NEW CURRICULUM ASSESSMENT

GOODBYE TO LEVELS! Levels will cease to exist after the end of this current academic year. Year 2 and 6 pupils will be given levels for reading, writing, maths, science and SPAG in Term Children in other year groups are now being assessed against the new programmes of study.

WHAT DO SCHOOLS DO NOW? Schools are now able to choose their own ways of tracking the progress of pupils in years 1, 3, 4 and 5. The government target for the end of Year 6 is 85% of children being ‘Secondary Ready’.

WHAT ARE ‘PROGRAMMES OF STUDY’? These are the objectives which children have to be taught in each subject. The new National Curriculum sets out these objectives into the year groups in which they should be taught. Theoretically, if a child fully understands all of the objectives laid out throughout Key Stages 1 & 2, they should meet the ‘Secondary Ready’ standard.

HOW DO ST MARY’S TRACK ACHIEVEMENT AND PROGRESS FOR EACH CHILD? In their reports, your child has been assessed for Reading, Writing and Maths using the terms: working below Programmes of Study, low entering, high entering, low developing, high developing, secure or exceeding At this stage in the year, the children are expected to be either low entering or high entering.

In order to decide upon these judgements, the teachers have carried out numerous assessments against the Programmes of Study. Each child will have been assessed against each of these Programmes of Study. For some they may have been ‘developing’, for others ‘entering’ and some objectives won’t have been taught at all as yet, so early in the year. A ‘best-fit’ judgement has then been made.

HIGHER ABILITY CHILDREN The guidelines for schools are now very clear in the fact that children should not be taught the objectives beyond their year group. If a child achieved an ‘above average’ level at the end of last year, this does not mean that they will necessarily be already secure in the Programmes of Study for their current year group.

CHILDREN WORKING BELOW PROGRAMMES OF STUDY If your child has been assessed as working below the Programmes of Study for their year group, this could mean that they are still working on P Levels of that they are still plugging gaps from the previous year group. Some of the objectives have been moved down to previous year groups leaving gaps in some children’s knowledge. All children working below what is expected are monitored by the SLT and SENCO.

Any questions?