

Emily, 16

Spoon-feeding works – but it works at the expense of something that British schools have always been rather good at, namely, turning out young people who are creative, thoughtful, critical…even intelligently awkward sometimes.

Independent Schools Inspectorate

3. Strong rationale

• Not Snake Oil or Sentiment, but research-based

– (R, R and R)

• e.g. New theories of expandable intelligence– “Intelligence is the sum total of one’s

habits of mind” Prof Lauren Resnick

• Without this, innovation is vulnerable– e.g. NZ, Australia, UK …

4. Precision language

• Not empty aspirations that fudge the values issue but accessible goals

• Vagueness and pomposity are other sources of vulnerability

• “How do you teach empathy through history, resilience through writing, or questioning through

science?”

Bin these words –

• “Inspirational”• “Transformational”• “Excellence”• “World-class”• “Best practice”

• “Metacognition”• “Autonomous”• “Agency”

• “Child-centred”• “Liberal”

5. Infusion

• Not add-ons but habit change– Not ‘implementing

initiatives’ but ‘growing a culture’

• Not Quick Fixes but Gradual Embedding

• PS – you can’t not be teaching dispositions towards learning

“I used to teach maths – now I’ve got to teach bloody thinking as well!”

6. Prioritisation

• Focusing on what’s important - teachers

“An effective school is [essentially] a school full of effective classrooms. It matters much less which school a child attends than which classrooms they are in at that school. In England there is a four-fold difference between the most effective and least effective classrooms.” (Dylan Wiliam)

• “The largest effect sizes on students’ achievement occur when teachers become learners about their own teaching, and when students become their own teachers” (John Hattie)

7. Evaluation and progression

• Not Hope but Evidence

• e.g. how do you tell if students are growing in their ‘appetite to know’ and their ‘capacity to learn’?

“If we do not find ways to measure what we value, we shall simply end up valuing what we measure”

8. Strategic leadership

• Readiness for innovation and dissatisfaction with piecemeal approaches

• Enthusiastic, visible and continual support from SLT • An open, inquisitive and supportive staff culture• ‘Tight but loose’ supervision• Teachers have time to experiment and safety to make

mistakes• There is a precise programme of peer observation and

report back• Students are involved in reflection and improvement• Planning is long term (3 years or more)• Parents are informed and supportive

What does it take to do 21st century education properly?

• The eight core principles of Expansive Education1. Broadening the core aims of education

2. A vision that offers success for all

3. A strong rationale

4. Precise and accessible language

5. Cumulative change to habits and culture

6. Focusing on teachers and teaching

7. Honest individual and collective self-appraisal

8. Visible leadership

e.g.s of what schools should be ‘teaching’

• Skeptical intelligence (knowledge appraisal)– Assessing source reputability– Checking assumptions / reasoning– Plausibility-monitoring– Triangulation

• Attention modulation– Scrutiny < - > Synopsis– Inward < - > Outward– Surfing < - > Sustained– Immersed < - > Reflective

• Deep reading – ‘the joy of the struggle’• Creativity – delights and rigours

Beyond the 19th century idea of ‘outstanding’

19th century• I am secure in my curriculum

knowledge• I explain things confidently and

clearly• I ask probing and good

diagnostic questions • I build interest, variety and

change of pace into lessons• I respond creatively to students’

learning styles• Assessment clearly shows

students how to ‘close the gap’• Students are highly engaged in

discussing content

21st century• I frequently show students I too

am learning in lessons• I model thinking like a researcher

in my subject• I challenge students to formulate

their own questions• I vary activities to develop

different learning capacities• I work to build broader

repertoires of learning capacities• Self-assessment builds students’

capacity for self-diagnosis• Students often pause to reflect

on their learning process

Our gift: confidence