Organising the school for personalised learning

Personalised learning demands that school leaders and teachers think creatively about school organisation, so as to best maintain high quality teaching and learning and to ensure that pupil performance and pupil welfare are mutually supportive.

Creating these conditions for learning involves:

• using the benefits of workforce remodelling to build a whole-school team to better support the learning of each pupil and increasing the planning, preparation and assessment (PPA) time for teachers;
• using ICT effectively;
• creating a clear and consistent policy on 'behaviour for learning' to create an environment in which all students feel safe and secure and can flourish as individuals.

It can also be enhanced by:

• pupil interviews - all pupils have regular individual, data-informed interviews focusing on their achievement and often involving parents; 
• learning from students' views on teaching and learning - pupils' views sought on effectiveness of classroom experience through, for example, surveys and conferences;
• pupil involvement - pupils contributing to whole-school life and to the work of the school;
• pupil focused - schools focused around the needs of pupils rather than teachers; students receive consistently good experience of school, pupil inclusion is seen as a guiding principle;
• positive school environment - pupils feel secure and can flourish as individuals; and there are clear sanctions combined with praise where earned for all pupils;
• physical environment - building schools for the future; quality displays to showcase achievement;
• service standards - guaranteed minimum standards: basic level of consistency in the experience of school for every pupil.

Pupil grouping

We have been encouraging schools to use setting and other forms of pupil grouping since 1997. 

Sophisticated approaches to setting and grouping can reflect the varying characteristics of the student population in each class or school and differences across subjects. Therefore it must continue to be for schools to decide how and when to group and set pupils.

We published independent research on pupil grouping methods in September 2006. This fieldwork phase formed the second part of an extended literature review and is based on case studies of grouping practice and organisational policy in schools across England. We also published a cluster of guidance documents alongside the research which is aimed at school leadership teams, and subject leaders/coordinators. It is designed to help schools to review their current policies and develop approaches that contribute to personalising learning. It includes: a set of principles for grouping policy, definitions of different types of grouping and a self-evaluation toolkit. Links to both the research and guidance can be found here:

http://www.standards.dcsf.gov.uk/primary/publications
/literacy/group_pup_succ/

We have commissioned extra research to determine effective practice that schools use to ensure that pupils placed in low ability groups fulfil their potential.  This will be published later in 2007.

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