Really Raising Standards: Cognitive intervention and academic achievement

Really Raising Standards explores the psychological theory underlying methods of intervention in cognitive development. The authors, Philip Adey and Michael Shayer, show how the practical expression of such methods can lead to long-term gains in academic achievement in ordinary school populations. Within a discussion of various attempts to teach thinking’, the design, delivery and results of the Cognitive Acceleration through Science Education (CASE) project are described. Other programmes such as Feuerstein’s Instrumental Enrichment are also described to abstract the features of successful intervention programmes. The key implications for teaching methods, for the nature of the curriculum, for teacher education, and for educational policy at school, local and national levels are also discussed. Having established the distinction between intervention and instruction, the authors show how a population, and the learning demands made on it, can be described in terms of levels of cognitive development. The emphasis then turns to how the current profile of thinking in schools can be changed through constructivist and metacognitive strategies. The CASE project provides a practical example of how this can be done. Really Raising Standards also takes a new look at the problem of inservice teacher education for real change in schools.