Matravers School

Phase/Provision: Secondary

Theme: Leadership and Management

Context for joining Behaviour Hubs

Matravers is a medium sized rural 11 – 18 secondary comprehensive school in West Wiltshire, with approximately 900 pupils on role. The school serves the local community of Westbury and surrounding villages, with a predominantly white British pupil population. The deprivation measure for education and skills is particularly low within key areas of the local community, and this is often reflected in low pupil aspiration. The majority of pupils who progress to Higher Education are the first in their family to do so.

Matravers was inspected by OFSTED in September 2023, receiving a ‘Good’ rating in all areas, improving from an overall ‘Requires Improvement’ judgement in 2018. Pupil behaviour and attitudes have been rated as ‘Good’ during inspections in 2015, 2018 and 2023, with these judgements being supported by positive comments regarding pupils’ conduct and attitudes. Furthermore, other external reviewers frequently reflect very positively on pupils’ behaviour and attitudes around the school.

In addition to these evaluations, pupil suspensions consistently fall well below national averages and attendance has been tracking above national averages since academic year 2017 – 2018.

A recurring theme in feedback from inspections and other external reviews has been that the level of challenge in lessons should be higher, that more could be demanded of pupils as learners and that pupils could be more proactively engaged as learners within lessons. This feedback, coupled with the school’s internal monitoring and knowledge of pupils, has formed the basis of the project to develop pupils’ learning behaviour during lessons through embedding our High Expectations in Action across the curriculum.

Behaviour challenges and goals

To develop pupils’ proactive learning behaviours during lessons, to ensure that they are fully engaged with their work and are able to make the greatest gains in their learning. Specifically, through tackling laissez faire attitudes and desktop truancy when they occur.

Milestone goals:

  • Ensure that all colleagues understand the importance of developing pupil learning behaviours as a school priority
  • Develop an approach to provide teachers with consistent language and strategies to support the development of pupils’ learning behaviours
  • Ensure that our approach aligns to existing school expectations linked to pedagogy and behaviour
  • Implement our approach to developing pupils’ learning behaviours through effective CPD
  • Evaluate our approach to developing pupils’ learning behaviours through internal monitoring systems and external reviews.

In general, pupils’ attitudes to learning have been relatively consistent for some time, often reflecting low aspiration and apathy. The demographic of the local community and often lower levels of parental engagement contribute to this and can present as barriers to raising aspirations and tackling pupils’ learning behaviours.

These engrained attitudes and behaviours have become ‘known’ characteristics of the pupil cohort and can at times be seen as an accepted norm or presented as a reason for pupils’ lack of engagement or success.

Presenting our approach to developing pupils’ learning behaviours effectively to colleagues was therefore a priority, both to ensure that they recognised the importance of the project and also to secure their engagement with the strategy.

Solutions to behaviour challenges

High Expectations in Action

To facilitate the successful introduction and implementation of our project to develop pupils’ learning behaviours, we completed the following preparatory stages:

