The purpose of assessment at St Peter's is to ensure that teachers are clear on what children have learnt, what they can recall and which next steps they need to take to make further progress. Assessment is often thought of simply as 'testing'. However, at St Peter's we understand the term assessment to be much wider - an integral part of the journey of 'learning more' across the curriculum. 

Our assessment is purposeful; minimising paperwork and formal testing but maximising the potential for learning and progress whilst informing teachers, pupils and parents of  next steps.

The assessment systems we use can be divided into two forms.

Formative Assessment

An ongoing assessment of what the children are learning and what they can do, enabling the teacher to adapt teaching and learning to meet the needs of the learner. This form of assessment is ongoing in the classroom and ensures that children grow in confidence as well as knowledge and skills in order to meet their full potential. 

We call this 'formative assessment' - it is assessment to facilitate the process of learning, to ensure all children know more and remember more in each lesson. 

Formative assessment techniques are integral to our style of teaching and our curriculum. Formative assessment will take place at the start of a lesson or unit of work to identify what the children already know and what gaps they might have.

This can take the form of: short quizzes, discussions with pupils, marking and feedback, peer questioning and response.

Summative Assessment 

Assessment which takes place at a set point in time to measure an end point in learning, to 'sum' up the learning that has taken place over time with reference to school end points and national standards. This type of assessment is often used to report on stages of pupil progress. We call this 'summative assessment'. 

Reporting of Summative Assessment Data