Headteachers in poorer schools that adopted a “narrow” curriculum to help with education recovery following school closures “tended to regret that pupils were missing out” and feared staff were becoming “deskilled”, research reveals.

In a new report from the National Foundation for Educational Research based on interviews with 50 mainstream primary and secondary school leaders, mostly working in areas of deprivation, some leaders reported using a “narrow” approach to education recovery when pupils returned to school following three national Covid lockdowns.

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Under this approach, literacy and numeracy was prioritised, with some subjects or enrichment activities reduced. It was used commonly in primary schools and was moderately common in secondary schools.

Schools adopting a “narrow” strategy either removed a small number of foundation subjects from the curriculum - most commonly arts subjects, modern foreign languages and design and technology - or “reduced time across all foundation subjects by teaching them in rotation/reducing lesson time”.

Covid catch-up: The impact of schools narrowing the curriculum

In secondary schools, narrowing the curriculum was usually restricted to key stage 3 classes that were not studying exam syllabuses.

Most senior leaders said that their schools had modified the curriculum to help pupils recover lost learning.

Schools followed four models:

• Narrow (prioritising literacy and numeracy over other subjects such as arts and languages).
• Focused (prioritising core content within subjects).
• Blended (supporting numeracy and literacy through other subjects).
• Continuous (covering planned content over a longer period of time).

The report says that senior leaders whose schools adopted a “narrow” curriculum “tended to regret that pupils were missing out and have concerns about staff becoming deskilled”.

“Some leaders noted that the reason for giving more time to numeracy and literacy was to ensure they met external accountability measures,” it adds.

It says that a “minority chose to narrow their curriculum to focus on core subjects at the expense of the wider curriculum” and that “school leaders rarely found this choice desirable, but often saw it as a necessary short-term response, driven by accountability concerns”.

“The Department for Education and Ofsted will wish to reflect on whether the balance of incentives created by national assessments and the Ofsted inspection framework are creating the right environment to enable schools to deliver the best recovery approaches for their pupils,” it adds.

One primary school leader said: “There are definitely gaps there which for some children will be life-changing… that might have been the beginning of their musical journey… There are significant gaps but not necessarily the ones that are measured by external agencies.”

Several school leaders commented that pupils were not making as rapid progress as expected because of a lack of engagement, while teachers also “suffered from the demands of a restricted curriculum focused on literacy and numeracy”.

Senior leaders whose schools had narrowed the curriculum were most likely to report teacher fatigue or workload concerns.

“In particular, less experienced teachers were said to have reduced opportunities to acquire wider subject knowledge and pedagogical experience, which was demotivating and counter-productive to their development,” the report adds.

It says that a small minority of schools (mainly primaries) had also increased the amount of time spent on the core curriculum by extending school hours, using catch-up funding to pay teachers or extra staff. 

The study also found that most leaders felt that in-school social distancing was “detrimental” to teaching and learning, with the two-metre teacher-pupil distance rule in secondary schools, for example, restricting teachers’ ability to use differentiation strategies or give timely individual feedback to pupils.

Caroline Sharp, research director at the NFER, and co-author of the report, said: “Our report shows the continuing impact of the pandemic on mainstream schools serving deprived communities, and its adverse effect on pupils’ wellbeing, learning and transition across all age groups.

“Schools are doing all they can to support their pupils, whose education and welfare has been so severely disrupted by Covid-19.

“Most are modifying the curriculum to help pupils recover missed learning, and simultaneously make progress. More research is needed to understand the implications of the various curriculum modification models identified in this research.”

Ofsted and the DfE have been contacted for comment.