Assessment and Reporting

At Chorlton High School we have taken a new approach to how we assess a student progress at KS3.

When assessing and reporting home to parents we want to be able to 

  • Measure how well students have learnt the curriculum so that we know that students are secure in their knowledge and can be successful for the next stage of their education
  • Evaluate their attitude, approach and learning habits using the CHS Effort grade so that they can become confident independent learners. Further information on this can be found here –link to effort (on a later slide)

Knowledge

When we assess students we want to be able to understand how well students can remember and apply what they have been taught. We split this in to two different types of knowledge called declarative knowledge and procedural knowledge.

Declarative Knowledge is often referred to as ‘Knowing what’. We assess students on the details of what they have been taught.

Procedural Knowledge is often referred to as ‘Knowing how’. We assess students on how well they can apply the facts and ideas that they have been learning. This is often built upon the declarative knowledge, but often students have to apply their knowledge to a new context that may not be familiar.

Teacher assess students regularly. At Chorlton High School ‘assessment for learning’ is built into each lesson so that the teachers gauge how well students are understanding the information as we go along. We use ‘low stakes testing’ as formative assessment and these are moments in the lessons where we use techniques such as questioning, a quick fact test or any other method of retrieval practice to ascertain the level of student knowledge.

This way the teacher then knows whether to revisit concepts, or to address any misconceptions so that they know how well students are learning during the lessons. It is also important to know how well the learning is remembered over time. It is one thing knowing the information at the end of the lesson, but can students still remember this after the lessons? Home Study, which is our name for revision, is essential to support knowledge acquisition. The more you practice a topic, the better you remember it! 

Our more formal tests at KS3, or our Summative Assessments, are our KS3 Progress Tests.

Assessment at Key Stage 3

Key Stage 3 Report

Twice a year students sit their Progress Tests. These assess what students have been learning during the academic year and will test both their declarative and their procedural knowledge. Regular testing of key curricula concepts enables us to monitor this knowledge over time as it builds cumulatively at KS3.

These tests enable teachers to know how ‘secure’ a student’s knowledge is. The security of knowledge is important as KS3 is seen as the bedrock of knowledge that KS4 qualifications such as GCSEs, BTECs etc are built on. 

To find out what has been taught parents can look at the curricula for each year group in the ‘Our Curriculum’ pages

Reporting using Curriculum Statements

After students have sat their Progress Tests class teachers have a broad range of evidence to judge how well students have learnt the taught curriculum. The teacher judgements will be based mainly on the Progress Tests but will also be informed by classwork and any interim assessment. We will then report to parents how students are performing in the entire curriculum. The teacher will make professional judgement about how secure the learning is in each subject. They will use one of 5 words, called a Curriculum Statement to describe how well they have remembered and applied what they have been taught.

These Curriculum Statements are:

  • Emerging: A student working at this level has some knowledge and an emerging understanding of key concepts of the Curriculum. 
  • Developing: A student working at this level is developing their knowledge as outlined in the Curriculum. They are developing the understanding of the key concepts however they are not yet secure in these.
  • Secure: A student working at this level is secure in their knowledge. They have mastered key concepts and would get things right the majority of the time.
  • Extending: A student working at this level is very sure secure in their knowledge. They are demonstrating that they have a greater depth of understanding and can apply and manipulate knowledge and key concepts.
  • Exceptional: A student working at this level is excelling at a level that is exceptional. They display excellent knowledge, application, and interplay of key concepts that together demonstrate an academic flair for the subject.

 

Assessment at Key Stage 4

Twice a year students sit their Progress Tests. These assess what students have been learning during the academic year and will test both their declarative and their procedural knowledge. Regular testing of key curricula concepts enables us to monitor this knowledge over time on KS4 courses.

These tests enable teachers to know how ‘secure’ a students’ knowledge is and at Key Stage 4 the majority of tests are based on examination style questions similar to those that they will meet in their Examinations at the end of Year 11. This means that students gain an understanding of how their knowledge will be tested, they learn the techniques needed to respond to the demands of a KS4 Exam, and they learn how to apply their knowledge to unfamiliar situations which will enable them to access the higher grades.

At Chorlton High School we continue to assess as we have done for a number of years at KS4 (see below).

When assessing and reporting home to parents we want to be able to:

  • Assess how well students have learnt the curriculum so that we know that students are secure in their knowledge and can be successful in their Y11 Examinations.
  • Assess their attitude, approach and learning habits using the CHS Effort grade so that they can become confident independent learners. Further information on this can be found here.

Year 10 sit Progress tests twice a year in the Spring 1 half term, and Summer 2 half term.

Year 11 have three Examination seasons, the College Entry Mock Examinations in November, March mocks in the Spring Term before their final

Examinations in May/June. Further information on Examinations can be found in the Examinations section of the website LINK TO EXAMS

Reporting using current grades

At CHS we report the attainment of students at KS4 using ‘Current Grades’. These grades are based on the students’ performance at the current time and are not projected or predicted grades. It is important that the student understands what this grade means in relation to curriculum coverage and class teachers will explain this in more depth during the ‘feedback fortnights’ after the test weeks.

Grades and Targets at Key Stage 4

Grades at Key Stage 4 are numbered from 9-1 and have been with us for a number of years. It is quite difficult sometimes to put them into perspective if we are used to the old A*-G grades, the image below gives a rough equivalence.

Chorlton High School Grades and Targets at Key Stage 4

A grade 4 is regarded as a standard pass and is often needed to access courses at College.

A grade 5 is regarded as a strong pass and students often need grade 5s in English and Maths to access higher level courses at College.

A grade 6 (or 7) is needed to continue to study that subject at A-level.

Targets

At CHS we give our KS4 students, where possible, a target grade. These are predominantly based on Key Stage 2 performance and average student performance of similar students across the country. We use aspirational targets so that our students are given target grades that are only obtained by the top 20% of students. 

Year 10 Next Steps Report