The study of 31 schools, entitled Workforce reform in schools: has it made a difference?, found that the quality of the support offered by the wider schools workforce, which includes roles such as teaching assistants and welfare staff, depended on teachers' ability to manage them properly.
Inspectors visited 16 primary schools, 14 secondary schools and one nursery school.
Only three of the schools knew about the Training and Development Agency's (TDA) career development framework for the wider workforce. This was said to have delayed the development of school support staff as a fully-trained professional body.
When looking at the role of teaching assistants, Ofsted concluded that support was most effective when teaching assistants were well-trained, knew what was expected of them, were aware of pupils' targets and were confident about assessing pupils' progress.
Support was not effective, however, when teachers became over-reliant on teaching assistants or made demands that were beyond the capabilities of these staff. In nearly all of the sessions of general support observed during the survey, teaching assistants worked with lower-attaining pupils or those most likely to disrupt the lesson. As a result, these pupils spent considerably less time than other pupils being taught by a qualified teacher.
A report published by the Institute of Education last year also found that teaching assistants spent most time with the children needing the most help, which meant that these pupils spent less time being taught by their teacher. The report concluded that the more support pupils received from teaching assistants, the less progress they actually made (Analysis, 16 September 2009).
Dave Prentis, general secretary of public sector union Unison, said, 'It is important that the systematic failure in many schools to train and support the wider workforce should be tackled urgently, alongside serious problems with pay. This should be seen as a priority for the Government and for employers if we are to even out inequalities across the workforce.'
Further information: www.ofsted.gov.uk
