GRADUATE SCHOOL OF EDUCATION College of Social Sciences & International Studies

St Luke’s Campus Heavitree Road Exeter EX1 2LU

Telephone +44 (0)1392 724917 Email J.Kleine‐[email protected] Web www.exeter.ac.uk/education

Report by Mrs Fiona Knapp on the application from Holcombe for accreditation as a Thinking School by Thinking Schools @Exeter.

Holcombe Grammar School is an 11‐18 selective boys’ school situated in Chatham in . Formerly Chatham Grammar School for Boys, it converted to an in April 2011 and in October 2013 acquired sponsorship from The Thinking Schools Academy Trust (TSAT). This is a growing family of schools that work together to "improve the life chances" of all its children and young people, underpinned by a common mission to nurture successful children who are confident learners and can think and act independently. This cross‐phase Trust currently includes eleven primary and five secondary academies in Kent, Medway and Portsmouth, led by The , an Advanced Thinking School.

The school currently has 853 students on roll, including 169 in the Sixth Form and students are drawn from a wide catchment area. As a selective school, many students are High Attaining Pupils and only a small percentage is identified as having special educational needs and/or receives Pupil Premium funding, which is used to enhance and enrich provision. Approximately 18% have identified EAL with a very wide range of home languages spoken.

When Ofsted visited the school in May 2018 to undertake a short inspection it was judged to be Good, Evidence supporting this application for accreditation, as a Thinking School is documented electronically, and provides comprehensive evidence that has informed this report.

At the heart of The Thinking Schools Academy Trust is the belief that schools must transform the life chances of their students by shaping their minds, attitudes and habits through a framework of cognitive education that enables them to become master of their own destiny.

Holcombe Grammar School recognises the teaching of thinking as fundamental to developing the skills of persistent, open‐minded and independent, lifelong learners and

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there is much evidence to indicate that the school has fully embraced the TSAT vision, is receptive to new developments and initiatives, and actively seeks out opportunities to continuously drive improvements in learning and teaching year on year. The school prides itself on providing a caring, supportive environment, and this is underpinned by the house and pastoral systems, which ensure that every student has a sense of community and belonging. This vision is clearly communicated on the school website:

‘Every individual at Holcombe Grammar School is encouraged to achieve their personal best and there is an emphasis on celebrating student progress as well as outright attainment.

Holcombe Grammar School sets a ‘culture of high expectations,’ delivering an ‘inspiring curriculum,’ proven to ‘develop resilience and determination’ in the students’ learning… Students are given the academic and intellectual tools to help them structure their thinking and learning effectively thus enabling them to engage successfully in their academic studies. In addition to this we believe in developing our students, understanding of how their brain works and how to deliberately use their brain in the most effective fashion for both academic and personal success.’

In 2016 the lead school in the TSAT, Rochester Grammar School created the post of ‘Associate Leader for Meta‐cognition and Thinking Schools Philosophy’ with the brief of ensuring that all TSAT academies were fully accredited and integrated Thinking Schools. Hanna Miller was appointed to this post and she has worked closely with Holcombe Grammar School since the beginning of their Thinking School journey, building knowledge, expertise and confidence through wide‐ranging and carefully planned programmes of support, professional learning opportunities both school‐focused and trust wide, and on‐going monitoring, evaluation and feedback.

The Regional Governing Body and the Academic Advisory Board are fully supportive of the “Thinking School’ ideal and recognise the part it plays in the development and achievements of students as skilled, independent and reflective learners, who embrace challenge and aspire to and strive for personal excellence. Governors have been involved in some training sessions and visit school regularly to participate in lesson observations and engage in discussions with students. Alison Tanti, the Lead for Thinking, Teaching and Learning also reports regularly on the impact and effectiveness of cognitive education to the school’s Academic Advisory Board.

