Archive | Assessment

From the TES: Plans to move Sats from May to June next year have thrown hundreds of primaries’ school trips into limbo and cast doubt over the proposed primary leaving certificate. Heads are also upset that their pupils will now miss out on a lot of what they believe is the most rewarding part of [...]

Schools Minister Sarah McCarthy-Fry today praised the hard work of pupils and teachers across the country as the Department for Children, Schools and Families published the Primary School Achievement and Attainment Tables. The results showed record numbers of children achieving the expected level in English, maths and the two subjects combined. Science results remained stable [...]

It may be a while till you think about writing your reports for this year but you can still decide which program to use.  Until the end of BETT2009 you can get a great discount on the single user versions of Elementary Reports.  Enter discount code SW3 at checkout to get £5 off the annual [...]

Lord Sutherland’s inquiry into SATs last year says that the QCA watchdog “failed its remit”.  As a result the QCA has disbanded its assessment agency and suspended chief executive Ken Boston.  Lord Sutherland told a news conference in London there had been a culture within the QCA and its National Assessment Agency (NAA) that “it’ll [...]

According to the Guardian the QCA intends to award the contract to run the Sats tests to Edexcel, the exam company which set and marked the tests for three years before this year’s disastrous collapse.  The announcement that Edexcel will be the preferred bidder for next year’s contract comes as little surprise after it was [...]

A controversial scheme under which secondary schools in England with exam results below a minimum level face closure could be extended to primaries according to some reports today.  According to the BBC ministers have yet to announce what the floor target will be, but the head of education at the National Union of Teachers, John [...]

Ed Balls announced yesterday that the Government plans to introduce a new School Report Card, to give parents a new, simpler and more comprehensive way of understanding schools’ performance and achievements. The new School Report Cards are part of wider changes to strengthen schools’ accountability to parents and the public, raise school standards, and reform pupil [...]

The Sats tests could end next year Ed Balls has hinted on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show. “The current system is not set in stone.  We are looking currently at a way in which we could assess progress child by child with individual level tests where the tests would be chosen in a way which [...]

The BBC have put together an interesting article detailing the whole debacle of the SATs this year.  It details the shortcomings this year and finishing by looking at what are the possibilities for 2009.  As pointed out in the article Dr John Dunford, head of the Association of School and College Leaders: “In the long [...]