There is continuous assessment and recording of children’s individual progress throughout the year by their teachers, this ensures that children are being supported and extended according to their needs.
As you may already be aware, there have been significant national changes made to both the curriculum and assessment across all key stages. The changes started in September 2014 with the introduction of a New National Curriculum for Key Stages 1, 2 and 3, and will continue until the final wave of new specifications at A Level are ready to be assessed in the summer of 2019.
These national changes have required all schools to review their own internal assessment, tracking and reporting systems in order to best meet the needs of their own students. Consequently, we have worked hard to develop a bespoke assessment and reporting system for our pupils. We have considered the greater demands of the new curriculum together with the idea of increasing breadth and depth within age related expectations. We are now using 'age related expectations' (ARE) as the old levels no longer match the new curriculum. We assess pupils as to whether they are: below, working towards, at expectations or deepening within the age related expectations.
Some parents have commented that using age related expectations seems less precise than the old level system, however the focus of our assessment has also become much more about each pupil's achievement and next step. Teachers in the classroom are now able to concentrate more on what their pupils can do, whether they can deepen or extend their knowledge in that context or what they need to do to address any misconceptions. This puts the emphasis back on the pupils' learning rather than jumping through hoops to get a particular grade.
We track each individual pupil to ensure progress and achievement. Formal national assessments in reading, spelling, punctuation and grammar and maths (SpaG) take place for year 6 in the second week of May (SATs week) so it is important all year 6 pupils are in school for this week.
Records of children’s attainment are also kept and updated regularly. Pupil progress is carefully looked at to ensure all pupils are being helped and encourage to do the best that they can.
Reports of children’s progress will be given at our Parental Consultation Evenings (Autumn and Spring terms) and annually in a written report.
