And why they so often prevent change.

Having spent a bit of time looking at the importance of oracy, the impact that it can make on the progress of young people and some approaches to developing classroom practice, we are going to shift focus this week and consider why oracy implementations can fail.

This newsletter is essential reading for anyone interested in embedding cultural change across schools, or other industries; whilst the specific examples used pertain to oracy, actually, the principles themselves hold irrespective of the intervention or change. So, if you know anyone who is overseeing a change management process, or who has responsibility for strategic planning, send this on to them (and ask them to subscribe…. 😀).

Teacher beliefs: what does the research tell us?

Everyone has beliefs: according to Poet Laureate Alfred Lord Tennyson, they are part of what characterises us as human. Beliefs are deeply held, and exist in the realm between fact and fiction: we hold on to beliefs as if they have the sanctity of fact, yet they lack the empirical evidence necessary to support this confidence.

Teachers are no different and, because teaching is not an absolute science, the presence of beliefs plays a significant role in classroom practice.

This practice, then, is informed by a series of inter-related beliefs. Firstly, there is the belief in the purpose of education. Overwhelmingly, teachers believe that the purpose of education is to improve the life chances of the children that they teach: however, there is a great deal of variance around what exactly this means. To some, this is defined by building cultural capital; others believe this to be about preparing young people for the world of work; others might focus on the emotional wellbeing and mental health of young people.

Secondly, there is the belief teachers hold in teaching and learning. Significantly, the large majority of teachers’ beliefs in the best way to teach are directly informed by their own experiences as learners; this is especially true of novice or beginning teachers, which is significant because the habits formed early in a career are often extremely difficult to shift later in a career. The majority of teachers did not learn in dialogic classrooms themselves so, logically, they do not believe that dialogic spaces offer an effective learning environment.

Finally, and again, specifically regarding oracy, it is worth considering teachers beliefs in the importance of speaking, listening and dialogue. This will itself be impacted by the first two points so, already, a proportion of teachers will not believe that these skills are important. However, even for those who do, a further proportion will believe that it is the role of the English teacher to develop speaking and listening skills: indeed, in many education systems, speaking and listening is only explicitly assessed in English or other modern languages. Further complicating this is the fact that, according to the University of Oxford, somewhere between 80%-90% of English teachers are literature specialists, which means their own beliefs in the significance of oracy are further diminished.

Why does this matter?

What is observable in a classroom is the consequence of the knowledge that a teacher holds (knowledge of their subject, of pedagogy and other associated things) and the beliefs that they hold. These beliefs will influence everything from subject-matter choices through to decisions about the learning environment, even classroom layout, which we covered last week. Witness, for example, the orthodoxy with which some people will state that learning best occurs when students sit in rows and others will argue that it best occurs with students sitting in groups. Whilst, as we argued last week, flexibility is key, this example highlights the complexity of the impact of teacher beliefs on classroom practice.

Ultimately, though, this matters because beliefs are the single biggest barrier to long-term change. Many of us will recall attending training, for example, and implementing the strategies discussed during this training. In the majority of cases, we revert back to our initial habits over time and the training has had little to no impact on our practice. This is because habits can only truly be altered if there is a belief the efficacy of this change. And, of course, changing beliefs is probably one of the most difficult things we can do….which is why we will start to explore how this might occur over the coming weeks!

Further reading

Nespor, J (1987), The role of beliefs in the practice of teaching; Journal of curriculum studies (317-328)

Pajares, MF (1992), Teachers’ beliefs and educational research: cleaning up a messy construct; Review of Educational Research