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Writing Assessments 2017

11/7/2016

15 Comments

 

Writing assessment 2017 or Post apocalypse writing.

Part one – The content of the Interim frameworks 2016 and their adverse effects.

Has the dust settled on the 2016 assessments yet? No way I hear you say.  I agree with you, I continually get asked about them on social media and when I go into schools.   There is much debate on Twitter and Facebook about what the writing assessments will or will not look like next year at the end of KS2.
Will it look the same as this year?  Will the interim framework just become the framework?  I cannot imagine there will be many changes if any at all.

The way writing is assessed against the framework is, anecdotally, having a negative effect on the teaching of writing in some schools, especially where the tick list method is used.

Gone has the teaching of writing which focused on effect on the reader, an outpouring of the author’s creativity and feelings -  to be replaced by staid pieces of writing whose main aim is to demonstrate the proficient use of complicated grammar and punctuation which is often unnecessary in quality writing.  Pick up a novel – go on… get one now… open it to any page. How many exclamation marks, colons or semi colons does it have?  I am guessing in many cases that they are rarely used and if they are used at all then they have been inserted sparingly.

This week I heard via Twitter of a child in Y2 being assessed as below expectations because she had only used exclamations in two of her moderated pieces of writing and thus didn’t demonstrate sufficient secure use.  (Surely if the two were used correctly this demonstrates a secure understanding?)


The sad thing is that I can’t see anything being done about this at a governmental level any time soon.  However, as teachers we can still focus on creating opportunities for our children to create writing which is creative and imaginative, which looks at the effect on the audience, develops vocabulary use and choice etc.  Whilst teaching grammar in context as part of the writing journey, which  can then be used by the children as and when necessary.  This needs to be done, as it says in the National Curriculum, through the teaching of reading, writing and speaking and not as a separate bolt on.  If this is done from year 1 onward, at a level appropriate for our pupils then we should see the effect in future years.

 Part two – Flaws in the assessment process.

Recently many people have been expressing their displeasure in the moderation process, that they have been forced to produce tick lists and endless evidence for moderation whereas other schools have had quite a positive experience.  Other schools didn’t have to experience it at all and we’ll just have to trust their results, with some teachers worried that they have been too generous or too harsh.

A friend of mine believes (and I am swayed this way too) if one school is moderated then they all should be. This would certainly seem fairer although it would come at great expense.

**Typing from my Anderson shelter**

It may be much simpler to return to the writing tests.


Not quite as they were before but still a one off test which would allow children to show off their writing skills.
I would personally go for a ‘cold’ write narrative which had an interesting and engaging prompt and a non-fiction ‘hot’ write.
 
How would that work?

Firstly, we would need a sea-change in what we (teachers) think the assessments are for.  At the moment I feel that many teachers think assessments are a way of students proving how good they are, showing off their very best work which is why it is produced over a period of time with a number of rewrites.  Is this really the purpose of the year 6 writing assessments though?  Not really, the purpose is to level/rank children against their peers and use these levels/ranks ultimately to rank their schools against those in the LEA and nationally.

Not many pupils are going to produce their best piece of writing under test conditions, not many of us would.  But what the tests would give is a standardised piece of work which can be easily ranked and compared across the country.

So what would these new tests look like?
They would be four hours long.  Two hours for non-fiction and two hours for narrative.

Narrative
Give children an engaging stimulus, an image or a short film and ask children to write a narrative piece based upon this.   It maybe that if they are watching a film extract they could write a conversational piece, they could be asked to write a description of setting, character or both.  They could be asked to write an ending for a short film or a piece of action.  It would be short and not a whole narrative.  Children should be used to this type of writing as it is standard fare in most schools.  The two hours would allow for 30 mins thinking/planning time if needed followed by an extended writing session of 90 minutes which would allow some children time to edit and redraft sections.
 
