Active in-class learning and learning success for all (evaluation ALLE)

Educational research has shown that all pupils benefit greatly from high-quality teaching and lessons designed to facilitate effective learning.

The ALLE project, which has been set up on a longitudinal basis, aims to further improve teaching quality and thus help students achieve greater learning success through a variety of teaching-related measures (e.g. lesson reflection sessions among colleagues using EMU and advisory services and training programmes). As commissioned by the Department of Education of the canton of Zurich, the project also examines and evaluates the effects of the measures on teaching quality and students' achievement in German and mathematics.

Institutes	Institute for Educational Assessment Institute of Research on Teaching Profession and on Development of Competencies
Heads	Professor Christian Brühwiler Professor Jan Hochweber
Team	Ann Christin Hochweber Dimitra Kolovou Nevil Knöpfli Hong Giang Pham
Duration	1 April 2016 to 31 March 2020
Financing	Department of Education of the canton of Zurich

Detailed project description

Central to evaluating the ALLE project is a comparison of the results of competency tests in German and mathematics of around 40 classes from the nine schools at which the pilot project is being implemented, and of a similarly sized comparison group. Based on a model for lessons conducive to learning (lernwirksamer Unterricht, Helmke and Wolf, 2014), the evaluation process establishes to what degree the ALLE project leads to an increase in lesson quality. It also looks at how some of the more central teaching-related measures (e.g. lesson reflection sessions among colleagues using EMU, using teaching assistants in the classroom, using homework-assistance, further training/advisory/coaching measures, using specific learning goals for academically weaker students) are implemented by the schools.
Monitoring how students’ achievement develops is key to the evaluation process. This is why students’ individual levels in German and mathematics are assessed at four separate time points, that is, at the beginning of grade 7 and at the end of grades 7, 8 and 9. For this, the ALLE findings are combined with the results of the Stellwerk tests. Questionnaires and interviews are also used in order to determine additional important information.