At Hope Valley College, we assess work in order to:

• Understand what students have and haven’t learnt and respond by adapting our teaching.
• Provide feedback which enables students to move forward and take action.

We assess the learning of students in two ways, which act as two separate layers of assessment. These are as follows:

• Formative: ongoing, ungraded, and focused on smaller sections of the curriculum.
• Summative: summative assessments may take the form of mock exams, a test, an assessed piece of writing or practical work as appropriate to the subject.

How do we judge the starting points of students?

We use Fisher Family Trust (FFT) software, which provides all key benchmarking data based on key stage 2 SATs results and other information about the student’s progress at key stage 1 and key stage 2. The FFT benchmarks, including target grades for every subject, are based on how similar students nationally performed in the subject last year (similar students are defined as similar prior attainment, gender and month of birth). We share FFT benchmark data with parents and carers in Year 7.

Attitude to learning (ATL)

We believe that to learn successfully, students need to be ready to learn, resilient, resourceful, respectful and reflective. These are the five characteristics of good learners and students who are consistently demonstrating these characteristics and will progress well in school. Four times a year, teachers give students a numerical grade (1-4) which demonstrates their attitude to learning in each subject. These grades summarise the extent to which each student is demonstrating the five characteristics of good learners.  You can find out more about ATL, and how the ATL grades are calculated on our attitude to learning page.

Measuring academic progress

At the end of Year 7 and 8 and twice during Year 9, teachers will assess what a student’s most likely outcome at GCSE would be if they continued to progress as they have been so far. We compare these most likely outcomes with each student's Fisher Family Trust expected grades to make a judgement as to whether they are 'above', 'on track' or 'working towards' expected levels.

At key stage 4, students' work is marked in line with GCSE or equivalent specification mark schemes. Ongoing formative feedback is also given. We report a 'most likely outcome' GCSE grade at two points in Year 10 and Year 11.

Reporting to parents and carers

Years 7 and 8

We report four attitude to learning grades a year. We also provide an assessment of progress towards GCSE grades at the end of the academic year. There is one parents evening with subject teachers per year.

Years 9, 10 and 11

We report four attitude to learning grades a year. We also provide an assessment of progress towards GCSE grades twice in the year. There is one parents evening with subject teachers per year.