Renaissance School Partnership
Case Study: Oasis Academy Hadley
Introduction:
} School Profile:
Oasis Academy Hadley
Enfield, Middlesex
Students: 1100, Reception - Year 13
Located within the Enfield borough of Greater London, students typically arrive
in Year 7 at Oasis Academy Hadley with Key Stage 2 scores significantly below
the national average and low levels of literacy. To address specific problems in
reading and writing, Principal Lynne Dawes and Deputy Principal Matthew Jones
chose to implement School Partnership Programme from Renaissance Learning™
- a comprehensive partnership and professional services programme designed
to empower educators through the use of data to identify, monitor and
accelerate the academic achievement of every student.
} Demographics:
Urban location
EAL: 80%
SEN: 35%
Free School Meals: 56%
} Educator Background:
Matthew Jones the Deputy
Principal at Oasis Academy
Hadley, has taught for 19 years in
a variety of settings.
At Oasis Academy Hadley he has
specific responsibility for raising
literacy standards throughout the
school.
Graph 1: Average Book Level of Year 8 students in
2010/11 compared to 2011/12
Graph 2: Reading trends analysis comparison at Term 2
of 2010/11 compared to 2011/12
Study Description:
Oasis Academy Hadley is an all through Academy that opened in September,
2009 specialising in Mathematics with ICT and a second specialism in Music. It is
a multi-ethnic school with a large proportion of students speaking English as an
Additional Language and in receipt of Free School Meals.
A key aspect of Renaissance Learning’s School Partnership Programme is
identifying a school’s literacy and numeracy requirements and providing staff and
students with the tools to raise standards and achieve success. At Oasis Academy
Hadley the most pressing issues related to the development of students’ reading
and writing skills, particularly those in Years 7 & 8, as Matthew explains:
“Following an extensive period of consultation with Renaissance Learning staff we
decided to implement their Accelerated Reader™ (AR™)1, STAR Reading™2, STAR
Early Literacy™ (SEL)3 and MathsFacts in a Flash™ (MFF)4 software together with
NEO 2™5 to support writing and Assessment for Learning. Thanks to the
comprehensive support and training from Renaissance Learning we have been
able to develop and implement teaching strategies in combination with structural
T: +44 (0) 20 7184 4040
Graph 3: Whole school word count YTD 2010/11
compared to 2011/12
F: +44 (0) 20 7538 2625
E: [email protected]
changes that are already yielding positive results.” He continues: “In accordance
with the Best Classroom Practices recommended by the programme we have
introduced a dedicated reading period for all students in Years 7 & 8, which lasts
for 20 minutes every day. This has proved so effective that many students are
also taking advantage of other curriculum time, such as during English lessons, to
read their books. Even more importantly they are also now going into the library
to read and complete AR quizzes, which is a significant change to their previous
behaviour.”
Many previously reluctant or struggling readers are now engaging with books
because they are being directed towards titles that are suitably challenging
thanks to regular STAR Reading testing to identify their actual reading levels,
reading ages and National Curriculum levels - all of which have risen consistently
since the programme started (see Graph 1 for the increase in average book level
YTD). This has subsequently led to more time devoted to reading (see Graph 2)
and more words read (see Graph 3), as Librarian Sylvia Riley has observed: “The
W: www.renlearn.co.uk/rsp
Study Description (contd.):
implementation of AR has begun to make a difference to the children’s excitement and view about
reading. The students enjoy taking AR quizzes as they immediately get their results and can see how
they are progressing. The issue of library books has definitely increased due to our use of AR.” Matthew
adds: “Students are definitely more engaged and reading more books. Furthermore, parents have also
become more engaged - in fact, when we introduced NEO 2 it was the best-attended Parents’ Evening we
have ever held.”
In addition to addressing reading problems, the staff worked with Renaissance Learning to find ways of
raising the standard of writing at the school. This was primarily achieved through the introduction of
NEO 2, which has also made Assessment for Learning easier for teachers using free 2Know!™6 and NEO
Share™7 software. “The real big push on NEO 2 started around October, 2011 when we were looking to
develop literacy as a whole-school priority. Having discussed the potential uses for NEO 2 and AR with
staff from Renaissance Learning I thought it would be a good opportunity to embed whole-school literacy
by using NEO 2. I think it’s been a really useful tool that has proved very motivating for the students.
