How can we move away from a levels mindset?
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Whether you thought levels were a good thing or not, what we cannot deny is that the vast majority of teachers were at least comfortable with them. They knew what they meant to them and their class and they knew the curriculum. So initially, many schools wanted to create a system as similar to levels as possible, for the purposes of staying in some sort of comfort zone if nothing else.
There is certainly still value for SLT in having some sort of overview of the school and some way of comparing cohorts. Find out more about when information is useful on our data without levels page. On this page, however, we want to look at some of the opportunities afforded by losing levels altogether, and some of the pitfalls to avoid, so that we can move away from the culture that accompanied levels and focus on formative assessment as the key to improving pupil attainment - for the benefit of the school's results but also, most importantly, for the pupils' benefit. |
The Possible Pitfalls - levels by another name
One (fairly major) pitfall many schools initially fell into was relabelling levels, rather than getting rid of them altogether. Most assessment systems do facilitate this and we need to make a clear distinction in order to avoid this issue. But is all data of this type useless or can we just ensure that we avoid the culture of levels, whilst keeping the graphs etc for the purpose of cohort analysis? Our video, below, looks at the pitfalls to avoid and the realistic side of when data IS still useful.
The Opportunity - putting the teaching and learning first
One thing we know that the Primary Assessment Commission are keen to see is that schools are putting their curriculum, and the teaching thereof, before the assessment itself. Indeed the report recommends that: "Schools should develop their approach to assessment before considering external assessment systems in order that products can be evaluated according to how they fit with the school’s aims, assessment policy and curriculum."
Whether you are reading these pages before purchasing Classroom Monitor, or whilst it is already in place, there is a lot of scope for you to customise your assessment framework in Classroom Monitor to suit the needs of your curriculum and assessment needs. You can find out more about how to make changes in our Customising your assessment framework area. We recognise that there is no real "one-size-fits-all" system when it comes to assessment.
One overarching theme, however, regardless of what you do with your curriculum, is that formative assessment must be acted upon and must be embedded into the classroom culture. The video below talks about how Classroom Monitor fits in with this.
Whether you are reading these pages before purchasing Classroom Monitor, or whilst it is already in place, there is a lot of scope for you to customise your assessment framework in Classroom Monitor to suit the needs of your curriculum and assessment needs. You can find out more about how to make changes in our Customising your assessment framework area. We recognise that there is no real "one-size-fits-all" system when it comes to assessment.
One overarching theme, however, regardless of what you do with your curriculum, is that formative assessment must be acted upon and must be embedded into the classroom culture. The video below talks about how Classroom Monitor fits in with this.
For more information on how to ensure that teachers have put formative assessment at the heart of their teaching and learning, and for tips in making this manageable for teachers, have a look at our Making the Most of Classroom Monitor pages.
