Next Practice in Communities for Learning - Pupils and students

Identifying, developing and maximising the skills of pupils and students to enhance learning

In recent times students have been described as a great 'unutilised resource' in education. This in itself is an acknowledgement of the fact that peers can and do learn from each other, and be their source of advice, guidance and support. In many schools in the UK today, students are learning to learn from their peers, through peer mentoring and tutoring (buddy) schemes, through e-mentoring, cross-age learning, and the informal sharing of ideas, skills and resources through social networking via the Internet.

Students who step into the role of 'teacher' for their peers, for example within PAL (peer assisted learning) schemes, which have been hugely successful in the US, find their depth of understanding of subject content and methods is greatly enhanced. In addition, skills of planning, communication, establishment and management of relationships are improved. Those involved in cross-age learning, where older students help younger ones in reading, writing and other subject areas, help engender a school culture of respect, responsibility and focus on learning.

As students increasingly move away from being passive recipients of education to being co-designers of their learning experience, the skills and identities of teachers are also changing. The extent to which the teaching workforce can innovate to reconceive its role in relation to these developments in student learning, for example supporting the training of student tutors, reorganising traditional school structures and hierarchies, overseeing the quality of the peer instruction, managing parents' cautiousness, is at the heart of this Next Practice project. 

Field trial sites

Armathwaite School
Chalvedon School and Sixth Form College
Creative Partnerships in Sunderland
The Nowhere Foundation
The Young Foundation

Horizon scanning

This report explores ways in which pupils and students themselves learn while supporting the learning of others. It profiles peer mentoring, peer tutoring and peer assisted learning models and schemes in schools and FE/HE institutions (in this country and internationally). It also looks at current, cutting edge practice in beyond school contexts and considers what we can learn from the learning models used in youth activities like Scouts and NGO youth organisations like Advocates for Youth, as well as from the more informal ways young people are sharing of ideas, skills and resources through the Internet (and sites like MySpace).

Pupils and students

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