Rationale
Assessment tells us what we need to do to enable every child in our school to achieve.
At Longwick there is an emphasis on putting what we know is right for children ahead of all else. We are mindful not to develop any ‘compliance anxiety’ amongst staff – rather to have the confidence that our assessment system has an impact on achievement and is worthwhile.
We do not think summative testing is the most insightful way to measure a child’s achievement at the Primary stage. Therefore, value is placed with teachers and their professional judgement about what a child has learnt and what they can do over a teaching period.
Tests will, however, be used to inform these professional judgements and by the leadership team to moderate assessments made by teachers.
Every interaction an adult has with a child in school is driven by or drives an assessment and each moment changes a child’s brain architecture. Great assessment comes from the strength of relationships built with a child over time and high quality teaching; adults using their intuition – what is right for that child at that point in time?
All stakeholders – from parents to the DfE have a right to know how individual children and groups of children are performing. Governors and the DfE need to ensure we are delivering outstanding achievement for all children across the curriculum. Our Assessment system must give insight to this.
“There is no intrinsic value in recording formative assessment; what matters is that it is acted on.”
We are extremely mindful that every moment a teacher spends on an administrative task is moment when they are not actively engaged in a live assessment/teaching moment with a child, or planning for one.
The school’s records of assessment judgments will be the evidence of the children’s work in their books, in their practical learning activities and in the conversations external bodies are invited to have with children.
Teachers should use assessment to establish children’s starting points within a session and across a teaching period so that they can best tailor the most appropriate next steps.
There are a number of forms this assessment can take
This continuous process of high quality questioning, observation and marking allows teachers to establish children’s understanding of a teaching point and swiftly act to tailor their response or design an activity to move the child on.
How do we evaluate children’s learning and progress at the end of a teaching period? (Summative Assessment)
At the end of a term teachers will answer binary questions about a child’s performance against curriculum milestones for the term. This information will be used to generate shared targets with parents and carers and will be carried out for all subjects.
In the Early Years, this is done at the midway point of the year and achievement is measured against their age in years and months and assessed development in years and months.
The following statutory assessments take place whilst a child is at Longwick.
There is a statutory requirement to report to parents on their child’s achievement at least once each academic year. At Longwick, we report to parents termly, and set 4 targets for each child.
| When | What | How does it take place? |
| Start of Reception | BASELINE Assessment | Observations of children over a 6 week period to establish what |
| May in Year 1 | Phonics Screening | Children are shown 40 words (20 real words, and 20 pseudo words) made up of the 44 sounds they will have learnt at school. This is carried out by an adult the children know well and are comfortable with and can be stopped and restarted as necessary over a one week period in May. |
| May in Year 2 | End of Key Stage 1 Assessment |
All papers are externally set and internally marked. 2 Reading Papers. |
| May in Year 6 | End of Key Stage 2 Assessment | Papers are both externally set and externally marked.
1 x 1 hour Reading Test |
At the end of each academic year we will report a child’s achievement in relation to age related expectations e.g. AT, ABOVE or BELOW.
Moderation is an assessment of our assessments. Teachers work with colleagues to agree what constitutes an assessment judgement. This takes place:
At the end of summer, term staff will engage in a review of our assessment programme which will be presented at the Summer Term Governing Body meeting for scrutiny and challenge.