Inspired by The Lazy Teacher’s ‘Progress Paparazzi’ idea, I have created my own ‘Progress Investigators’.  I am trialling the idea with my year 8 class and plan to roll it out once I iron out any teething problems. Here’s how it works:

 

 

 

 

 

The Progress Investigator is given the scrapbook and a camera.  It is their job to investigate whether progress is being made and to record it in a variety of ways.

The pupils are given several prompts.  They are:

• Get students to sign the scrapbook, describing what they have learnt.
• Describe what is going on in the lesson and how this is helping students to progress.
• Take photographs of pupils’ work to show their progress.
• Offer your own ideas on how to help the class make even better progress.
• Speak to anyone who comes into the class about the learning taking place.

You can see the glog here.

It is hoped that this will be real evidence of ‘progress over time’ and that the clear focus on progress will help the students to become more aware of what and how they are learning.

Thoughts after the first couple of weeks:

• Students take their responsibility seriously- they are really looking for progress.
• I need to spend more time training the students in how to describe progress.  They have commented on hard work and ‘lots of writing’ but need to refer to specific success criteria.
• Some of the comments are brilliant: ‘Eben has an itchy eye but continues reading’ is my favourite.
• I had a lesson where the internet connection was playing up.  One of the progress Investigators wrote (and underlined) ‘Mr Miller says we need to be more resilient!!!!’
• I have been pleased with the way the Progress Investigators pounce on any adult to enter the room and explain what we are learning.
• I have started giving some specific  questions to support the Investigators during particular lessons.

 

I will continue to update this post as I refine this way of working.