Assessment and Reporting

Assessments

At Ormiston Denes Academy, we believe all students should have the opportunity to succeed at the highest level. All aspects of our school life aim to inspire students to aspire and be ambitious. This is matched by a curriculum that is designed for all students to experience rigorous academic challenges, whilst enabling all our students to make positive life choices so they are healthy, polite and respectful.

Purpose of Assessment

Assessment is used to enable the following:

For students, provide targeted feedback and development points against curriculum intentions and assessment.

For teachers and curriculum leaders, the measurement and tracking of student progress.

Reporting to students, parents, school leadership teams and governors.

Principles of Assessment

Summative assessment sits within a broader framework of assessment as a tool for, of, and as learning. The OAT Principles of Assessment, which explore this framework further, are set out below:

To enable teachers to identify and respond to what students know and don’t know: We use whole-class, inclusive assessment strategies in every lesson to check students’ understanding and inform a teacher’s next steps.

To strengthen students’ learning: The very time students retrieve something from their memory, their learning is strengthened. We use varied tasks, especially those that are routine and low-stakes, to make students recall their learning, deliberately contributing to knowledge-building.

To prime students to learn something new: Learning happens when students can make meaning of new content, and this means the new must ‘attach’ itself to what we already know. This means that, to learn something new, we need to activate students’ relevant prior knowledge.

To summarise attainment and progress: Curricular-aligned, infrequent, higher-stakes assessments can be used to give us a broad snapshot of learning at a moment in time.

Assessing the curriculum

When we assess, we try to make invisible learning visible. We use different types of tasks to make judgements about what students have understood or remembered. We use these judgements for

different purposes, some of which are formative (that is, shaping learning) and some of which are

summative (that is, summarising learning).

At Denes, ‘assessment’ is not synonymous with ‘test’ – assessment encompasses a great range of ways that teachers check students’ learning, including tasks in many formats, low-stakes quizzes, retrieval practice, checking for understanding and more. When thinking about assessment, we start with its purpose, including the kinds of inferences we want to make from it, before turning our attention to what the assessment looks like.

OAT Common Curriculum

A high-quality curriculum is one of the best strategies for raising attainment of students in our academy. We know from evidence that a coherent, carefully sequenced and appropriately pitched curriculum is key to raising attainment. As an OAT Academy, over the next two years, we are implementing an aligned curriculum. We believe we can better serve the students in our academy by aligning the curriculum and exam boards for national curriculum subjects in KS3 and KS4, so that we can work closer together as a trust to serve our 35 000 children. We want to ensure that every student in Ormiston Denes:

Has equitable access to the most powerful knowledge

Is taught by subject experts who are always learning themselves

Accesses the highest quality materials from subject experts across and beyond Ormiston Academy Trust.

Common summative assessment (mid-year and end-point assessments)

One of the benefits of having an aligned curriculum, is being able to use common summative assessment, set centrally at a Trust level. These provide:

Entitlement. Given our commitment to raising attainment and giving students the best possible education, the common curriculum specifications and assessments help us to check that all students, no matter what classroom they are taught in, have the same minimum entitlement to knowledge.

Benefits of scale. These standardised assessments are taken by thousands of students across the trust. We can more effectively identify gaps in knowledge for individual students, in classes or whole cohorts and, importantly, see how other schools compare, opening conversations around practice and leveraging the support to drive improvements.

Target setting

By setting ambitious, aspirational and achievable targets for all our students we help them stay motivated and help them to understand the progress they are making at school. Students tell us that they value these targets, they appreciate knowing how well they are doing, and they want to understand how to improve. 

How do you decide what my child’s target will be? 

By placing ambition at the core, we set targets grade based on national progress models set at a Trust level. The aim is for better progress than students nationally, ensuring higher levels of attainment which results in improved future life choices. These targets reflect what your child should aspire towards. We are ambitious in our desire for all students to reach a minimum of Grade 5 because this is the benchmark set for a ‘strong pass’ by exam boards. Further education and training establishments and employers also recognise this too therefore we will not set a target lower than a -5 but will help and support your child work towards this target. 

Throughout the academic year, teachers in each subject can raise a student’s targets to reflect particular talents of or knowledge of the child. 

What do these targets look like?

As you may be aware, the Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation (Ofqual) has introduced reformed GCSEs. These have more content, a higher focus on literacy and in most cases are assessed through examination only. In addition, the grades awarded are from Grade 9 to Grade 1, instead of A* to G. Therefore, in Year 7-11 targets will also be set as grades 9-1. Some specialist courses that can be chosen from Year 10 such as BTECs have an alternative system (for example, Pass, Merit, Distinction, Distinction*).

New GCSE Grade	9	8	7	6	5	4	3	2	1	U
Old GCSE Grades	A* A			B C			D E F G			U

When is this target set for?

All targets are set at the beginning of the year and remain till the end of the academic year. This means students should be working towards meeting this target throughout the academic year.

What information will I receive about my child’s progress?

At the end of each term, target grades are reported along with progress towards targets to parents and carers using Arbor. The progress of all students is tracked by the academy each term and progress reports are then produced which are available for parental viewing.

Currently, students receive a Current Grade and a Forecast Grade (the grade that the teacher believes a student will reach by the end of year/or GCSE/BTEC course for Year 10 and 11s) through subject based assessments and OAT Common Assessment three times a year.

What does each of the Grades mean? 

Current Grade – The grade your child is currently working at. This is based on their current level of work and assessments. 

