I am a Success Coach at an Outstanding FE college. I work in the Engineering department and my role is as a tutor for learners. I do not teach them course content, but teach and support around: wellbeing, progression, industry knowledge, employability skills, study skills, personal skills and qualities, work experience, extra curricular involvement, attendance, behaviour. I do this through... more

I am a Success Coach at an Outstanding FE college. I work in the Engineering department and my role is as a tutor for learners. I do not teach them course content, but teach and support around: wellbeing, progression, industry knowledge, employability skills, study skills, personal skills and qualities, work experience, extra curricular involvement, attendance, behaviour. I do this through regular 1 to 1s with every student, and whole class teaching. My students range from Level 1 to Level 3. I have previously been a Head of Year in Secondary Schools and also a Subject Leader for Psychology and Sociology A levels. less

I decided to maximise the value of my 1 to 1 time with the learners. Due to the time allocated in tutorials and my level of students, most only get 15minutes per 1 to 1. This is taken up by asking the same questions and not having time to delve into the areas of real need, and not being able to give strong quality of support. I was able employ Flipped Learning, and blend the approach but using... more

I decided to maximise the value of my 1 to 1 time with the learners. Due to the time allocated in tutorials and my level of students, most only get 15minutes per 1 to 1. This is taken up by asking the same questions and not having time to delve into the areas of real need, and not being able to give strong quality of support. I was able employ Flipped Learning, and blend the approach but using terms we teach and also enable the students to reflect and learn (blended learning online). I was specifically inspired by the Flipped Learning Module as I really like the opportunity to maximise the value of face to face learning, but that it also gives an opportunity to develop soft skills like self regulation, self discipline, employability, interview skills, problem solving. I also particularly felt that the "Being confident" module for The Digital Teacher highlighted that it is better to do something simple, effectively, than something complicated and not effectively. less

I took the typical questions we normally ask, and created a Microsoft form. The questions would cover the course, BAKS, wellbeing, progression, and English and Maths. There is also opportunity for the learner to reflect on their own performance and state what they feel they do well and what needs to be better, or something they aren't sure on. This enabled me to focus my 1 to 1s solely on... more

I took the typical questions we normally ask, and created a Microsoft form. The questions would cover the course, BAKS, wellbeing, progression, and English and Maths. There is also opportunity for the learner to reflect on their own performance and state what they feel they do well and what needs to be better, or something they aren't sure on. This enabled me to focus my 1 to 1s solely on the area of concern or improvement, and really deep dive into this specific issue. I then also shared a feedback form for the students to respond to, letting me know their thoughts on this alternative way of doing the 1 to 1s.

Due to the shift in teaching due to COVID 19, we had to adapt our usual practices of face to face 1 to 1s, and make the best of what we could with our resources. These included video calls, phone calls, or typing a conversation. At times we had much better submissions from learners if they had time to think about their answers and did not have the pressure of being in an immediate conversation, and as such I wanted to consider how this could be added to our usual practice once back on site. This meant I was able to blend the online practices with the face to face to potentially create something even more effective. I decided to use the same questions for all levels of learners, to identify where it is most and least effective dependent on the level of learner. less

Microsoft form, questions asked:

How is the course going currently? Please provide an overview of what you are currently working on. If you have multiple units, please give an overview of each.
What assignments/assessments are you currently working on? Please state any upcoming exams you may have.
Do you have any outstanding assignments? If yes, please list them.more

Microsoft form, questions asked:

How is the course going currently? Please provide an overview of what you are currently working on. If you have multiple units, please give an overview of each.
What assignments/assessments are you currently working on? Please state any upcoming exams you may have.
Do you have any outstanding assignments? If yes, please list them.
How do you use Maths in your course? Please give an example.
How confident do you feel about using the correct industry terminology in your assignments?
How confident do you feel with writing assignments?
What behaviours do you demonstrate that are desired in industry?
What behaviours do you think you need to improve on?
What is your attendance?
How would you describe your approach to learning?
What kinds of things have you been able to do to keep yourself feeling good and well at this time? This can be both mental and physical wellbeing.
What kinds of skills would you say you've developed this term?
What skills do you feel you need to improve on?
What are you currently doing to support your progression? Consider work experience, professional discussions, research, applications, extra curricular activities, CV writing.
Do you need any further support with anything like wellbeing, finance, online learning, progression, academic work? If yes, please say what you feel you need, and we can discuss further. less

It went far better than planned, with two thirds stating it should be used moving forward, and one third saying it should be an option. No one said it should not be used. Two thirds also stated that it enabled them to talk about what they felt was important.