  • Reviewed evidence from a range of sources to identify and justify our project focus – High Expectations in Action. The evidence sources included our internal monitoring data and pupil outcomes, feedback from our OFSTED inspection and feedback from other external reviewers including the first visit from our Behaviour Hubs Lead School
  • Aligned our strategy to develop our pupils’ learning behaviours with our existing pedagogical priority of High Challenge Teaching, ensuring that our High Expectations in Action project worked well in tandem with our existing approaches. Additionally, we ensured that our High Expectations in Action project built upon the existing whole school practice and expectations of behaviour, as outlined in our Behaviour Policy, shared our intended project aim and action plan with our Behaviour Hubs Lead School during our open day visit, implementing the outcomes of this discussion and feedback within our updated action plan
  • Created a communications plan for the project, alongside our action plan, which enabled us to consider the various stages of implementation and how the process would be introduced to key stakeholder groups
  • Following completion of the action plan, this was shared and discussed with the school Leadership Team. We used this opportunity to refine our planning further, as well as sharing our approach with the wider team. This discussion also enabled other members of the team to feel invested in the process, as they helped shape the project through their feedback
  • The contributions from Middle Leaders were collated and shared with the Leadership Team who completed an activity to select and refine the most pertinent and useful slogans, soundbites and specifics for the final implementation model
  • The final implementation model was designed as a learning mat, to provide all teachers with an easily accessible visual resource of the strategy to refer to during planning and teaching. This approach was adopted to facilitate the consistent implementation of the strategy across the school
  • The final project strategy was launched to all teachers through an INSET day training session during T6. The session included a clear rationale for the project, ensuring that all colleagues understood why embedding our High Expectations in Action is a whole school priority. The training session also focused on each aspect of the implementation model in turn (3Ss – slogans, soundbites and specifics), developing colleagues’ understanding through explanations and various activities. All teachers completed the training session having identified a couple of priority actions to implement before the end of the academic year
  • Further training regarding our High Expectations in Action strategy was provided during T1 and T2 of the new academic year, including:
  1. Specific training for new teachers
  2. Refresher training for all teachers
  3. Optional behaviour surgeries for all teachers
  4. T1 focus on specific strategies to raise the expectations for all pupils in lessons, holding them to account for the quality of their work in lessons
  5. T2 focus on planning for high challenge and positively engaging all pupils with this during lessons – including through November INSET day. In-school training from T3 onwards will continue to include a focus on our High Expectations in Action strategy.
  • High Expectations in Action has been placed at the centre of the appraisal cycle for 2023 – 24, with all teachers identifying 3 targets linked specifically to the project aims and strategy. This alignment of appraisal targets with the whole school priority to develop pupils’ learning behaviours will ensure that the strategy remains a priority and becomes increasingly embedded within practice across the school.

“Students are ready to learn and apply themselves well to their learning.”

Impact on behaviour

Our High Expectations in Action project continues to be a priority and there is still work to do to ensure that the strategy becomes fully embedded and has the desired impact on developing pupils’ learning behaviours. However, there is already evidence that the strategy is being successful both from internal and external monitoring.

Internal monitoring through lesson drop ins from this academic year compared to a similar period last year, at the start of the project, reflects a 40% increase in references to Behaviour for Learning and a 59% increase in references to High Challenge. This suggests that these aspects of pedagogy and behaviour are a much higher profile across the school.

During an external review of the school conducted in T1 by a trained OFSTED inspector and a former CEO of a MAT, our High Expectations in Action strategy was shared with the reviewers, and they were asked to look out for aspects of the strategy in practice. The report from this external review included the comments below.

The overall strategy and its impact:

The strategic development of implementation tools, including High Expectations in Action, together with very useful exemplification, is clearly impacting on staff practice. Consistency was evident in many aspects and senior leaders are clear about the next steps, supported by planned professional development.

  • Senior leaders have established a strong and positive ethos through the setting of clear values and high expectations
  • Staff embrace the expectations by implementing what is expected of them, such as the pedagogical guidelines
  • The planned pedagogy and expectations approach is instrumental in keeping students alert and participating
  • Students are ready to learn and apply themselves well to their learning.

Specific examples of practice:

  • Questioning was used well and supportively especially if a student did not get the answer correct
  • Teachers relentlessly check the [white]boards of all students to be sure before moving on
  • Modelling, following by students’ application was a feature in all lessons. Where practice was strongest, it involved co-construction and student involvement and avoided copying.

Examples citing practice of ECTs:

  • Strong practice was evident in one classroom where the teacher’s circulation was both supporting and checking stretching the top set and ‘peeling off’ those more able students in order to push them even further
  • Demonstrated passion for the subject and this was hooking students’ interest.

Next steps on your behaviour journey

  • Continue to embed the strategy across the school for the remainder of the academic year through termly foci and specific training in T3 – T6
  • Continue to promote High Expectations in Action through monitoring, both to capture an overview of practice across the school and to provide specific feedback to colleagues regarding their practice
  • Create time for teachers to review their appraisal targets linked to High Expectations in Action throughout the year to support their individual development through engagement with the strategy.