About the study

What are the benefits for my school?

• 50 schools will receive the 16-month TEEMUP professional development (PD) for FREE during the project; 50 schools will be offered the PD at a much-reduced price following the completion of the project, if the PD is successful.
• Through the PD, teachers will be supported to enhance the mathematical intent, implementation and impact of mathematical teaching in their classrooms (Ofsted 2019).
• All schools who take part (regardless of when they participate in the PD) receive £750 to spend as they wish. 

ALL TEEMUP schools will be expected to:

• Agree and sign the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).

• Share information about the project with YR parents (2021 cohort and 2022 cohort) and offer them the chance to withdraw their child from data collection during the project.

• Share school and child information with the evaluation team.

• Collaborate with the York Trials Unit (YTU) evaluation team in the evaluation process.

The Professional Development (PD) is evidence-based and has already shown positive improvements in practice and child outcomes in other trials.  It allows teachers to:

• explore best practice in mathematics teaching,
• work together to support transitions into and across classrooms,
• effectively engage the home in their children’s education,
• build their mathematical confidence, knowledge and understanding,
• explore novel techniques to strengthen children’s self-regulation,
• effectively self-evaluate, plan for improvement and monitor their own and children’s progress.

The PD programme aims to empower staff to make their own professional judgements about how best to teach the children in their classes. It is therefore expected that the staff will individually interpret and tailor the materials themselves to best serve their class. A minimum of one teacher from Reception and one from Year 1 will directly receive the PD and be expected to use their professional judgement to integrate recommendations in mathematics teaching. However, the PD is likely to support/change their delivery across several areas of learning as it also considers how to integrate and consolidate maths skills across the curriculum. The target primary outcome is improvement in maths, the secondary outcome is improved self-regulation.

For a detailed breakdown of PD sessions, please see 'The TEEMUP PD'

What does the Professional Development (PD) involve for participating teachers?

Teachers will receive specialist training from the Oxford PD team in how to support children’s mathematics and self-regulation.  The PD consists of the following:

• 2 full days (9.30-16.00) and 8 half day (14.00-17.45) face-to-face workshops. This will consist of two consecutive days followed by 7 half day sessions once a fortnight in Spring 2022, allowing time between sessions to use the new ideas and activities and involve other staff within their team. The final follow-up workshop will be offered in 2023.

• Specialist coaching/mentoring in school. Following the intial series of workshops, this will provide needs-based support for implementing changes, adapting the approaches to suit the school’s context and children/families, and getting other staff (e.g. Teaching Assistants) involved.

• Access to a dedicated 'knowledgebase' - the TEEMUP online platform. This will extend PD learning by offering practical teaching resources, background materials, and information and ideas to support families at home.

For the 50 schools randomly selected to participate in the initial PD trial, a nominated Reception teacher and a nominated Year 1 teacher from each school (plus an optional third member of staff) will be expected to attend and participate in the workshops together.   For the trial, the 50 schools will be grouped (according to location) into at least 4 smaller cohorts and workshops will take place in a location convenient to the  schools in each cohort.  

The effectiveness of the PD in improving children's early mathematical learning will be independently assessed by the York Trials Unit (YTU) from Durham and York universities.

Schools will be randomly allocated to a control group or an intervention group.   The control group will be eligible to receive the finalised PD after the study concludes at a significantly reduced price, if the PD is found to be effective.  The intervention group will receive the PD free during the study timeframe.

For both groups, the same assessments will take place as below:

• Trained assessors from YTU will visit the school (in Oct/Nov 2021 and June 2023) to assess the mathematical levels of least 15 children from one Reception class and one Year 1 class. These assessments will be short, hands-on and age-appropriate.
• Class teachers will also be asked to complete a short survey on social development and self-regulation for these same children at 4 time points during the 2 years (Oct/Nov 2021, June 2022, Oct/Nov 2022 & June 2023).
• The same children assessed in Reception in the first year of the study will be those assessed in Year 1 in the second year of the study.

It must be emphasised that the YTU researchers will not be evaluating your school, teaching staff, or the individual children in the class. No individual children, teachers or schools will be named in the report arising from the research. The researchers are evaluating the PD only - their role is to assess how successful it is in helping teachers to improve their practice by measuring if it improves children’s outcomes.  The Oxford team delivering the PD will not have access to the assessments collected. 

Parents will be given the option for their children to opt out of the evaluations, but all children in the nominated Reception and Year 1 class will receive the intervention (via their class teacher) if their school is one of the 50 randomly allocated to receieve the PD.