Assessing students up to age 14 - A better future. Part 1 - key components of the way forward

It is of great benefit for students, teachers and parents to have detailed information regarding precisely what each student can do and where their knowledge gaps are.

However:
SATS, as a measure of school accountability are too narrow and skew what schools actually do away from best practice.

and

SATS levels do not provide much useful information.  It would be much better if detailed information regarding precisely what at student is doing well and what they are struggling with were shared.


Key Components of the Way Forward:
A coherent solution will require two key changes in practice.

1. The integration of formative and summative assessment.
In other words schools systems by which they track the detail of students' progress (APP systems) should lead directly to accreditation and SATS should be abolished.

2. Formative assessment must be made coherent by using different types of assessment for those targets which can be easily tested and those which cannot.
Most current systems of APP are not currently suitable for direct accreditation.  We need to specify and track targets which can be easily tested using different processes to those used to specify and track targets which cannot be easily tested.



In this next series of blogs I will explore how these changes can be achieved and some of the many benefits they will bring to students' education.

Assessing students up to the age of 14 – A better future  QUICK LINKS

Part 1: key components of the way forward

Part 2: protocols for this series of blogs

Part 3: integrating formative (APP) and summative (SATS) assessment

Part 4: being allowed to test what is testable

Part 5: more about online testing

Part 6: central tracking of progress

Part 7: supporting diversity

Part 8: student behaviour management

Part 9: bridging the primary/secondary divide

Part 10: at what age should this type of tracking begin? (and tracking inputs)