Changes to assessment and reporting of children’s attainment Amherst School

What changes have come from the Department for Education (DfE)? Amherst School

“As part of our reforms to the national curriculum, the current system of ‘levels’ used to report children’s attainment and progress will be removed from September 2014 and will not be replaced. By removing levels we will allow teachers greater flexibility in the way that they plan and assess pupils’ learning. The programmes of study within the new National Curriculum (NC) set out expectations at the end of each key stage, and all maintained schools will be free to develop a curriculum relevant to their pupils that teaches this content. The curriculum must include an assessment system which enables schools to check what pupils have learned and whether they are on track to meet expectations at the end of the key stage, and to report regularly to parents.” National curriculum and assessment from September 2014: information for schools Amherst School

Assessment at Amherst With levels now gone, all schools have been given the freedom to select an assessment procedure that is clearer for parents to understand. As a school we must report on whether a pupil is achieving the expectations for the end KS2 The revised national curriculum has a list of outcomes for each year group which are now split in to ‘End of Year Expectations’ for English and Mathematics. This is a list of the key objectives that pupils need to know by the end of each academic year. Amherst School

How will this change the assessment and reporting of my child’s attainment? Amherst School

Changes in Assessment Children will not be assessed using National Curriculum Levels. Children will be assessed against the expectations from the program of study for their own year group. Children’s attainment will be reported to parents matched to their own year group’s key objectives. Amherst School

Summative Assessment Children in Year 2 and Year 6 will still sit end of key stage assessment papers in Mathematics and English. These assessment papers will be sent from the DfE and are external assessment papers. The new format for these assessment papers will be introduced in May The assessment papers will reflect the changes in the new curriculum for Mathematics and English implemented from September Amherst School

Summative Assessment end of KS2 (Year 6) English Reading Assessment testing comprehension skills SPaG assessment testing spelling, punctuation and grammar Writing Assessment- evidence collected across all subjects and internally marked and externally moderated. Mathematics Two assessment papers Rigorous assessment of formal methods of computation Increased emphasis on problem-solving & reasoning skills Increased emphasis on application Reduced focus on shape, data handling, measures. Amherst School

Internal Assessment Children’s progress in all years will be formally assessed at least 3x per year, December, March and June. Children’s attainment and progress will be assessed in Reading, Writing, SPAG and Mathematics using a combination of teacher’s assessment and written tests. Children in Years 3-6 will sit written tests in the Autumn, Spring and Summer Terms. Children in Years 3-5 will sit NFER tests in English and Mathematics in the summer term. Children in Year 6 will sit external tests in May Children in Year 4-5 will also sit NVR and VR tests. Children’s progress is internally tracked throughout their whole time at Amherst. Amherst School

How will we report progress back to parents? From Years 3-6, every pupil has a set of ‘End of Year Expectations’ to achieve by the end of each academic year in English and Mathematics. At parental consultations, and for your child’s end of year report, you will be given information on: How your child’s progress is matched to the expectations for their year. They will be assessed using the language of Below, Emerging, Expected, or Exceeding expectations This language will be used on the end of year report What their next steps for learning/targets are to continue to make progress will be discussed and included on the end of year report. The ultimate aim is by the end of Year 6, is for every pupil to be ready for secondary school, by achieving the Year 6 Expected grade. Amherst School

Important things to note. When children enter each new academic year the majority will be assessed as Emerging because they will not have been taught the program of study for that year group yet. Children may have been Exceeding expectations at the end of the previous year (Summer Term)and then be Emerging in the Autumn Term. They are still making progress. If a child is working below the level expected for their year group, class teachers will let you know which of the outcomes they are not yet meeting and discuss their next steps in their learning and skills they need to master to move forwards. Amherst School

It is important to note that… the new curriculum is very challenging. The bar has been raised for every year group. to achieve an ‘Expected’ grade in Year 6, researchers and educationalists have compared it to an old level 4A/5C. Previously, a child only had to reach the level 4C threshold to have met the old national expectations for the end of Key Stage 2. Amherst School

Level 6 Level 5a Level 5b Level 5c Level 4a Level 4b Level 4c Level 3a Level 3b Level 3c Level 2a Level 2b We move away from an assessment system that runs throughout the School and across Year Groups where children are encouraged to accelerate through the levels. We move to a system where pupils are assessed against a key set of expectations per Year Group. The children are to learn in greater depth and apply their learning to a wide variety of situations. They are not accelerated through levels, instead they develop a deeper understanding and an ability to apply this understanding across other subjects and in a variety of situations. At the beginning of each year they face the challenge of a new set of End of Year Expectations