Exams in the news: Extra time, exams and SEND Part 2

Highlights from The Exam Man podcast, Series 3 Episode 3

Part 2: Tracking and assessment for pupils with SEND

In this part we continue the theme of assessing students with special needs and how you adapt systems to try and capture everybody’s abilities and progress.  We speak to Vicki Clayson, a former Deputy Headteacher with a special interest in inclusion, who is now a consultant for iTRACK Education. She gives us valuable insights about the importance of tracking all progress, even small steps, in pupils’ learning and development.

Firstly, it would be great to hear a little bit about you and your background, and how you ended up working in this area.

That's a long story. I went to uni and trained to be a primary school teacher. It was all I'd ever wanted to do. I worked in the primary sector for eight and a half years, had a baby, went back to teaching part-time, didn't feel the same, didn't want to do the juggle of being mum and being teacher. So I left teaching, did some supply teaching, which was great. And then I just stumbled into this job, to be perfectly honest.

My role in the company has changed over time. Initially I joined just as someone supporting clients, a bit of sales, but mainly supporting current clients. But then because of my inclusion background, I've developed to now,  where I'm the product champion for iASEND. So I'm specifically working on that product and with schools around tracking those small steps of progress for pupils with SEND.

You were a SENCO, is that right, Vicki, when you were a teacher?

I was a deputy head and inclusion lead. So I worked in quite a large school in Dartford, a very challenging school, with very high level SEND, very complicated SEND history as well, a very complex and diverse range of families, range of children, and a very bumpy school in terms of leadership, in terms of teacher retention. You'd got TAs that had been there 20, 30 years, but by the time I left, I was the longest reigning teacher at five years. In fact, I was the longest reigning non-TA member of staff. I joined there as an NQT, and even in my NQT year I took on responsibilities, just because someone had to, just because of the dynamics of things. I'd done a module or a specialism within my degree in inclusion in SEND. So naturally, in a turbulent school like that, they were the children I was drawn towards. As new people came in, new leaders came in, I progressed quite quickly because the opportunity was there within the school.

It got to the point where it was me that the parents knew, it was me that the children knew, and those children that need that extra support are going to veer towards the familiar adult. So it just became a natural journey. I was assessment lead for a little while, then I went into behaviour, and then the deputy for inclusion went on maternity leave. So I was asked to step into that position. A bit of a whirlwind really.

So I guess having been the assessment lead and having that focus on inclusion must have really helped you form your thoughts around assessment for everyone, not just the kind of people who do very well with summative exams. Is that right?

Absolutely. And I joined teaching when we just lost levels. We'd got the new national curriculum, we'd lost what everybody had always known as assessment. Then we were in this world where it's the “expected”, it's the “working towards”, and no one really knew what that meant. I still don't think they 100% know what those things mean. We work with some schools that use an on-track method, some schools that still use an end of key stage method. So even now - are we 10 years on from that new curriculum? - we still have schools that are looking at it in very different ways. What I really saw was that for those pupils with SEND, they were and very much still are, completely lost in that world of assessment with these really big, vague assessment bands.

Potentially, there's some children that will be working towards year one for their entire primary school career. But actually, in those five, six, seven years, they've made huge amounts of progress. But when you look at it in black and white on a piece of paper, they've made nothing. And the conversations that you have to have with parents around that and the self-esteem with children is really difficult.

And it’s how you frame it, isn't it, in those conversations, to make sure that what they have achieved is captured?

I've sat in Ofsted conversations where you're saying these kids have made progress, but you show them the data and they haven't. But you put a class teacher in front of them, and that class teacher talks about the child and everything they know about the child. And that's where the rich data and progress for those pupils are. But in the current academic system they are completely lost.

You've identified there are flaws in the assessment system. It can't capture a certain group of kids. But is there something about inclusion as well? So if you've got a kid who's working towards a year one level over a long period does that suggest that the setting might not be right for them? Do we need to think more about creating better, more bespoke settings for different groups of kids?

