ASKING Year 5 pupils mind-expanding questions, such as: 'How do we know the earth is a sphere, or the person next to us is alive?' can boost their knowledge and understanding of science.

This is according to the results of a new evaluation report of Thinking, Doing, Talking Science published by the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) on Friday.

Pupils participating in the trial saw their science scores increase by three additional months and the positive effects of the programme look to be particularly pronounced for disadvantaged students. Attitudes towards science improved too with half of pupils reporting they found science lessons interesting, compared with 37 per cent of pupils who were not involved in the intervention.

Funded by the EEF and delivered by Science Oxford and Oxford Brookes University, the randomised controlled trial involved 1,500 Year 5 pupils across 42 schools in the UK and was independently conducted by the Institute for Effective Education at the University of York.

Over a year, the programme provides five professional development sessions to two teachers from each school. The training sessions help the teachers to deliver lessons that include more creative investigations and class discussions in order to develop their pupils’ higher order thinking.

Also published were the results of Improving Numeracy and Literacy, another EEF funded trial focused on effective teaching. This programme of teacher training and teaching materials is accompanied by a series of computer games designed to help engage the pupils with their learning. It focuses on promoting children’s mathematical reasoning and the EEF evaluation found it to have a positive impact on primary pupils’ numeracy skills, with their attainment in this area improved by three months.

These new results are from two of 10 evaluation reports published by the EEF. All the results will be used to inform the organisation's Teaching and Learning Toolkit, a resource used by nearly half of all school leaders.