Pupils, the forgotten partners in Education Action Zones
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Pupil Voice
What did the study find out about student views on their learning preferences?
The researchers collected the students’ views on:
- how they learned;
- the strategies which helped their learning;
- factors which hindered their learning; and
- what enhanced their motivation.
Activities which students felt were helpful to their learning included:
- listening and discussing, which enabled them to share ideas;
- practical work, which they saw as more memorable and fun;
- working in friendship groups, which enabled sharing of skills and a safe space for asking questions.
They preferred working in self-chosen groups or pairs to working in groups chosen by the teacher, whole class settings or independent work.
Factors which students felt were unhelpful to their learning included:
- bad behaviour by others (80%);
- friends (17%);
- personal feelings (16%);
- a mismatch between teacher expectations of what they could achieve and their own expectations (13%); and
- teaching methods.
“If the teacher doesn’t explain properly.”
“Some teachers expect too much and others think I am not bright and don’t give me much.”
It may be unsurprising that high numbers of students identified others’ poor behaviour as a key factor that was unhelpful to their learning. The authors wanted to unpack students’ concerns regarding behaviour in more detail.
The widespread student dislike of whole class teaching seemed to flow from concerns about behaviour (“In a whole class, people mess around more”) as well as concerns about understanding (“If you don’t understand something in the whole class, you can’t ask, ‘cos it’s embarrassing”).
Some students held unequivocal views on how misbehaviour should be addressed. They saw it as the school’s responsibility to “sort out” disruptive students.
“Split difficult kids up.”
“Exclude people that disturb the class.”
