This diagram summarises the range of people, support structures and processes within the education system that will be in place to support quality assurance and moderation in assessment.
As can be seen from the diagram (click on it to see a larger version) all staff engaging with learners contribute to the quality assurance of assessment and its moderation.
Working together and harnessing the range of support processes and resources available and in development, a rigorous and systematic national approach to quality assurance and moderation will be developed. At the same time, a national approach depends on the engagement of all concerned, including children and young people themselves, and their understanding of the role of assessment in improving standards of achievement.
The approaches build on recent international research and development work, as well as recent work in Scotland as part of Assessment is for Learning and National Qualifications.
At school level, teachers need to have opportunities to discuss and share expectations across the curriculum with a view to achieving consistency. These expectations also apply more widely at associated schools group/cluster level and in colleges and other providers, where examples of standards and expectations can be shared, particularly in key areas such as literacy and numeracy. Exemplification material will help to make standards and progression clearer and support reliable assessment.
Developing approaches
Teachers and other practitioners will continue to work collaboratively to develop approaches to monitoring, self-evaluation and improvement planning, building on the existing strengths of their practice.
Learners have a key role in moderation activities and teachers have an important responsibility in developing that role. Moderation activities will involve all teachers in engaging regularly in ongoing professional dialogue and collegiate working including by participating in local and national networking activities. Ongoing professional dialogue is a key component for coherent planning, checking, sampling, reviewing and providing feedback for improvement. Such collaboration and use of resources including those in the National Assessment Resource will help ensure that teachers develop a shared understanding of standards and expectations and apply these fairly and consistently. By taking part in such activities, teachers will be involved in high-quality, ongoing professional development.
Curriculum planners and managers (headteachers, depute headteachers, faculty heads/principal teachers) will build on existing practices to ensure that quality assurance activities are fit for purpose, proportionate, manageable and accessible. This will include providing opportunities and support for staff working collaboratively on moderation, verification, CPD activities and contributing to the National Assessment Resource. They will ensure an appropriate focus on coherent planning, checking, sampling, reviewing and providing feedback for improvement. Managers can also ensure that appropriate target-setting, monitoring and tracking of learners' progress is in place and that self-evaluation is based on a wide range of evidence across all aspects of learning including benchmarking information to inform improvement planning and raising achievement for all learners.
External quality assurance and moderation will focus on the judgements teachers make and on internal quality assurance and moderation practices. Education authorities will have a key role in ensuring that schools have suitable arrangements in place to support teachers' judgements and focus on any action required for improvement.
There are also details of the role of national partner organisations in quality assurance and moderation.
Find us on