Category Archives: Accountability

Ofsted: notoriously unreliable

Posted on April 3, 2019 by

Ofsted judgments have never been trustworthy. There have been problems from the start. It should come as no surprise that none of the 46 schools wearing an Outstanding label which were inspected this January retained that label: 37 became Good, … Continue reading →

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How teaching can be different

Posted on March 27, 2019 by

by Valerie Coultas Cultures of performativity must go if collaboration and creativity is to survive in teaching This article takes issue with the dominant managerial view that teaching is improved by close supervision and imposed lesson observations. Instead, I argue … Continue reading →

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Urgent action on Ofsted

Posted on February 17, 2019 by

Ofsted are desperately trying to rebrand themselves, including the claim that they will rely less on test data and more on intelligent engagement with the school’s curriculum. There are good reasons to be sceptical about this, given the hit-and-run nature … Continue reading →

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Ofsted – a fairer future?

Posted on February 3, 2019 by

Rumours are circulating that schools in poor areas will stand a better chance of getting a good Ofsted grade, but where is this coming from? There are no such promises in the new draft Inspection Framework. In fact, page 11 shows … Continue reading →

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Progress 8 – a biased and misleading measure

Posted on January 25, 2019 by

Progress 8 was supposed to be a fair measure of secondary school ‘effectiveness’. New research confirms that it is seriously biased against schools with more disadvantaged pupils. It is vital to expose this injustice because scoring ‘well below average’ on Progress … Continue reading →

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Phonics test – Nick Gibb fails again

Posted on September 27, 2018 by

Schools minister Nick Gibb is crowing, once again, that thousands more children are ‘on track to become fluent readers’. Improved pass rates in the Phonics test show no such thing. “163,000 more 6-year-olds are on track to become fluent readers … Continue reading →

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Challenging the tyranny of the Phonics Check

Posted on July 9, 2018 by

It is hard to compete with Margaret Clark’s tenacity in challenging the deeply flawed Phonics Screening Check along with  schools minister Nick Gibb’s dogmatic support of Synthetic Phonics. After editing two books in a single year, she has just completed a … Continue reading →

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