What do you believe about learners?

1. What is your ‘image of the child’?

Do you believe all children are inherently intelligent, curious and creative? Do you recognise their passions and capabilities? Do you trust them to learn for themselves and others?

2. What do you believe about learning?
How does learning take place? As a school and individually do you have an agreed and informed belief system about what learning is and how it takes place in a students' mind? Do you know individually and as a school which teaching practices are most effective in bringing about learning? How have you arrived at this understanding? Have you carefully examined the extent to which your practice aligns with your beliefs?

3. Who do you believe should hold the power?
Who decides what is learnt - the teachers or the students? Who decides how students learn - the teacher or the students? Who makes most of the decisions about learning - the teacher or the student? Do you believe the learners can really lead the learning? Is initiative valued over compliance?

4. Do you see every learner as an individual?
How well are individual students' known - their learning styles, their barriers to learning specific things, their interests and passions? Are you tempted to refer to the class as ‘they‘ or do you always consider each individual’s personal story?

5. Do your learners believe in themselves?
To what extent is a growth mindset fostered in your school and your individual classroom? How is this evidenced? Do you group your learners on perceived ability or do they have opportunities to learn with and from others with varying strengths, challenges and interests? To what extent are learners motivated by learning itself, rather than extrinsic rewards that encourage winners and losers in the game of school?

6. Who do you believe should do the heavy lifting?
Do you explain everything in detail, sometimes several times in different ways? Or do the learners have a go at experimenting and tackling problems first and you step in at point of need? Are you able to release control so that the heavy lifting is done by the learners?

7. Who owns the curriculum?
Who decides what is learnt? Is this the privilege of the teacher or can students choose what they learn and how they learn it? If this is the role of the teacher how do you ensure that students become the inquirers?

8. How important is measurement of achievement?
To what extent do you teach to the test? Do you believe everything has to be formally assessed and what can’t be measured is less valuable? To what extent do you ensure that the process of learning is perceived as more significant than the outcome?

9. What is the language of your classroom?
How do you talk about 'the work' of learning? Do you speak about tasks which have to be completed (and assessed) or do you all speak the language of learning? Is how we learn as much a part of the conversation as what we learn? Are students aware of who they are as learners? Are learning dispositions noticed and named? Do you and your students believe that reflection and metacognition are integral parts of learning?

10. Is there a safe space for risk-taking and failure?
Does the learning culture encourage students to take risks and make mistakes? Do learners seek and grapple with challenging problems and unanswerable questions? Do you (and they) believe that failure is an opportunity to learn and grow?

In the light of your discussion try to re-imagine what education would be like if some of the constraints you have discussed were removed. Do this re-imagining exercise by creating WHAT IF ... statements.