Principles of Assessments

The Principles of Assessment at Stockham Primary School

At Stockham Primary School, the governors and staff use an ongoing assessment process which is at the heart of teaching and learning. It is a fair, consistent, age and ability appropriate process across all year groups and phases within the school, which will support pupils and their families to understand where each pupil is on their learning journey and support each pupil, whatever their ability in achieving their potential. It is a manageable process for staff.

Pupils

Pupils experience a range of assessment procedures which are used to give them an honest, open and transparent review of their learning to provide the next steps and challenging targets within the child’s ability. Pupils are provided with frequent and regular opportunities to discuss and review their progress with their teachers and agree new targets. Pupil-teacher discussions celebrate the whole child and promote self-esteem for all pupils whatever their ability, thereby inspiring greater effort and the recognition that hard work reaps well deserved results. Targets and next steps discussed with pupils are qualitative rather than quantitative.

Parents

Parents have opportunities to discuss their child’s progress using evidence from the range of assessment procedures used. Opportunities are discussions about the child’s progress on their learning journey and the next steps and support required to achieve the ambitious targets set. These discussions will be on a qualitative level. Parent-teacher discussions celebrate the whole child and promote self-esteem for all pupils whatever their ability. At the end of each Key Stage, parents are informed about their child’s progress and attainment compared to children nationally of a similar age. Some children will have individual learning plans and these will be discussed with parents and pupils.

School

Feedback to school leaders from assessment is used for School Self Evaluation, to develop School Improvement priorities, for Staff Performance Management and for comparison of schools performance nationally. This is in the form of quantitative data. In order to do this fairly and accurately the school uses internal and external professional moderation procedures to check judgements and standards. Staff keep themselves up to date with assessment procedures through continual professional development. The school can be compared with other schools nationally using quantitative data from school assessments.