Researching the pupil voice: what makes a good teaching assistant?

This article reports on a small‐scale research project concerning the views of pupils on what comprises a good teaching assistant (TA). The study indicates that pupils clearly valued the support given to them by TAs. The pupils outlined the main personal and professional characteristics they wanted to see in, as well as the kinds of support they wanted from, a TA. The implications of these data for schools and for TAs themselves are briefly indicated.     

Pupils talking about their learning mentors: what can we learn?

The use of learning mentors to provide additional support to pupils who experience barriers to learning has become a feature of many schools in recent years. Mentoring places learning within a social context and recognises the necessity to ensure that students feel both comfortable with and in control of the learning process. This paper describes research which sought the views of young people who, having been identified as having social difficulties, had been supported by learning mentors. Their personal interpretation of mentoring and its impact on their lives is discussed and illustrated through use of their own words. Students interviewed demonstrated an ability to rationalise their own situations and behaviors and provide an indication of the important role that learning mentors have played in their lives.     

Teachers’ organisational practices and their perceptions of the benefits of support by withdrawal for mathematics in Irish primary schools

This study was designed to ascertain the organisational practices of learning support teachers and their perceptions of the benefits, if any, of support by withdrawal for mathematics in Irish primary schools. The study reports on the views of a sample of 137 teachers who have postgraduate qualifications in learning support/special education from six designated centres for professional development in this area. As an organisational model for learning support in mathematics, small group/individual withdrawal was the most popular way in which additional support was organised, with 94% of the survey respondents in this study operating this system to some degree. Furthermore, key findings also highlighted that teachers perceived the following as advantages to out-of-class support: learning benefits; enhanced learning space; benefits for certain types of pupils; time benefits; positive contrast with mainstream class; assessment benefits; and greater use of concrete materials. In contrast, only 41% of teachers reported that they provide an in-class service for pupils and class teachers. Barriers to collaboration for in-class support are identified and teachers’ responses to these outlined. The study found large differences between teachers in the amount of support they provided to class teachers, the amount of non-contact time they had for planning and collaboration, and in the range of practices used to carve out time for collaboration. The implications of these findings are then discussed.     

Encouraging voices: listening to young people who have been marginalised

When provided with an opportunity to reflect upon their experiences of education, young people can often offer insights into those procedures and actions which have either supported or inhibited learning. In this article Richard Rose and Michael Shevlin describe how a team of researchers came together with a group of young people from marginalized communities, including those with disabilities, from refugee families or from ethnic minorities to explore the ways in which they had been included or excluded by the education system. The project described involved a team of people drawn from the UK and the Republic of Ireland. Their work focused upon the experiences of young people who were concerned to tell their stories and, in so doing, inform teachers and education policy makers about the steps which may be taken to enable the inclusion agenda to be more thoughtfully addressed.     

‘It wasn't too easy,which is good if you want to learn’: an exploration of pupil participation and Learning to Learn

This article explores the process of Learning to Learnb from the pupils’ perspective. The Learning to Learn in Schools Project started in 2003 and includes teachers and pupils from primary and secondary age phases in four local authorities. Key to the project has been a focus on the collaborative exploration of metacognition in practice. With the increased prominence of pupil participation and learner voice in the rhetoric of education during this time, the inclusion of learner perspectives in the project was perhaps inevitable. However, there appears to be something beneficial about the definition of Learning to Learn (L2L) used by the project that supports the development of such participation. As the project progressed, and the incidence of pupil participation increased, evidence from the contexts needed to support learning-based dialogues also developed as well as, crucially, understanding of how the interplay between L2L and pupil participation operates. This article therefore explores the link between the rhetoric of the pupil participation agenda and an understanding of L2L from the pupils’ perspective.     

Realising child voice: the development of Cue Cards

There has been lively and continuing interest worldwide about how best to ensure that all children, and, in particular, children with special needs or disabilities, have their views heard. In the UK, successive legislation across children's services has made this increasingly important. Children's views are even a part of the formal evaluation of many services (such as reviews and inspections of peripatetic support services in education). Making such processes ‘real’ rather than token requires that we find effective ways through which all children can share what they feel about their schools, services and provision. This article describes a technique using a small number of card pictures (eight) to prompt ideas about key elements of a narrative. We suggest that this approach, which has been tried and tested in depth in a local authority (as well as in various research projects), has considerable application in teaching and assessment with diverse children and young people across various contexts. We include examples to illustrate the versatility and value of the approach for schools and other services.     

