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Senior Reporting

This page is designed to support you in understanding the new reporting schedule, content and next steps for pupils within the Senior school. 

Reports should act as formal documents to communicate the progress each pupil is making during their time at Felsted. We suggest that the report is read, discussed and reflected on by pupils with their parents, as well as with their tutors. In order to provide context to the report and allow this process to be successful, full information is available below; if you have any questions following digestion of the information please do contact Sarah Capewell (Deputy Head Academic) or Richard Williams (Director of Data & Reports) for advice regarding the structure and process and your son/ daughter’s tutor for pupil specific advice.

There will be many areas of success and, equally, some areas to target for improvement, both in attainment and approach to learning. It should also serve as a way for us to work together to support the overall progress of each child as an individual learner. With that in mind, this year, the academic office has developed a new set of reporting criteria. 

The change will:

  • provide more regular feedback to parents and pupils (as on the reporting below) 
  • make use of a greater variety of data streams
  • think more intelligently about how to quantify attainment
  • add a gauge of how well pupils are approaching their learning

The ultimate aim is to increase academic dialogue between pupils, parents, teachers, pastoral staff and senior leaders. This will allow our pupils to make better overall progress and put metacognition at the forefront of their learning, allowing them to be more involved in their own developmental process in readiness for life after school. 

By shifting the focus away from being primarily outcome driven, we are moving the process of developing as a learner firmly front and centre, meaning pupils of all abilities can be championed as academic leaders within the school.

Reports may contain attainment, two approach to learning scores (in / beyond classroom) with improvement codes, examination scores / grades and full comments depending on year group, time of year and subject (as on the reporting schedule below)

There will be three main types of report:
Interim Report
Subject teachers to provide approach to learning grades in / beyond classroom with relevant improvement codes and if appropriate an attainment grade through iSAMS reporting system.

Subject Report
Subject teachers to provide current attainment grade (if appropriate), approach to learning grades in / beyond the classroom and a comment.

Exam Report
Exam results will be uploaded into iSAMS assessment system to produce an exam report including solely a score and grade.

Reports will be available via the parent portal on iSAMS at 9am on Monday of each completed reporting cycle.

A brief outline of each aspect of the Report for each pupil is below

1. Attainment

Attainment grades are linked closely to the grading system used by the examination board towards which pupils are working.

The attainment grades rely on some subjective judgement by teachers, but are underpinned by all academic data available on the pupil at the time of writing. The starting point is the school’s historic data, supplemented by central / cohort formative and summative assessments throughout the whole course studied so far. The grading is not be a snapshot of attainment for the reporting cycle but rather reflects the attainment across all reporting cycles pertinent to the course being undertaken (GCSE, IB & Level) as well as any relevant NEA / IA work. 

The grading does NOT reflect a prediction for the pupil, but simply states that: “Felsted pupils who respond to all the material studied in this course as this pupil has done so far, typically go on to secure this grade in their terminal exams”

There is no longer a ‘flightpath’ for each pupil as each curriculum is structured in such a way that it enables progression. Informal assessment will take place in every single lesson, and will take the form of questioning, verbal assessment, quizzing and multiple-choice testing, to name a few methods. Such informal assessment will inform future planning of lessons, allowing teachers to respond to the progress of pupils.

Therefore it must be understood that grades may increase AND decrease as the course continues dependent on the individual academic progress pupils make and their approach to learning.

Monitoring these changes, reflecting on baseline measurements and focusing on a pupil’s approach to learning is essential in ensuring the best outcomes possible for each Felstedian at all levels and in identifying where interventions are necessary / reflecting on the success of any interventions already in place. 

 

What can pupils do to stand out?

Simply stating that a pupil will WORK HARDER will not make any difference – Pupils need to be PROACTIVE, DRIVEN & SMART about targets and address deficiencies in their Approaches to Learning.

2. Approaches to Learning

Separate judgements have been given for Approach to Learning in and Approach to Learning beyond the classroom and may also be accompanied by a set of improvement codes.

Approach to Learning is how the pupil engages with their studies and their teachers’ expectations. When grading a pupil on their Approach to Learning teachers consider to what extent they persevere on a topic or prep, what research they have done (where and how). Is there evidence that they have taken a risk with an answer when they were unsure?  Is there evidence that they have reflected upon previous work and found better strategies to improve their understanding or output?  Are they organised in having the right equipment, meeting deadlines and being punctual to lessons?  When grading pupils for their Approach to Learning there will have to be a certain amount of subjectivity but by focussing on their overall approach to learning rather than just “Effort”, we are rewarding our pupils for working smarter not just harder.

Reports are on a four level scale (Exceptional, Above Expectations, Meeting Expectations and Needs Improvement) and are intentionally demanding.  We want very high standards and obtaining an ‘Exceptional’ is very difficult.  Obtaining ‘Needs Improvement’ is worrying and the pupil should reflect with their tutor and the relevant teacher/s about the reason for this descriptor and discuss how to improve over the next half-term and beyond.

The ATL statements are not absolute and need to be considered across the whole reporting cycle. A best fit model, taking the pupils stage of education (eg a Year 9 pupil should not be expected to have the same independent working skills expected of the majority of U6th) should be applied; by no means does a pupil need to display all of the indicative qualities to receive that level, but if in doubt, the lower level should be applied to allow room for improvement. We intentionally have high expectations on approach to learning and as such these should be demanding. Meeting expectations should be the norm.

3. Improvement codes

In order to contextualise the Approach to Learning grades provided, pupils will be given a maximum of three improvement codes.

The improvement codes will be supported by year group / subject specific advice to support pupils, tutors and parents in understanding how best to target improvement over the following weeks / months. They should act as a starting point for dialogue between pupils and teachers / tutors to set an agenda for improvement. 

A full list of improvement codes and details of the advice to pupils, which will be developed further as the year continues, are both available below: