This document introduces the Structural Learning Toolkit, which provides teachers with resources to help students develop fundamental learning skills. It discusses several frameworks and strategies within the toolkit, including learning through talk, visuals, thinking critically, and connecting ideas. The toolkit is designed to equip children with academic skills and metacognitive approaches to learning. It discusses how the membership provides professional development support to help teachers implement engaging learning activities that build conceptual understanding and foster independent learning.

1. Learning Fundamentals
Preparing children for a lifetime of learning
A new teacher toolkit for designing and delivering
meaningful learning experiences
Learning through
talk
Learning with
visuals
Learning by
thinking critically
Learning by
connecting
structural-learning.com

2. Learning through
visuals
Learning to Learn
Learning through
building
Learning
through talk

3. “This unique way of thinking
about the curriculum makes the
process of learning more visible
across whole school
communities.”
How does this approach enhance comprehension and memory?
Planning
Learning
Facilitating
Learning
Assessing
Learning
The Structural Learning toolkit provides teachers with the resources they need to drive students forward in their learning. Acting as a vehicle for
deeper engagement, this metacognitive approach enables whole-school communities to build a shared vision of the fundamental principles of how we all
learn.
The frameworks and strategies are designed to equip children with the academic skills they need to become successful lifelong learners. Underpinned by
evidence-informed ideas, the fundamental principles are applicable to pupils of all ages and backgrounds.

4. The Structural Learning Toolkit
structural-learning.com
Planning sequences of learning that stimulate
student thinking and generate a greater depth of
understanding.
• Develop a well-rounded understanding of how the mind works.
• Untangle knotty classroom issues.
• Set children up for lifelong educational success.
Enabling your staff to foster fundamental
models of how children learn.
• Explain complex tasks in an accessible, direct way
• Equip children with a clear language for learning
• Provide practical steps toward educational success
• Encourage children to take ownership of their learning
• Promote a better understanding of curriculum content
• Provide greater access to complex classroom tasks
• Highlight the skills that enable children to behave
more effectively in educational settings
• Reward learners when they demonstrate progress
1. Understanding learning
Staff Professional Development
2. Facilitating learning 3. Reinforcing Learning Skills
Our membership offer provides schools with a complete approach for optimising curriculum engagement and advancing learning deeper
outcomes. The resources and strategies provide teachers with the tools they need to bring a greater level of challenge to classroom
activities. So how exactly can this family of learning tools make learning more memorable in your school?
Implementating engaging learning activities that
help build conceptual understanding.
Creating whole-school cultures of thinking and
learner independence.
Learning through Building
Learning through Talk Skills Framework
Learning through Visuals
Thinking Framework

5. What does the membership support look like?
The training that accompanies your learning toolkit includes a period of consultancy support for school leadership, followed by one launch workshop and 3/4 follow-
up sessions.
The training model can be delivered entirely online or using a blended approach incorporating face-to-face training. Depending on the size of the school and the
context of the project, the professional development can be cascaded through a small team or with the whole staff within small schools.
Through an open dialogue with your head or leadership team, we explore your school’s context and the purpose of your interest in adopting the learning
fundamentals. Collaboratively, we fine-tune the plan and discuss how to implement your new strategies. We also use this opportunity to introduce our action
research model and lesson design canvas.
Your membership gets you an annual supply of physical resources, access to digital resources and termly professional development support.
Whole Staff Launch [Half/full day]
An introduction to the practical applications of the learning fundamentals: Visual tools and thinking actions, using physical tools to build knowledge, classroom talk
for facilitating learning and reinforcing learning skills and behaviours. We usually schedule in the follow-up sessions once every half-term.
Block Building
Thinking Framework
Talking Toolkit
Graphic Organisers
Session 1 - Thinking framework [1 - 2 hour workshop]
Planning for deeper learning: How can we use this new framework to plan, facilitate and assess deeper learning?
Supported Gap task: Plan an activity using the framework and monitor how it helps your learners.
Session 2 - Visual Tools [1 - 2 hour workshop]
Learning through organising: How can we use visual tools for planning and consolidating knowledge?
Supported Gap task: Design an activity using a visual tool and monitor how it enhances learning outcomes.
Session 3 - Building Blocks [1 - 2 hour workshop]
Learning by connecting: How can we use the building blocks for facilitating critical and creative thinking?
Supported Gap task: Design a block-building task and monitor the impact it has on your learners.
Session 4 - Talking Toolkit [1 - 2 hour workshop]
Learning through talk: How does purposeful classroom discussion help children understand new ideas more effectively?
Supported Gap task: Incorporate a talking exercise into your lesson and observe how it helps your learners.

