The Pupil Premium is additional funding given to publicly funded schools in England to raise the attainment of potentially disadvantaged pupils and close the gap between them and their peers. As a new school, identifying children eligible for Pupil Premium funding was straightforward; in our first year we had a total of 43 children entitled to receive Pupil Premium and received £27,591.00.

However, determining the most helpful use of this funding to most effectively address need and vulnerability required some careful thought and consideration. One of our issues was the initial lack of up-to-date and detailed information around the attainment and progress of eligible children, given they were new to our school.

Our school’s response to this situation was practical. In our first year (2013/2014), we chose to invest our Pupil Premium funding in resource that helped us.

• Promptly and accurately identify pupil need and vulnerability across the group of children entitled to Pupil Premium payment, and
• Put in place the most effective practice and resource likely to achieve the most sustainable impact. This practice was based on findings from the Education Endowment Foundation [EEF] Toolkit, and included the use of feedback and meta-cognition and self-regulation strategies

Use of this funding enabled us to develop feedback practice within Studio’s, developed through a coaching approach (which focused on the learner’s performance relative to their learning goals). Feedback was focused to specifically help children understand the links between effort, activity and outcome. Feedback was used to develop this understanding about the learning activity itself, the process of learning, the child’s management of their learning, their self-regulation and their understanding of themselves as individuals. Use of funding in this way has also supported the development of meta-cognitive and self-regulation strategies (‘learning to learn’ strategies) within teaching and learning approaches. The aim of this was to enable both children and adults to think about learning more explicitly.

The development of both of these approaches within a single process has been reflected in the development of our Individual Learning Profiles, which include an assessment of attainment and progress alongside an analysis of individual learning needs and work developed to address these needs.

Both of these approaches support our school’s work to develop working practice that has a ‘visible’ and positive outcome for children. The approaches we chose were selected as being the most effective and sustainable interventions to ensure the most effective use of Pupil Premium funding in our first year. In this way, we could be confident these approaches also supported our whole school purpose of ‘Creating Individuals, Making Futures’.

As the school year progressed and individual needs were clarified and identified, Pupil Premium funding was used more specifically. Ways that funding was used to meet individual need included: additional teaching time (individually and/or in small groups); provision of additional Teaching Assistant resource; the use of additional Teacher resource for precision teaching; development work with parents (including training for parents around understanding behaviour as a communication); enabling the school’s participation in relevant multi-agency meetings; and funding the involvement of an Educational Psychologist and an Education Welfare Officer to address specifically identified needs. The impact and effectiveness of these interventions has been monitored through an assessment of progress and attainment recorded in each child’s ILP. Consistent with developing outcome-informed practice, analysis of attainment and progress through the ILP will be used to review and develop the use of future Pupil Premium funding to maximize learning outcomes.

Impact

Initial results of this approach are encouraging.

In the Reception phase of our school we had 59 children, of which 23 (39%) were entitled to Pupil Premium funding. Overall, 65% of the whole group reached a ‘Good’ level of development; this compares to 52% nationally and 57% across Plymouth. Interestingly, 74% of our children entitled to Pupil Premium (17 children out of 23) achieved this ‘Good’ level of development. This suggests that the targeted interventions put in place through Pupil Premium funding have been successful, resulting in a reversed or ‘flipped’ gap, where children entitled to this funding are out-performing the overall group.

The following table represents the progress made over the first year for children in Year 1 and Year 2 who were entitled to Pupil Premium funding. A total of 20 children in Years 1 and 2 were entitled to this funding out of a total of 60, i.e. one third of the whole group.

What’s important for us as a school (and significant for those children) is that in all areas (except Science, where the difference reflects just one child) the percentage of children receiving Pupil Premium that is meeting or exceeding national expectations in terms of the progress of their learning is higher than the overall group.

Again (as for our Reception children), this represents a ‘flipped gap’ where children entitled to Pupil Premium funding are out-performing the overall group. This indicates strongly that the interventions and work put in place through this funding have proved effective in helping to develop children’s learning progress. And we know that when a child is making good progress in their learning, their achievement (or attainment; the level they’re able to achieve in their learning) follows. We feel that being able to incorporate the strategies and understanding gained through developing individual work into general Studio practice is one of the factors that contributes to the high percentage of our children who are meeting or exceeding national expectations in their learning progress (between 83% and 95%) across Years 1 and 2 in our school.

Next Steps

For this coming year (2014/2015), we will be continuing to invest in and use the strategies and practice that have worked over our first year. In September 2014 we were joined by 180 young people new to our school, of whom at least 59 are entitled to Pupil Premium funding (although this figure may increase as we finish processing Pupil Premium and Free School Meals Registrations). We will be working with these young people to quickly and accurately identify what’s underpinning any attainment issues and to put in place support we know is appropriately matched to the needs identified.

For those children we have already been working with, we will be continuing to use the strategies we know have been successful, carefully monitoring progress and attainment to make sure every child is developing to be the best they can be and developing any additional interventions necessary to meet individual need. A very small percentage of this group (5 – 15%, dependent upon subject) have yet to meet or exceed national expectations; where desired progress hasn’t been made we will be investigating and implementing further strategies and support.

Based on what we found worked well over our first year, we will also be investing in the development of our Individual Learning Profiles to include a measurable self-assessment of well-being alongside academic attainment and progress. We’re also aiming to develop a measurable assessment by the child of the effectiveness of their learning relationships with others. We know that wellbeing has a hugely significant impact on achievement and we will work to ensure our children are as happy and successful in their learning (and learning relationships) as possible.