They like getting them out in lessons and when used frequently they can significantly increase student
engagement. Personally, having used NEO 2 with my Year 7 class I notice a significant improvement in
the quality of their writing - which has been a real bonus for the Academy,” commented Matthew.
He continues: “Staff have found NEO 2 to be a useful tool for Assessment for Learning, particularly when
using the 2Know! toolbar. They are able to ask questions at the start of a lesson and students simply
key in their answers using their NEO 2s and the teacher is quickly able to ascertain whether or not the
students have understood the recent content they have been learning. The data gathered in this way
allows staff to adjust their teaching to meet the needs of the students based on their responses.”
“Another piece of software is NEO Share, where students tasked with writing a short piece of text
regarding a particular theme or something they are studying in a lesson can send their work wirelessly
to me immediately. I can then share their work with the rest of the class who can either make individual
comments about the quality of the response or they can make amendments to what has been written in
terms of punctuation and grammar using their individual NEO 2s.”
Results:
In the entire 2010/11 academic year just over 5 million words were read by students at Oasis Academy
Hadley using AR. However, after only six months in to the partnership with Renaissance Learning over
4,000 books and more than 31 million words have been read - and the number is still rising.
Furthermore, engaged time in reading has doubled, the difficulty level of books read has increased
and the average reading age has risen from 7.08 to 10 in just over a year and a half.
The key to the Oasis Academy Hadley’s success to date has been the close relationship with
Renaissance Learning and the in-depth analysis offered through the partnership, as Matthew notes:
“Renaissance Learning has provided extensive support and training, regularly visiting the school to
help both staff and students develop and implement appropriate strategies to achieve growth. This
comprehensive support has been very welcome. Overall, Renaissance Learning’s literacy products
have helped us make a significant improvement in the students’ comprehension of text read and a
positive impact on their overall attitudes towards, and standards of, reading. Recent in-term testing
has shown a very significant increase in English Year 7 & 8 assessment grades, which we are
confident will continue to develop as they progress towards GCSE.”
Conclusion:
As a result of the hard work of the staff and students and the close relationship with Renaissance
Learning, Oasis Academy Hadley has already been shown significant improvements and is well on the
way to achieving the high standards of literacy desired by everyone at the school. The level of
success already being achieved in reading and writing bodes well for when the programme focuses
on numeracy, as Programme Manager Sanober Vir explains: “Everyone at Oasis Academy Hadley has
really got behind the School Partnership Programme, which is really paying dividends now. When we
first met with the Senior Leadership Team we looked at where the school was and where they wanted
to be in terms of overall standards of literacy and numeracy and agreed a 3 year partnership
programme and timetable of measures to reach these objectives. No two schools are exactly the
same, so we take great care to shape the programme to meet specific requirements, whilst always
adhering to the Best Classroom Practices that are research-proven to achieve success. The results
already speak for themselves.”
1
5
Accelerated Reader offers personalised reading practice for students of all ages and abilities with over 20,000 fun,
motivational quizzes on popular books ranging from The Hungry Caterpillar to Roald Dahl and the Harry Potter to the
Classics - as well as non-fiction titles - which test a student’s understanding of what they have just read.
2 STAR Reading is computer-adaptive, baseline assessment software that quickly and accurately establishes the actual reading
age and National Curriculum level of individual students, so that growth can be easily measured.
3 STAR Early Literacy offers personalised maths practice for pupils of all ages and abilities that allows them to learn essential
maths skills and progress at their own pace, without being left behind by the rest of the class.
4 MathsFacts in a Flash helps build a core foundation of mathematics skills by offering personalised practice of essential
mental maths facts, without increasing levels of paperwork.
T: +44 (0) 20 7184 4040
F: +44 (0) 20 7538 2625
NEO 2 The ultimate classroom tool; NEO 2 helps students of all ages and abilities become confident, enthusiastic writers,
promoted Assessment for Learning, meets JCQ requirements for use as a keyboard in examinations and supports
Accelerated Reader, Accelerated Maths and MathsFacts in a Flash software - offering personalised practice both in and out
of the classroom.
6 2Know! is free voting and assessment software that allows students to submit true/false, multiple choice, numeric or ‘pulse’
answers wirelessly to the teacher via their NEO 2.
7
NEO Share is free software that allows teachers to send and retrieve text to and from a NEO 2 to the teacher’s computer
and onto an Interactive Whiteboard, making it ideal for collaborative writing.
E: [email protected]
W: www.renlearn.co.uk/rsp