As GCSE courses are moving away from coursework and tested on exams, it is more important than ever that students know how to work effectively by themselves; knowing how to learn and revise successfully and use a range of tools to help them.
Annually, each Year Group takes part in Independent Learning days. During these days, the students practise the skills of independent learning and learn about some of the barriers to independent learning that they need to overcome.
An example of one of these days was to solve a murder! The students were given a task in groups and had to work together to solve puzzles, work out clues and piece all of the information together in order to solve the crime.
Alongside the benefits of learning through working together, each of the suspects represented a barrier to learning; laziness, disorganisation, reliance on others and spending too much time planning and not enough time actually doing. Students completed an evaluation which allowed them to think about their own learning and how they could become a more effective independent learner.