Supporting Assessment Design at Key Stage 3
Adapting assessments
This section enables you to:
- identify an assessment for improvement within your setting;
- adapt a current assessment to reflect your learning about assessment design; and
- administer and review the impact of the adapted assessment.
Choose one assessment that you intend to carry out this year. Download Adapting an Assessment to help you think about possible adaptations and improvements you could make.
Based on your responses, you can amend the current format of your assessment as needed.
Plan
- What changes will you make to the assessment?
- Who will make the changes?
- When will they be made?
- Who will quality assure them?
Do
- When will you carry out the assessment?
Review
- How will you review the assessment?
- Who will be involved in the review?
- What opportunity will there be for pupil voice?
Reviewing assessment language
Consider these myths and realities about accessible language:
| Accessible language | |
|---|---|
|
Makes questions easier - myth |
Expresses requirements accurately - reality |
|
Avoids technical language - myth |
Uses appropriate technical and subject-specific language - reality |
When you review assessment language for accessibility, take the following into account:
- Consider the length and complexity of sentences. Use shorter sentences with a simpler structure where you can.
- Use the active voice instead of the passive when possible, for example ‘Students have three booklets’ instead of ‘Students have been provided with three booklets’.
- Prefer the most frequently used word for the non-technical terms (carrier language), for example:
- ‘make’ not ‘produce’;
- ‘use’ not ‘utilise’; and
- ‘need’ not ‘require’.
- Some words or phrases have specific technical meanings in certain subjects and cannot be changed, such as ‘plane’/’plain’ (important in technology, science, geography, history and ICT) and ‘settlement’ (important in geography, science and business studies). Use words that have multiple meanings with care to reduce the risk of misunderstanding – for example, in some contexts ‘came to an agreement’ might be clearer than ‘came to a settlement’.
Consider also these aspects of language:
| You may choose to avoid | Possible examples |
|---|---|
| Phrasal verbs | Carry out, put out, cut off |
| Idioms | Touch alcohol, pool results |
| Two negatives near each other | Hardly, neither, nor, not many |
| Non-finite clauses (which can mean that some information is lost) | ‘Using information from the graph, calculate the number of …’ (Replace with two sentences: ‘Calculate the number of … Use information from the graph.’) |
| Subordinate clauses | ‘While the Industrial Revolution transformed societies, the impact on working conditions was profound.’ (Replace with two sentences: ‘The Industrial Revolution transformed societies. The impact on working conditions was profound.’) |
| Words with double meanings | Present, plane, key |
Reflection
- Did your chosen assessment serve the purpose it was designed for?
- Did you discover any unintended consequences?
- Did this activity allow you to identify areas of strength or improvement?
Possible extension activities
- Review three sample pupil assessments and determine what they reveal about the pupil’s strengths, gaps, and next steps needed.
- Evaluate your current assessments against criteria for effective assessments (such as alignment to learning outcomes, appropriate assessment types and clear marking criteria).
- Create a sample rubric for assessing an upcoming pupil project or assignment.
- Develop 3–5 exit-ticket-style formative assessments to gauge pupil understanding after a lesson.
- Practise providing actionable feedback on three sample pupil assignments through notations and comments.
- Reflect on how you currently use assessment data and set 1–2 goals for making your assessments more purposeful and pupil-centred.