Assessment at Barley Lane Primary School
The current national curriculum for England has now been taught in all maintained schools since 2014. We assess children against age related expectation.
In order to continue to achieve better than age related expectations, we need to develop mastery of each subject and encourage children to explain their understanding. Mastery includes children using their reasoning to explain their understanding of way they have learnt.
The system is personalised to each child where every single skill within reading, writing and mathematics is tracked - therefore enabling teachers to know exactly what your child can do. Assessment continues to be at the heart of teaching and learning at Barley Lane Primary School; it is fair, honest, ambitious and consistent.
The aim of all children to reach and be working At Age Related Expectation or to be at Greater Depth within Age. If children do not meet Age Related Expectations, then they will be assessed as Below Age Related Expectation.
Teachers will analyse children's gaps in their knowledge and understanding and use targets to assist in closing these gaps.
The key principles for inclusion are that teachers will have due regard for
- Setting achieveable expectations for all
- Monitoring of assessment so that lack of no progress is identified quickly
- Close liaison with SENco
- Individual Education Plans (IEPs) are used to support learning
What information will support you as parents with your child's learning at home?
There is a lot of information on the school's website, such as termly curriculum maps, calculation policies and help booklets.
Parent workshops take place in the autumn term, whereby teachers give information to parents on our curriculum and how to support your children at home.
What does Barley Lane's assessment system look like?
Each child is aiming to achieve and be working At Age Expectation (or better) be the end of the year. When marking children's work, teachers assess the children against the key statements for the year and record when children have shown what they can do on our Scholarpack assessment system. These key statements are available on this page. Teachers will record at three 'checkpoints' throughout the year, whether each child is:
- Working at Greater Depth within Age
- At Age Related Expectation
- Below Age Related Expectation
- Well below Age Related Expectation
End of Key Stage Testing: Year Two and Year Six
- Tests at the end of KS1 will provide a guide for teachers when making their end of year assessment
- Tests at end of KS2 will give raw score and scaled score. This will be reported to parents in the summer term.
Diminishing the Differences
Our curriculum and assessment framework enables us to highlight the aspects of the curriculum in which pupils are not meeting the expected levels whilst recognising children with exceptional performance. Our assessment system tracks how each pupil is performing against the new skills of the national curriculum. Teachers use the outcomes of these assessments to analyse attainment and progress for their pupils and their classes and use this data to plan future learning for every pupil, ensuring they meet or exceed expectations.
Teachers and leaders analyse the data across the whole school to ensure that pupils identified as vulnerable or at particular risk in this school are making appropriate progress and that all pupils are suitably challenged. We celebrate all achievements across a broad and balanced curriculum, including sport, art and performance, science, behaviour, and social and emotional development.