The Drive Team consists of three key members of staff, who meet regularly and play a strategic role in supporting the accurate and purposeful integration of cognitive strategies across the curriculum. The Drive Team are responsible for conducting learning walks, evaluating practice and progress, gathering feedback, sharing expertise, leading

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assemblies, planning and delivering CPD and establishing a unified and consistent approach to the development of a common thinking language, and questioning and thinking skills across the school. The Drive Team has also developed ‘The Engine Room Guide to Teaching and Learning at Holcombe’. This includes information on all the Thinking Tools in use and their application in a wide variety of contexts, as well as a wealth of strategies to support teaching and learning and ideas from recent research. All staff are provided with a copy and, as it is a working document, input from all staff members is welcomed to keep the document ‘live’ and up‐to‐date. A possible future development will be for each department to have a ‘Thinking Champion’ to support the Drive Team in the development of the Holcombe approaches to cognitive education.

The school has adopted a very structured approach to the introduction of a range of thinking approaches and strategies, under the guidance of The Rochester Grammar School, and supported by clearly targeted professional learning for teachers, learning support staff and governors. The approaches adopted include Tony Ryan’s Thinkers’ Keys, David Hyerle’s Thinking Maps, Edward de Bono’s Six Thinking Hats and the Question Matrix, all underpinned by Art Costa’s Habits of Mind, adapted as the ‘Holcombe Habits.’ More recent work has included a focus on the role of the cognitive approaches in supporting memory. All the tools are widely and consistently used by all staff across the school and across the curriculum, and the evidence suggests that students in all year groups across all Key Stages are using a range of cognitive structures to support and scaffold their learning, thinking, questioning and reflection.

The school began by introducing the Thinkers’ Keys to better engage students with opportunities to stretch and challenge their learning. Currently students encounter Thinkers’ Keys particularly as starter tasks, which engage them at the beginning of lessons in applying knowledge gained from previous learning, or in a wider context. More experienced users of the Keys use them as appropriate and some good practice is evident where staff have selected specific keys in mini plenaries to summarise, evaluate or develop the content from the current lesson or a previous one; this more critical application has also encouraged students to be more selective when identifying the Keys they use to support and enhance specific tasks. Thinking Maps and Hats are displayed in each teaching room and are used as a point of reference for both students and staff. The sentence starters, key questions and thinking process associated with each Hat and Map provide students with a language to discuss their thinking and learning.

The school has adopted a developmentally appropriate approach that starts from Year 7 when students are introduced to the tools at a ‘Brain Building Development Day’. The student‐run Captains Team leads the day organising a range of tasks, which demonstrate how to use the Maps, Keys and Hats and integrate them into their learning. Thinking Tools for revision are also incorporated into Year 11 Study Skills and Revision Days, and

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Year 12 is supported in the transition from GCSE to ‘A’ level by a particular focus on using the Frame of Reference for exam style questioning.

Thinking Hats are used regularly to aid student reflection and to support meaningful student feedback in marking and can be seen in student work across all department areas. The Hats have also provided an important bridge between pastoral and curriculum support with students choosing to use the Hats to articulate a response to a debate question or an idea.

The Q Matrix and related dice provide clear question stems and are used to support students in generating their own questions, as well as for teachers to ensure the promotion of higher order thinking.

Holcombe Habits are included in the rewards policy. Students are rewarded with points when they are seen to be developing a particular Holcombe Habit. These points go towards house points and prizes. The school considers that praising the development of student attitudes to learning and successes in this way encourages more students to commit to their own journey of development.

It is clear that thinking plays an integral part in the learning of a Holcombe student, and as students progress through the school and develop fluency with the tools, the evidence suggests that they begin to take more ownership over how they use them and independently select the most appropriate tool for the task. All students are encouraged to be consistently reflective and mindful of their own progress and development and have a Thinking Learning Journal, which provides resources to support them in their learning, and in ‘thought‐fully’ reflecting on their own academic learning journey. Lead students have been identified as role models and at every age group students can articulate the positive impacts that thinking has had on their learning journeys with comments such as: ‘It's the best way I work’ and ‘It enables me to structure my ides more clearly.’ Students are also invited to present and share ideas as to how thinking tools and strategies help to shape and develop their thirst for learning.

