The principal, school improvement, and making sure the numbers add up.

Teaching mathematics is no simple task. It requires some real shifts in pedagogical thinking and making sure students are at the centre.  According to Peter Sullivan, educational consultant specialising in the teaching of mathematics,  kids learn best when they work on problems that they do not yet know how to solve. Peter's research shows that many students do not fear challenges in mathematics, but actually welcome them. However, to get to this point, principals need to be sure the numbers add up.

Transcript

Loretta  0:00  

You're listening to Loretta Piazza experienced school principal, mentor, and coach. And together were talking out of school. You will hear from leaders who have lived and breathed so many experiences good and bad, agonized over decisions, and have tossed and turned through countless sleepless nights. These are the people who will help you stay ahead of the game.

I'm sure we're all in agreement that principals are first and foremost, educational leaders. But where does the bulk of the time go? Probably dealing with people and those pesky administrative tasks that have to be done by 4pm today. This is why educational experts like Peter Sullivan, who I interview today, is the principal's best friend. Principals don't really need to know the ins and outs of the curriculum. Unless of course, they're teaching principlals. But they do need to have a big picture view of the subject area, as well as the structures that need to be put in place to support the teachers so they can do their best work. Peter Sullivan was a very big name in mathematics in the northern metro region, about 15 or so years ago, when then Regional Director Wayne Craig gave him the job of helping principals to better understand what was needed to improve student achievement in their own schools. If you listened to Wayne's story, a few episodes ago, the North was a basket case and underwent a massive regeneration process. Peter Sullivan's message has not changed. Students need to be at the center. Therefore principals should be asking their teachers firstly, how do we know students have learned? What resources are needed? And lastly, how do we differentiate learning? 

Hello, Peter, welcome to Talking out of school. 

Peter  2:08  

Hi, Loretta.

Loretta  2:08  

Can we start off by you telling us a bit about yourself? I know these days that you're a mathematics consultant. But how did you get to that point? 

Peter  2:17  

Well, I've, I've worked in universities in teacher education for about 30 years. But prior to that I was a maths teacher both in Australia in New Guinea. And so by, you know, after after teaching in schools in New Guinea, and, and Australia, I then did higher degree study, and then have ever since I've worked in universities, you know, doing teacher education and research. And when I retired a few years ago, I've just done work, you know,I it really would get invited. I haven't been advertising, my services. But I very much enjoy the work with schools and the, you know, the challenges of improving teaching and learning for mathematics.

Loretta  3:06  

So what sort of work is it that you do with schools? 

Peter  3:10  

Well, almost anything. So sometimes I run pupil free days. But other times it's working with teams of teachers on their planning, sometimes it's classroom modeling. It's more or less anything that schools feel will help improvev their teaching, and give their teachers more confidence, give their teachers more resources, more ideas, or options, then, I've had I'm willing to engage in that. 

Loretta  3:41  

Okay, I'm thinking back to around 2008 when you were doing work with the northern region, as part of the achievement improvement zones. What sort of work did you do with Wayne Craig, regional director in schools around that time? 

Peter  4:03  

Well, it was predominantly out of class, teacher professional learning. Generally, it was in a central location where teachers, school leaders, numeracy leaders would come together. And, you know, we work on content, pedagogy and assessment. 

Loretta  4:24  

Okay. Pedagogy. What is the pedagogy that underpins mathematics? 

Peter  4:32  

But this is where the issues become a little bit contentious. And if I can just give you my perspective, 

Loretta  4:38  

yes, please do that. 

Peter  4:41  

Generally, the schools, schools would have to clear foci although this year we have three and I'll explain the third one. But we want students to develop agency. We want them to know that they can think for themselves, they can create their own ideas. They can make decisions for themselves. They can manage their own learning, attitudes, confidence, persistence, and so on. So agency is quite critical. The other one is inclusion. And we want all students to feel like they're included in the classroom, in the school, in the learning and in mathematics. There are unfortunately, mathematics is sometimes taught in ways which reduce student agency. And so teachers, for example, have students following recipes, that's going to reduce student agency. And likewise, if teachers separate students into different class groups based on achievement levels, that's going to have an impact on inclusion. And so I would say that we want the students to be the center of the thinking in the classroom. And we want all students to be able to participate in those opportunities to think now the third one, of course, now would be wellness. We want students to experience their but again, inclusion and agency are going to contribute to wellness. And so trying to teach maths in ways where the students are doing the thinking, the students are not being told, initially what to do, creates a much more comfortable and much better classroom climate for students.

