HSAEL News

Most secondary school age pupils in the UK move from lesson to lesson, day to day, week to week, year to year, making little to no progress with their academic studies. It is commonplace for teachers to teach brand new content every lesson in a bid to cover lesson sequences underestimating the importance of stopping and checking for understanding of even the most basic pieces of knowledge.

At HSAEL, teachers know that just because that have imparted knowledge onto students doesn’t mean they understand. It doesn’t mean the knowledge will transfer into their long-term memory and it certainly doesn’t mean they will be able to apply that knowledge in any kind of powerful or critical way. Only once the most important knowledge becomes automatic can students begin to do the real thinking.

Last January, we began the Golden Nugget testing project.

Before the winter break, students were given the terms and definitions of the most important pieces of knowledge they had learnt the previous term in each subject. They were tasked with making sure the terms were memorised over the holiday and were asked to complete one piece of Look Cover Write Check for each subject. When they returned to the academy in January, the majority of students had not done their homework. We supported them in large numbers to complete this work before re-joining lessons and beginning their tests.

The pass mark that Spring term was only 50%. Students were asked to pass all but one of their tests. A few weeks later, we celebrated 100 students who had managed to recall the key knowledge they had been taught with party hats and pizza.

The term after we repeated the process. News of the knowledge party had spread. We raised the pass mark to 65%. 200 students attended the celebration on the green. The ice cream van paid students a visit to reward them for their hard work. A culture of achievement was beginning to embed.

September 2025. The pass mark 80%. Students were allocated onto three pathways: Alpha, Beta and Gamma with students given scaffolded amounts of knowledge to retain depending on their starting point. Students could move themselves up but not down.

250 HSAEL students attended the celebration in the hall. Doing your homework, passing the tests and being congratulated for your hard work became the norm. Students were more engaged and focussed in lessons now that they knew their lessons had purpose; the knowledge was important, their teachers there to help and support them to develop their understanding of the world around them.

January 2025. Almost every single HSAEL student came back to the academy in January with an exercise book full of LCWC homework. A very small minority of students were supported on the first morning to complete this work.

Students began testing and, as usual, were allowed to re-take the test if they failed. Scores were posted on the cobbles before the ‘Re-test Centre’ opened after school for one week straight. Students took ownership of their work by seeing which tests they had not yet secured 80% in and visited the centre staffed by our wonderful Middle Leaders who supported them to achieve 80. Students hugged and jumped up and down when they achieved 100%. Students felt a sense of mission. Teachers and students high-fived and fist-bumped as scores of passed tests were inputted into our system.

On Monday 3rd of February, 83% of our academy who achieved 80%+ in all but one of their subjects will be treated to the best Knowledge Celebration to date, a whole school trip to the cinema.

The students who have still not met this bar will be kept on site and supported by some of our most experienced teachers to make sure they do not fall behind. Students who stay at our academy will be allowed to go home early once they have passed the tests, worked with teachers on their study habits and reflected on why they did not manage to get to the cinema this time. They will be empowered to get their next time.

These students most importantly need to know we believe in them and the importance of their education so that every child can become a leader in their chosen field.