Using Tassomai to help close the attainment gap in my school
Faye Brodrick, Head of Science at Ysgol Maesydderwen Comprehensive School, Swansea, tells us how she uses Tassomai to incentivise her lower attaining students.
Here at Maesydderwen we have a number of disadvantaged students; in terms of self-motivation, financial or COVID impacted. We see ourselves as the extra parental support that some pupils need during the school day, providing emotional and educational support.
About 4 years ago we began using Tassomai for targeted interventions with the Year 10 and 11 students we found to be struggling the most in Science. My strategy has been to only use Tassomai as an intervention strategy with these students, rather than rolling it out across the whole school, partially to keep costs down but also to make them feel chosen and ‘in the loop’ about our secret club, Tassomai.
This method has worked well for us over the last few years, and we keep the students using our Tassomai slots on rotation, based on how well they are doing in their science classes. It also means that the whole Science department regularly sits down together to work out which students are struggling, which ensures that all their teachers know to give them that little bit of extra support.
Secret Tassomai club
I often joke to my selected students that Tassomai is like Fight Club, the first rule of Tassomai is: don’t talk about it! There will be times at the start or end of a class where most students will be set a short task to help access previous knowledge and our Tassomai students will be allowed to login for their daily goal during this time instead - this makes other students envious of the few who are allowed on their phones during lesson times and gives the whole thing an air of mystery.
Occasionally students who ask their friends about Tassomai then approach me and ask to be given an account and even then I play along saying ‘there’s a very long waiting list’ or ‘a spot just opened up but it’s very exclusive’. It might seem like a small thing, but it helps to give it some glamour rather than feeling like a punishment for the students who are already lacking in confidence.
We’ve had great success with this method, with all our targeted students all going up a grade after being put on our Tassomai program.
Cognitive Load
One of my favourite things about Tassomai is how clean the interface is - it doesn’t give students too many distractions or overload them with sensory information. I’m fascinated by cognitive overload and how it impacts students these days when there is so much technology around them.
Our brains only take in a very small amount of the information they are bombarded with every second, so for students who already struggle in school or are easily distracted, having too much gamification can be a real negative. They become distracted, not engaged, by flashing images and lots of colours on a page - that’s why I think Tassomai has really hit the nail on the head by keeping its design simple and clean, so that the students focus on the job in hand.
Closing the attainment gap
Schools are places of social development and learning for pupils, and as educators we have a moral obligation to ensure that all pupils achieve their best. It is important to ensure that all learners are supplied with the very best tools and strategies to help them help themselves to achieve their very best. Tassomai helps to organise revision and present it in a way that reinforces long term learning, shifting content from working to long-term memory, where then hopefully it can be retained and retrieved as necessary.
Strategy
We hold a drop-in centre after school for year 10 and 11 students with an open-door policy, which gives them a short, sharp half an hour where they can do their Daily Goal but also talk to science teachers from all 3 specialisms. The school is in quite a disadvantaged area and there are many students who do not have access to a device or wifi at home so being able to have a time that they can use it in school is really helpful.
Tassomai have been very flexible with us, allowing our department to switch accounts around to suit our students’ needs best. This is very helpful in terms of managing costs and acting as a reinforcer of use – our policy is use it or lose it! You can’t force students to do the work, but this has been a good way of getting students into a positive learning space and encouraging them to take part. It has definitely worked better for us to use it on a reward basis rather than focusing on punishment if you don’t complete it.
Building it into their routine
I’m always checking in on my Tassomai users throughout the week, asking when they’ve done their Daily Goal or what time they dedicate to it - is it in the dinner queue? Is it on the bus? It’s all about building that quick fix into their routine but the best part is it doesn’t take up much time. Completing 10 minutes a day for their Daily Goal is so accessible and simple to do, for ALL students.
One of Tassomai’s biggest selling points is that it is so flexible in this way. As a parent myself, I’m always keen to see what progress my daughter is making, so the fact that parents get updates on how their child is doing through the school is a great feature.
We’ve tried to streamline the process as much as possible, so I now have a presentation ready to go that I send to new students, which explains everything they need to know about getting their accounts set up. This means it takes minimal time and effort for teachers in the catchup sessions but maximises its impact in getting the students up and running quickly.
New features after teacher feedback
Tassomai have just released a new subtopic feature, allowing us to pause topics and subtopics that students haven’t covered yet. This has been a real help as it lets lower achieving students build their confidence more easily as we can limit how much of the content they are seeing and stop them from feeling overwhelmed by topics they don’t know.
As Head of Science, I can look at an overview of our different classes and subjects, which is a great way to see where a class is and whether there are any general trends across year groups. We use this tool to identify areas where students may have some misconceptions surrounding a topic, which may be causing them to stumble on certain topics.
We have a great relationship with the Tassomai team and love all the additional resources that are available on their website and the Teacher Dashboard that explain how and why it really works.
The best thing for me is that the students are going back and reviewing where they have gone wrong, which helps them to take responsibility for their own learning and makes them more independent. Once our target students have learnt these skills and their confidence has grown, we see big improvements in their learning and grades thanks to Tassomai.