Non-Fiction
(Disclaimer) This is just an idea that I think could possibly work.
Two/three weeks prior to the test date teachers can download a 2/3 week basic unit plan on a topic with key focus points, key information and key vocabulary. This, for example, could be Volcanoes, Castles etc.
The teachers then have 2/3 weeks to teach content and vocabulary whilst revising text types and applying them to the topic.
On the day of the test the task is revealed.  Something like non-chronological report, recount of visit to… etc
The children at this point should have the content knowledge and also knowledge of text types in order to ‘succeed.’
 
Although in a perfect world none of this would happen, we would just teach our pupils how to write creatively, passionately and accurately without the need for testing.
​
As always I welcome your comments.
Rob

15 Comments
Ben Connor
11/7/2016 11:49:17 pm

I agree that a test would be more fair. Abuse of the current system is rife, schools and individual teachers are forced to either lie about their pupils, shoehorn ideas into work or both. There's also a massive discrepancy between moderators.
I'm not sure how the non-fiction piece would be policed, but at least they would have input without knowing the final writing style. How would the writing be judged? Against the same framework? If so we'll just get robotic writers by another means and lower results than the inflated ones we have now, an even bigger stick for N. Morgan to use.

Reply
Robert Smith
11/7/2016 11:52:48 pm

If we had lower results than those which we have now, perhaps they would see how ridiculous the writing expectations are at the moment. It is the fact schools getting 90% -100% ARE at the moment and pushing up scores, through hot housing of writing, grammar etc that results are perhaps skewed. I am not sure what you mean about the policing of the non-fiction writing piece, it would be done under test conditions but children will have prior knowledge of content etc.

Reply
Tarjinder Gill
12/7/2016 01:53:39 am

I have been thinking along similar lines Rob but couldn't quite piece together how to make it fair. Thanks for this. I think that the only problem with the non-fiction test would be that it is as much about teaching as it would be the child's ability. However, this is one area where i feel that the lack of a national curriculum is wanting. If we knew that all children would be taught x, y and z then non-fiction test could be similar to the narrative one. This would also mean that schools would need to ensure depth of teaching across the curriculum. It might be fairer to restrict it to History, Science, Geography and RE as these already have expectations that writing will be undertaken. It would require a more thrased out system of interleaving throughout the years.

Leigh Danckert link
12/7/2016 06:41:54 am

One question:as with the case of the discrepancy between moderators this year (some more lenient than others on certain things etc), and combining this with the whole creative and subjective element of writing, how would we ensure that whoever is marking the writing tests are going to do so fairly and consistently?

Reply
Rob
12/7/2016 06:44:37 am

I think that is always going to be the problem Leigh, although if there was a standardised piece if teachers could see how others had been marked in their locality they could appeal, like the reading and maths papers now perhaps.

Reply
Leigh
12/7/2016 07:19:53 am

As long as it was fair. Although saying that, I don't think (through no fault of their own) teachers have done themselves many favours with the being trusted stakes after the debacle of this year's writing! Is there ever going to be an option that satisfies all?!

M Street
12/7/2016 07:31:21 am

Yes, good question about fairness and consistency, but the big problem we have now is that we are striving too hard to produce a totally measurably reliable system. Good writing is not like that. Just because something can be measured consistently (all the technicalities) doesn't make it the most important thing or the right thing to measure! Right now, I would definitely risk a bit of inconsistency to restore a focus on the content and effect of writing (as well as keeping appropriate expectations about punctuation etc.).

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Annakatrina
12/7/2016 07:57:33 am

Well said. The writing is enormously flawed in its present state. Tick lists are extinguishing creative flames and leading to formulaic writing with semi-colons shoe-horned in.
Of course, there are some fabulously creative writers ( and teachers)!out there. Testing writing will always be the most challenging to get right. I would make it simpler still:
1) scrap the ticklist and trust teachers to make a best fit judgement. All schools would have to run moderation sessions across groups ( perhaps those that feed to a secondary?) and these groups would ALL be moderated. ( one from each group, different each year).
2. Trust teachers to teach the children what is needed and have a writing test along the lines you mentioned; this could be used to inform the TA but not be the only measure.
3. Remove writing from the combined and put the SPaG in.
4. Did I mention trust teachers?
5. Make composition and effect the most important part of any writing judgements.