I think that's a really interesting question. And currently, under the new government, if you listen to what has been said as recently as last week, that is the focus going forward. However, it's where that setting is. Is that setting within their mainstream provision? Is that where they should be, but with the right level of support? Or is that in a specialist setting, as in a special school? I am a big advocate for pupils staying within mainstream, but the difficulty that you have there then is the subject knowledge of teachers, the budgets, the provision. But I think you're right. I think a huge part of why those pupils don't make progress is the time, energy and expertise that they require and deserve, but don't always get.

So if you could devise a system for how you might assess students with SEND, that would look a bit different, how would that look?

I would totally scrap what currently exists in terms of this kind of working towards “expected”. To me it is what can they do? Where do they need to go next? And are they doing that? So the national curriculum exists. It is very vague in places or very large chunks in places. But to me it's about where are they? What is realistic for them? So not where should they be at the end of key stage, et cetera, but what is a realistic expectation for this pupil?

And then what are the steps between where they are now and where we want to get them? So it is very much, what is that next little step they need to achieve rather than here's a whole national curriculum, or even here's a whole year group’s curriculum, because even that is much too large for some.

Would you apply that system to all students or would you keep something that resembles the current system for some students and then apply that kind of system to a group of students who have been identified as having needs?

I think, for the majority of pupils, the current system works. I think it's this group of pupils that, by the time you're getting to year one, year two, and you're still looking at reception curriculum, or you're still looking at the very early starts of year one curriculum,  and when that gap is starting to evidence itself, that's where something different then needs to be put in place.

So could you tell us a little bit about your work, Vicki, and what you're doing to work in this area and support schools with students?

At iTRACK Education we work in assessment tracking. We had a previous company, LCP, but we rebranded recently to really focus on the assessment tracking because that's where the majority of people want us these days. So we have a mainstream product which has worked.

But around the time that I was entering teaching really, and this whole conversation around curriculum was developing, we were approached by a lady called Dr. Sue Fisher, who did a whole doctorate around assessing pupils with SEND, and our special needs product developed from there. All of her expertise and knowledge of the curriculum has developed into a system that allows you to create a starting point for a pupil wherever that may be, whether it's two years, three years, four years, five years, it's very bespoke to that individual pupil. It also captures what we refer to as the depth of learning because that's something else that I don't feel the current system does well enough for all pupils, let alone SEND pupils.

The current system very much works on, you've taught a kid something, they've learned it. And anyone that's worked in education in any way, shape or form, knows that that is not the case. You could teach them on a Monday and they can remember on a Tuesday, but by Friday they've forgotten. For people with SEND, they need to see it in different settings, they need to see it with a different person, they need to see it in a different day of the week, in a different time of the day. And that's one thing that we're quite passionate about, capturing that new learning and that moving on and creating that next step in the learning journey, but also how embedded, how internalised is the learning that they've already been through, as well as looking at that next step.

I think that's really interesting. It makes me think of our eldest son who goes to a special school, and has profound needs. One of his targets at his school is around using a spoon. It has been the same target for a couple of years, because he loves food. It's critical because it helps with not looking like a horror movie after he's had bolognese, or because every time he has a roast, he has to have a shower. So it's been a really important target. And at school he's met it, and it's literally the most magical thing, the video of him using a spoon is just the most exciting thing ever. At home, not a chance. And we were talking about this, that he will have that skill mastered when he's doing it at home as well.

So actually, rather than moving on to the next target, it's about consolidating it in different contexts. And I find that really fascinating in special education, how they do that, because it's also about really being able to focus on the depth and breadth of a skill. So my question around that is, do you have any ideas, through your work, about how to make that sort of approach better for the masses? Because we're looking at numbers of children we're sending in mainstream schools at the moment. It's increasing, it's high. Do you have any ideas around that? Because it's almost like the ideal, isn't it? But how do we do that for more children?

