Why Data Can’t Beat Watching Pupils Learn

When it comes to checking pupil progress, a hundred spreadsheets of data will never match up to just watching children learn, says Michael Tidd...

Progress seems a simple enough word. It’s not educational jargon or political waffle, it’s a straightforward term that we all understand and use in daily life. And yet it has become such a damaged concept in our schools – we no longer use the word in its proper way, but rather as a description of data.

Over the past year I’ve worked with schools and teachers across the land, looking at assessment without levels and trying to encourage schools to take up the new freedom we’ve been given. It’s a delightful chance for assessment to return to its real purpose of judging what children can do, and where teaching should go next. We are free from the burden of sub-levels and average point scores and teachers are able to assess what really matters and use that assessment to support children’s learning.

But time and again I find myself faced with the same comments: “This is all very good…but how do you show progress?” Note: nobody asks me how you help children make progress – every teacher knows how to do that almost instinctively. Nobody asks what you should do about children who seem not to be making progress, that too comes as second nature. The question is always about showing progress. Apparently, it’s no longer enough for it to be evident to pupil, teacher and parent that a child is making progress in her learning. We’ve become so used to the model of sub-levels that we struggle to see progress in any other terms.

The answers, of course, are simple, and always the same. How do you show progress? You watch the lessons, you speak to the child, you look at her books, you look at what she can do now that she couldn’t do previously. The progress will be evident. It might be a challenge to record all that in a spreadsheet, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

We’ve heard so much about teacher workload recently, and almost any teacher will tell you that one of the greatest increases in workload has come from the increasing demands for data. Most of those teachers will also tell you that data is for someone else, and of little use to them. The reality is that teachers know when children are making progress, and they know that sub-levels are a poor proxy.

Sub-divisions of sub-levels appeared because, too often, teachers could see that children were making progress, but the sub-levels weren’t showing it. Perhaps that was one of the many points at which we should have stopped and recognised that the system was broken. It’s for that reason, among many others, that we should welcome the views of NAHT leader Russell Hobby that we should “slay the sacred cow of progress”.

His argument recognises that for too long we’ve let the demands of the spreadsheet dictate what goes on in our classrooms, and that rather than looking at points of progress, leaders should interest themselves in the proportion of children who are reaching the expected standard for their age. If we’re serious about tackling the long tail of underachievement in our schools, then this would be a reasonable focus.

But what would it mean for teachers? Well, hopefully, a return to what really matters in the classroom. Rather than trying to balance the needs of 30 or more different children to try to keep up an average point score, we can instead focus on helping all children to reach the standard expected for their age. Rather than foolishly rushing higher-attaining pupils on to more new content at a faster rate, we can instead offer those children richer and more challenging tasks that will help them to secure a deeper understanding of the subjects. Rather than feeling forced to focus on narrow groups of children who might just reach the next sub-level, we can instead ensure that an increasing majority of children are reaching those appropriate standards.

So when those discussions come up in your school, and somebody asks about how you’re going to demonstrate progress, just suggest that they look at what children can do. It’s a pretty good indicator.

About the author

Michael Tidd is deputy headteacher at Edgewood Primary School in Hucknall, Nottinghamshire.