What are inspectors looking for in Ofsted personal development?
The current Ofsted inspection framework now places a much greater emphasis on pupils personal development and how the school and its curriculum contributes to this.
In Ofsted personal development inspectors are particularly looking for the following:
- the school’s curriculum extends beyond the academic, technical or vocational
- the curriculum and the school’s wider work support learners to develop their character
- developing responsible, respectful and active citizens
- promoting equality of opportunity
- promoting an inclusive environment
- developing pupils’ character, giving them qualities they need to flourish in society
- developing pupils’ confidence and resilience so that they can keep themselves mentally healthy
- preparing pupils for the next phase of education
“To flourish in this turbulent and tricky world, a strong, agile, curious mind is an essential.”
Guy Claxton, Powering Up Children: The Learning Power Approach to Primary Teaching
School’s must extend the traditional curriculum beyond academic, technical or vocational education to offer a curriculum which promotes the learning behaviours of independence, resilience and confidence. But many teachers do not feel confident in how to explicitly support pupils’ ‘personal development ’ in schools. As we teach these, developing and strengthening learning behaviours in our pupils, not only do we see improvements in wellbeing and mental health, but also in students’ academic performance. This approach aims to provide students with the assistance and structure for attaining long-term success in all areas of their life, preparing children and young people for future roles as parents, employees and leaders.
Ofsted Personal Development : the Research
In the UK the EEF have identified effective learning behaviours in their guidance reports on improving behaviour, metacognition and self-regulated learning and special educational needs in mainstream schools .
Development of these behaviours is fundamental for students to develop an awareness of the way they learn and establish forward-facing attitudes to learning, critical if they are to be able to become lifelong learners.
Some commonly identified behaviours that are particularly important for ensuring students are prepared to thrive in their futures include:
- Resilience & Perseverance
- Self-motivation and Confidence
- Metacognition (thinking about thinking)
- Independence & Problem-solving
This INSET will examine how the research from across the globe into personal development and learning behaviours can be put into practice in the classroom, packed with strategies to train or coach your students to improve their intellectual behaviours and subsequently their personal development and learning outcomes.
You may also be interested in our INSET courses on Metacognition – click here
Ofsted Personal development INSET Outline
Cultivating Resilience & Perseverance
- Building pupils resilience to setbacks
- Incorporating opportunities for children to experience failure
- Teaching children to persevere in a world of ‘virtual stone-throwers’ and against a backdrop of increasing mental health problems
Training pupils to be more independent & better Problem Solvers
- How do we best install strategies for problem-solving?
- How can we use different thinking taxonomies to increase our student’s depth of thinking?
- Self-regulation and its role in learning
- Helping pupils understand the power of taking charge of their own learning and performance
Coaching Self-motivation and Confidence
- Top 10 inspirational self-motivation tips for pupils
- Developing self-awareness and confidence
Developing Metacognitive Skills
- Turning pupils into metacognitive experts
- 5 powerful ways to promote metacognitive awareness in the classroom
- Developing reflective learners