From September all new primary school pupils will take the
new reception baseline assessment (RBA) that will replace
SATs in year 2.
Following successful pilots all over the country, the RBA,
a one-to-one exercise done in 20 minutes with a teacher in
an informal setting, will be taken by all children in their
first six weeks of primary school.
The move paves the way for the removal of the national
curriculum assessments at the end of key stage 1 from
2022/23 – commonly known as SATs – when pupils are aged
six- or seven-years-old.
It comes after a validity report based on a national pilot
confirmed that the new assessments provide an accurate
assessment of a pupils’ starting point from which to
measure the progress they make in primary school.
School Standards Minister said:
It’s hugely important that we understand how much
progress primary schools help their pupils make.
This new teacher-led check will replace the SATs taken at
the end of year 2 to give a better understanding of a
child’s starting point when they arrive at school and
reduce the number of assessments in primary schools
overall.
A new report analysing the effectiveness of the RBA found:
- the assessment is representative of a range of
literacy, communication, language and mathematics skills
and knowledge appropriate to the age and development of
children at the start of reception.
- assessment results provide a fair and accurate measure
of pupil performance – including for those with special
educational needs and disabilities; and
- pupil performance is comparable within and across
schools.
- evidence from the pilot shows we expect over 90% of
assessments to be completed within 20 minutes
NAHT General Secretary, Paul Whiteman said:
The NAHT welcomes the transparency and openness shown by
Standards and Testing Agency through the publication of
this report and we are pleased to see that the government
has reiterated its intention to remove SATs at the end of
year 2.
NAHT has long argued that it makes little sense to take a
baseline measure for progress midway through the primary
years, as is the case now, effectively ignoring the
incredible work and progress made in those critical first
few years of school.
The introduction of a reliable and workable baseline
assessment to replace year 2 SATs has the potential to be
a fairer way of measuring progress and means we should
finally start to see the reduction in the volume of high
stakes testing in primary that NAHT has long called for.
The reception baseline assessment has been designed to
reflect the types of assessment that most schools already
carry out in reception. It will take roughly 20 minutes, be
carried out one-to-one with pupils, and does not have a
pass mark.
Children will be assessed orally through simple, practical
tasks which could include counting or describing pictures,
reflecting the types of activities which many parents
already do with their children at home. There is no need
for teachers or parents to prepare pupils for the
assessment.
