1. ON-SCREEN TESTING on THE ISLE OF WIGHT The Power of Digital Assessment June 15 th 2005 eLearning@greenwich/conference – Extending the classroom walls

2. WHY E-ASSESSMENT ON THE ISLE OF WIGHT? The Isle of Wight has three phase educational provision 5 High schools (year 9 – post 16) 16 Middle schools (year 5 – year 8) 46 Primary schools (year R – year 4) 2 Special schools (MLD and SLD primary and secondary)

3. The three phase system has meant that we needed to develop a robust system of benchmarked data at pupil level to inform assessment for learning and phase transfer. Schools in the Isle of Wight have been using nferNelson’s Cognitive Abilities Tests (CAT) and Suffolk Reading Scale (SRS) for many years The tests are administered in year 3, year 5, year 7 and year 9 to all Island pupils by agreement with the schools these results are shared both by the school and the LA THE NEED FOR INDIVIDUAL PUPIL DATA

4. The schools use these results in a variety of ways to support learning by helping teachers identify individual pupil strengths and weaknesses, develop realistic targets for their classes, profile pupil groups and identify target groups of pupils. Also helping to indicate preferred learning styles and pupil’s likely exam results Last year, the Isle of Wight explored the option of delivering the tests online rather than using the traditional paper-based versions and instantly saw the advantages of the e-assessment option. NFERNELSON’S COGNITIVE ABILITIES TEST (CAT) AND SUFFOLK READING SCALE (SRS)

5. The Isle of Wight Local Authority (LA) has become a leading supporter of onscreen testing and intends to develop this practice throughout its 69 schools. The authority is delivering both cognitive abilities and reading tests via computers to help save teachers time obtain high quality diagnostic information quickly and make the assessment process a little less stressful for students. The tests are delivered via nferNelson’s Testwise, a portal that allows schools to administer tests via PCs and automatically marks answers. Pupil diagnostic information is available to view online and can be downloaded into the school or LA management information system for reference. THE CAT3 AND SRS2 DIGITAL TESTS

6. Our schools are well versed in the administration of paper versions of the Cognitive Abilities Tests (CAT) and Suffolk Reading Scale (SRS) which are taken annually by pupils in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 the results collated and sent by the LA for analysis and returned to the school. The LA invited head teachers to a workshop to try the onscreen tests and evaluate the system to see if they would prefer to run on screen tests in their school. The heads saw that the tests could reduce the amount of time teachers needed to compile and manage assessments. This, coupled with the impact of the improved feedback and quick access to results decided the LA to move to the onscreen version of the tests THE JOURNEY TO ONSCREEN TESTING

7. The LA set up an initial round of training for staff in selected Middle and High schools who were willing to pilot the on screen tests Five middle schools and one high school were the first to switch to the online versions of the tests and they achieved a good testing experience. Teachers taking part in the pilot were encouraged by the pupils response to the onscreen tests and felt that the tests were delivered in a format that was very familiar – via a computer screen. This more relaxed attitude to the onscreen assessments meant that pupils were more engaged with the process. THE IMPLEMENTATION – THE PILOT

8. There were some schools where the recommended specifications for the computer workstations were not fully met. Individual school networks in some schools had proved problematic. Some schools needed to invest in further equipment such as good quality headphones. Necessarily there were issues in some schools around the management of the testing. There was a need for a change in perceptions to testing with online systems. High quality support from Testwise was essential to the success of the pilot THE LESSONS LEARNT DURING THE PILOT

9. As with any large-scale technical implementation, there were initially areas that needed some development. The LA worked closely with nferNelson to develop and deploy changes such as more user friendly administration tools, the use of UPN as a pupil identifier, on line browser capability checking, Flash and SEN versions of the tests. Evaluation from the pilot and high quality support from testwise encouraged the LA to continue with the rollout of onscreen testing to as many of its 46 Primary schools as possible. Although it was recognised that there may be issues around the technical capacity to carry out the tests for some of the schools. FROM PILOT TO ROLLOUT

10. An audit of equipment had to be carried out in the primary schools to ensure that there was the capacity to implement the on screen tests. Trials of the Flash version of the tests were carried out in Primary schools using both schools with broadband and ISDN connectivity. A schedule of training for all 46 primary schools was initiated during the Spring terms 2005 on the use of the administration tools and scheduling tests for pupils. The recent development of Portal2 with better administration tools enabled all schools to be set up with users and scheduled tests for June 2005. THE CHALLENGE

11. The results so far have been very positive. In short, it is hoped that digital assessment will aid the LA, teachers and students in the following ways: Local Authority: It will enable easier co-ordination of assessments throughout the LA. Easier management of high quality assessment results across the authority. THE MAIN RESULTS

12. TEACHERS: Provide teachers with additional support in preparing pupils for national tests with no extra administration work; Aid individual planning which will help to raise overall school standards; Provide instant marking and reports giving teachers diagnostic information that they need; Enable teachers to set up their own questions to enable assessment for learning. PUPILS: Deliver tests in a format that is very familiar to them – via a computer screen. Engage them better with the assessments process so that they can perform better.

13. THE NEXT STEPS The team at the authority are planning that by next year’s round of testing, all schools on the Isle of Wight will be using Testwise to administer the CAT3 and SRS2 tests online. We are also looking to make more use of the QCA Digital Question Bank from nferNelson. The online database of over 3,000 questions that cover the QCA National and optional tests in maths, science and English. We have found that teachers use of predefined tests or a bank of questions to create assessments targeting specific areas or topics has been an invaluable tool in developing assessment for learning in schools.

14. THE FUTURE With the computer-based tests, schools have found that students prefer the on screen tests and are more likely to take their time and go back to questions they found difficult to answer in their first run-through and so potentially perform better. The flexibility to test at any time and receive very quick analysis from tests will lead to a better regime in testing as appropriate for individual pupils learning The challenge for our schools will be to make best use of this medium of testing as a significant tool in formative assessment to support pupils individual learning needs.