Hiking, Assessment and Shoeburyness

Walking along Shoeburyness coastline, whilst training our Scouts in hiking and navigation, I chatted to one of the boys, Daniel, about his school education and how he felt he was progressing.

What was interesting and really obvious in Daniel's conversation with me, was his awareness of exactly what level he was working at.

I shouldn't be surprised, after all, Daniel wasn't and he thought it normal that he would know and be able to share such things with others. It became obvious that Daniel wasn't aware of his ability in one subject alone, but in other subjects too. I questioned him further as to whether he knew how to improve beyond his current assessment, he said he did and cited some examples. Making pupils aware of their National Curriculum levels in both Primary and Secondary education has been encouraged for the past few years now, where teachers have been open with parents and pupils about attainment levels. At the end of each key stage, parents are informed of attainment levels in English, Maths and Science.

It was an enlightening conversation, and one that filled me with some excitement about children understanding more about their own learning and how to progress and achieve higher. We are definitely in a new era of learning, no longer is it helpful to assess a piece of work as "good" or comment "try harder" - instead, we as teachers are more informative about how well the pupil performed and how they can attain higher.