Assessment Policy

At Moss Hey, assessment is a continuous process integral to teaching and learning. It is how teachers gain knowledge of their pupils’ needs, achievements and abilities, enabling planning and delivery to be more effective, thereby raising attainment for every child.

Principles of assessment are:

• To enable all individual pupils to make good progress in their learning
• To track individual and groups progress
• To identify children for intervention
• Provide feedback which leads to pupils recognising the ‘next steps’ in their learning and how to work towards achieving these
• To allow teachers to plan effectively, reflecting the needs of each child
• Include reliable judgements about how learners are performing, related, where appropriate to age related expectations.
• To provide information to set appropriate targets for groups and individuals
• Enable us to involve parents in their child’s progress
• To provide the Headteacher and governors with information that allows them to make accurate judgements about the effectiveness of the school.

Attainment and progress:

There is an important distinction between these two terms:

Attainment refers to the standards a pupil has reached. This is a measure of relative performance against the average level of performance for a child of a similar age. Attainment is measured in relation to national average standards and is judged in comparison to all schools.

Progress is a relative measure that refers to how much progress a pupil has made from their initial starting point. It refers to the difference between where a pupil started from and where they have reached. Progress can be measured over different time frames: a term; an academic year; a Key Stage or the whole of a pupil’s time at the school.

At Moss Hey we aim to create a high achievement culture and expect every pupil to reach the highest possible attainment that they are capable of.  Teachers track progress rigorously and ensure this is fed into teaching and learning.

Roles and Responsibilities:

Teachers are responsible for carrying out summative and formative assessments.  Where appropriate, outcomes will be shared with pupils as part of an ongoing dialogue about their learning and progress.  Teachers are responsible for tracking pupil progress and reporting to the Headteacher in pupil progress meetings and informing parents.

Subject leaders will use assessment to inform their action plans and monitoring.

The Headteacher has the overall responsibility for monitoring assessment.

Types of assessment:

At Moss Hey we use a combination of formative and summative assessment as outlined below:

Assessment for learning (formative assessment)

Assessment for learning focuses on how children learn and is central to daily classroom practice and planning.  Teachers assess and track progress through the learning objectives, observations, ‘the steps success’ criteria, mini quizzes and through marking/feedback and pupil response.  Peer assessment is also used throughout the school.

Assessment of learning (summative assessment)

This involves judging pupils’ performance against the national age-related expectations.  Teachers form these judgements at the end of each term using a combination of tests, mark sheets, book scrutiny and moderation.  Subject leaders and the SLT are part of the moderating and book scrutiny process.  Year 2 and 6 use the interim assessment frameworks.

Formal Assessment Cycle:

Formal assessment is a systematic part of our school’s work which will be used to track each cohort in the school and more specifically each pupil in the school. It is through an effective tracking system that the needs of every pupil can be met and that the school develops a clear understanding of how to raise standards.

The Assessment cycle at Moss Hey includes:

1. i) EYFS

• a Government baseline assessment of every pupil when they start in Reception (these take place in the first 6 weeks)
• Termly assessment of all pupils in EYFS in all 7 areas of the EYFS curriculum; statutory end of Key Stage assessment
• ongoing observations
• Each child has a learning journey which shows progress against the 17 areas
• Development Matters Profile in which shows progress is recorded

1. ii) Phonics Assessment

• EYFS & Y1: Assessment occurs in the fifth week of each half term
• The diagnostic assessment is available through the phonics scheme we use; Essential Letters & Sounds
• New starters are assessed on arrival
• Phonics screening check practises are completed each half term in Year 1.
• The ELS assessment tracker is used to analyse data

iii) KS1 & KS2

• a baseline assessment of children when they transfer from another school
• statutory end of Key Stage assessments
• statutory Year 1 Phonics Screening test
• statutory Year 4 multiplication test
• practise SATs testing in Year 2 and Year 6 from past papers and from other providers
• termly writing assessments
• termly reading assessments -tests and evidence in books & guided reading sessions
• termly maths assessments – tests & learning objectives met
• spelling tests

How pupils are tracked:

Every term all teachers have an individual meeting with the Head teacher & Deputy Head teacher to discuss the progress of every child in their class.

If a child is identified as not making sufficient progress then a number of measures may be put into place:

• targeted support in class by the class teacher
• intervention programme put in place (this may be 1:1 or a group intervention)
• extra work at home
• parents / carers invited to a meeting to discuss their child’s progress.

At Moss Hey we use an online assessment tracker (SIMS) and we also use a simple tracking sheet which is a working document for each teacher, which feeds into their planning, teaching and learning.

Statutory tests and assessments:

Statutory, formal assessment procedures and examinations exist to measure attainment against national standards – now measured as age related expectations. Our pupils’ achievements are compared nationally with all those pupils of the same age and against schools in the local authority and in England.       

Reporting to Parents/carers:

Parents/carers are kept up-to-date with their child’s progress and development. This is done through parent/carer consultations, which take place twice a year and the end of year report. Parents are also able to request a meeting with their child’s class teacher at any other point throughout the year.

Parent/carers consultations take place in the second half of the Autumn term and the second half of the Spring Term. During this meeting parents/carers will have the opportunity to find out what progress their child is making in reading, writing and maths and what their next steps are. If parents/carers would like to know this information at other points in the year then they are able to make a separate appointment with their child’s class teacher. In the Summer Term a written report is sent home for every pupil in the school. This outlines what the pupils have learnt this year, what their next steps are and what level they are working at within the age related expectation.