From a personal point of view and from personal experience, I think a huge amount of it is around continual professional development. So many of our primary school teachers are brilliant teachers. They're great. They know the curriculum. They can teach the majority, but actually the understanding of certain diagnoses, or certain needs isn't necessarily as strong or, dare I say, necessarily seen as important for some staff, because that might be for them, two, three pupils, and they've got 27 others that they need to get to “expected”.

I do think it starts with informing and developing our teachers. And I think some of that potentially starts right back at training. I could sit and talk to you for hours about training because that's so diverse now. When I trained, everyone went to university, you did a degree or you did a PGCE, and that's how you entered teaching. Now you've got unqualified teachers, you've got Teach First, you've got Schools Direct, there are all these other pathways that don't necessarily give the time and energy to this area that potentially I got when I was at uni because I was there for three years. I was able to do that specialism. So I do think some of it starts right back at unpicking how people are getting into this profession and with what actual training and support. I love the fact that they've extended the NQT year, so that now it's two. And actually newly qualified teachers are getting far more support than they were.

I think it starts right back at teacher level because everything in the classroom comes from that teacher. If you're constantly putting a TA to work with a pupil, then that child becomes that TA's responsibility. And I think from my experience far too often, that's the case when - no discredit or disservice to TAs - the expertise in the room is the teacher. Those pupils with that high level of need deserve that expertise just as much as anybody else.

Personally for me, it starts right back with what are we expecting from our teachers? And what priority is placed on these pupils when we're training? Because we spend a lot of time learning the curriculum and learning next steps and all of those types of things. But actually, there are more and more pupils presenting with these needs. So in my opinion, it should be a fundamental part.

When I was leading inclusion, my view was that if you cater your classroom to those pupils, the majority are going to benefit from it anyway. Even things as basic as not having a white background on your whiteboard, but having a pale yellow or a pale green to be dyslexic friendly. Actually that glare is horrible for everybody, let alone pupils that are going to find it difficult anyway. And things like having your visual timetable, that's just beneficial for the majority.

And I do genuinely think that if you took a SEND classroom and built all primary school classrooms with that view to how are the pupils going to access this classroom, I think all pupils would benefit from that. So I think it is a shift of not seeing these pupils as an add-on, but actually seeing them as the way forward and the solution. And if we're supporting them right, then we're going to be supporting everybody better.

Those things that really support SEND are often really helpful for all students, aren't they? Or their impact is neutral. Do you know what I mean?

It's not going to be detrimental.

Can I ask you about SATs? We did an episode on SATs recently with a primary school deputy head teacher. Rather than whether SATS are a good or bad thing, what's been your experience of how schools deal with SATs and the preparation for it and what works and what doesn't. What have you seen?

I would say from my experience, if a school consistently does well in SATs, SATs are just part of the school year, and they're just seen as another thing, it's just something that happens. We change the tables, we sit and we do them. You then come to the two polar ends - those schools that have consistently done very, very well and therefore need to continue to do very, very well, and those schools that have done quite poorly and therefore must do better - I see a very stark difference between how those schools see SATs because for them SATs is then high stakes for the school, therefore high stakes for the teachers, and therefore that pressure is passed on. It's wrong in my opinion, but I think if a school has consistently done well, then it's just part of it. It's one thing we do, we teach the National Curriculum, you have a go at this exam, we know that you're going to do alright, so happy days.

A school that's doing everything right anyway, probably isn't going to struggle to incorporate and absorb SATs within that, but a school that's feeling the pressure, maybe that pressure will  mushroom.

That's when you then see constant practice papers, where you see the early morning work isn't come in and draw a picture or whatever, it's do these five SATs questions. And conversation isn't how was your weekend? It’s how much revision did you do? Or booster groups and all of this sort of stuff. Unfortunately, it's the pupils that have to perform for the school to get what they need from it. But in terms of your pupil level, as soon as you've hit secondary school, your SATs don't matter anymore. For the kids, it means nothing.