Reply
Miss Price
12/7/2016 10:03:24 am

Pretty much along the lines that I'd go down although I tweeted my preference for a longer "test" recently and was shot down in flames because children can't write for that long apparently! Mine can and do and they enjoy
Being given enough time to produce their best writing - I like the idea of the part narrative.

Another thought was that we could all be given a set text to study in Spring term (a bit like they do for GCSE) and our non-fiction test could be based around this. I see that as a really fair way of ensuring that all children have access to the same resource and all teachers have control over the way we are able to prepare our children for a test.

What do you think?

Reply
Rob
12/7/2016 04:00:59 pm

I like the idea of a set text to complete work on.
Great idea!

I agree many children enjoy writing for this long, they could always be allowed a break half way through if needed.

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Susan Simons
12/7/2016 11:19:38 pm

I really like the idea of a set text for either fiction or non-fiction stimulus. My experience of having studied a whole book with a class has been really positive in terms of writing outcomes and everyone remembers those set texts they studied at secondary. Why not at primary too?

Reply
Craig Westby
12/7/2016 06:31:41 pm

Well, I agree that the current assessment system of tick-box patheticness, is...pathetic! As a side note, just look at my punctuation range! Writing is an art. What makes a favourite story your favourite? Is it the amount of fronted adverbials it uses? Or perhaps that semi-colon that really puts some added 'oomph' into an otherwise drab read? Surely, quite possibly, could it be the intricate way modal verbs are used? Like a piece of music, there are some stories I have read that I really shouldn't have enjoyed quite as much as I should: my 'guilty pleasures'. They weren't as technically proficient as some but nevertheless they were enjoyable , for me, the audience.

I like the ideas above and yes, there will be issues with any such form of assessment when it is sometimes hard to verbalise yourself what makes a good piece of writing better than another (here I'm thinking more fiction but not altogether dismissing non-fiction). But how creativity, effect on the audience, flow and voice aren't a bigger part of assessments , in my opinion is a travesty to young writers and those who are teaching them. We are putting this right in our school, to hell with tick lists!

It's easy to teach technical writing ; it's much harder to teach imagination and creativity.

Reply
Suzanna
12/7/2016 10:16:31 pm

Agree that set text would be good and should be changed every year. I think that the moderation process should involve looking at the child's planning as well as the finished product. I also think there is scope for including some kind of commentary on the assessed piece by the child. I know this would be time consuming but I think it would really illuminate the child's understanding and secureness of writing techniques and effects. I think that teachers need very clear guidance on teaching for the assessed pieces in terms of support offered. I know it is nigh on impossible to provide the same experience for every child but I know that many teachers feel insecure because they are not exactly sure what level if support can be offered.

Reply
Cerih7
18/1/2017 11:39:20 pm

http://schoolsweek.co.uk/consider-scrapping-ks2-teacher-marked-writing-tests-says-ofsted-director/

Reply
Ben
9/7/2017 01:28:21 pm

There is no fair way to assess writing. Any system used will be flawed as it is a creative process not a mechanical one.

Any assessment of any subject has to have criteria. Knowledge based subjects (maths, science etc) are easily tested - do you know the content or not.

Creative subjects are much more subjective - style, content, formality and voice all differ from person to person, heavily influenced by what they read, what they watch, how they converse and what experiences they have had. To assess this you need criteria. To have criteria you need to remove the creative element of writing and focus on mechanics and technicalities. Once you have criteria, they become tick lists. Why? Because that's what you're reducing writing to.

With the system you propose, there will still be assessment criteria which the children will be trained in, the stress levels will just be higher for a one-off piece of writing.

The current system at least adds a touch of reality to the assessment. It allows time for children to be more creative alongside the 'tick list' criteria as pieces of writing can be developed and discussed. A one-off piece (especially with the focus on punctuation) will be a case of cramming different skills into one piece of writing and remove any chance of individuality or creativity.

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    Rob from Literacy Shed

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