The process of becoming a thinking school and embodying the ethos has resulted in a changed school culture, which is much more learning‐focused. Some of the evidence includes a wide variety of subject specific displays and public displays, which demonstrate the use of a wide range of Thinking Tools and show how they have become integral to the learning.

All staff have a clear understanding of the Thinking School vision and are committed to creating a positive learning culture. All are trained in the use and accurate application of the Thinking Tools. There is a planned Induction Programme for new staff and a range of formal and informal opportunities for all staff to engage in learning‐focused

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professional development including a ‘buddy up’ system and mentoring and coaching, as well as the regular sharing of exemplary practice and ‘Market Place’ opportunities `across the curriculum, which is an integral part of the day‐to‐day work of the school. This is supported by a Teaching and Learning Manual, which clearly outlines the effective use of thinking tools and strategies. There is also more formal on‐going whole staff Professional Learning, which is part of the annual planned programme of Trust wide and individual school improvement and development.

All developments are underpinned and informed by detailed and clear action planning linked to and part of the School Development Plan, and Holcombe Grammar School has further focused on the on going development of the school as a Thinking School by including challenging targets for development as objectives in the Performance Management process.

A recent Lesson Study Cycle focused on the application of cognitive load theory in the classroom, specifically in terms of classroom environments and presentation of lesson content.

All staff participated in a formal CPD session that explained the theory of cognitive load and provided examples of how to reduce extraneous load. The drive team had previously identified examples of excellent practice, where the Thinking Tools in place had been used explicitly and consistently to support learners with tasks and provide ways of linking together knowledge while not exceeding demands on students. The drive team also identified areas, which could be improved – where classroom displays were not clear or purposeful and slides for presentations were overloaded with unnecessary information. Learning walks had also identified missed opportunities where cognitive approaches could have been used more effectively to reduce extraneous load and free up space in the short‐term memory.

A follow‐up CPD session was held to share the areas of great practice and identify potential developments. Staff then shared ideas on how to develop their areas and began planning learning episodes to use the Thinking Tools to reduce extraneous load.

Staff were assigned to Thinking Triads with members from different departments each with a range of experience and expertise. Each member planned a lesson and the others observed and provided feedback based on what went well and how to further improve. Each lesson was then adapted and delivered to another group of students. This time it was reviewed by a member in each department and again revised if necessary. From this point staff then had the opportunity to have each lesson recorded using a piece of software called Swivl. Each department then stored the lessons in a shared area and

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commented on the videos, thus providing a valuable resource to support on‐going development.

Staff enjoyed the ownership of their individual projects and although some were reticent about analysing their practice closely with members outside of their curriculum areas, most appreciated the value of professional dialogue across different areas of the school.

The focus on cognitive load theory is on‐going and the plan is to continue this theme and begin to look at using the tools for retrieval practice. The sharing across department areas has enhanced teachers’ knowledge of the strengths across the school and has also encouraged more staff to collaborate beyond their immediate comfort zones. This reflects a significant shift in the culture of learning and provides further evidence that Holcombe Grammar School is developing as a truly learning‐focused school.

A further survey involved the use of MALS, a measure of learning self‐concepts, with a randomised sample of students from Years 7, 8, 9 and 10. The results indicated that generally the students had much higher regard for themselves as learners in Year 10 than in Year 7. These findings are unusual in that younger students are more likely to see their learning capabilities positively than older adolescents, however, they were in line with staff predictions and may be partially explained by the demands of transition from primary to secondary education.