Forecast Grade – The grade your child is predicted to gain at the end of the academic year (or GCSE/BTEC course for Year 10 and 11s). This is based on their current level of work and their teacher’s professional judgement as to their likely progression with them continuing their current level of effort. 

Student Target Grade – The grade your child should be attempting to achieve by the end of the academic year (or GCSE/BTEC course for Year 10 and 11s). All targets are aspirational and challenging and based on a target setting process used across the trust. 

When can I expect a progress report?

We aim to send a progress report to parents at the end of the final week of half term or the week immediately following a school break (depending on the length of the half term). Year 7-10 will receive three full progress reports at the end of each term supported by Attitude to Learning judgements made by teachers. As Year 11 students’ academic year is shorter, parents will receive two, one at the end of the Autumn term and then one at the end of the Spring term (the forecast grades of both can be used required for college applications).

Academic Reports

Reports will be issued via Arbor to parents and students in the last week of each school term. Reports will include:

Target Grade

Current Grade

Forecast Grade

Attitude to Learning Grade

Attendance Percentage

Reading Age data (Autumn and Summer Term only)

Also available through Arbor:

Timetables – daily and weekly timetable.

Attendance – Shown from the start of the academic year.

Rewards and Behaviour information.

Parents are encouraged to go through the report carefully with their child, highlighting areas for improvement and considering action points for further progression. Where there is a corresponding parents evening this may be done with the support of class teachers.

At the beginning of every half term, students work with their form tutor to set academic targets in the planners to help them improve over the next half term. These action points will then be reviewed and adjusted through the next reporting cycle. At the academy, we follow a coloured coded system to help us identify those students who need further support and to celebrate and reward students who are doing well.

Attitude to Learning Grade 

Through the academic year, students will receive attitude to learning grades which show how they have been responding in lessons, how much effort they have been putting into their learning and the quality and frequency of the home learning. These grades are used by both the academic and pastoral teams to support students who are struggling to reach their full potential as learners and to celebrate and reward others who are striving to achieve theirs.  

This academic year, we have refined the Attitude to Learning (AtL) descriptors this year to raise expectations and further challenge our students. Last year, they demonstrated remarkable potential for improvement, and we want to ensure that progress continues rather than plateau.

Whilst we acknowledge we are asking more of our students, we also provide greater support through our universal offer in lesson, through our targeted form-time and assembly programme and where required more bespoke support for some students because we believe all our students deserve the very best opportunities to succeed.  

The table below shows how teachers make these judgments. 

	Behaviour & Attitude for Learning	Effort	Home Learning
4	Exemplifies the Denes Way – is proud to participate in lessons and is responsible for their learning. Always on time to lessons because every minute matters.	Takes responsibility for their work, completing with enthusiasm, focus and to a high standard, showing respect for learning and for others. Always works hard in their lessons.	Takes responsibility to write their home learning in their planner, and consistently meets home learning deadlines, usually being ahead of them ensuring they are ready for lesson.
3*	Usually exemplifies the Denes Way and is mostly proud to participate and offer their input. Usually on time to lessons.	Work set in lessons is usually attempted with good levels of effort, although this is not always consistent. Does not go above and beyond.	Attempts to take responsibility for their home learning and meets most home learning deadlines. Attends Study Hall if needed.
2	Has to be reminded of the Denes Way and often needs prompting in lessons. Mostly on time to lessons, some concerns about lateness.	Does attempt work set in lesson to try to take responsibility, however, needs prompting from the teacher to stay on track, sometimes working hard.	Does not often attempt Home Learning and revision and misses numerous deadlines. Does not tend to attend Study Hall to support.
1	Rarely works independently and relies upon teacher input. Denes Way not yet evident in this student. Often late to lesson.	Limited attempts to take responsibility, and work is often incomplete with little respect for work shown.	Does not attempt Home Learning and revision in readiness for lesson, with deadlines often missed. No attempt made to go to Study Hall.
N/A	Has been absent for long periods of time so difficult to judge behaviour & Attitude.	Has been absent for long periods of time so difficult to judge Effort in lessons.	Has been absent for long periods of time so difficult to judge levels of Home Learning.

Teaching and Learning Feedback Policy

All teachers check what students know and can do well enough and provide timely and relevant feedback during the lesson. Effective responsive and adaptive teaching requires an effective feedback process. Through this, gaps are identified in student learning or understanding, and students are provided with the next steps for improvement.

Green Pen for metacognition: students will use green pen during their lessons to reflect on their work, develop in response to teacher feedback and correct errors. For example, marking answers as right or wrong, self/peer assessing according to a checklist, addressing feedback at hinge points.

Live Feedback: teachers will use red pens in books while circulating to support student development. For example, developmental questions and corrections. Students respond to this in green.

Pink Highlighter for Literacy: When circulating, teachers will use pink highlighters to support literacy development. For example, highlighting misspelled words, highlighting in the margin where sentences need reformulating, dots to seek out an error. Students respond in green.

Summative and Formative assessments: Teachers will use red pens to offer feedback on formative or summative assessments. For example, WWW and EBI, written feedback on specific errors, whole-class feedback. Students will be responsible for acting on feedback in green.

Practice makes permanent: feedback requires students to act. High-quality feedback at Denes is well-timed and gives students an appropriate task to show that they have improved.

Appropriate feedback responses are focused on the task, subject or self-regulation strategies that make students successful.