Improving communication skills

How did the school collect evidence?

The school aimed to measure the number and quality of responses made by pupils to a researcher, teachers and their peers through:

• monitoring by a researcher (a member of staff appointed to observe the project);
• pupil interviews and discussions;
• teacher observation;
• assessment of pupils' work;
• comments made by pupils, staff and parents;
• collecting information before the work began and comparing this to information collected in the same way at the end of the work.

The school compared the quality of pupils' responses after an enquiry on Ancient Egypt in the summer term of year 4 with that at the end of the Tudor project (Christmas of year 5). A member of staff who knew the pupils as a support teacher was appointed to act as researcher. She interviewed nine bilingual or emergent bilingual pupils after the year 4 Egyptians project (which had been taught in discrete lessons, with some science and language work), then again after the Tudor project. The interviews were recorded on video and transcribed for analysis, to see whether the pupils' spoken English and understanding of history had been improved by the cross-curricular arts-based approach.

Initially, the researcher also observed all three classes for two sessions a week -- one arts-based; the other numeracy-based. She focused in particular on pupils who were unwilling to be involved in whole class sessions, observing their response during the introductory part of lessons, their ability to remain on task, and their response during the plenary. As the project progressed, the school decided to focus the research on one class, as other factors (such as change of teacher and staff absences) made it difficult to give each class an equal amount of time and experiences.

Meanwhile, the class teachers (who were unaware of the pupils identified as the target for the research) kept details of their class' development and samples of work, including recordings. The headteacher and other members of staff also regularly visited the classrooms to observe the project and meetings were held to compare and discuss observations. In music, each group's performance and composition was recorded and assessed each week. A similar process was used in art, both for portrait work and collage. The eight small writing groups that composed the play performed at the end of the project were also formally assessed.