North Somerset Baseline Assessment Steering Group – DfE Accredited Baseline Provider Review
26 March 2015
The table below outlines the findings of the Baseline Assessment Steering Group.
The group was developed in haste due to tight timescales from the original EYFS Profile Steering Group from 2012. The group members
included representation from:
EYFS Teachers – representing a range of types of school
EYFS Moderators
EYFS and Key Stage 1 Moderation Manager
Head Teacher and Local & National Leader of Education
Early Years Local Leaders of Education representing the Private, Voluntary and Independent sector
EYFS Lead Adviser for Inclusion
Head of Early Years
Members of the group met two providers at national briefings and three providers met with the whole group. The group developed principles to
review the efficacy of each Baseline Assessment from the following sources - Ofqual, STA, TACTYC, Early Education, the DfE, and those in the
statutory EYFS Framework.
The North Somerset baseline assessment steering group were unanimous in recommending the Early Excellence EExBA baseline
assessment as the one most likely to produce valid, reliable, manageable assessment that creates both the required cohort progress
measure, and has the best potential to offer useful information about children’s starting points, with the least disruption to teaching at
a critical life event for children.
We believe EExBA is the most likely baseline assessment to support teachers to create principled provision and summative assessments (based
on observational assessment and routines), from which they can continue to monitor children’s progress to the end of the statutory Early
Learning Goals at the end of Reception. Schools can continue to use the North Somerset E-Profile for this purpose.
We will also work with Early Excellence to find ways to align the Baseline Assessment with the wider on-entry assessment teachers will continue
to find useful in order to plan for their children, and for them to show progress towards all the 17 statutory ELG’s at the end of Reception.
We hope you find this briefing paper helpful for your decision-making in choosing your baseline provider. It will be particularly helpful if regionally
all schools sign up for the same provider, as moderation between schools and bench marked data could remain an option and feature of
dependable assessment between all North Somerset schools.
Andrea Sully, Head of Early Years and Sarah McGahern, Moderation Manager EYFS and KS1, on behalf of the Baseline Assessment Steering
Group.
April 2015
Principles for review of DfE CEM Durham
Approved Providers
University
1. Validity
Do all aspects of the baseline Partially Met
assessment measure what it
proposes to measure in domain
content?
2. Disclosure
Does the assessment capture Not Met
what the child can do in more than
one context?
3. Reliability
Meets DfE published criteria.
Fully Met
4. Manageability
Assessment on entry needs to be
manageable for teachers and least
intrusive to everyday provision i.e. Not Met
within classroom practice and
useful to inform future learning
needs (EYFS Framework 2.2).
Does the scheme meet those
requirements?
5. Appropriateness (pitch)
Are the questions appropriate to
the
ages
and
stage
of
development for children starting in Partially Met
Reception? (EYFS & ELG’s)
Does the scheme only link to the
EYFS and what is taught within it?
GL
Assessments
Early Excellence
EEXBA
Hodder
Stoughton
NFER
Speech Link
Not Met
Fully Met
Partially met
Fully Met
Not fully
reviewed due
to lack of
information
Not Met
Fully Met
Not Met
Partially Met
Fully Met
Fully Met
Fully Met
Fully Met
Not Met
Fully Met
Not Met
Partially Met
Partially Met
Partially Met
Partially Met
Partially Met
Fully Met
Principles for review of DfE CEM Durham
Approved Providers
University
GL
Assessments
Early Excellence
EEXBA
Hodder
Stoughton
NFER
6. Child friendly and likely to
support well being
Does the method of administration Not Met
support children’s emotional well
being on transition to school?
Not Met
Fully Met
Not Met
Partially Met
Not Met
Fully Met
Not Met
Partially Met
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
30 minutes
9-12 minutes per
child to record
judgments.
30 minutes plus
possible upper /
lower extensions.
Plus admin.
30 minutes.
10 mins
observations
for checklists
plus admin.
Does the scheme take into
account child-motivated or initiated
activities?
7. Alignment to EYFS principles
and usefulness within class?
Does it include other relevant
aspects of significant learning for Not Met
young children aside from the
minimum required by DfE.
