Assessment Policy

Written by: Georgina Couram, Principal American PrivateSchool of Kalba

Mission: Create an efficient world class education system that engages and empowers every student to become a life-ling learner who is responsible, productive and an engaged citizen within (the UAE) and global community.

Vision: School graduates capable of life-long learning who can apply the knowledge, skills and values required for an effective role in society.

SLT responsible: All HODsand principal

We aim to:

• Provide diagnostic tests all new students that enter the school.
• Diagnose specific strengths and areas for improvement for all of students for English, Maths and the sciences and Arabic Language
• Assist in the prediction of future attainment and target setting.
• Monitor the academic performance of students as they move through the school.
• Encourage the use of assessment as a tool in students’ learning.
• Develop students’ ability to become expert peer and self-assessors.
• Ensure all departments are consistent in their approach to assessment.
• Inform teachers’ planning so that it responds to the needs of the students

What is assessment?

Simply put: assessment is the opportunity to demonstrate knowledge and abilities. Therefore, any opportunity that students have to demonstrate their learning could be deemed an assessment opportunity, whereby a student’s level of understanding, skill and knowledge can be judged. An assessment could be anything from a formal exam to a Q&A session, a class test to a role-play, a presentation to a mind-map.

ASK recognises that teaching, learning and assessment of that learning are fundamentally interdependent. Assessment takes place to better inform our students, parents and teachers of the students’ progress and achievement.

Assessment is the process by which students, teachers and parents are able to make judgements that allow them to monitor progress, evaluate the learning experience, improve planning, diagnose difficulty, identify progression, assist personalisation and improve the quality of teaching and learning.

Assessment types

Within education there are three key strands of assessment:

Summative assessment - often referred to as assessment of learning. This covers those assessment events that aim to provide information about how much a student has actually learned at the end of a particular section/unit of work. Our weekly tests, and  are  mid – term exams and end of term exams are summative assessments. International exams or standardized tests including PISA, MAP, CAT 4 are all classified as summative assessment

Formative assessment - often referred to as assessment for learning. ‘This is the process of seeking and interpreting evidence for use by pupils and their teachers to decide where the pupils are in their learning, where they need to go, and how best to get there’.

Diagnostic Assessment – Any assessment event that seeks to identify a pupil’s strengths and weaknesses.

Using our data tracking our summative and diagnostic assessments will also support assessment for learning at ASK

COMMUNICATION

It is the role of the teacher to constantly evaluate their using the assessment types mentioned and standards set out by the relevant Department or School. This evaluation is communicated through verbal feedback, written comments in students’ books as set out in the school’s marking guidelines, reports, etc. Our school’s standards are set out by our Curriculum and are in line with those of American Core Curriculum Standards

Methods of assessment:

Formative Assessment:

Formative assessment involves:

• Marking
• Questioning
• Showing evaluations
• Sharing learning objectives
• Mini plenaries
• Plenaries
• Feedback evaluations to students
• Assessment for learning
• Ticks and next steps in students’ books
• Peer Assessment /marking
• Self- Assessment or marking

• Our curriculum plans show how we are going to teach the knowledge, skills and processes and include overall learning intentions in terms of knowledge, skills, competencies and attitudes.
• Weekly plans identify specific learning intentions, the activities which will accomplish these, the way the lesson will be taught (whole class, types of groupings etc) and differentiation.
• The weekly plans also identify the success criteria which is; what students must be able to do to show that they have achieved the learning objective
• Marking concentrates on learning intentions and sets targets for students (‘Marking’ in this context means written evaluation and verbal evaluation (e.g. a discussion with the student about their work.)
• Class tests show how students are achieving in relation to their peers.
• Monitoring by the principal and HODs ensures progression and high standards across the school.
• End of term reports show coverage and assessment in all subjects and target setting in the core subjects.
• Teachers must use open ended and closed questioning to assess students’ understanding and of key concepts.
• Teachers must use peer assessments to enable students to give feedback on the ‘good bits’ of their work to their peers

Formative Assessment Strategies

Long term Curriculum Plans:

Long term curriculum plans show the main learning objectives for the particular subject, the knowledge and skills that students will learn and what would be taught throughout the whole year. It must show cross curricular links and progressing from term to term and year on year. The curriculum plans are linked to the USA Common Core Standards where applicable.

