Oxenhope CE Primary School

Adaptive Teaching at Oxenhope

What is Adaptive Teaching?

Adaptive Teaching is an approach a teacher will use to continually assess the strengths and needs of learners and adapt their teaching accordingly to ensure all learners can meet expectations.
With Adaptive Teaching, the teacher plans for the whole class and makes changes to the curriculum or resources so that all learners can achieve the same goals.
Research based practice:
Using research from the Education Endowment Fund (The EEF) Oxenhope has developed 5 a Day Principles approach to adaptive teaching within the curriculum subjects. These involve:
1 – Explicit Instruction
· Communicating clearly and succinctly with the pupils
· Using carefully selected visuals
· Checking pupils understanding
· Modelling how to complete a task
2 – Cognitive and metacognitive strategies
· Introducing content in small steps
· Helping pupils consider ways to remember new information
· Frequently asking learners top recall previously learnt content
· Promoting metacognition including Growth Mindset strategies and independence
3 – Utilizing Scaffolding
· Visual – like a partially completed model
· Written – such as a list of key words and phrases
· Verbal – as in re-teaching key content to a child who has picked up on a misconception
4 – Flexible Grouping
· Re-grouping children after reflecting on learning to add in challenge or support
· Re-grouping children within the lesson to react to misconceptions or the need for challenge
5 – Using Technology
· Technology can be used effectively by teachers to model worked examples, or by pupils to help them to learn.

What Adaptive Teaching looks like at Oxenhope:

These are some of the strategies teachers will use within the classroom at Oxenhope as part of adaptive teaching:
• Re – Focusing – refocusing the class in the lesson to review and address misconceptions seen as a whole class.
• Developing a professional hunch – teacher will develop understanding and knowledge of the children and can plan forward with good knowledge of how their children learn. They will be able to develop a hunch about each child’s journey within the lesson and therefore they will be able to adapt to the learning quickly with more support or challenge.
• Scanning – the teacher may stand back and observe the children, scanning the room to understand where the children are and if there are misconceptions occurring. They will also scan to see if children need more challenges or if they need their knowledge deepening within the lesson.
• Checking – teachers will use a variety of techniques to check children have understood and are ready to apply. They may do whole class marking halfway through the lesson and then adapt the learning within the lesson either moving children on quickly or offering more support.
• New professional learning – teachers may choose to apply pedagogical CPD in lessons. Adding new strategies to engage or support children, for example strategies given by specialists in SEND for certain children.
• Taking Action – teachers could and should change the format of the lesson if the children are not accessing or they have been under challenged. This might mean a teacher going off plan because the children need stretch, challenge or support. Teachers will use their subject knowledge to move the children on.
• Plan, Teach, Reflect, Do – this is the cycle of teaching applied at Oxenhope this allows for adaption lesson on lesson allowing flexibility within the teaching to address misconceptions or ass in stretch, challenge and knowledge deepening.

The teaching sequence and Adaptive Teaching

At Oxenhope we incorporate Adaptive Teaching into the teaching sequence in the following way:
1. Long term and medium-term plans are written in advance to ensure there is clear progression in knowledge and skills to align with the national curriculum outcomes.
2. Teachers then finely tune these plans into short term plans to use knowledge and understanding of their class. They gain this knowledge from assessment data, discussions with previous teachers and support staff, how the children work in their classroom, discussions with parents and carers, professional discussions with specialist partners and from pupil progress meetings.
3. The short-term planning is then implemented. Throughout this implementation the teacher, reflects, observes and challenges the children to draw conclusions about learning.
4. This provocation may result in the teacher changing what the child is learning i.e. they may need further challenge, or it may result in the teaching intervening with further support or4 guidance.
5. Once the lesson is over the teacher and support staff reflect. This is from assessment from the lesson, marking or feedback and lesson professional hunches.
6. This refection then impacts for further short-term planning, including re-grouping children, annotating medium term planning to address misconceptions or to move outcomes on.
We make sure that EVERY child learns something new each lesson.

Adaptive Teaching and how we support our staff:

At Oxenhope we use adaptive teaching for supporting lower ability and SEND children but also for children who need challenge and stretch.
We train all our staff in Adaptive Teaching and teachers and support staff have all received CPD to help inform their already excellent practice.
Adaptive Teaching is a focus of monitoring including book -looks, lesson observations, planning scrutiny, conversations with teachers and pupil progress.
The key message we have at Oxenhope is ‘know your children’. We support staff in becoming the expert of the children in their class and therefore they know exactly what each child needs to thrive.
This link is a video we have used as CPD with staff to help them understand the concept of Adaptive Teaching:

How parents and carers can support Adaptive Teaching at home:

EYFS
• Encourage your child to be independent at home and learn how to dress themselves and go to the toilet independently
• Share stories and poems at home
• Sing songs and play games together
• Practise counting in everyday situations
• When you’re out and about look out for a discuss numbers, letters and shapes in the environment
• Visit libraries, museums and galleries
• Involve your child in everyday tasks such as writing shopping lists, paying for items, laying the table and pairing socks
• Talk to your child about things they have done at school, but also about things they remember doing at pre-school, nursery, at the childminder or at home.

KS1/KS2

• Help your child complete homework
• Encourage reading as a part of your family life
• Practise times tables using TT Rockstars or other games
• Be out in nature and observe the world
• Visit libraries, museums and galleries
• Talk to your child about things they have done at school but also practice their recall of things they did at the weekend, last week or even last year.
• Build writing into your everyday life. Writing diaries, lists and stories.
• Develop resilience and learning from mistakes.