10 ideas for 21st century education

The  Innovation Unit has produced a thought provoking report on what needs to be done in schools to prepare today’s young people for the world in which they will live and work as adults.

The main premis has been rehearsed many times: we live in a world that is changing so rapidly that today’s children and young people need to be prepared to undertake jobs that currently don’t exist using technologies that have not yet been invented.

The ten ideas put forward in the report range from changing the organisation of the school day and the school classroom, to actively using smart phones to engage pupils in learning and working with the whole family not just children.

A key focus is on encouraging pupils to become teachers and teachers to become learners and on listening to and acting on the voice of young people.

The report is well worth a read and should not be dismissed as impracticable and unachievable.  There are the germs of some great ideas here.  Crucially, they need the act of faith that acknowledges the challenge and recognises that these could be potential solutions.

The full report can be found here

National service for headteachers

When Her Majesty's Chief Inspector (HMCI), Sir Michael Wilshaw, spoke at the recent annual conference for the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL), he called on headteachers to become more involved in school inspections, in particular as part of the National Leader of Education (NLE) programme.

The National College of School Leadership has agreed to run a pilot scheme from September with around 40 current NLEs. If successful, participating with OFSTED  in some school inspections will become part of the condition for becoming a NLE.

In this speech, Sir Michael also explained the rationale for the main changes he is proposing to the school inspection process from September 2012 on which OFSTED is currently consulting.

These main changes are:

• no notice inspections;

• the outstanding judgement being reliant on gaining outstanding for all four main inspection components, including teaching and learning;

• changing the 'satisfactory' judgement to 'requires improvement' and requiring that all schools judged to require improvement receive two monitoring visits in the two years following the inspection with the expectation that they will have improved to at least good within this time scale. If this is not achieved, the school will be placed in a category - with all that that entails.

You can access Sir Michael's speech to ASCL here >> http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/resources/leading-system-speech 

Summer schools to help transition to secondary school

The government has launched a £50 million fund to help the most disadvantaged pupils make the transition from primary to secondary school. 

Secondary schools can now sign up for £500 for every disadvantaged pupil who takes part in a two week summer school.  This funding applies to all pupils transferring into Year 7 who are on free school meals or have been in care for six months or more.

Secondary schools can apply for funding on a web form available on the DfE website.  Applications must be submitted by 30 April 2012.

Full information about the scheme can be found  here.