Assessment in Years 1 to 6

At the heart of our assessment approach is a definition of the core learning in each year group from 1 to 6 – the essential knowledge and skills from the national curriculum and our curriculum progression maps that we believe each child in the year group must have mastered in order to have a secure foundation for moving into the next year.

These learning intentions (both substantive and disciplinary) are embedded into weekly teaching cycle in order to ensure that the intended learning is being taught, understood and recalled by all pupils not just at the point of learning but next week, next term and next year:

• The learning intentions are referenced and used for short term (daily/weekly), medium term (unit) and long term (curriculum progression) lesson planning
• The learning intentions are used to support and review learning in children’s books for evidence of  achievement of the objective and long term 'learning'
• Learning intentions are used by the children and teachers regularly during the week to review and assess learning
• Understanding what pupils can do/know from one lesson/week is used to inform planning for the next steps in teaching
• Some learning intentions are identified as the non-negotiables foundations for learning in the year group and will be the initial focus for teaching in each academic year and will continue to be woven throughout all teaching during the course of the year.

Our main focus therefore is on ongoing formative assessment to check that pupils are on track to meet the end of year expectations.  We formally assess and analyse achievement once a term in the core areas of Reading, Writing and Maths.

This cycle of termly progress monitoring has several elements:

1. At the start of the Autumn term, each child is set an end of year attainment target.  This target is embedded into teacher's appraisal .

2. Each term, teachers use formative assessment tracking together with summative test benchmarks and results to judge whether a pupil is not on track, on track or ahead of the end of year target.

3. We share pupils’ attainment and our judgement of whether they are ‘on track’ at parent consultation meetings in the autumn and spring terms.

4. Summative tests include end of unit tests/quizzes, which are useful to cross check pupils’ recall of knowledge and content.

At the end of an academic year, we make one final assessment judgement for each child: Working At Greater Depth; Working At; Working Towards; or Working Below, and report on this to parents.

In order to validate and triangulate our ongoing assessment judgements against age expectations, we also use termly standardised tests in reading and maths – National Test-style Standardised (NTS) Assessments, designed to benchmark progress and attainment in reading and maths against national averages. Children take three tests per year to allow teachers to track progress termly. Tests increase in demand every term, reflecting the progress children will be making in class - this will also develop their stamina for national testing. The tests have curriculum maps that are specific to national curriculum content, which teachers can use as a guide to plan and structure lessons. 

These tests produce a reading/maths age and an age standardised numerical score (based on a normal distribution around a median of 100). This provides information about whether a pupil’s attainment is above or below the national average for their year group cohort.

Analysis of standardised scores is also a useful tool for indicating whether pupils/pupil groups are below, at or above age expectations consistently and tracking year-on-year progress. The tests are designed to sync with content and structure of statutory assessment testing. Therefore, results from NTS tests can allow for accurate and appropriate assessment tracking for national assessment in Years 2 and 6.

Statutory Assessment

Although end-of-Reception Foundation Stage Profiling and end-of-Year 2 SATs are no longer statutory, we continue to use these as part of our assessment cycle to help us judge childrens' achievement and monitor progress.

The first statutory assessment is the Reception baseline which is required to be administered to children joining reception within the first six weeks of September.  

Then, at the end of year 1, the children's progress in early reading is monitored through the national phonics check reading 40 words.  At the end of year 4, the children's knowledge and rapid recall of times tables is checked through the national multiplication tables check of 25 random multiplication facts.

Finally, at the end of year 6, pupils take national SATs tests in maths, reading and grammar/punctuation/ spelling.  These tests are marked externally, and pupil’s results reported to parents as scaled scores (around a national mean of 100) for each test.

In addition , teachers make judgements as to whether pupils have met end of key stage performance descriptors in writing and science.  Evidence must come from the body of pupil’s work in their books and be available for external moderation.  The judgements that teachers make are simply whether a pupil is “working at the expected standard”  (science), with further judgements of “working towards the expected standard” and “working at greater depth within the expected standard” for the writing judgement.