Gainsborough Primary School

Principles of Pedagogy

Eko Trust Vision

Every member of our community is empowered to learn, to be ambitious and to be resilient.

Our Commitment

Equity for all - every child no matter their background will be supported and will

receive the best education to enable them to access equal life chances.

Introduction

There has been much research and development in the last 10 years into how pupils learn and the consequential impact this has on teachers’ approaches to pedagogy. At Eko Trust, we promote 5 key principles of pedagogy based on up-to-date and current knowledge and ensure teaching and learning in all our schools takes account of these core ways of working.

We have taken learning from the Education Endowment Foundation and Research Schools Network, as well as from providers like Ambition Institute to support us in defining our approach to pedagogy.

The Ambition Institute Learning Curriculum 2.0 has been particularly helpful.

The 5 Key Principles 

Principle 1 – People can only consciously attend to a handful of stimuli at a time

Environment and attention: How can teachers help students to attend to Learning?

Principle 2 – Working memory is limited

Working memory, load and thought: how can teachers help students focus on what matters?

Principle 3a – Memory is the residue of thought

Principle 3b – Identify and address student misconceptions

Long-term memory: how can teachers help students encode information in long-term memory?

Principle 4 – Prior knowledge determines what students can learn

Linking new learning to prior knowledge: How can teachers find out what pupils already know?

Principle 5a – Ensure that learning sticks through practice and retrieval

Principle 5b – Help students organise their knowledge

Forgetting: how can teachers help students to remember what they learn?

Measures of success

We encourage teachers in all our schools to reflect on the following questions (from The Ambition Institute Learning Curriculum 2.0) to support their implementation of the 5 key principles of pedagogy. These questions also support the evaluation of the impact of the 5 key principles of pedagogy.

Principle 1 – People can only consciously attend to a handful of stimuli at a time Environment and attention:

● Resources contain only information essential to learning?

● Remove redundant information from resources: are images essential for learning?

● Remove redundant information from resources: is all text essential for key learning point?

● Remove redundant information from resources: are your instructions complex and procedural? If so, include them on the resource.

● Remove redundant information from resources: are your instructions simple? If so, remove from resource.

● Is all related information organised logically?

Principle 2 – Working memory is limited Working memory, load and thought:

● Have you strictly limited the amount of new “moving parts” you require students to process at one time.

● Have you carefully considered whether students will be able to deal with all the new learning in this lesson?

● Have you carefully considered whether there is enough new learning this lesson?

● Have you considered splitting your lesson into more than one, or including more new learning, depending on the answers to the above questions?

● If the material is novel or complex, have you thought about providing students with “external working memory” (scaffolds,supports, thinking tools like calculators) to limit load on working memory?

Principle 3a – Memory is the residue of thought

Principle 3b – Identify and address student misconceptions Long-term memory:

3a

● Have you created an opportunity to transform the knowledge you have shared?

● When asking pupils to ‘think’ have you given them an opportunity to write?

● Have you modelled an example of how you have thought about the key area of learning?

● Is there adequate time planned into the lesson to allow for thinking?

● Carefully consider your activity and or questions, do they guide the student to think about the right learning point?  

3b

● Do you know where in your lesson it is worth stopping to identify and address misconceptions? (What is the key learning point?)

● Have you considered the areas where students are likely to have misconceptions around your key learning point?

● Is the activity designed in a way to allow for easy exposure of the misconceptions?

● Have you included an activity that allows you to do this?

● Have you considered how you will address any misconceptions that might arise?

Principle 4 – Prior knowledge determines what students can learn Linking new learning to prior knowledge:

● Are you pre-teaching key ideas before exposing students to new content?

● Are you checking student knowledge early in the lesson?

● Are you helping students to activate and retrieve key ideas early in the lesson?

Principle 5a – Ensure that learning sticks through practice and retrieval

Principle 5b – Help students organise their knowledge Forgetting:

5a

● What is your method for choosing the most important knowledge to practise?

● Have you completed a whole-class check for understanding before beginning practice?

● How is practice scaffolded and guided to ensure a high degree of success (80%)?

● Will pupils have multiple opportunities to practise (spaced over time)?

● How are you varying practice to encourage transfer and retention?

● What feedback will pupils receive to ensure increasing accuracy?

5b

● Have pupils gained fluency in the knowledge you want them to organise and categorise? (How do you know?)

● How will organising the knowledge help deepen pupils’ understanding of the topic/subject?

● Have you identified/planned the links/categories and why they are meaningful?

● Does the activity help pupils think about the links/identify the links for themselves/understand what they are and why they matter?