Parents’ forum
January 2016
Assessment & the future of the school
School news
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World culture week (WB 8th Feb)
New synthetic phonics reading books soon
Open afternoon- 28th January
Y5/6 Houses of Parliament trip- 4th July
Redecoration of Falcon classroom
Looking at ways to improve the playground.
KS2 SATs 2015- local schools
Forum focus: Assessment
Key questions
 Why
has this change happened?
 Which
children in school are affected?
 What
will replace the levels?
 What
is mastery?
What is assessment?
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Schools are expected to demonstrate their assessment of pupils’
attainment and progress and share this with parents.
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At Upottery, we have continued to assess attainment and progress
through:
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Observations of the children learning
Looking at learning in the children’s books
Talking with the children about their learning
Formal assessments of learning
The new curriculum encourages teachers and children to look at
what the children can do and what the children need to do next,
identifying strengths and areas for development.
Why has this change happened?
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“… the current system of levels and level descriptions will be
removed and not replaced.” Department for Education (July 2013)
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“Schools need to be conscious that the new curriculum is not
in alignment with the old national curriculum levels.” NAHT
commission on assessment (February 2014)
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A new national curriculum was introduced in September 2014. The
new curriculum is more challenging therefore expectations are
higher.
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The government have removed levels and are leaving it up to
individual schools to design their own individual framework.
Which children are affected?
 Children
in Foundation Stage are not
affected by these changes.
 From
September 2015, all children from
Y1 to Y6 have been assessed using a new
system based on Age Related
Expectations (ARE).
What will replace levels?
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The Curriculum has been split up in to Schemes of Work.
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Each scheme of work sets out the objectives which must be
achieved at each year group.
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Teachers at Upottery assess which objectives each child has
grasped and which objectives they still need to master.
What will replace levels? Cont.
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With the changes to the National Curriculum,
expectations at each year group have changed.
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Children are expected to be working at a higher level.
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Objectives have moved to younger year groups.
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Due to this, many children are currently learning
objectives which are in a lower year group to that of their
age.
 Spellings in particular are an issue…
What is mastery?
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The new National Curriculum is called a Mastery Curriculum.
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Teachers have to teach the objectives of the year group.
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If your child is achieving well and has achieved the objectives
for their year group, rather than moving on to the following
year group’s objectives, we have to encourage more in-depth
and investigative work to allow a greater mastery and
understanding of concepts and ideas.
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If a child can demonstrate a comprehensive and broad
application of their understanding (a mastery), then we are
able to push them in to the objectives of the next year,
although this is a very small number.
How does this affect Key Stage 1
and Key Stage 2 SATs?
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Statutory assessment in Year 2 and Year 6 continue but no levels
given.
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A scaled score will be given. “…100 will always represent the
‘national standard’” Department for Education (June 2015)
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No information has been given for what is above and below average
(see quote below).
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“We do know the scale will have a lower end point below 100
and an upper end point above 100. Once we have set the
national standard we will use a statistical technique called
‘scaling’ to transform the raw score into a scaled score. We will
publish this after the first tests have been administered.”
Department for Education (June 2015)
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Children in years 1, 3, 4 and 5 will set end-of-year tests much like
the old optional SATs. However, these are not DfE approved.
Key Stage 1 SATs
 Tests
in Reading, Maths and Spelling,
Punctuation & Grammar (SPAG)
 As in the past, tests inform teacher
assessment (TA)- the TA is the reported
level.
 For writing the DfE have published an
interim criteria.
KS1 writing criteria
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Working at the expected standard
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The pupil can write a narrative about their own and others’ experiences (real and fictional),
after discussion with the teacher:
demarcating most sentences with capital letters and full stops and with some use of
question marks and exclamation marks
using sentences with different forms in their writing (statements, questions, exclamations
and commands)
using some expanded noun phrases to describe and specify
using present and past tense mostly correctly and consistently
using co-ordination (or / and / but) and some subordination (when / if / that / because)
segmenting spoken words into phonemes and representing these by graphemes, spelling
many correctly
spelling many common exception words*
spelling some words with contracted forms*
adding suffixes to spell some words correctly in their writing e.g. –ment, –ness, –ful, –less,
–using the diagonal and horizontal strokes needed to join letters in some of their writing
writing capital letters and digits of the correct size, orientation and relationship to one
another and to lower case letters
using spacing between words that reflects the size of the letters.
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ALL criteria with the exception of handwriting must be met!
 Working
at greater depth within the
expected standard
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The pupil can write for different purposes, after
discussion with the teacher:
using the full range of punctuation taught at key stage 1
mostly correctly
spelling most common exception words*
spelling most words with contracted forms*
adding suffixes to spell most words correctly in their
writing, e.g. –ment, –ness, –ful, –less, –ly*
using the diagonal and horizontal strokes needed to join
letters in most of their writing.
+ ALL the criteria for the expected standard INCLUDING
handwriting.
KS2 writing criteria
Working at the expected standard
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The pupil can write for a range of purposes and audiences
creating atmosphere, and integrating dialogue to convey character and
advance the action
selecting vocabulary and grammatical structures that reflect the level of
formality required mostly correctly
using a range of cohesive devices*, including adverbials, within and across
sentences and paragraphs
using passive and modal verbs mostly appropriately
using a wide range of clause structures, sometimes varying their position
within the sentence
using adverbs, preposition phrases and expanded noun phrases effectively
to add detail, qualification and precision
using inverted commas, commas for clarity, and punctuation for parenthesis
mostly correctly, and making some correct use of semi-colons, dashes,
colons and hyphens
spelling most words correctly* (years 5 and 6)
maintaining legibility, fluency and speed in handwriting through choosing
whether or not to join specific letters.
ALL criteria with the exception of handwriting must be met!
KS2 writing criteria
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Working at greater depth within the expected standard.
The pupil can write for a range of purposes and audiences:
managing shifts between levels of formality through selecting
vocabulary precisely and by manipulating grammatical
structures
selecting verb forms for meaning and effect
using the full range of punctuation taught at key stage 2,
including colons and semi-colons to mark the boundary
between independent clauses, mostly correctly.
+ ALL the criteria for the expected standard
INCLUDING handwriting.
Above all…
 Do
not worry!
 This
is a positive move for children and
their learning.
 This
will take time.
 Any
questions about assessment?
Future of the school
 Budgetary
issues (not specific to Upottery).
 Changes in assessment will affect data- not
comparable.
 Ensuring the current size of the school is
maintained.
 Front playground/ grounds.
 David Cameron announced in August 2015
that he wants all school to become
academies. These are now all in the form of
multi- academy trusts (MATs).
School dinners Thursday
January
st
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