It’s still
five months before the first GCSE English exams and 1 in 5 of our Year 11 have
already attended at least one voluntary after school revision session.
Now, not for a
second am I complacent about this. What will impact student achievement this
summer is sustained hard work – both in and out of lesson – but I am taking a
moment to have a demi-smile that this year group clearly want to do well and are
upping their game when it most counts for both them and the school.
I was asked by
the lovely @cazzwebbo how we go about getting these students to attend such
additional revision sessions. I can only reply with a slightly scattergun and
naggingly persistent approach that uses two main tactics:
1)
MAKE REVISION UNAVOIDABLE AT
SCHOOL
·
We display posters on the doors
of all form rooms and class rooms.
·
We have daily announcements over
the P.A. system at the end of the school day to say where revision is
starting.
·
We give reminders in year team
briefing for form tutors to pass on and ensure these messages are repeated in assembly.
·
We have a form group league
table updated on a weekly basis to show which groups have attended most
frequently and then award prizes to encourage a competitive element.
·
Our HoY has a loyalty card
scheme which unlocks access to the prom and then further Vivo rewards.
·
Revision session reminders are also displayed on TV screens around the school.
·
We provide free buses for
students to get home twice a week to ensure every child can access the after
school sessions.
2)
MAKE REVISION UNAVOIDABLE AT
HOME
·
We give all parents revision class
timetables on Year 11 Parents’ Evening. Class teachers then refer to this
in their discussions with parents to clarify expectations about which sessions
their child will attend.
·
We send text messages to all
parents to remind them when revision sessions are taking place.
We call home or post letters when target students are not attending and clearly
need to be.
3)
MAKE REVISION COUNT
·
We make sure that when students do
attend that their time is well spent by teaching well-structured sessions.
All teachers ‘opt-in’ to lead the sessions they are most confident delivering.
This helps ensure that they come back!
·
We give every student a timetable
showing the topics that will be covered on each day so they can ensure they
can address areas of weakness. We hope that this encourages them to divide
their time sensibly between revision for other subjects. Note: we remove the teachers who will lead each session as students
sometimes only want to go to the ones ‘their’ teacher leads!
·
We liaise with Maths to
ensure that students can attend revision in both core subjects.
Of course,
this only scratches the surface of our revision strategy. I haven’t even begun
to mention the revision bags, QR code revision sheets, revision book marks,
half term and Easter schools, intervention days, walking/talking mock exams, use
of website or Twitter, or our deployment of an English Support teacher. I’ll
save that little lot for another blog.