In all year groups boys scored themselves positively for Q18 ‘I know how to be a good learner’. When probed for extra detail during small focus group interviews, students were keen to share that they find the Thinkers’ Toolkit particularly beneficial when completing independent work and will often choose to structure their learning using the Thinking Tools. As a selective grammar school it was unsurprising that students scored positively on Q7 ‘I like having difficult work to do’ and Q19 ‘I like using my brain’ which reflects enjoyment and involvement in problem solving. There was a positive upward trend in response to the Q20 ‘Learning is difficult’ and by Year 10 the number of students who felt that learning is difficult had fallen by a third. This may indicate a correlation between the students’ fluency with the tools and their confidence is undertaking new challenges. There was a negative downward trend in response to Q5 ‘I’m good at discussing things’ (Learned Optimism) and this might be explained by the increased academic demands of in comparison to , although it would be interesting to gather more evidence to explain this. The school has a clear focus on stretch and challenge for all and this, together with a high focus on the Holcombe Habits as the behaviours of effective learners and thinkers, and Carol Dweck’s Growth Mindset may help to address some of the more negative perceptions.

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There was no obvious correlation between the overall MALS scores and whether the students were pupil premium or had identified special educational needs. This might imply that provision is fully inclusive and that the cognitive approaches are all adequately preparing students for the challenges their learning brings. Again further interrogation of the evidence would be expedient.

Whilst providing useful information about student perceptions of their learning capabilities, it is important to correlate the MALS data with a range of data from other sources. As the school develops their use of MALS, the focus will be on larger sample sizes within each year group and scrutinising the outcomes at a deeper level. This will involve tracking students over an academic year and identifying the key contributors to perceived learning ability.

The school values its relationships with all stakeholders and uses a range of strategies and approaches to engage parents and carers with the idea of being a Thinking School. These include, a clear message in the prospectus and introductory presentations about the school, an information leaflet for parents outlining the key tools, student‐led tours, parent consultation evenings, open evenings, displays and the cross‐Trust magazine with a very strong ‘thinking thread’ running through it,

Holcombe Grammar School began the process of becoming a Thinking School in October 2014 and the current Year 12 students are the first cohort to have been exposed to the Thinking Schools ethos and the key strategies and tools in use throughout their time at the school. Over recent years external exam results have improved consistently; this year at GCSE some 80% of all grades were Grade 5 or higher and some students had results that exceeded all prior educational expectations. ‘A’ level students achieved a 98% pass rate with some outstanding results and significant success in securing entry to university. Although it could be argued that this is unsurprising in a highly selective grammar school and it is hard to accurately measure the impact, one reason for this may be a result of the increased focus on developing higher order thinking and questioning across the school.

As Holcombe Grammar School continues to evaluate practice and focus on developing as a thinking and learning‐focused school, some further suggested areas for future development might be:

 to visit a de Bono training school and further develop the use of Six hat Thinking as a tool for parallel thinking;  to continue to develop the use of Thinking Maps in combination with each other and with other tools, always focusing on the thinking process(es) rather than the name of the tool;

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 to continue to develop an explicit focus on the metacognitive Frame of Reference for each Map at all stages;  to continue to develop the focus on Habits of Mind and Growth Mindset as key positive learning behaviours:  to consider the introduction of the Three Storey intellect and Bloom’s revised taxonomy to further develop Higher Order Thinking and Questioning and link to the key tools already in use;  to consider current research such as that from Project Zero at the University of Harvard to further develop the culture of thinking, and the use of a range of other structures and routines to make thinking visible; http://www.pz.harvard.edu/topics/secondary‐high‐school  to consider the use of Looking for Learning as a tool for developing as a learning‐ focused school; https://fieldworkeducation.com/professional‐learning/looking‐for‐learning  to develop Action Research initiatives (staff and students) including a rigorous and focused approach to Lesson Study, and the continued use of MALS;  to further develop links with other schools both locally and nationally to develop and share expertise in the field of cognitive education.

In conclusion, there is much evidence to indicate that Holcombe Grammar School meets all the criteria for accreditation set by Thinking Schools @Exeter and I therefore recommend that accreditation as a Thinking School is awarded until September 2022.

Fiona Knapp B.Ed (Hons) Honorary Associate University Research Fellow

Thinking Schools @Exeter Graduate School of Education College of Social Sciences and International Studies University of Exeter

On behalf of Dr Judith Kleine Staarman, Director, Thinking Schools @Exeter

September 2019

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