Looking at pupils' work and observing lessons: what is appropriate?
What should I look for when looking at pupils' work? We relay advice from two of our associate education experts on how to approach book scrutinies and lesson observations from a governor's perspective. We also suggest questions you could ask when looking at work and visiting the classroom.
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Governors' role in monitoring pupils' work
A governor explained that his governing body has been asked to scrutinise pupils' work when visiting the school.
We spoke to two of our associate education experts, Harry James and Jackie Beard, about this. Both are national leaders of governance (NLGs).
Look for consistency across the school
Harry explained that looking at pupils' work would be part of monitoring that the school is providing a broad and balanced curriculum, but that this should be done in co-operation with the class teachers and subject leaders.
He said that governors should be looking for consistency across classes and year groups. For example, if the school has a policy that once a week all pupils do extended writing or that pupils do a weekly spelling test, governors could look to see if this is happening consistently across all year groups.
Harry recommended that governors
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