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(PROJECT NUMBER: OER 20/09 DH) Core 2 Research Program 1.1 ABSTRACT

In broad terms, the central objective of the Core 1 programme of 2004/07 was to measure and model pedagogical practice and student learning in a representative sample of Singaporean primary and secondary schools. Core 1 consisted of six Panels, of which four (Panels 2, 3, 4 and 5) were centrally concerned with pedagogical practice and classroom processes. Four panels (1, 2, 5 and 6) focused on student outcomes. Core 1 findings showed that teachers’ pedagogical approaches lean more towards the traditional mode of teaching and learning. Moreover, their day-to-day instructional activities and assessment tasks tended to focus on the drill- and-practice of basic knowledge and skills. The intellectual quality of knowledge work has a statistically significant relationship with the intellectual demands of teachers’ assessment tasks. However, these findings reflected teachers’ instructional, pedagogical, and assessment practices prior to the launch of the Teach Less-Learn More (TLLM) initiative. The Core 2 programme proposes to focus now on just three Panels: pedagogical beliefs and practices (Panel 2-2), instructional (Panel 2-3) and assessment practices (Panel 2-5).

As background to the present proposed pilot study, the Core 2 programme has six key objectives:

1. Measure, map and model pedagogical practice in Singapore, including the definition of learning goals, the organization of classroom activity, the nature of the enacted curriculum and assessment practices, the use of instructional strategies, the nature of the classroom learning environment, the intellectual quality of knowledge work in the classroom, and the structure of classroom interaction and discussion.

2. Determine similarities and differences in the pattern of pedagogical practice between the Core 1 and the Core 2 findings, including establishing whether there is greater variance in the pattern of pedagogical practice as a consequence of the TLLM implementation model, and attempt to specify the

extent to which any differences can be accounted for by the impact of recent policy initiatives on pedagogical practice.

3. Model the impact of pedagogical practice on cognitive, meta-cognitive and “non-cognitive” student outcomes. Despite our efforts to design multiple and overlapping measures in the Core 1 Programme, we had to rely, in the end, on two independent approaches to establish the relationship between teaching and learning: multilevel modelling of cross sectional data on classroom practice and student learning (Panel 2), and a correlation study of the relationship between the intellectual quality of teacher assessment tasks and the quality of student work generated as a result (Panel 5). While we plan to include (and improve) Panel 5, we intend to alter the design of Panel 2-2 in substantial ways to facilitate both value added (using gain scores) and longitudinal growth modelling. In addition, we intend to ensure proper integration of the three data sets across the Core 2 panels to enrich the analysis in ways that proved impossible in Core 1.

4. Further develop our understanding of the logic of teaching in Singapore: Why do teachers teach the way they do? What is the relative impact of student background and orientations to teaching and learning? What are the effects of teacher training and orientations, including their commitment to “vernacular” or “folk” pedagogies on teaching and learning? How do the prescribed curriculum, the assessment system, and the complex and ever changing contingencies of the classroom situation, impact teaching and learning? How do classroom size, school resources, and the pressure from parent and public opinion on school staff to teach in particular ways, affect teaching and learning? Good answers to these questions are necessary to support an intervention program focused on improving the quality of teaching and learning.

5. Develop a comprehensive and well-documented video library of unusually effective pedagogical practices in Primary 5 and Secondary 3 Mathematics and English classrooms, and to make this library available for pre-service and in-service teacher training purposes. While the Core 1 mix of survey, classroom observation, tape recordings of oral exchanges and collection of assessment artefacts permitted construction of a rich picture of pedagogical practice, it did not enable us to generate point-able models of effective

practice that could be used in pre- and in- service teacher education programmes. The use of videography, supplemented by teacher interviews and careful analysis of classroom interactions and conversation in the Core 2 program, will enable us to record effective practices and use them in pre- service and in-service teacher training programmes.

6. Draw on the results of its research programme to propose a series of interventions designed to improve the quality of teaching and learning in Singaporean classrooms and promote evidence-based pedagogical practice in schools. This objective directly parallels one of the key objectives of the Core 1 program that resulted in the design and implementation of a series of interventions across the curriculum between 2005 and 2007.

The Core 2 programme intends to make significant improvements in the quality of our understanding of pedagogical practice through better research designs and instrumentation.

However, there is a pressing need to begin trialling and refining the Core 2

instrumentation now before the attention of teachers turns in the latter parts of Term 3 and the majority of Term 4 to test preparation, and the marking and moderation of exam scripts. The present proposed study is designed, therefore, to provide essential methodological groundwork in the key areas outlined above in advance of the submission of a substantial Tier 3 grant proposal for the main Core 2 research programme.

1.2 RESEARCH PROJECT OVERVIEW:

The Core 2 Research Program is composed of three separate but interrelated projects: • The Panel 2 project, based on a stratified random sample of all Primary 5 and

Secondary 3 English and Mathematics classes in 63 Primary and Secondary schools and consisting of two separate surveys of students, two assessments of students in Mathematics and English, and a survey of teachers in all the schools in the sample, including teachers whose students we sampled in Primary 5 and Secondary 3 classes (n=62 schools, 454 Classes, 16,895 Students, 2,100 teachers)

• The Panel 3 project, based on a subsample of the Panel 2 sample of schools (n=31), focusing on the videography, coding and analysis of 624 lessons across 117 units of work in Sec 3 and Primary 5 Mathematics and English • The Panel 5 project, based on the same subsample of the Panel 2 sample of

schools as the Panel 3 sample (n=21), focusing on the collection, coding and analysis of a representative sample of teacher tasks and student work and the qualitative analysis of 115 teacher interviews (n=385 teacher tasks, 2,897 student work, 115 teacher interviews, 209 surveys)

The principal objectives of this report are to report the initial efforts of the Core 2 research team to measure, map and model the pattern of instructional practice in Secondary 3 Mathematics and English classes in Singapore, to identify and evaluate the underlying assumptions about the nature of instruction, to measure and explain changes in instructional practice, such as they are, since the TLLM initiative in 2004/05, to identify what instructional practices promise substantial improvement in the quality of teaching and learning in Singapore, and to construct a general conceptual model of instructional practice as a pedagogical system.

Key research Questions

• How do teachers teach in Singapore? • Why do they teach this way?

• To what extent has pedagogical practice changed since the introduction of TLLM in 2005?

• How well does the enacted curriculum match the prescribed curriculum in English and Mathematics?

• How strong is -- and what determines -- the intellectual quality of teaching and learning in Singapore?

• How strong is the effect that teachers and teaching have on student achievement? • What factors constrain the capacity for instructional improvement?

• What pedagogical and enabling reforms are indicated by Core 2 findings to be necessary to improve the quality of teaching and learning in Singapore?