In August 2024 the Head of Education, the head teacher s, teachers  and key staff at all the six schools in the Örkelljunga municipality, Sweden, started a 3 year training and tutoring to develop skillful evidence-based teaching in every classroom. This is a three year programme using a theory of action framework. .

The municipality booked the experts in Skolkompaniet, Fibbla Kompetens and BRAVOlesson to lead the project. 

They jointly determined that over the next three years 700 lesson observations would be carried out using the evidence based observation from developed by Bernt Friberb, Urban Hansson and Mats Rosenkvist – This would define what they are trying to achieve – the espoused theory for teaching and learning

After each observation had taken place the results would be shared with the teacher. The results would then be collated and the aggregated results shared across the learning community. This would determine where they were now? – their theory in action

As a result, of the teachers’ own reflections, the feedback from the observer and the dialog with colleagues in the collective feedback session and afterwards, the expectation was that the quality of their teaching and learning would improve. So that at the next observation the results would show that the gap between what the teacher had achieved and what was best practice – the espoused theory – had closed.  The use of single loop and double loop learning to close the performance gap. 

In addition it is planned that the development of the project will be researched by Associate Professor Marcus Samuelsson’s team from the University of Linkköping. Over the three years of the project their research will focus on four areas –

1. the quality of teaching

1. the teachers experience of workload, job enjoyment and self-efficacy 

1. the pupils experience of a calm and secure learning environment

1. pupil learning outcomes

Progress to date

The progress of the project so far:

• The project started with inspirational seminars for all staff about what dimensions of teaching would be focused upon, the learning process and the overall nature of the three year project plan.

• There have now been 2 cycles of lesson observations plus reflective discussions individually and collaboratively for all teachers at all 6 schools respectively.

• The head teachers and key staff have been trained and tutoring about how to carry out observations and reflections individually and collaboratively

• The Head of Education and the deputy have been trained about how to analyse and lead the development of evidence-based teaching and learning

• Throughout the observations and surveys data for all variables have been collected for the research that is planned to start after year one.

In the attached graphs you can see how the quality of teaching has progressed for the 90 teachers in all 6 schools for the 10 dimensions that are in focus. 

The results for this group of schools follows the same pattern as for the 30 schools in the research report Undervisning med uppseendeväckande brister – så blev den signifikant bättre (Samuelsson, Samuelsson, Friberg, Hansson and Rosenkvist, 2024): 

The evidence shows that the teachers improve their teaching from a focus on what shall be done during the lesson to what shall be learned during the lesson. 

The results show that after only one cycle of observations and reflective collaborative discussions teaching has improved significantly at all schools with a stronger focus on learning. With 4 and a half more semesters to go (Sweden has a 2-semester academic year) it will be very interesting to see the degree of progress being made.

The team’s experience at the start of a project which is similar to the other schools they have worked with is that a significant number of  head teachers, key staff and teachers are sceptical about the approach. Some also doubt the results after the first cycle of observations, however after the second cycle the interest in and attitude towards the approach is now positive.

To be continued… next report from this project is scheduled for a summary after the first academic year.

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It was a privilege to be invited to visit the municipality and meet with the Head and Deputy of Education, Kristian Lindgren and Eva Schelin, and key staff and share the origins of our approach to school improvement. 

We are grateful to Bernt Friberg, Urban Hansson and Mats Rosenkvist with Associate Prof. Marcus Samuelsson and Prof. Joakim Samuelsson for sharing their work with us. It is to their credit that they are continuing to engage schools in improving the quality of the teaching and learning they provide for their students. 

We will continue to report the progress being made in these important Swedish projects in future articles. 

Take care and stay safe

George

http://georgeberwick.com