In this blog, Head of Vocational Studies, Rebecca Baker, considers three important questions when helping Health and Social Care students to prepare for their assessments:
- What is the Crucial Knowledge in Health and Social Care?
- What fundamental knowledge do students need to know in order to be successful?
- How can we plan effective recap activities?
What is Crucial Knowledge?
Crucial Knowledge is the most important knowledge that students need in order to build further understanding and develop skills as they progress through their studies.
To establish our Crucial Knowledge, we began by identifying ten of the most important pieces of knowledge students need to know from each unit of the course. These became the Crucial Knowledge statements which we refer to in every lesson and recap regularly. For example, when covering communication, students need to know about different verbal communication skills. We identified that the Crucial Knowledge was to know what verbal communication actually means…and so we developed the basic Crucial Knowledge statement:
“Verbal communication is the use of spoken words to deliver a message to a service user”.
This statement can then be developed by identifying verbal communication skills such as tone, explaining how and why tone is used and the associated benefits.
Developing Crucial Knowledge
As we have progressed, we have established the need for layers of Crucial Knowledge to scaffold learning. Because of this, we have developed these levels of Crucial Knowledge:
Knowing how to promote this to the students is key; this is something that should be at the forefront of students’ learning.
In Health and Social Care, students use our online platform of Microsoft Teams and Microsoft OneNote. Each student has a Crucial Knowledge section in their OneNote class notebook. This allows the students to access all of the materials for the course. The information is organised in sections, so that the students can navigate their way through the information independently. Additionally, the Crucial Knowledge can be referred to throughout lessons and when completing Non-Exam Assessments (NEA).
Our Year 9 students now begin an introduction to the course that purely focuses on the Crucial Knowledge they need to know from each unit. We then progress this to develop their application skills through being exposed to sample assessment tasks
The key message of our Crucial Knowledge-based learning is: “know more, remember more, understand it and apply it”.
An example of how OneNote is used for students’ class notebooks.
Planning for Recap of Crucial Knowledge
An important aspect in our drive on Crucial Knowledge is to plan for regular recap. This is important as we need to ensure that students regularly re-visit it, even after topic areas have been covered. We incorporate recap into our curriculum plan by picking out relevant synoptic links throughout the course. Once students’ knowledge of a topic is secure, we then introduce new information. This layering of Crucial Knowledge builds students’ understanding and confidence in the subject, as they are able to make connections between the topics we have taught.
Delivering Recap
To reinforce and deepen students knowledge its important to recap and revisit topics.
There are a number of ways we recap in Health and Social Care:
- Create weekly recap quizzes using Microsoft Forms
- Use of online programs such as Blooket and Kahoot, both in and out of lesson
- Five-minute recap starters at the beginning of each lesson
- Recap assessments
- Recap focus lessons or weeks
Much of our inspiration for five-minute recap starters come from @KateJones_Teach, who has published a number of retrieval practice books. We have adapted a range of the templates from her books so that they are appropriate for our subject. They are then distributed on a OneNote page for students to complete in their class notebook.
Ensuring Recap is Meaningful
Recap must be meaningful. By embedding it into the curriculum and reviewing it regularly the students’ knowledge and misconceptions are identified. As a department, we evaluate this weekly and adapt our lesson planning to address any gaps or misconceptions with individual groups. We use the information provided by our weekly evaluations to adjust our curriculum and the long-term delivery of the subject.
In vocational subjects, such as Health and Social Care, recap has been invaluable during Non-Exam Assessment (NEA). Our recap specifically focuses on Crucial Knowledge and its application to prepare students for the requirements of their assessment. Spending five minutes of each lesson focused on the Crucial Knowledge needed in their NEA gives students confidence in their ability to approach assessment tasks.
Rebecca Baker is Head of Vocational Studies and Head of Year at Chesterton Community Sports College, Staffordshire. She is responsible for the Health and Social delivery since it was introduced as a KS4 option in 2015 and has since supported the introduction of other vocational subjects at the school. The continued growth of vocational subjects led to the role as Head of Vocational Studies in which she leads the delivery of both Health and Social Care and Child Development, along with the quality assurance of other OCR Cambridge National qualifications in school.