That's always one of the curious things. When we talked to Daniel about this, he was saying that often he has to have this conversation with parents. The parents are very stressed about it because they've developed some view, and I'm not quite sure where it comes from, that this is really, really important for their child. And actually the effects for the child are really minimal. It's mainly about assessing school performance and then also about baselining students for their start at secondary school.

Within two, three weeks, that baseline is redone anyway. So they can move up and down from that. To me, SATs are a measure of the school. At the end of the day, the SATs are a way of testing the key stage 2 subject knowledge, so if you are teaching that well, there should be nothing to worry about. If you're not teaching that well, then you've got a problem. And unfortunately, it's all seen as a year 6 problem. But actually, if you've got good teachers doing the right thing in year 3 and year 4 and year 5, leading up to year 6, then you're much better off. It's a conversation that I have with some of the primary schools that we work with. If you've got a child that's OK in reading and writing, but maths is a weakness, you can pick that up in year 3, because that's good quality teaching. We don't have to just think that a well-rounded pupil is formed in year 6. There's a few years before them.

That's obviously better for the students, but it's also much better for the teachers, because it just reduces that pressure overall on a school. One of the things I've seen which I think is quite a good signal of when a secondary school is struggling is when they're pumping loads of resources into year 11. Whereas a school that's been really well run is pumping the resources into year 7, because we know that this pays off over time. Obviously, there are certain things you want to do in year 11 to try and maximize gains or whatever.

Absolutely. I've had that conversation sitting in May, June time, looking at staff planning. These are the teachers we've got, where are we going to put them? So often, it was we've got an NQT or we've got a new teacher to the school, we'll put them in year 3 or we'll put them in year 4. We need so-and-so a really good teacher, we need them in year 6. I'm sat there saying, if we want year 6 to be okay, how about we share some of that good teaching down in year 3 and year 4? So that actually by the time that they get to that NQT in year 6, we're in a much better place to start off with. I’ve had very interesting conversations personally around that.

It's one of those things as well that's so obvious, but I do feel for people who have to make those decisions because they are actually quite difficult decisions to make. To say, right, we're going to take our strongest teacher, and we're not going to put them in the examined year groups, we're going to put them down, in the secondary case, in year 7, year 8. That's a tough call to make at any point in time. But actually, if you do want your school to be good over a long period of time, then that's the really hard decision you have to take at some point, isn't it? Do you work with secondary as well, Vicki, or is it just fully primary?

We do. Our mainstream system goes right from nursery through to key stage 5. The secondary college side of it is newer. We're still building experience and clients in that area. And the special needs tracking currently goes right from the engagement model. So using a spoon, grasping objects, all of those really fundamental skills currently goes right through to key stage three. But we are in the thick at the moment of developing that into key stage 4 as well, and kind of exploring what that looks like in that, are we going to go down the road of entry levels or...?

And we have a lot of settings that use both. So they put mainstreams on iTRACK, you know, the people that need the specifics are on iASEND. Or we have some kind of special settings that will use iASEND, and then when they get to the point of GCSEs, they'll use secondary, because then they can build the GCSEs on secondary. We cover everything, really.

Do you have one tip that you could give teachers or schools in terms of track and assessment that they could just do quite quickly?

I would always say, know your pupils. If you know your pupils, you can assess them easily and accurately. I'm a big advocate for teacher relationships. If you know your kids, you know where they're at. You know where they need to go next. You know the curriculum and the subject knowledge and all of that - that's what you go to uni for, that's what you do your qualification in. But if you want to assess accurately and you want to assess well and you want pupils to make good progress, know your kids. Spend that time to build the relationships with them.

Vicki, can you tell us where people can find out more about what you do and hear from you?

So we have a website, itrackeducation.com. You can find out about both systems on there, book demos, get in touch.

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