• Year Plan : Schemes of work for all subjects corresponding to text book pages. The work in the books must be completed by the end of year. It must be broken down in units and pages.
• Short-term planning or weekly plan: Must show the following:
  • Learning Objective
  • Success Criteria
  • Teaching input
  • Differentiation (including IEP targets)
  • Plenaries
  • Adult Support
  • Learning Journey
  • Resources
• Sharing learning objectives:
  • Use student friendly language
  • Key words or vocabulary must be taught and written on the board
  • Questioning must be:
    • Open-ended
    • Closed
    • Differentiated
  • Plenaries must focus on:
    • Reinforce Learning Objectives
    • Clear up misconceptions
    • Problem solving in maths
    • Problem solving in science

Criteria for Book Monitoring

Outstanding:Students work receives well-focused diagnostic comments that help them to see how to improve.  Information from assessments is used to directly inform planning.

Good

Marked work helps students to improve their work.  Students are regularly involved in helping to assess their work.  This information is used to establish challenging targets for students

Satisfactory

Work is marked regularly and students are aware of the overall quality of what they have done.  Teachers know what they have achieved recently and base their plans on this information.  Teachers let students know how well they are doing and use this information to help set targets.

Inadequate

Students work is infrequently marked.  Targets set for most students are too easy, too hard or too general.  Marking does little to help students improve.  Mistakes are frequently unchecked.  Assessment is not used to assist planning.

Rationale for marking

• To value work the students do
• Inform us and children if Learning Objective has been achieved
• Identify specific students who need more targeted input
• Gaps in students’ learning
• Misconceptions
• Inform next steps
• Target setting
• Students to reflect

What do we do in terms of marking?

• Marking must be Linked to Learning Objective
• Model corrections
• Write at least two next steps, including challenging questions
• Positive reinforcement
• Use of ticks/no crosses and red pens
• Peer marking- students must be able to evaluate each other’s work
• ‘2 stars and a wish’
• stars and observations
• verbal feedback
• Students must be allowed to respond to the marking in green pens

Summative Assessment:

These will vary dependent on the age, ability and learning needs of the students. Below is a

Standardised Testing:All students in the UAE have to write standardized tests at some stage in their school career. These tests are international benchmark tests that are designed in line with UAE National Agenda and Vision 2021. Students in the UAE would meet international standards in maths, science and verbal and non- verbal reasoning and problem solving. The tests for American schools are:

• CAT 4 (Cognitive Ability Test) Grades 8,
• NWEA MAPS Grades 7,8,9,10,11,12
• PISA 10
• Grade 12 Students in American curriculum schools must also pass the following exams:
  SAT or TOEFL which are required for entry into University
  EMSAT for entry into UAE Universities

These standardised assessments:

• Should be compared to a teacher’s own assessments and any anomalies analysed e.g. a high standardised score and lower teacher assessments may indicate a student ‘coasting’.
• Give information about students’ strengths and weaknesses so that teachers can identify possible solutions and interventions.
• Help identify those students that may need additional support or more challenging teaching.
• Enables meaningful, achievable targets for individuals, classes and the school as a whole by combining attainment data, measures of ability, and powerful predictions.
• Gives ASK independent, objective information to evaluate our school’s performance and to act as our school key performance indicators (KPI’s).

Mid Term and End of Term Exams

Mid - term exams take place half way through each term as scheduled on the school calendar. Questions are set by teachers to assess areas of the curriculum covered, the skills and knowledge corresponding to the curriculum and textbook pages.

End of term Exams: Students will write term 1, 2, 3 exams at the end of each term. These exams are set by teachers. Each semester exam covers the terms work covered or taught throughout the term.

Mock exams for grade 12 should cover the entire term, and consist unused complete past SAT exam papers and other assessments as appropriate. Only the formal mock exam (usually towards the end of Term 2 preceding the real exam) should be referred to as a mock exam.

What To Study and Revision Packs: Teachers must complete ‘what to study’ packs for grades 7 and 8 for each exam. Revision packs must be compiled by all teachers in all subjects to help the students to understand what they must focus on in preparing for the exams. Teachers must teach the revision packs during revision week which is the week before the exams. HODs and the principal must check all revision packs and ‘What to Study’ before they are uploaded on the D6.

Length / Exam Timetable

HODs will be asked to submit information to draw up an internal exams timetable, and will receive guidance on exam length. Alternative lengths of exam may be requested with sufficient justification. It is also permissible in certain situations to request additional assessments just before, or just after exam week, using lesson time (but only the lesson time of the subject concerned).

Department Assessments

It is up departments and how when they assess outside the internal exam cycle. However, there must be a series of formal assessments that are common to all sets, the marks of which should be stored centrally by the Head of Department. In Year 10 and above, it is recommended that these assessments make use of past SAT material.

These informal internal assessments (often at the conclusion of topics) are essential for helping to assign grades (Reports and Interims) and can also be used on department pupil target trackers.

Whilst it is no bad thing to have informal assessments prior to Interims, Interim grades should not be based solely on a single assessment, but take into account the work over the entire period.

American Private School of Kalba Grading Scheme