Ardgillan College
Castlelands
Balbriggan
Co. Dublin
76129H
School Improvement Plan
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING
Issue Date: April 2016
Main Strengths as identified in SSE Process 2015/16 and in the MLL:
- A highly qualified and committed teaching staff who are enthusiastic and open to developing new ideas.
- Well-motivated students, 76% of whom say they enjoy their lessons in Ardgillan College (MLL student survey).
- A broad balanced curriculum, with a variety of subject choice in TY and for LC
- Positive examination outcomes for our students
- A drive to encourage students to take Higher Level where possible
- Good ICT facilities, supported by the implementation of AirServer and Ipads
- Positive Reinforcement – 94% of parents feel the school has a good atmosphere and 75% of students feel they are getting on well
- Excellent collaboration among staff /Staff Planning Groups- SSE, Literacy, Numeracy, AFL, Policy Review, Subject coordination
In relation to AFL:
- Positive feedback in regards to AFL from the Whole School Evaluation
- A range of strategies already in use to promote the use of AFL
- Feedback prioritised and becoming a core strategy in teaching and learning
Evaluation Theme / Improvement Target / Required Actions / Persons responsible / Timeframe for Action / Success Criteria/Measurable Outcomes / Review Date
Quality of Learner Outcomes /
- Students should continue to receive quality feedback on work
- Continue use of exam cover sheet
- Whole staff
- Increase ‘always’ response to the question ‘I give students quality feedback’ to over 60%
- Students will be have to respond to feedback they are given
- New exam cover sheet, with space for student response to feedback, to be used for Christmas and Summer exams.
- C Dunphy and whole staff
- Increase student engagement with feedback (focus group)
- Students to be surveyed
Quality of Students’ Learning Experiences /
- Increase number of students who report that they feel listened to by teachers and told how they can improve
- Increased emphasis on questioning in class and time for students to respond
- Survey students in class groups about experience of learning
- AFL Policy Group & Teaching staff
- Use of student response to feedback on exam sheet
- Implement surveys staff can use with class groups
- More opportunity for informal collaboration within lessons
- Informal collaboration/ students working together to be implemented as baseline strategy across whole school
- Increase number of students reporting that they can seek help from a peer in a lesson (focus group)
- Students to be surveyed
Teachers’ Practice /
- Learning objectives are to be visually displayed in every lesson
- Continue as a baseline strategy for 2016-17
- Decrease the number of teachers saying that learning objectives are always rarely displayed from2% to 0%
- Non summative assessment assignments are to be commented on only. Students are to be introduced to other ways of judging their success.
- To become baseline strategy for 2015-16
- Teachers to be encouraged to use comment only marking when appropriate
- Students being asked to engage with the comments they receive – new Exam Cover Sheet
Whole staff / 2016-17
October reports /
- Increase number of students saying that they are told how to improve from 69% to above 75%.(Target achieved for 2016 was to reach 65%)
- Peer Observation to be continued in order to share best practice
- Peer observation sheets to be changed in line with MLL feedback
- Peer obs to become a more targeted, reflective exercise
Whole staff / 2016/17 /
- Increase number of teachers sharing best practice informally
- Question wait time to be increased
- All teachers to be asked to be aware of wait time, and to not accept ‘I don’t know’ responses from students
- Increase positive feedback response in student focus group on wait time