1. Assessment Makes Sense

2. Pre-history
In September 2014 the government removed the national levelling system:
as you may know the levels for primary school went from 1c to 6;
the expected attainment for the end of KS 1 was 2b and 4b for the end of KS2;
this gave a progress window of TWO levels through the whole of KS2;
2015 was the final year for Pupils being awarded a NC level;
from this year all children will be assessed against the new more challenging curriculum.

3. What has the Government done? A shift of approach in assessment
From To
Differential tests
Can/can’t tests
Best-fit level descriptors
Pass/fail descriptor
Levels
Test scores & comparative placing

4. Rhodes Avenue Principles of Assessment
Assessment is at the heart of Teaching and Learning
It supports teachers to:
track progress and attainment;
diagnose and record pupil understanding;
plan the next steps for pupil learning;
provide opportunities to feed back to pupils;
inspire greater effort and a belief that hard work and practice will lead to greater success.

5. How do we assess?
The school is using a software program - Target Tracker - which allows us to measure pupil attainment and progress.

6. Tracking Attainment and Progress with ‘Steps’ from Target Tracker
Target Tracker has replaced national levels with a system of ‘steps’;
There are 6 ‘steps’ within each year group.

7. What are the steps?
Each year band has been broken down into six steps:
beginning (b)
beginning + (b+)
working within (w)
working within + (w+)
secure (s)
secure + (s+)
Most pupils will begin the year as a ‘b’ and progress through the levels as the year evolves.

8. Where should my child be ideally?
This will depend on the pupil’s ability level, the time of year;
the expected standard at the end of each academic year (attainment) will be ‘s’ – ‘secure;’
BUT we will be tracking progress as well and each pupil will ideally make 6 ‘steps’ of progress from one year to the next;
So for example ‘Berty’ who was ‘2s’ (Year 2 and ‘secure’) at the end of Y2, should be ‘3s’ by the end of Y3.

9. What does each step actually mean?
The three broader sections may be thought of in these terms:
Beginning – Pupil learning is chiefly focussed on the criteria for the band. There may be minimal elements of the previous band still to gain complete confidence in.
Working Within – Pupil learning is fully focussed on the criteria for the band. This is a teacher best fit decision but could be informed by statement assessments between around 40% and 70% achieved.
Secure – Confidence in all of the criteria for the band. There may be pupil learning still focussed on gaining thorough confidence in some minimal elements but the broad expectations for the band have been met.

10. Why have we got ‘b’ and ‘b+’?
Each band is broken into two parts to enable progress within the band to be evident;
For example, a pupil may be assessed as Band 2 Beginning (2b) in the Autumn term in Year 2;
The next time the teacher records their assessment they may not feel that the pupil has progressed to Working Within, but the pupil has made progress. An assessment of Beginning + will allow that progress to be shown.

11. Progression/Frequency
Previously the inability to record ‘smaller-step’ progress was a frustrating issue associated with the outgoing levels system.
With this new assessment system:
the school has 3 major assessment windows during the year where we report progress to parents however Target Tracker is used 6 times throughout the year to monitor and record pupil progress.

12. Year 1 Autumn 1 assessment
So what should the age expected ideal attainment and progress look like?
Year 1 Autumn 1 assessment
End of Year 1
target
End of Year 2 target
End of Year 3 target
End of Year 4 target
End of Year 5 target
End of Year 6 target
40-60s+ 1s 2s 3s 4s 5s 6s
For a pupil to attain thorough coverage of the year band, children should reach the secure (‘s’) step by the end of the appropriate year ;
We believe this makes reporting your child’s progress and attainment much clearer for you.

13. So what’s the ‘s+’ step all about?
The advice from the Government is that pupils who have gained a secure understanding of the Y4 programme of study, for example, should not be automatically moved on to the next year’s programme.
Instead they should be provided with extension work to deepen and consolidate their understanding of the concepts and skills already grasped.
The new curriculum is already more challenging so this extension work will be covered by a smaller cohort within each year group.

14. Keeping you informed

15. This can be used for discussion with the pupil, parent or support staff enabling effective intervention
Or for groups ….

16. The new ‘Secondary Ready’ expectation
At the end of the academic year, Year 6 pupils will be taking a new, more challenging SATs tests in English and Mathematics:
there will still be a national expected level of attainment for these pupils;
this level is to be called ‘Secondary Ready’ and is based around a scale score of 100;
100 will be the expected attainment level.

17. The take home message!
We are starting a new assessment and progress system which will:
be clearer to understand for parents and teachers;
have greater accuracy in supporting teachers with their planning of learning;
work hand in hand with the new National Curriculum and its higher expectations.

18. However………