Loretta  6:18  

Certainly does. Now, here's a scenario for you, a hypothetical, which may not be that much of a hypothetical, but I'm a new principal, I walk into a school that's quite low performing in maths. I know it's a bit like trying to solve world hunger here. But what is the first thing that I really need to do?

Peter  6:42  

I would say that the major asset that you have, as a new principal, are the teams of teachers working together, teams of teachers, working together collaboratively. And so looking at what what are there any barriers to the teams working collaboratively that they might be: time barriers, they might be personality ones, but they need to be addressed first. The next issue is to say, what are the big picture goals for the school and for learning and for mathematics? And as I say, you know, if, if the big picture goal is about student agency, well, okay, let's let's work out how we achieve that. And whether we're whether we're actually addressing that or not. If the big picture goal is inclusion, work out, you know, are we, including all students or not? Now schools actually have massive amounts of data, they're like data museums, and data in order to be able to engage with, with with, you know, the improvement in the school, it's understanding what the what are the achievement of the goals now, and use the data to actually articulate goals, you know, gather evidence, have teachers ask, being curious about what's going to work and what's not going to work, you know, having teachers try things out, you know, not just teaching the same way they've taught every year for the last 20 years. But you know, explore new ways of getting kids engaged, new ways of including all students, including students, you know, who may be under some threat from wellness, the, it's becoming an active and exploratory system. I think one of the troubles or one of the mistakes I think that principals make, possibly early in the career, but even more lately is that they think that the, they need to establish a compliance type culture, and have students doing what the say, teachers are following routines that the principal is determined as the way to go. I think that as well as student data to teacher agency is also important, and finding ways to foster collaborative, collaborative relationships among the teams of teachers, and structure their planning in particular ways. Which I could talk about if you want to. 

Loretta  9:03  

Okay. Which brings me to this next train of thought that I have. I'm remembering a conversation with Patrick Griffin, and he talks about teachers not developing the higher achieving kids, that we tend to whether it be because we don't know the curriculum, or we're a little bit frightened of their knowledge. We tend to leave them, you know, to their own devices. So how do you tackle that issue around the kids who are cruising?

Peter  9:41  

Well, firstly, if they if they're just following recipes, follow up doing what they're told to do, working through the textbook pages, of course, they're going to relax and then cruise. If the structure of the pedagogies and the content put the student thinking at the center of it, it's been relatively easy to adapt that content and adapt that probe focus, so that those students who are ready can be extended effectively, you know, to think that to step to foster their curiosity, to encourage them to go deeper, to help them to form generalizations. And to think that these are, these are the things that can be done. If the lesson structure is flexible, and puts the students at the center. Now, of course, we can, at the same time, engage the students who are struggling, and who may find mathematics difficult, in the same ways, just being flexible with the nature of the learning goals, and fostering a classroom climate of collaboration and respect for each other. So I think that the, the kids who are cruising are certainly a problem. But if the if the emphasis is on the students doing the thinking, the students making decisions about their own engagement, the students recognizing that the harder they try, the smarter they get, you know, the, these are the things that have now and again, just to contrast it, you know, if the teacher is telling the students what to do, and saying, here's some examples just work through in this way. That's not going to encourage students to do their best, it's not certainly not going to engage low achievers, either. And so in a sense, it's quite the wrong approach to the teaching of mathematics, if you're trying to have students included and have students thinking for themselves. 

Loretta  11:36  

Do you think that our universities and our teacher training institutions are doing enough to prepare our pre service teachers for the classroom?

Peter  11:47  

Look, struggling with a whole range of issues. And every time you open the newspaper, someone's got a new issue that schools need to solve. And so I think the universities are doing fine, I think what happens needs to happen is we need to find effective ways of supporting students when they do have school based practice. And then mentoring and supporting teachers when they start teaching in the schools. At the moment, it's actually, you know, very difficult for students, because many of the fourth years are now working, working in schools as CRTs.

Loretta  12:27  

And tutoring as well.

you know,

Peter  12:29  

Exactly. And so, you know, in a sense, they're being thrown in the deep end, which I'm not sure is the ideal approach. But we do need to find ways to support teachers through their pre service education, that yeah, they're practical aspects of the pre service education, their early years of teaching, any interim work that they do, and so on their journey to become, you know, independent, authentic teachers 

Loretta  12:56  

I would have thought that if they were to spend a good 12 months, in a school, in a classroom, with the teacher and a team of teachers, that would certainly tell them whether or not they're cut out to be teachers. And secondly, give them that really good foundation for when they are fully accredited and can have their own grade. Do you think that's likely to happen? 

