Video · Teachers Media
Reflecting on outstanding teaching
What do we mean when we call teaching "outstanding" — and how useful is the word? The Ofsted judgement of that name has come and gone; the underlying question of what makes teaching genuinely good is still worth taking seriously.
About this video
The Ofsted "outstanding" grade for teaching, learning and assessment was retired in 2019, and the broader "outstanding" grade for schools was retired in 2024. Both were retired for good reasons: the label was doing more harm than help, encouraging performance for observation rather than sustained development, and giving parents a simplified signal that concealed as much as it revealed. What remains is a more grown-up question: what do teachers who are consistently effective actually do?
The research consensus, drawing on syntheses like Coe et al.'s "What Makes Great Teaching?" (2014), Rosenshine's Principles, and the EEF's guidance reports, points to a small set of things that reliably matter. Deep subject knowledge that lets the teacher anticipate misconceptions. Clear communication that pupils can follow. High expectations backed by scaffolded challenge. A classroom climate where mistakes are treated as information. Systematic use of formative assessment. Deliberate practice with feedback.
What doesn't show up in the research as strongly as popular discourse suggests: the flashy lesson observation, the "engagement" that's more about entertainment than learning, the presence or absence of specific techniques (learning styles, group work, differentiation-by-worksheet). What matters is not the ritual of teaching but the substance of what pupils are asked to think about and how deeply they think about it.
What the research consistently associates with effective teaching
- Deep pedagogical content knowledge. Not just knowing the subject but knowing how pupils learn it and where they get stuck.
- Clear, well-modelled explanations. Worked examples, careful analogies, deliberate sequencing.
- High-quality questioning. Questions that probe thinking, not just check recall.
- Systematic formative assessment. Evidence of pupil thinking, used to adjust the next move.
- Explicit and demanding practice. Purposeful, sustained work on the specific things pupils need to get better at.
- A climate of high expectations. Pupils believe they can succeed, teachers believe it too, and behaviour supports work.
Discussion prompts
- When you think of a teacher whose lessons you'd put your own child in — what specifically are they doing that's different?
- How much of what your school calls "outstanding practice" is really about performance, and how much is about sustained quality?
- What has changed for the better since the "outstanding" grade for teaching was retired? What, if anything, has got worse?
Try this in your classroom
- Read Coe et al.'s "What Makes Great Teaching?" summary. Compare its list to your school's teaching-and-learning framework. What's missing? What's over-emphasised?
- Ask a trusted colleague to observe one lesson and give you feedback on your explanations specifically — not classroom management, not pace, just how clearly your ideas landed.
- Pick one aspect of your teaching to work on deliberately for a term. Not five things — one. Notice how much easier sustained development is when it's narrow.