What the Good Schools Guide Says About Teddies

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ST EDWARD’S, OXFORD

Teaching and learning ‘They needed to raise their game’, we’re told by lots of parents, and Mr Chirnside’s on the case. New optionality within year 9 (Shell) curriculum means that newbies tailor their timetables, allowing for more time per subject. Metacognition, thinking skills, presentation etc built in from the off and expectations set high. Praise for ‘inspirational’ teachers; ‘he pays attention because they’re brilliant’. Maximum 20 in lower school classes. Into year 10, Pathways and Perspectives courses run alongside GCSEs. They’re going ‘incredibly well’. Topics are modern, relevant and (whisper it) fun, things that teenagers really want to learn about like sustainability, the ancient world, sports science. We’d take ‘jewellery and entrepreneurship’ in a flash, particularly having seen the dedicated studio. More than 75 per cent of pupils take at least two – school says they are ‘more demanding’ and that imperfect work can be graded very highly because metacognition ‘is woven through it’; that said, pupils produce ‘amazing work’ when not constrained by GCSE mark schemes. Parents love

them, too, not least because they ease year 11 exam burden. Curriculum now allows for triple science as well as GCSE computer science. IB and A level peacefully co-exist; school recognizes that they suit different learning styles. Apparently not a case of the clever ones doing the IB, and take-up evenly split. Pupils need a 7 at GCSE in proposed A level subjects, 8 if it’s science or maths, a bar which worries some existing parents. No one’s pushing STEM here, or not at the expense of the other bits anyway: classics ‘core’, design ‘huge’, languages ‘not under threat’, with two-thirds of sixth form learning them (partly thanks to IB requirements, but still…). Academic expectations rising but stuffiness is not: IB dance newly introduced alongside A levels in computer science, textiles, politics and psychology. Maximum 14 in sixth form classes but most much smaller. New St Edward’s Fellows – Oxford postgrads – spend a few hours a week at the school, ‘inspiring interest beyond the curriculum’.