Goodbye baseline assessment, hello profiles. Mary Evans outlines the requirements of the new progress yardstick for reception pupils
This term marks the introduction of the Foundation Stage Profile, which replaces Baseline Assessment in England as the mechanism for assessing children in reception classes.
The new scheme streamlines the 90-odd baseline assessment systems that were used to assess children during their first seven weeks at primary school.
In brief, the new scheme requires reception class staff to observe and assess children throughout the year. They will need to record children's progress either by using their setting's assessment system, so long as this is based on the stepping stones and early learning goals, or by completing a 'Foundation Stage Profile' (a 12-page booklet) for each child by ticking the developmental markers that a child has reached at the end of each term and adding any comments. If they use the profile booklet, this can replace the written report at the end of the reception year.
Early years experts have welcomed the fact that continuous observation and assessment, rather than set tasks and tests, are the basis for the scheme. Advocates argue that if implemented properly, the Profile could produce a fundamental improvement in practice. They envisage the emphasis switching away from an over-reliance on formal, adult-led sessions to a child-led and developmentally appropriate approach to activities. However, others have voiced concerns that the Foundation Stage Profile could yet amount to crude 'tick-box testing for toddlers'.
Caz Birch, a reception class teacher and early years co-ordinator at St George's Church of England Primary School, Edgbaston, Birmingham, was involved in piloting the new scheme. She says, 'I believe the system is a lot better than baseline assessment because it is on-going assessment of children throughout the whole of the reception year.'
Scales
The profile has 13 scales, based on the six areas of learning, the early learning goals and the stepping stones. Personal, social and emotional development:
- Disposition and attitudes
- Social development
- Emotional development
Communication, language and literacy:
- Language for communication and thinking
- Linking sounds and letters
- Reading
- Writing
Mathematical development:
- Numbers as labels for counting
- Calculating
- Shape, space and measure
Knowledge and understanding of the world
Physical development
Creative development
Points
Each scale has nine points. For example, the nine points for 'Calculating' are:
1. Responds to the vocabulary that is involved in addition and subtraction in rhymes and games.
2. Recognises differences in quantity when comparing sets of objects.
3. Finds one more or one less from a group of up to five objects.
4. Relates addition to combining two groups.
5. Relates subtraction to taking away.
6. In practical activities and discussion, begins to use vocabulary involved in adding and subtracting.
7. Relates subtraction to taking away.
8. Finds one more or one less than a number from one to ten.
9. Uses developing mathematical ideas and methods to solve practical problems. Points 1, 2, 3 apply to a child who is still progressing towards the early learning goals and are mainly based on the stepping stones.
Points 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 are drawn directly from the early learning goals and are presented in approximate order of difficulty but are not necessarily hierarchical.
Point 9 describes a child who has achieved all the earlier points on that scale, has developed further both in breadth and depth and is working consistently beyond the level of the early learning goals and within the early levels of the national curriculum.
The profile booklet is colour-coded for the three terms so the practitioner can indicate at what stage during the school year a child achieved which point.
Comments
The profile booklet includes a comments box on each area of learning and this can be used to record observation evidence, assessment contexts or next steps. Space is also provided for comments from the child's previous settings and from parent and child conferences.
Handbook
The Foundation Stage Profile Handbook, supported by a video and CD- Rom, acts as a guide to the new system, describing how it works and giving examples of each point and how to observe its attainment.
It includes information on how to use the assessment scales, and case studies demonstrating how practitioners can initiate activities and use them to observe achievement of different points across several scales. The handbook also describes how to:
- assess children with special educational needs
- assess children who are learning English as an additional language
- involve other 'assessors', including giving guidance and prompts on how to conduct a parent conference and a parent questionnaire
- ensure the assessments are carried out consistently.
Timetable
September 2002 Statutory baseline assessment ends and is replaced by the Foundation Stage Profile.
October/November The final materials will be posted on the website. Case studies from the second pre-test (conducted this summer) will be added, and the advice from teachers involved in this pre-test will be used to improve the materials. There will be few other changes to the current materials.
January 2003 Schools receive Foundation Stage Profile packs.
February to June 2003 Training and moderation activities for practitioners.
June Completion of Foundation Stage Profiles.
July Submission of results of local education authorities; reporting to parents. Autumn term Publication of national results - final decisions have yet to be made on the format.
Completion
Schools can use the profile as part of their observation and assessment system throughout the year or transfer their records from other observation systems to the children's profiles during the summer term.
The system has been designed so a straightforward 'yes/no' judgement of a child's achievement can be made. And the handbook's advice is that 'this should represent your assessment of the child's typical attainment.
'Some practitioners refer to this as a best-fit judgement, in the sense that while a child's behaviour may vary somewhat from day to day and from context to context, the assessment made is the best description of that child's typical achievement.'
Settings will be expected to share the profile with parents at the end of the Foundation Stage and it is anticipated that most practitioners will use the profile booklet as the basis for reports to parents and information to pass on to the child's next teacher.
People other than the reception class teachers will contribute to the assessment process, for example nursery nurses and learning assistants, the child's parents and the children themselves.
Training
Training will not take place until next year, but a QCA spokesman says the timetable is realistic for practitioners. 'Most schools will already be recording the assessments they make for teaching and learning. If local training has been about how to deliver the Foundation Stage, then practitioners will need relatively little additional training. Some LEAs carried out their initial training during the summer term to ensure all settings could attend.'
Moderation
Moderation of the assessment judgements will be essential for the scheme to succeed. To ensure practitioners maintain a consistent approach to their observations, the profile handbook provides a framework for moderation and says local education authorities will have to ensure that all practitioners responsible for completing profiles take part in moderation activities at least once annually.
The QCA spokesman says, 'Some LEAs now intend to run twilights and half-days on moderation, a couple of sessions each term. LEAs are finding that they are delivering the same kind of programme they used to for baseline.
'Some have said they will use the same teams they used for moderating baseline assessment. Other LEAs intend to recruit and train a new group.
'During baseline assessment, moderators were usually appointed by the LEA, and paid by their own school. The LEA provided supply cover to the school. We would expect similar arrangements to be made for the Foundation Stage Profile.'