I had given the same form to all Levels, to enable me to reflect and assess what works best with each level. I initially... more

It went far better than planned, with two thirds stating it should be used moving forward, and one third saying it should be an option. No one said it should not be used. Two thirds also stated that it enabled them to talk about what they felt was important.

I had given the same form to all Levels, to enable me to reflect and assess what works best with each level. I initially wondered if the content of the questions would be too simple or too complex depending on the level, but thus far it appears the language is simple enough and the questions phrased clearly enough that all Levels have been able to access this.

Some feedback from learners in other areas suggested they struggled with some of the answers and some prompts would be helpful, for example with professional behaviours. This might be something to add moving forward, however I would like the students to be self aware and really reflect on their own practice, instead of taking prompts and potentially being influenced by generic options. less

Using feedback from the Learners, we established that two thirds agreed the quality was better, and one third said it was about the same. To identify if this was due to the quality being poor initially, we asked the Learners if there was anything they felt could be improved. No further actions were given and all seemed happy. Students rated the 1:1s that took place with the form as 4.73 Average... more

Using feedback from the Learners, we established that two thirds agreed the quality was better, and one third said it was about the same. To identify if this was due to the quality being poor initially, we asked the Learners if there was anything they felt could be improved. No further actions were given and all seemed happy. Students rated the 1:1s that took place with the form as 4.73 Average Rating out of 5. less

I shared my form with colleagues, to see if it held the same value across departments. I am also delivering it to our team as a potential option moving forward. This is in line with the EIF having changed, but also from our own reflective practice, seeing what needs to change to keep up with the needs of our learners and industry.
I am hoping it will result in a permanent change to our... more

I shared my form with colleagues, to see if it held the same value across departments. I am also delivering it to our team as a potential option moving forward. This is in line with the EIF having changed, but also from our own reflective practice, seeing what needs to change to keep up with the needs of our learners and industry.
I am hoping it will result in a permanent change to our 1 to 1 format moving forward. I obtained some feedback from those staff who used the form, including my line manager from the Quality team:

"I definitely recommend using the feedback option. My student had it up when we were on the call so she knew what points we would be discussing beforehand. I have asked her to do the feedback form, she said she struggled with a few of the questions - Might be a good idea to put some examples in. For example the 'what skills have you developed'. She didn't know how to answer but when I gave her prompts it helped so maybe if you put eg. communication, time management etc it might help? I guess if people are unsure of any questions they can just be discussed verbally to clarify like I did". Success Coach, Health and social Care and Construction.

" I think the form is a great way of collecting the usual information that we need to check on and then allows you to scan through and prioritize your time with the student on the issues that matter. So less time wasted on collecting information and more time on dealing with problems. Its structure allows you to tick off all the boxes for OFSTED and gives the 1:1 a little more structure. It also helps you to give the same level of 1:1 to all students.
Like now when time is limited due to lots of other tasks etc it also allows you to get a blanket feedback from all learners and then prioritise learners for follow ups and 1:1's based on the responses. It means you can filter those that require support but still make the others feel like they have had the opportunity to air their thoughts and opinions on their progress.
I think moving forward we can tweak the questions based on the level, course or even time of the year. We could chop and change to cover what we need. " Success Coach, Engineering.

"this appears to be a useful tool to support the pre planning and deployment of 1:1 tutorials. This can work to triage the students requirements support . This has been trialled in 3 areas to date with positive results " CPD Coordinator, Teaching Learning and Quality. less