Assessment after Levels Dubai Lead Meet Rachael Edgar 24th February 2015 Assessment after Levels “Stealing hubcaps!”

Curriculum matters! Debate it! “Study fewer things in greater depth, so a deeper understanding of central concepts and ideas can be developed. Assessment should focus on that” Tim Oates Big ideas? Opportunity to debate curriculum. What are we teaching? assessing? before…. how we are assessing? Model KS3 on KS4. What are the big ideas? Knowledge v skills? Year Term Topic Core knowledge Core skills 7 1 2 3

( 9 Gifts!

Blocking V Interleaving The diagram above shows how traditional curriculums have been planned i.e. blocks of topics over the course of the year. As we learn more from neuroscience, we understand that if topics are not revisited over time, it becomes difficult to recall the information and this consequently does not make it to long term memory. So when designing the curriculum it would be worth considering an approach of ‘interleaving’ topics throughout the year i.e. coming back to them regularly.

Possible whole school assessment model- English Dept example

Developing Embedding Secure Confident +Excellence Possible whole school assessment model- History Dept example Threshold GCSE New Level GCSE current Generic marking criteria Level of learning Developing 1-3 3-4 D-G Limited conceptual understanding. Students are beginning to develop ideas but this is incoherent to the task. SURFACE Embedding 4-5 B-C Single idea. Recall and reproduction. Students are embedding their ideas and understanding, though this may be disconnected. Secure 6-7 5-6 A-B Many ideas. Can apply skills and concepts. Students are securing more knowledge and show an understanding of several key ideas DEEP Confident 7-8 A Can link and relate ideas. Uses strategies for thinking and reasoning. Students are confident within the topic and are able to link and integrate ideas which show a coherent understanding of the whole. +Excellence 8-9 7+ A* Can extend and apply ideas. Extended thinking. Students are excelling and going beyond their current line of study and are able to rethink their ideas and understanding and approach or apply in a new way. History lesson study What did we want to achieve? A KS3 assessment system which is.. Based on developing the key knowledge and skills required for success at KS4 Based on high expectations Based heavily on formative feedback and incorporates periodic summative assessment Based on consistent principles that can be used across subjects, but the flexibility to be suitable for all subjects Is simple and easy to understand- for staff, parents and students Conducted a small pilot study The key driver behind this model is to use thresholds, not to assess everything, or to apply these thresholds to individual pieces of work in lessons, but to assess what matters, the key concepts and 'big' ideas in History. The success criteria would be used regularly with students in lessons, to familiarise them with what is need to achieve 'excellence' in their understanding of the core knowledge, skills and concepts in History. Further to provide formative feedback for students to support them in progression through the thresholds. Findings? Why SOLO? It is a practical and visual way of assessing students and can be used in a variety of ways: planning lessons, structuring learning and evaluating progress. A key advantage is the autonomy it gives students over their learning. It encourages them to reflect on their learning before, during and after, through the use of SOLO levels, rubrics and frameworks. SOLO can provide a common language of learning across subjects. SOLO is transparent and facilitates consistency across subjects. It will mean students continue to develop confidence about exactly where they are currently and how to progress.

Clear progression and feedback Assessment: Clear progression and feedback Threshold Threshold knowledge Threshold skill Excellence + Confident Secure Embedding Developing These banded thresholds of knowledge and skills can then be used to give students ongoing and personalised formative feedback on their day to day work, focusing on how to improve towards excellence. Like for like comparisons of real work is the most useful way to compare standards. If we want to see how much progress students have made, we should look at their work and the questions they can answer and compare that over time. Compare with schools in similar contexts? What does excellence look like? Set the bar for brilliance- reinforce expectations Within a unit of work (half termly), what is expected, in terms of knowledge and skills, at each of the five thresholds?  This, when used with student baseline thresholds, allows teachers to plan for progression within their teaching – with the aim being that all students are aspiring towards excellence. Students know what they need to do to improve.

SURFACE DEEP Developing To analyse various pieces of evidence about the Gunpowder plot. To use the success criteria to develop my understanding of how to analyse sources for inference and reliability Grade Inferences Source Reliability Level of learning Developing I have not made any inferences. I have just copied or paraphrased the source. 1 mark I make a very simple judgment about the content or NOP or copy the source. 1-2 marks SURFACE Embedding Unsupported inferences. I make one point but this is not supported with evidence from the source. 2-3 marks I discuss how it is or is not reliable based on the content of the source with evidence from the source. 3-5 marks Secure Supported inference. I make one point and support this with evidence from the source. 4 marks I discuss how it is or is not reliable based on NOP with evidence from the source. 4-6 marks DEEP Confident Supported inferences. I make two or more points and support this with evidence from the source. 5 marks I discuss how reliable IT IS and IS NOT, using BOTH content and NOP with evidence from the source. I make a judgment about how reliable the source is. 6-10 marks This model needs further development to incorporate knowledge- what do they need to know about the context of the time in order to successfully analyse the sources? Task specific mark schemes An assessment constitution in History to include: Frequent, low-stakes, testing of knowledge, regular quizzes, timeline tests and so on. Importantly, these tests should not just cover what was done in the previous lesson or week, but should test pieces of information learnt throughout schooling. Milestone pieces of work at the end of a sequence of lessons. These should be marked using task-specific mark schemes. The piece can be given a summative mark for teachers needing to input data but it should be understood that a mark in this task is not connected to a mark in the previous half-term or next half-term. The marking can also be norm-referenced (i.e. how does a pupil’s work compare to others in this year and previous years). Formative comments shared with students. End of year exams.

Reporting progress 1-DHS model Making less than expected progress Exceptional progress +2 Using the thresholds for each assessment, where is the student relative to their baseline threshold? Good progress +1 Baseline Expected progress Making less than expected progress -1 In terms of tracking progress and reporting to parents we can look at how students are performing, relative to their baseline threshold: Working below their baseline threshold– Making less than expected progress Working towards the lower end of their baseline threshold – Making expected progress Working towards the top end of their baseline threshold – Making good progress Working above their baseline threshold or at the top of or beyond the excellence threshold – Making exceptional progress. Allocate students a baseline using Midyis/CATs.Report to parents only sharing progress in each subject against the baseline, remove gradings from reports/ student work? Debate worth having?

Reporting progress 2- Canon’s model

Checklist for Schools/Depts Does our curriculum allow for spaced retrieval and interleaving practice? What are the ‘big ideas’ we want to assess? Knowledge and skills What is our assessment constitution? How will we assess? How does this fit in with a whole school model? Have we got task specific mark schemes for key pieces of work? Formative comments only on key pieces of work? Break culture of ‘I’m a 6a’. Build in time for students to respond to feedback- D.I.R.T Do we have ‘real work’ progress files- ‘benchmarks of brilliance’- compare with schools in similar contexts? Have we done a pilot of our assessment model? Questions so far? Should we set targets for end of KS3? Against growth mind set? Should we link thresholds to future GCSE grades? Should we remove grading from student’s work? Report to parents with a RAG rating only? How would we build progression within thresholds? ‘Embedding’ in Year 8 should be more challenging than ‘Embedding’ in Year 7? How would we quality assure across different subjects? i.e. how so we ensure ‘Confident’ in English is as rigourous/challenging as ‘Confident’ in Maths?