Skip to main content
Beta
This is a new service – contact continuing-professional-development@digital.education.gov.uk with any feedback
  • Support for early career teachers
  • Education Development Trust
  • Year 2: First half-term: deepening assessment, feedback and questioning

    • Video introduction

    11.1b: Video introduction to the Block

    • Watch the video.
    • The video outlines what you will cover in this Block.
    Video transcript

    As an NQT last year, you completed Block 5, which introduced you to what good assessment, feedback and questioning are.

    Remember:

    assessment is the link between teaching and learning – it is how we find out the extent to which pupils have learned what we have taught them and identify any misconceptions they may hold. It gives us information which helps us respond to pupils through further teaching or feedback that pupils can act on. Effective assessment should always drive pupil learning.

    No doubt, you have created brilliant assessment tasks and issued high-quality, purposeful, personalised feedback which has supported teaching and learning.

    It is important to remember that assessment can be part of existing interactions with pupils and therefore not add to your workload.  In Block 5, you explored how to ensure your assessment always matches the objectives, which will have saved you time and made sure the data you gather is always useful and practical. You probably still have moments when assessment takes up much of your time - planning, facilitating and marking - but this is undoubtedly something that will be refined and improved over time. In this Block, you will be encouraged to work with your colleagues to find more efficient approaches which will support you to manage your workload further. 

    Now in Year 2, we will support you to build on your learning and initial successes by deepening your knowledge in this area and developing further practical strategies. You will go beyond looking at what makes effective assessment to focus on how you can link assessment to metacognitive strategies. This builds on the work you did in Block 3 in this area. 

    You will also look at how to ensure feedback is of high quality: that it is specific, helpful, and drives learning forward. You will look in detail at strategies you can use to scaffold self-assessments, to provide model work that supports learning, and to always ensure you are giving effective verbal feedback. 

    We will also spend some time looking specifically at peer- and self-assessment. These strategies are often presented as a way to increase efficiency. However, the time saved is just time wasted unless pupils are doing this really well! You will explore how you can structure and facilitate self- and peer-assessment so it can be a valuable tool within the classroom.