Chronicle January 2021

32 ST EDWARD’S CHRONICLE

Sophie Shen Which Pathways and Perspectives are you studying? Big Ideas and Art. Are the lessons different from your GCSE lessons? There isn’t an overbearing emphasis on forthcoming external exams – instead of being assessed by a set of papers at the end of Fifth Form, we’re assessed regularly. I think working hard on a regular basis is better than sitting a nerve-wracking exam that you can either pass or fail once. We are very much encouraged to follow our own independent path. In Art, we have the choice to focus on our own theme, our own artists for inspiration, and our work is based on our own source imagery. In Big Ideas, we are assessed on a

part in a Harkness style class discussion, created their own infographics, composed abstracts from academic journals and written evaluative essays. Shortly, pupils will be designing their own cities of the future, drawing influence from the thinking of historical and contemporary urban planners and social theorists they have studied in lessons. These tasks have a more flexible structure than those set on GCSE courses, which gives pupils the freedom to become experts in the aspects of topics they’re most interested in and to have more opportunity to demonstrate creativity in their response to these tasks. This has created a greater diversity of knowledge within classes and allows for interesting academic discussions in lessons. What do you hope pupils will take away from these new courses? I hope that they enable pupils to discover new academic interests to explore independently and enthuse about with others. I would like the courses to give pupils an understanding of the extent of their capabilities as learners (perhaps even surprise them!) and give them greater confidence to approach the challenges of learning in life ahead. portfolio containing pieces of work that we hand-pick and revise ourselves – we submit a portfolio that demonstrates self-development and self-reflection. The privileges of freedom and opportunity are definitely the best things about the new courses. I’m really pleased that my Pathways and Perspectives courses are both favourite subjects. In Art, I’ve enjoyed projects such as photo collages and mixed media responses which have allowed me to experiment with elements of surrealism in my art. I love Philosophy, and so in Big Ideas, I always enjoy critical and analytical responses such as speeches, essays and presentations that allow us to share our ideas about profound philosophical subjects.

Hugh Stephens Head of Geography

How does your approach to lesson planning differ for Pathways and Perspectives courses compared with GCSEs?

Why do you think these courses are a step forward? Many of the new courses go beyond traditional boundaries of subjects, allowing pupils to explore topics

The thing I most enjoy about planning and teaching Pathways and Perspectives lessons is how learning can be personalised around the interests and passions of the individuals within the class,

more comprehensively. In addition, the structure of continuous assessment

gives a greater opportunity for pupils to demonstrate the full extent of their progress and achievement when compared with a single terminal assessment at the end of a two-year course. Give us some examples of topics or projects from your subject which highlight the benefits of the new approach. Our first topic was the Anthropocene, where we investigated whether we have entered a new age in the history of Earth that is dominated by humans, which we were able to explore from a more interdisciplinary perspective. Pupils were able to assess the geological, biological, historical and socio-cultural evidence on the issue to make their own conclusions. Recently in Global Societies and Environments, pupils have taken

rather than beholden to content dictated by exam boards. It means that across the four Global Societies and Environments sets, while all the pupils are studying the same topics, the areas explored within topics will vary according to the particular elements pupils in each set are most inspired by. These lessons are designed to develop a broad range of skills and as such activities within lessons are incredibly diverse. Particular attention is given to building confidence to engage with a wide range of academic material, with the goal of challenging pupils to think creatively about complex issues. What differences will pupils experience in Pathways and Perspectives lessons?