Assessment and Planning

The 2014 National Curriculum does not include an attainment target or any specified level against which you are expected to assess pupils' progress. The new attainment target says simply that:

‘By the end of each key stage, pupils are expected to know, apply and understand the matters, skills and processes specified in the relevant programme of study.'

The removal of level descriptions has generated a great many questions. The HA has produced a guide to those headaches with our Assessment Without Levels FAQs guide.

In the absence of level descriptions, the HA has produced a set of guiding principles intended to help you both to plan for assessment and to assess pupils' progress.

These principles have also been exemplified in a variety of ways.

• Reflections on the problems created by levels and practical proposals for alternative approaches were outlined by experienced Head of History, Michael Fordham, in a specific Teaching History Supplement focused on the new curriculum.
• Several HA members have shared their approaches to planning for assessment at previous HA conferences and forum events. You can find their recommendations here.
• The HA is also collecting together a number of case studies illustrating the approaches adopted by departments in different kinds of school.
• Pamphlet by Jamie Byrom - Progression from EYFS to Key Stage 3. Jamie Byrom takes us back to basics and helps us to think more deeply about the statements made by the National Curriculum 2014, the nature of progression in history and to map what progression actually looks like right from those early
  years through to the end of Key Stage 3.
• For further resources covering assessment from 2014 click here