Ofsted (the Office for Standards in Education) has published its first report in ages into Computing as a subject. I've summarised the findings, and added some links and comments on my own in italics. 

I suggest using the report as a yardstick by which to measure the state of Computing in your own school. Are the good practices suggested in the report in evidence where you work? (Although I think a good question to ask is: are they invariably good? I don't agree with all of it.) Are the shortfalls to be seen in your school as well?

This is a longish article I'm afraid, but I hope you find it useful.

Ofsted report into Computing: Key points

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/research-review-series-computing/research-review-series-computing

Reception and primary

• Several studies have demonstrated that young pupils are able to wrestle successfully with the core concepts of computing, including more technical subject content such as programming and robotics.

• However, it is important that children experience teaching informed by expertise.

• The main obstacle to teaching computing faced by teachers is a lack of technical subject knowledge.

Secondary

• A recent report using government census data showed that the amount of curriculum time allocated to computing in key stage 3 fell from an hour to just over 45 minutes between 2012 and 2017.

• The same report suggested that pupils in key stage 4 who are not studying a computing qualification receive little timetabled computing education.

• Although access to computing education is improving for most pupils, there are still inequities in provision.

• There has been a rapid increase in the number of pupils studying computing GCSE qualifications.

• A-level computing has also seen a sharp increase in the number of entries, though not as much as in other subjects.

Gender

• The gender imbalance is significantly higher in the new subject of computing than it was in ICT. https://www.ictineducation.org/home-page/it-wasnt-me-wot-done-it-sir-the-depressing-state-of-computing-as-a-subject

Recruitment/workforce

• Teachers’ content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge are important factors in high-quality computing education. This is because this knowledge helps teachers decide, for example, what to teach, how to question students about it and how to deal with problems of misunderstanding. https://www.ictineducation.org/home-page/2013/11/28/5-reasons-schools-need-computing-teachers-with-expertise-in.html

• Not enough teachers with CS qualifications.

• The drop-out rate for teachers in ITT is higher in computing than in most other subjects. Why?

Curriculum

• Interesting views on what constitutes good computer education in different areas (such as computer science, information technology, digital literacy), and useful fleshing out of approaches.

Curriculum sequencing

• Hubwieser notes that it is important to consider how knowledge components or elements are sequenced when designing a curriculum and that ‘knowledge determines the substantial and logical structure of the teaching process’. Frankly, I think the first part of this sentence is obvious, and the second part is not as self-evident as the dogmatic nature of the quotation would seem to suggest. In any case, what do statements like this mean for helping you decide the order of elements to be taught on a particular course?

Cross-curricular computing

• Some believe that elements of the computing curriculum, such as those relating to information technology and digital literacy, can be taught through other subjects. Well, as the report itself points out, this approach was largely unsuccessful when it came to ICT. In the few schools I came across that were doing it well, the ICT was well-resourced, copious CPD was available to teachers, and it wasn’t optional. In my experience also, and I seem to recall there was evidence to back this up, the ‘level’ of ICT was always lower than the level of the subject through which it was being taught. In my opinion, it’s a grand waste of time and effort. ICT and Computing can always be taught much better as a discrete subject in most contexts. Attempts at teaching ICT, English, Maths and Economic Literacy across the curriculum have all, in my opinion, been abject failures.

Pedagogy

• It is important to consider that elements of the subject content have an intrinsically high cognitive load.[footnote 113] That is to say, the subject content places great demands on a pupil’s short-term memory. In this section, we explore ways to manage this cognitive load and help pupils remember what is taught. Really? https://www.ictineducation.org/home-page/i-dont-agree-with-cognitive-load-theory-clt-heres-why

Assessment

• Rather pedestrian and obvious in my opinion. On my Assessing Computing courses I covered a wide variety of (successful) approaches that are not mentioned here. However, there is an interesting discussion of Concept Inventories (CIs).

Curriculum time

• The amount of curriculum time afforded to computing education is a significant concern within the sector.

• Reducing computing curriculum time also increases the workload of teachers, who must meet the same requirements of the curriculum in less time or provide a diminished curriculum. This has been a concern for a long time. As the report points out, if there is too little time allocated to computing the aims of the National Curriculum are unlikely to be achieved.

Other factors mentioned

• Adequate infrastructure.

• CPD.

• The support of senior leadership.

You may find it interesting to peruse an ICT subject report from Ofsted in 2001. Some findings are, depressingly, the same:

https://www.ictineducation.org...(1):_Annual_OFSTED_report