Lavish praise for students is among seven popular teaching practices not supported by evidence, according to a new Sutton Trust report which reviews over 200 pieces of research on how to develop great teachers.

What Makes Great Teaching, by Professor Rob Coe and colleagues at Durham University, warns that many common practices can be harmful to learning and have no grounding in research. Examples include using praise lavishly, allowing learners to discover key ideas by themselves, grouping students by ability and presenting information to students based on their “preferred learning style”.

On the other hand, some other teaching approaches are supported by good evidence of their effectiveness. Many of these are obvious and widely practiced, but others are at odds with common assumptions. Examples include: challenging students to identify the reason why an activity is taking place in the lesson; asking a large number of questions and checking the responses of all students; spacing-out study or practice on a given topic, with gaps in between for forgetting; and making students take tests or generate answers, even before they have been taught the material.

Previous Sutton Trust research shows that the quality of teaching is by far the biggest factor within schools that impacts on the achievement of children from poorer backgrounds. It found that over a school year, poorer pupils gain 1.5 years’ worth of learning with very effective teachers, compared with 0.5 years with poorly performing teachers. In other words, a great teacher can produce a whole year’s extra learning.

In future BLOGS HH Education Events will share examples of how some common used teaching strategies are ineffective and how teacher candidates react to them. More to come on this topic. Let’s help to make all teachers master teachers—for the students.