6. Advancing Comprehension
structural-learning.com
Block Building
Thinking Framework
Talking Toolkit
Graphic Organisers
Resource
Check conceptual understanding by asking
learners to complete a graphic organiser after
they have finished a non-fiction text. Useful
as a formative assessment tool.
Facilitate higher-order questioning to foster
deeper understanding.
Use the blocks to categorise information
and build background knowledge.
Strategy
Use a cause and effect graphic organiser to
explore why geographical and historical
events happened the way they did.
Utilise a mindmap to consolidate
understanding after finishing a unit of work.
Strategy Strategy
Using the Structural Learning resources for developing conceptual understanding
Decoding: Break words down to find
spelling patterns.
Enable learners to build meaning using the
blue organisational learning actions. These
actions require children to structure
information into organised schema.
Provide children with a choice of challenges
from the thinking framework.
Vertebrates Invertebrates
Sociability
Trust
Friendship Kindness
Forgiveness
Wisdom
Importance
Extract information from the text and then ask
learners to reason and rank the significance.
Use the talking toolkit to facilitate a debate
about an issue raised in the text. Use the ‘talk
tactics’ to encourage children to take on
different roles.
Discuss the meaning of adjectives.
Identify the main points from a text and
explain their connections.
More gases Higher Temp
Warmer
ocean
Sea level
rise
Causal
Weak
Strong
pleased
cheerful
ecstatic
blissful
Dis ful
respect
Un ness
happy

7. structural-learning.com
Block Building
Thinking Framework
Talking Toolkit
Graphic Organisers
Resource
Use a completed graphic organiser as a pre-
writing tool and ask learners to present their
thoughts verbally.
Breakdown a complex piece of writing into
manageable stages.
Cultivate creativity by prompting children to
look for conceptual connections between
the blocks.
Strategy
Encourage students to use a graphic
organiser for notetaking after a presentation
or visit.
Cluster students ideas using a visual tool to
help them formulate logical paragraphs.
Strategy Strategy
Using the Structural Learning resources for advancing language skills
Bring order to children's writing by
sequencing their ideas into logical
progressions.
Monkey Bus
Use the red learning actions to bring more
creativity to a piece of writing.
Encourage critical thinking by utilising the
yellow learning actions.
Help learners clarify their own thinking by
engaging peers in dialogic learning.
Facilitate classroom discussion and provoke
new ideas by asking students to take on
different talk roles.
Generate new ideas by building on each
other's thoughts.
Encourage ambitious vocabulary by showing
the grammatical structure of sentences.
Speedy football
Florence playing
is
Infiltration
Surface
Run-off
Precipitation
over land
Writing Preparation

8. The Structural Learning Toolkit is designed to help children understand how we think and learn. As the resources begin to be adopted across your
school, you will notice children engaging more deeply in their learning. With repeated exposure and enough practice, pupils gradually take more
strategic decisions over their learning. This exciting shift in mindset sets a child on a pathway of classroom independence and a journey of fulfilling
lifelong learning. The following statements can be used to monitor the wider educational outcomes of your learners.
Knowledge is not passively received and absorbed but actively built up by the individual. J. Watson
Becoming an independent learner
What does progression look like?
Independent Thinking
Metacognition
Strategy Planning
and
problem-solving
Reflection and
Self Regulation
I am aware of some of
the thinking actions
and strategies
available to me.
I am able to name and
talk about the function
of a significant amount
of thinking actions
available to me.
I am able to select
appropriate actions and
strategies to complete a
task.
I am able to evaluate
the range of possible
actions and strategies
available to me and
select the most
appropriate ones.
I am able to use the full
range of thinking actions
fluently and am able to
combine them into
effective sequences.
I can understand it is
possible and necessary
to select varying
approaches to
complete different
tasks.
I am aware of the
strategies, tools and
thinking actions available
to me. I am aware that
complex tasks can be
broken down into stages.
I can sequence
appropriate actions to
complete a task. I am
able to choose
appropriate methods to
complete complex
activities.
I am fully able to
justify my reasoning
for choosing my
strategies.
I can work
independently,
choosing and evaluating
the appropriate ways to
complete a task.
I am comfortable
knowing that I won’t
get everything right the
first time.
I sometimes know what
went well and what
didn’t. I am comfortable
selecting ways of
improving my work.
I can understand when I
need to change a
strategy and I am
comfortable choosing
alternative approaches.
I can evaluate the
effectiveness of the
various approaches,
stages and tools that
I undertook.
Refining and improving
my work has become a
habit. I understand
that I can get better at
most things with
practice.

9. School membership Classroom Tools Professional Development
Membership £4 per pupil
This includes a whole staff induction and
an annual professional learning project.
Writer’s Block £199
Ream of ‘printable’ card inserts for the
blocks £25
Staff set of durable framework cards £10
Staff meeting £150
A great way to explore these new
ideas and takeaway some new
perspectives.
Staff workshop £350
A half-day session digging deeper
into cognitiion and learning.
Full training day £600
A whole-staff session of
facilitated activities.
Research into practice program
(4 x sessions) £1400
A longer term action research
project putting theory into
practice.
The membership provides every member of
staff with access to all the digital resources
and an annual supply of physical resources.
Additional classroom resources to get
everyone thinking:
How can we work together?
We provide a range of options for developing school-wide independent learning and metacognition. Whether you are addressing a whole-
school agenda or supporting a small cohort of learners, we can help you create the positive changes you need to make. Most schools
complement their thinking tools with a variety of training options. The options below will help you plan your learning journey.
Just need staff training on the fundamental
principles of learning?
Choose from the following options.

10. structural-learning.com
We improve educational outcomes by enabling children to think their way through any challenge they encounter in
school and beyond. We provide tools and strategies that help pupils develop into active, confident learners who can
successfully engage with the curriculum and society.