Heavy emphasis on phonics in new Ofsted reports, while need for pupils to “know more and remember more” also features

Inspection reports produced under Ofsted’s new framework are heavily emphasising phonics, while the controversial exhortation that pupils should “know more and remember more” is also featuring.

Education Uncovered looked at all the reports published by the inspectorate yesterday (Monday), and found the distinctiveness of the new framework – which places more emphasis on the curriculum and the word “knowledge”, rather than “skills” – showing through clearly.

The framework was introduced last month, with the first inspection reports on schools produced under it having been published in the past few days.

Phonics mentions in the reports

Woodstock primary academy in Leicester received a “requires improvement” judgement, which was a falling-back from the “good” its predecessor school had recorded in 2013 before academising, with its phonics work criticised.

The report stated: “The teaching of phonics (letters and the sounds they represent) and early reading is not as well organised as it should be. For example, not all staff have had the same training.”

Perhaps especially controversially, the report added: “Pupils’ reading books do not always match the letter sounds and words they have been learning.”

The report also said: “This is no whole-school approach to the teaching of early reading. In recent years not, [sic] enough pupils have achieved well in the Year 1 phonics screening check.”

A special measures monitoring report on St Catherine’s Catholic Primary School, an academy in Wimborne in Dorset was also critical about phonics teaching.

It found: “Leaders have not ensured that the school has an effective phonics programme in place. Teachers do not have the knowledge of when and how pupils learn their letters and sounds. This leads to low ambition, such as pupils in Year 1 being retaught simple words, for example ‘jar’ and ‘jet’. Teachers do not have a clear understanding of phonics development or assessment. As a result, phonics teaching is haphazard. Pupils’ reading books do not match their phonic ability and the reading scheme is not coherent enough to secure pupils’ phonic development.”

By contrast, Lyminster Primary School in Littlehampton, west Sussex, received a “good” judgement, with the inspectors reporting that “leaders have put reading at the heart of the school”.

The report found: “Leaders make sure that pupils develop a love of reading from the word go. Reception children were excited about having their first ‘proper’ phonics (letters and the sounds they represent) lesson. They told me that they wanted to learn phonics because then they would be able to read stories themselves.”

It seemed to me that the emphasis on phonics was greater than in inspection reports published under the previous framework. But I have not done a lengthy trawl of former inspection reports to test that view.

Knowledge vs skills

Two other reports published yesterday seemed to offer contrasting levels of emphasis on the word “knowledge”.

This has become a much-debated word within England’s current education policy debate, of course, with “knowledge-rich” approaches being more associated with the traditionalist side of England’s prog-trad row, and Ofsted seeming to lean slightly towards this side of the argument.

Meanwhile, the inspectorate has courted controversy by suggesting that, in the relation to the new framework, pupil progress might be seen as them “knowing more and remembering more”.

Sean Harford, Ofsted’s national director of education, wrote about that last year , while it also featured in an Ofsted training booklet I wrote about last December.

The phrase appears not to feature in Ofsted’s new framework document itself, although it does appear in the inspectorate’s “School Inspection Handbook”, where it was stated that pupils should be seen as “making progress in the sense of knowing more, remembering more and being able to do more”.*

The phrase seems controversial in emphasising volume of knowledge over, perhaps, the quality of any insights and understanding that pupils might be developing.

In any case, here it was in one of the reports published yesterday.

In another “requires improvement” report, on Aldermaston church of England primary, in Reading in Berkshire, the inspectors concluded: “Not all subjects are taught well. This means that pupils are not able to achieve as well as they could. Most curriculum plans do not include the knowledge that pupils need to help them know more and remember more over time.”

That report featured six mentions of the word “skills,” but the word “know” or “knowledge” featured 13 times, including the following sentence: “Leaders should ensure that the curriculum plans for all subjects show teachers the knowledge that pupils should know and when they should know it.”

By contrast, the report on St Teresa’s Catholic Primary School, in Skelmersdale, Lancashire, which was rated “good”, seemed more balanced, including the following sentence: “[The curriculum] aims to provide pupils with the skills, knowledge and understanding they need to achieve well in all subjects.”

The word “skills” featured four times in this report, which was the same number as the word “know” or “knowledge”.

As expected, all of the reports saw a greater emphasis on curriculum planning than had been the case under the previous framework.

In the only inspection verdict on a secondary school published yesterday, a special measures monitoring visit by Ofsted to William Lovell Church of England Academy in Boston in Lincolnshire, the inspectors seemed to be praising the school for taking into account a government target to increase the proportion of pupils taking subjects which the government calls the “English Baccalaureate”.

The report found: “[School leaders] have reduced key stage 4 from three years to two. This means that pupils now experience a broad range of subjects at key stage 3 over three years…Leaders are aware of the 6 government’s target to increase the proportion of pupils who follow the English Baccalaureate suite of subjects. They have reintroduced French into the curriculum and have ensured that those pupils wishing to follow the ‘Ebacc’ are able to do so.”

Overall, of the nine inspection reports published on state schools under the new framework yesterday, three saw the schools rated “good”, three saw them adjudged “requires improvement” and there were three special measures monitoring reports, which did not result in that category being lifted.

Education Uncovered is continuing to follow the new Ofsted framework, and the debates around it, closely.

-At least one publisher appears to be seeing commercial opportunities in the framework’s new emphasis on phonics. See this recent blog from Oxford University Press.

*Ofsted’s “Inspecting the curriculum” document also states that “The end result of a good, well-taught curriculum is that pupils know more and are able to do more.”