Building essential skills in subject lessons through effective professional development

Working with educators in 25 regions across the globe, we are privileged to witness examples of effective teaching in a wide range of contexts.

A model for positive impact

DLF Public School, in Delhi, India is just one example of a school that is delivering a strong impact for both learners and teaching staff through their essential skills programme.

With support from the Skills Builder Partnership via the Accelerator+ programme, DLF Public School aims to prepare their learners for success in all aspects of their lives - this means going beyond traditional books and classroom experiences to give learners an opportunity to build the essential skills they need to succeed.

A structured approach

To support this aim, teachers have adopted an approach that uses steps from the Universal Framework to structure subject lessons and objectively measure essential skills like Creativity and Teamwork.

Every subject lesson across the school includes a section dedicated to essential skill development. Ensuring explicit teaching of essential skill step strategies that support the subject’s wider objectives. This approach has significantly improved outcomes for students at all stages across the curriculum, in both subject and essential skill attainment.

Supported by professional development

The impact of this approach has been underpinned by a comprehensive programme of CPD (continuous professional development) for staff. For example, this year teachers at DLF attended a Skills Builder training session that showcased examples of effective skill integration in classrooms from across the school.

Subject teachers demonstrated how they integrated targeted skill steps from the Creativity, Teamwork and Staying Positive Universal Frameworks into their subject areas. From a social science topic on water conservation to a STEM project based on the Mars Rover, the training session showcased students’ opportunities to build their essential skills in a range of different subjects.

Training sessions like this ensure that all teachers benefit from clear, practical examples that they can use in their own classrooms. This leaves teachers feeling inspired by the ease, relevance and the benefit of teaching essential skills in their own subjects.

This type of training is a great example of how to raise the profile of essential skills and provide teachers with the resources, training, support and motivation that they need to include essential skills in their own pedagogy.

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