The new Ofsted framework has been with us for over a year now, but it is still one of the most hotly debated issues in education. The change that has got most people talking is the new overall quality of education judgement. With this change, Ofsted hopes to ‘de-intensify the inspection focus from performance data and place more emphasis on the substance of education and what matters most to learners.’
Thus, the focus shifts from results to curriculum. The focus is now on three areas; the intent of your curriculum, how you implement it and the impact it's having on pupils. This part of the inspection will take place in the form of a Deep Dive. These will go further than the whole school curriculum and will test whether the school's curriculum rationale is being implemented in specific subject areas. As drama teachers, we need to be aware of what's to come.
A rich understanding
Inspectors will start by looking to see if your curriculum is both broad and ambitious for all the students you teach, including pupils with SEND and pupil premium statements. There is no answer about what you should teach, only that what you do teach pushes, stretches and challenges the students in front of you. It must challenge your students’ existing knowledge of drama, stretch their understanding of drama and push them towards succeeding in drama. Inspectors will want to see that drama knowledge is at the core of your curriculum.
Knowledge is much more than learning and reciting facts or key terminology, it is also about developing an awareness, familiarity or understanding of concepts, theory and practical processes. Success is not just measured in results and data but in whether the students know more about drama.
You will need to have a list of core vocabulary and concepts that you want students to know and apply in performance. Inspectors will want to see that you have planned and sequenced this core vocabulary and these concepts across your curriculum: sequenced so that new knowledge builds upon prior knowledge and prepares them with sufficient skills for future learning and employment.
You need to be able to justify the journey that students take from entering drama to leaving it at the end of Key Stage 3, 4 or 5. Firstly, through the knowledge you will give them; secondly, through the amount of time you give your students to practise the application of knowledge, through either a performance or an exam response. Inspectors will want to see that you are able to guide them, check their understanding and provide feedback or re-teaching where necessary.
Practical and theoretical
Remember, the Ofsted framework offers no guidance on how to teach. There is no direction to teachers to use direct instruction, strip away classroom displays to bare walls or ban all forms of group work and discussion. However, Ofsted will want to see that you have taken the appropriate decisions to deliver the curriculum in a way that is best for the young people you teach. It may be that direct instruction or bare classroom walls works best for you, your students and your school. It may not be.
One thing in lessons you will need a focus on is developing confidence and enjoyment in reading, but that engagement with reading doesn't have to be just scripts in drama.
Students can read information sheets, articles, pages, or even whole chapters from books on topics that support their study. Ofsted will want to see that students can show their level of knowledge through the work they create. For drama they should be looking for that evidence in books and in practical performance. Remember that a majority of the work drama students produce is practical and will not be evidenced in a book.
Things evidenced in a book are knowledge and examination work. At Key Stage 3, this can be as simple as quick knowledge quizzes. But it is in the performance that you can see whether a student has mastered an understanding of proxemics, tone of voice or still images.
Ofsted will want to see that you have made your students ready for their next level of education, employment or training. This is beyond the awarding of a qualification and whether their future includes drama or not. So, Ofsted will want to see that your students are aware of how the drama knowledge you have given them is helping them to succeed in the future. Are they aware of how this drama knowledge will help them socially, culturally, personally or economically? You need to justify how the key terminology and performance skills you teach will help their future. But it is also an opportunity to highlight the soft skills developed by drama, such as communication, confidence and teamwork. They are essential and important skills that are vital to the workplace and any young person's life.