Lee Shu Shing

In many countries and regions, education authorities have shown interests in promoting new education initiatives or innovations. With the hefty investments, they are keen to see that their initiatives are well received by the various stakeholders, namely, national leaders, district-level leaders, school leaders, teachers, students and their parents, and can be successfully scaled and improve learning. However, are the perspectives and expectations of policymakers and practitioners with regard to education innovations and their scaling necessarily the same as those of the researchers? Some of these stakeholders may expect a linear model of scaling, i.e. innovations can be translated into ready intervention packages which can be replicated mechanically by all the practitioners and consequently uplifting learning outcomes within the nation. Others may expect extensive adaptation to be allowed for any education innovations accepted for scaling. This chapter describes an eco-logical model for scaling that allows for a productive tension due to the differences in stakeholder perspectives. Based on scaling practices and considerations that operate in Singapore, the lessons about how scaling can be advanced at the systems level, which may be relevant for school districts, regions or countries similar in size to Singapore, are drawn. The paper also attempts to distil underlying scaling principles that can provide some directions to help analyse or shape scaling strategies across a hierarchy of much larger scale levels.

The 21st century is an era of changes. Professional Development (PD) and teacher learning are critical. The Ministry of Education (MOE) recognises the importance of PD and introduced the Teacher Growth Model (TGM) in 2012. In line with TGM, there are efforts to promote teacher inquiry in communities. Teacher Inquiry (TI) is a systematic study of one’s teaching practice. Literature suggests that collaborative inquiry in communities promotes teacher learning and change in practice, which in turn, contributes to school improvement and effectiveness. Thus, it is useful to document how Singapore schools engage in self-improvement where teachers inquire critically by examining their assumptions about pedagogies and student learning to develop professionalism and change practices.

In 2011, the Ministry of Education (MOE) embarked on a study of five Integrated Programme (IP) schools, and sought to find out how the IP had enabled students to achieve the intended outcomes as well as the unique characteristics of IP students. Since the study was done seven years after the IP was incepted and there was no comparison group of students in the same school that had gone through an O level programme (OP), it was difficult to attribute the outcomes to the IP. It is possible that the outcomes could be due to the quality of that IP intake or it might be that the outcomes had already been achieved in those schools prior to the IP. Since 2013, more schools have started to offer IP. This study involved four of the new schools, namely: Pawai School (PS), Istana School (IS), Marina School (MS), and Sentosa School (SS). Besides the IP, these schools also offer the O level Programme, and OP students were included as a comparison group. A fifth school, Ujong Junior College (UJC), also participated in the study as it receives students from three of the schools after Year 4.

The Ministry of Education (MOE) recognises the importance of teachers’ professional development (PD) by introducing the Teacher Growth Model (TGM). In line with TGM, our case study, Stanley School, adopts a 5 stage, school-based PD cycle. This study is situated in the third iteration of this PD cycle, focused on differentiated instruction (DI). The key components of DI are the develop students’ critical and creative thinking which relates to students’ 21st century competencies. This study aims to understand the intended conditions for professional growth and teachers’ perceptions of these conditions and ways in which PD informs enactment and sustenance of practice, as well as achieved outcomes of PD such as shifts in students’ learning and teachers’ readiness.