Peter  13:19  

Well I think it's almost going the reverse way to that. I think it's, you know, the Teach for Australia, for example, where encourages students, you know, admittedly, bright students to, to engage in teacher education and get into the game quickly. It's not necessarily fostering the type of, you know, practical, engaged learning. Look, I think, probably that the bit, the biggest issue that we have is not pre service or initial teacher education at all. It's, it's having, you know, a culture of ongoing improvement from year one to year two to year three. So each year, that is better than the previous and, and the next year is going to be better than the current and, and just that culture of improvement, I think is is more likely to see sustainable long term improvement.

Loretta  12:28  

You make a really good point there. And it's actually very refreshing to hear you say that. What are your views on Pisa? And why we're not doing as well as some of our counterparts, say in Hong Kong and Shanghai?

Peter  14:12  

Well, in fact, I'm wanting to write something about this. And it's one of my goals. When when I'm going away on a holiday for a month....

Loretta  14:43  

Let us know when you've written it.

Peter  14:45  

What the reality is that I've been told by people who are in a position to know that if Canberra was a country, it would be the top country in the world. And if New South Wales was it...

Loretta  15:00  

Why is why is that? Sorry.  Why is that? 

Peter  15:02  

Oh, because I think that apparently they have the highest rating, the highest mean score for the world, of any country, any city in the world. I think it's because of the socio economic background, you know, dealing with public servants. And the real issue with Australian education, the problem is equity. That the differences between Indigenous and non Indigenous, as in PISA results is about three years, the difference between remote and metropolitan is about three years, the difference between the lower socio economic quartile and the episode, so it's going to cost us about three years. And in fact, they're actually quite similar those differences. And it's arguable that the course of the difficulties socio economic rather than indigeneity, or geography. And so, trying to find ways to, to, and so what it's actually saying is that there's not a problem with Australian education, generally, there's a problem with equity. And the way maths has been taught is not necessarily deficient in any way, and plenty of students are achieving at the top levels. But the difficulty we have is the wide disparity between the high achieving students and the low achieving students and the students who are not meet reaching the bottom to benchmark levels for PISA is a serious concern. And so I don't think there's anything fundamentally wrong with the Australian education system, other than this issue of equity, and finding ways to, you know, support the parents, you know, low income parents, remote parents, indigenous parents, to engage their kids in the school, getting the kids to school is, you know, is a is a major is a major challenge, you know, student absence is high student absence. In those, those particular target cohorts that I just mentioned, is a critical issue. If the students are not there, they're not going to be learning the content. So I don't have any concerns about the nature of the PISA study, it's actually very well conducted study. And we, you know, we have to rely on the results. But I think there needs to be more interrogation of the data from the from the the issue of equity, so that government policy and can start to address some of these fundamental issues, 

Regarding government policy, is it just a matter of pouring more money or say, you know, more of the equity money into the disadvantaged schools than say, to the private schools.  Would that solve the problem?

Now, so I don't see the issues as being money issues. Now, you know, in a sense to address some of the issues, they'll need to expand, but it's not, it's not the sort of massive amounts of money, there's probably enough money in the system now to be able to do the job. But the but it's actually, for example, recognizing that with low income, that lower socioeconomic quartile that PISA identifies as three years behind, so say, okay, how can we how can we engage? How can we engage the parents of those students, to make sure the students come to school, make sure they do their homework? To find out what are the barriers to engagement of the of the students in the schools? So maybe, you know, this, what needs to be one of the deputy principals of schools that has a particular brief to, to address issues like attendance and an engagement with parents. It seems that the, even with early childhood, you know, early years education, that there's now going to be some attention to this in New South Wales and Victoria. That making sure that the way the kids do get the preschool that they actually learn and and not just being being, you know, the the learning is not just restricted to their social development, but they can learn the basics, get started on numeracy, get started on literacy, because that's what the, the children of the high socio economic parents are doing. They're coming to school, knowing how to count, knowing their letters, reading some words. They're familiar with books, you know, you hear people saying that students should have read 1000 books read to them by the time they get to school. Well, you know, some kids come to school, they've never played a jigsaw, you know, they don't know, you know, how how books operate, you know, there. It's, I think finding ways to support home, the home and supporting the kids and recognizing the home,you know, we change, we change community attitudes and all sorts of things. As you know, progressively, you know through education campaigns and through people talking about it. So there's no reason why we couldn't change community attitudes, then the same, the same things will apply in indigenous communities in remote communities. That, that if we can support the communities to support the kids, so the kids get to school, the kids realize that, that schooling has created opportunities for them, it's not a punishment, that society is devised for them, it's actually an opportunity for them to learn and to and to, to achieve their aspirations and, and raise their expectations.

