Tracking Progress: My Reflections

This year (I admit with my head bowed and a muffled voice) I feel that I have somewhat neglected my creative approach to the classroom. I hasten to add, that I have not neglected the classroom - but the glitter, songs and whatever other madness I have been responsible for creating (the lesson spent beneath the desks was a particular favourite) have been put aside as I have tried ensure that I have a thorough understanding of the key skills that my students will need.

In doing this, I have returned to and reflected on some of my tracking tools and thought I would share some of the strategies I have experimented with...


1) The Progress Grid
I am sure that by now thousands of teachers across the nation have been subjected to this. The student names are entered on the left and individual targets for progress are entered on the right.

 I've met many teachers who detest this approach. They find it timeconsuming and that the naming of students in this manner can make them feel ashamed in comparison with their peers. Although I found the ethics of this method difficult at first, I must admit that the students certainly engaged with the lesson as they knew they would be held account. It also helped to create a factual ethos - grades became a reflection of skills and it really helped me to challenge under performance. The fine detail of the progress grid also developed my understanding of the AFs drastically - and ensured that my lessons involved real challenge for my higher ability students.

Another advantage of the progress grid, is that it can be used as a basis for monitoring the progress of break out groups. When tackling subjects such as writing, where criteria can be more objective, I have found that students can complete a skills test at the start of the lesson that places them into a category. They then complete the relevant tasks to address their skills gap and reflect on their progress. I found that one Year 7, where the students possessed a strange collection of skills, really engaged with this as they understood that they each had different strengths and appreciated that the levels of support or challenge varied at an individual level of each student and for each learning objective.

2) The Tracking Snake
However, the independent skills test and investigation approach was not suitable for all students - particularly those lacking motivation. I also found that seeing their name in a box was demotivational and restricting for some pupils. The tracking snake was my response to this issue - it made the skills journey apparent and, more favourably, highlighted that all students are on the same journey (they just happen to be at different points).

I have used variations of this for a year now from bottom set Year 8:

to a higher set Year 11, and found that students are motivated by the fact that they can can see all targets but understand which are most relevant to them. In feedback, I cross off targets as they are achieved and am often ticking off higher ability skills - this is where the snake format is particularly effective as they begin to understand just how important the lower skills are. No matter how many higher skills they tick, their level is lowered due to the one that is missing.

Furthermore, I have found this to be an excellent springboard for the 20 minute progress check. The student friendly nature of the stages ensures that pupils can assess whether they are moving toward the next step and where students don't feel that they have made progress, I simply encourage them to write a question that would help - other students are then asked to repond.

However, upon listening to the reflections of another teacher - I found that I began to question this approach. As with all strategies the most important factor is how you use them, and although my students respond very positively to this strategy - I have begun to question whether it too could be restrictive in its current format as it may suggest that there is only one way to hit the criteria. Therefore, I offer this with a healthwarning - precise targets really do help the students but occasionally giving them a vaguer target to annotate with their own relfections may be just as successfully. 

3) The Learning Passport

A similar principle to the tracking snake but each target is organised under a skills heading. I used this across a year with a year 7 group - they referred to it during every writing assessment and "collected" skills as they were achieved by highlighting them. The advantage of this is that students can see the bigger picture without being overfaced. However, it is the layout that I find most appealing as it offers them a pallette of skills that they can choose from in which ever order they see fit. I can also extend the higher level pupils by placing blank boxes or including inspiration pages where students add their own strategies throughout the year.

However, the biggest lesson that I have learned this year is that the shape or format doesn't really matter - only that students are encouraged to reflect on the skills that they are enquiring. The strategies above are all teacher led and that is required to a certain extent but, if I'm honest, the proforma that has had the most impact is this...

It requires very little input - just a piece of marked work. I ask students to rephrase my target in their own words and then write it in the top box. This is then followed by ten minutes of classical music where students use their peers and resources around the room to write something that shows me they understand. It may be a redrafted sentence or a summary of a piece of research. I then walka round the room and award merits for progress.

Each one of these strategies has helped me differently - some have developed my understanding, some have developed the students understanding and some have developed their understanding. I hope they are useful and would be happy to swap strategies with anyone who is trialling something different.

Thanks for reading

Miss M
:)