Assessment

Assessment (Standard 6 – ‘Make accurate and productive use of assessment’)
Learn that…	Learn how to…
1.      Effective assessment is critical to teaching because it provides teachers with information about pupils’ understanding and needs.   2.      Good assessment helps teachers avoid being over-influenced by potentially misleading factors, such as how busy pupils appear.  3.      Before using any assessment, teachers should be clear about the decision it will be used to support and be able to justify its use.   4.      To be of value, teachers use information from assessments to inform the decisions they make; in turn, pupils must be able to act on feedback for it to have an effect.   5.      High-quality feedback can be written or verbal; it is likely to be accurate and clear, encourage further effort, and provide specific guidance on how to improve. 6.      Over time, feedback should support pupils to monitor and regulate their own learning. 7.      Working with colleagues to identify efficient approaches to assessment is important; assessment can become onerous and have a disproportionate impact on workload.	Avoid common assessment pitfalls, by: ·        Discussing and analysing with expert colleagues how to plan formative assessment tasks linked to lesson objectives and think ahead about what would indicate understanding (e.g. by using hinge questions to pinpoint knowledge gaps). ·        Discussing and analysing with expert colleagues how to choose, where possible, externally validated materials, used in controlled conditions when required to make summative assessments. And - following expert input - by taking opportunities to practise, receive feedback and improve at:  ·        Drawing conclusions about what pupils have learned by looking at patterns of performance over a number of assessments with support and scaffolding from expert colleagues (e.g. appreciating that assessments draw inferences about learning from performance).  Check prior knowledge and understanding during lessons, by: ·        Receiving clear, consistent and effective mentoring in how to structure tasks and questions to enable the identification of knowledge gaps and misconceptions (e.g. by using common misconceptions within multiple-choice questions). And - following expert input - by taking opportunities to practise, receive feedback and improve at:  ·        Using assessments to check for prior knowledge and pre-existing misconceptions. ·        Prompting pupils to elaborate when responding to questioning to check that a correct answer stems from secure understanding.  ·        Monitoring pupil work during lessons, including checking for misconceptions. Provide high-quality feedback, by: ·        Discussing and analysing with expert colleagues how pupils’ responses to feedback can vary depending on a range of social factors (e.g. the message the feedback contains or the age of the child).  ·        Receiving clear, consistent and effective mentoring in how to scaffold self-assessment by sharing model work with pupils, highlighting key details. ·        Discussing and analysing with expert colleagues how to ensure feedback is specific and helpful when using peer- or selfassessment.  And - following expert input - by taking opportunities to practise, receive feedback and improve at:  ·        Focusing on specific actions for pupils and providing time for pupils to respond to feedback.  Make marking manageable and effective, by: ·        Receiving clear, consistent and effective mentoring in how to record data only when it is useful for improving pupil outcomes. ·        Discussing and analysing with expert colleagues to develop an understanding that written marking is only one form of feedback. ·        Discussing and analysing with expert colleagues how to identify efficient approaches to marking and alternative approaches to providing feedback (e.g. using whole class feedback or well supported peer- and self-assessment) and deconstructing this approach. And - following expert input - by taking opportunities to practise, receive feedback and improve at:  ·        Using verbal feedback during lessons in place of written feedback after lessons where possible. ·        Reducing the opportunity cost of marking (e.g. by using abbreviations and codes in written feedback). ·        Prioritising the highlighting of errors related to misunderstandings, rather than careless mistakes when marking.
Notes Learn that… statements are informed by the best available educational research; references and further reading are provided below. Learn how to… statements are drawn from the wider evidence base including both academic research and additional guidance from expert practitioners.  Other key definitions can be found in the introduction.