Utilising creative methodologies to elicit the views of young learners with additional needs in literacy

The research described in this article aimed to explore and examine the dominant ‘assessment’ and ‘participation’ stories of upper‐primary pupils with long‐standing and marked literacy learning needs, their views on how their level of participation in the assessment and remediation of their additional needs might be increased and also how they perceive themselves as literacy learners. This qualitative small‐scale study adopted a case study approach and utilised creative methodologies in the context of focus groups to investigate sensitively the views and experiences of Key Stage 2 pupils with additional needs in literacy. The findings discussed here are based on the outcomes from the four Northern Irish schools that participated in the original cross‐border (Northern Ireland/Republic of Ireland) study. Findings are discussed in the context of strategies for promoting holistic and empowering pathways for learners with additional needs in literacy.     

Turning points in a qualitatively different social space: young adults’ reflections of alternative provision

There is a wealth of evidence suggesting that after being marginalised and excluded from school young people who attend Alternative Provision settings report positive relationships and experiences of learning. There is however very little research which explores the longer term outcomes of attending this sort of provision. Retrospective life history interviews were undertaken with 18 young adults in their early to mid-20s who had attended Alternative Provision in England. Interviews focused on schooling, exclusion, attending Alternative Provision and the impact of this on what they had done since leaving school up to their present situation. Analysis showed that the experience of attending Alternative Provision frequently constituted a turning point in a young person’s life story. This was due to the qualitatively different kind of social space experienced there.     

Preparing to transition to secondary education: perceptions of Dutch pupils with migrant backgrounds

Background: The transition from primary school to secondary school is a crucial period of time for children and this may be especially the case for pupils with migrant backgrounds. While there has been considerable research on the transition from primary to secondary school, more needs to be known specifically about the experiences of this group of pupils during their final year of primary school, as they prepare for their transition to secondary school.

Purpose: The study investigated how Dutch children with migrant backgrounds in their final year of primary school perceive the preparatory process for the transition to secondary school. In particular, we were interested in who the children felt were the important ‘actors’ (e.g. pupils, parents, teachers and others) in the preparatory process.

Sample: We collected data from 76 primary school pupils from three schools in an urban city in the Netherlands. The sample included pupils who, according to the Dutch system, were preparing to follow an academic pathway (i.e. the tracks known in this system as ‘HAVO’ or ‘VWO’) and those who were preparing to follow a vocational pathway (i.e. the track known as ‘VMBO’) in secondary education.

Design and methods: We used photo elicitation (N = 76) and also conducted semi-structured interviews with a subsample of the pupils (N = 25) to examine the roles of the important actors in the preparatory process. Data were analysed qualitatively; responses were coded and underwent pattern analysis in order to identify and describe repeating structures in the data. Data were grouped according to whether the pupils received school recommendations for an academic track or a vocational track.

Results: Findings suggested that the pupils perceived the most important actors to be the pupil, the classroom teacher and the parents. Both teachers and parents were considered valuable resources for pupils in the preparatory process. Patterns representing the participants’ perceptions of the roles of three actors – namely, (1) the child, (2) the classroom teacher and (3) the parents, were identified. Six patterns were identified with respect to the child, four with respect to the classroom teacher and two with respect to the parents. For some patterns, it was apparent that the responses of children in the vocational group and the academic group had different emphases.

Conclusions: The study highlights the importance for teachers and parents of children in their final year of primary school to be aware of the pupils’ perceptions of and feelings about their preparation for secondary school, so as to be in the best position to support them collaboratively.     

The potential determinants of young people's sense of justice: an international study

This paper uses reports from 13,000 Grade Nine pupils in five countries to examine issues such as whether they were treated fairly at school, trust their teachers and adults in wider society, are willing to sacrifice teacher attention to help others, and support the cultural integration of recent immigrants. Using such reports as ‘outcomes’ in a multi‐stage regression model, it is clear that they are largely unrelated to school‐level pupil mix variables. To some extent, these outcomes are stratified by pupil and family background in the same way for all countries. However, the largest association is with pupil‐reported experience of interactions with their teachers. Teachers appear to be a major influence on young people's sense of justice and the principles they apply in deciding whether something is fair. The paper concludes by suggesting ways in which schools and teachers could take advantage of this finding.