Loretta  20:43  

Now, isn't it interesting that we started out talking about maths? And how do we improve maths in schools, and we've ended up talking about these huge, big picture issues that transcend literacy and everything, everything and, and until we get all these really big picture issues fixed, it's gonna, they're going to have a very big impact on how we deliver curriculum in the classroom, whether it be literacy or maths or anything else. So getting back to maths, as a principal, and, you know, regardless of whether principals are experienced or not experienced, and we did touch on working in teams and collaboration, and, and building agency, but can you tell us, you know, from all your experience, what really needs to be happening in schools, you know, the really, really basic things around maths to get it moving in schools?

Peter  21:59  

Okay, well, I'm not sure whether it's specifically answering the question, although that would be sort of answer your real questions. What I do do in schools is trying to say, yeah, here's a way we can approach the teaching of whatever. And engaging the students but, but in terms of advice for principals, and doing this, I would say, make.. allocate some time for the teachers to plan their, that slash numeracy together and, and structure that planning specifically and have an agenda for those planning meetings. And so for example, just off the top of the head, you know, the first issue on the on the agendas should be what, why how, you know, what do we want the students to learn? Why do we want them to learn that? And how are we going to get them to learn? Then the second item on the agenda is how will we know if they've learned it, then the third item on the agenda is, what resources do we have access to that that can help us to achieve those goals? Then the next issue is how do we differentiate the learning for those students? Who are ready for extension? How do we support those students who are struggling? You know, these sorts of these sorts of issues should be front and center of the teacher planning and, and collectively, if the teachers do collaborate, if they do work, collectively, they do have the knowledge about the mathematics and about the pedagogy between them. And sharing that that role sharing that task and, and seeing their collaboration has been paramount is, is important. Of course, you do need to have some exemplars of, okay, well, what what sorts of approaches can we take that are likely to affect improvement? And so that's where, you know, there, for example, there's a program called the primary maths and science specialist program that's been supported by the government for seven years at least. And it's a fantastic initiative. This year, there's 200 Teachers participating, and the people there get a very thorough and deep induction into the specifics and nuances of teaching mathematics and numeracy effectively, and trying to find, you know, people, you know, school based leaders that can be effectively supported and trained. Yeah, there's plenty of opportunities for further learning. For teachers who are interested, not through, you know, through the Bastow. It's not called Bastow and now I forget what it's called- the Leadership Institute is that what's called, through through the maths Association of Victoria, you know, to just that special programs even through the universities, there are programs so the seeing the support of teachers, the education of teachers has been critical for for learning.

Loretta  25:01  

Just one little hypothetical here. If you were to become the Minister for Education, what's the first thing you do?

Peter  25:09  

Well, the first thing I do would be that issue of saying how can we address these equity issues, these equity differences, and how we can support families, to support their their children to realize the families to realize that even though they may have had an unsatisfactory experience with education themselves, that that's not the case there is support in schools, the schools can create opportunities for their children, and that they try and just raise the engagement, they address the equity issues, through the through the families.

Loretta  25:47  

Which you from here for you? 

Peter  25:50  

Well, look, I gotta keep doing what I've been doing, keep doing what I'm doing. What, uh, what I actually find is that working side by side with teachers, whether it's planning or whether it's modeling or whether it's, you know, sort of supporting coaching, but I find that that's the most impactful way I can use my time. But you know, I've written a lot, I've written books. I've run large scale PDS. I've run programs from both through the university and elsewhere. And I think the way to make a change, from my perspective is to work closely with teachers.

Loretta  26:29  

Well, if that's your passion, I think that's certainly something that's that's greatly needed. I think schools are very, very busy places and to be able to call on somebody who has that expertise and that knowledge, and can quite effectively impart that knowledge is a wonderful thing. Look, I've been a principal for a long time. And there's a whole lot of stuff that I don't know. So it's people like you that we really rely on to help us get the job. Okay, Peter, thank you very much. I wish you all the best. Thank you for sharing these great insights. And, and I absolutely love your comments around the whole notion of equity and inequity. Thank you very, very much and keep doing the great work because we love people like you in our school. 

Peter  27:33  

Thanks. 

Loretta  27:36  

Thanks for listening to this latest episode of talking out of school, where we cover topics and dilemmas associated with the ups and downs and even the downright curious of the school leaders job. Want to know more? Then visit me at shaping leaders.com.au But for now, here's to staying ahead of the game.