Reporting & Assessment

Reporting

We will keep parents fully updated. Aspects of student performance, such as attendance and punctuality, will be available to track online using our VLE. An electronic report card (paper copies will be available to parents/carers without IT access) will be uploaded to the VLE for parents to access. There will also be an early consultation event in October for year 7, focused on pastoral issues. A formal year 7 consultation evening will be held later in the year. In years 8–11, electronic reports will be uploaded to the VLE twice a year, there will also be a parental consultation event for each year group. Parents/carers who cannot attend the events will be contacted by the pastoral team to arrange an alternative appointment or to receive feedback. The VLE will be developed to capture real-time attendance and positive reward points and sanctions. We aim to be transparent in our support for students and engagement with parents. 

Assessment

At KS3 the Academy will monitor student progress using four stages, which will be tracked against criteria used in the curriculum maps of each subject. Each student on entry will be given a target stage based primarily on their KS2 SAT's scores. The target stage will reflect potential GCSE grade outcomes. Throughout the year subject teachers will assess your child using one of the four stages which will allow you and your child to see the progress they are making in each subject. Curriculum overviews will be available on the Academy website, this will enable parents/carers and students to focus on specific curricular areas.

Students will be expected to reflect on their progress at each data entry point, and this will be discussed with teachers and tutors, and with parents/carers at consultation events. As students’ progress to KS4, GCSE grades will also be used on some assessments and reports so that parents/carers and students are aware of their progress towards their GCSE targets.

At Edgar Wood Academy, we strongly believe that a student’s attitude towards their studies is the biggest determining factor towards the grade they will achieve at GCSE. Therefore, from year 7 students will also receive Attitude to Learning (A2L) grades on each report card and on some of their assessments. We will indicate four different attitudes to learning and have a set of criteria for classwork and homework for each category:

• Learning is a Concern.

• Coasting Learner.

• Engaged Learner.

• Independent Learner.

The following forms of assessment will be used at EWA for students from years 7-11:

• Formative: To identify future targets for individual students and to inform teacher planning at class and student level.

• Diagnostic: To identify students’ strengths and weaknesses and inform future teaching or identify necessary intervention.

• Summative: To examine student performance and progress over time and report to parents, SLT, governors and DfE about students, subjects, groups of students and whole academy performance.