Attachment Research Community: ITT CCF commentary launch

8 June 2023

Both the draft commentary and the ARC review of the CCF are attached below.

ARC Commentary on ITT Core Curriculum Framework

The ARC Commentary on ITT Core Curriculum Framework (CCF) was produced by a working group of academic researchers, school and ITT practitioners. It provides a practical evidence-based guide for trainee/early career teachers and their mentors in using the CCF to develop their capacity to support every child in the classroom by understanding their emotional, social and learning needs.

There is strong evidence for the efficacy of relational based approaches and, conversely, the negative consequences of over reliance on traditional behaviourist or ‘zero tolerance’ approaches. This is particularly relevant to the most vulnerable and disadvantaged pupils, but applies to all members of the school community – a number of studies have indicated the positive impact of such approaches on staff wellbeing, confidence and consequent improvements to learning overall (eg Gentle et al., 2023).

A common misconception is that the adoption of relational approaches leads to a reduction in overall standards of behaviour and learning, but as Scales et al. (2020) indicate, on the basis of a wide study of US Middle Schools, such approaches need to be established alongside significant challenges to individuals, on their own terms, to be fully effective (see Parker, 2022).

In order to implement this guide we considered Teachers’ Standards 1 (High Expectations), 5 (Adaptive Teaching), 6 (Assessment), 7 (Managing Behaviour) and 8 (Professional Behaviours), taking the ‘Learn that’ statements as read. We produced new ‘Learn how to’ statements, linking these directly with published research. We produced a further set of statements describing how these might look in practice and set out the evidence on which this guidance is based.

This evidence includes academic publications, policy documents and practitioner guides. It is deliberately intended to reflect a range of professional, theoretical and methodological perspectives. We believe that this gives the body of evidence a much more rounded and credible basis than would be gained from a single, limited methodology and will enable colleagues to adapt the approaches and strategies outlined to their particular circumstances.

If you would like to know more about ARC and the ITT Core Curriculum Framework, please contact Dr Richard Parker richard.parker18@bathspa.ac.uk or Name of specific contact

References

Gentle, L.., Rose, J., McGuire-Snieckus, R., Gilbert, L., & Parker, R. (2023). Combined summary: Impact evaluation of staff experience of the Attachment Aware Schools Project phase 2 (Stoke on Trent, BaNES and Leicestershire Virtual Schools).

Parker, R. (2022) Teacher perceptions of attachment awareness in schools – normative or transformative? PhD thesis, Bath Spa University

Scales P.C., Van Boekel, M., Pekel, K. Syvertsen, K. A, Roehlkepartain, E.C. (2020) Effects of developmental relationships with teachers on middle-school students’ motivation and performance Psychology in the Schools. 57(4): 646–677