New online assessments that can support pupils to develop their
literacy and numeracy skills in Years 5 and 6 are now available
to schools in England.
Covering reading and maths curricula across autumn, spring, and
summer terms, NFER Online
Assessments (NOA) aim to engage pupils with
age-appropriate questions, optimised for the online environment,
while saving teachers time.
The assessments, originally launched in 2024 to pupils in Years 3
and 4, have been taken by over 9,300 pupils in the academic year
2024/25. This expanded offering of online assessments ensures
schools can now support pupils throughout their Key Stage 2
journey.
It offers pupils interactive, standardised tests that are fun and
appealing to use. This platform also delivers reliable
information to teachers for diagnostic and summative assessment
purposes.
Pupils in Years 3 to 6 will also get the opportunity to meet
NFER's friendly interactive guides, Noa the Panda and Fern the
Robot, who will be there to help them navigate through the
assessments via videos and practice questions.
Meanwhile, teachers facing workload pressures will save time as
70 per cent of all NOA questions are marked automatically,
leaving teachers to mark the ‘open-ended' and ‘show your working'
type questions.
Claire Hodgson, eAssessment Programme Director at NFER,
said:
“This dynamic and high-quality set of standardised reading and
maths assessments is designed to be used each term to track pupil
progress. Drawing on our expertise in assessment and using data
and feedback from extensive trialling, we've developed an
intuitive platform to provide stimulating, curriculum-aligned
questions.
“We're thrilled that schools have fed back to say that pupils
find NOA engaging, accessible and enjoyable and that teachers
value its accuracy and time-saving benefits.”
One school that has been using the tool told
NFER:
“I loved using NOA with the Year 3 pupils. It saved hugely on
teacher time and the children had a positive test
experience.”
Schools that are interested in learning more about these
assessments can join a number of demonstration webinars that
will take place during the Autumn term.