8. Time (for administration)
Are assessments conducted one Yes
to one?
How long does it take to administer 40 minutes
each assessment?
The DfE recommend completion of
the assessments within Term 1. Can be broken into
What
does
the
provider chunks
recommend?
Observations
assessment within
normal provision.
Speech
Link
Principles for QA of DfE
Providers
CEM Durham
University
9. Inclusion/Equal Opps (99% of
the population
The DfE states ‘the assessment
must be accessible to 99% of Partially Met
children’.
How does the provider adhere to
this requirement (EAL and SEN)?
10.
Multiple
perspectives
including
parents
(EYFS
Statutory
Framework
requirement 2.2)
Not Met
The statutory framework says
practitioners should respond to
their own day-to-day observations
about children’s progress and
observations that parents and
carers share (2.1).
GL
Assessments
Early Excellence
EEXBA
Hodder
Stoughton
NFER
Speech Link
Not Met
Partially Met
Not Met – check Partially Met
EAL
Not Met
Fully Met
Not Met
Partially Met
12 = Fifth Rank
25 = First Rank
13=Fourth
Rank
20 = Second Not fully
Rank
reviewed due
to lack of
information
and resource
What facility is there for more than
one person to contribute to the
assessment?
Scores and Ranking
1 – Not Met
2 – Partially Met
3 – Fully Met
14 = Third Rank
Implications for Schools – what we found during the review
o All the providers were required to draw content domain from the DfE document ‘Early Years Outcomes’ and all have therefore drawn
content from the 40-60 month age bands. Some of the developmental descriptions in the 40-60 month age band include previous EYFS
Profile Scale points 1-9. This means that content being assessed within the baseline assessment for Reading, Writing and Maths includes
outcomes previously expected at the end of the Reception year and includes phonological attainment associated with Phonic Phase 4.
Therefore, the pitch in expectation becomes rapidly high for children starting their Reception year.
o Several of the providers are part of ‘not for profit’ companies (without shareholders but profit for reinvestment is required) who publish a
whole suite of assessments throughout primary and secondary. These companies were certainly promoting the idea of the Baseline
o
o
o
o
o
Assessment as an individual tracking tool, linked to their own products for key stage 1 and 2, but not always aligned to the new National
Curriculum ethos on assessment. The Baseline Assessment is a piece of cohort data only. Each school will be given a single scaled
score, which will be used as a measure of progress if a school does not meet the floor target of 85% at the end of KS2 in Reading, Writing
and Maths combined.
The DfE have recently sent more updated information as follows: ‘The DfE will only use the outcomes from the reception baseline to
develop a cohort measure of progress. The reception baseline will not be used to track individual pupil progress. The reception baseline
should not affect the nature of provision in early years and it is not intended to be used to hold early years providers to account: it is a
base to measure progress for primary schools. A progress measure is important to celebrate the work done by schools with more
challenging intakes and recognises the vital work on narrowing the gap that takes place in reception and key stage 1.
It can be used if schools choose to undertake the Baseline in 2015 if Key Stage 1 to Key Stage 2 data might make them vulnerable to
good outcomes in an inspection. Ofsted will take whichever is the better progress measure, KS1 to KS2 or baseline to end of KS2, in
2022.
Several assessments accelerated children through one or two examples to the end of Year 1 and 2 PoS. This does not match the new
‘mastery’ approach for learning mathematics, although it does match for some aspects of the new English curriculum.
All providers were unable to show a wide range of questions used to assess children within their sample Baseline Assessments.
All providers were working to DfE criteria. However, the steering group was very concerned that children with EAL and children with SEN
will not find these assessments accessible. The only modifications for SEN offered by providers were large print for print-based material.
All providers expressed that the DfE were only requiring assessments in English – this is a real concern for children with EAL in assessing
their attainment in Maths and Language and Communication. We believe this is in contravention of the Equalities Act and have spoken to
the DfE about our concerns.
What you need to do as a school
o You need to decide if you are undertaking the baseline in September 2015, or waiting until 2016 when the profile is no longer statutory.
This rests on your confidence about your progress measure this year for KS1 to KS2, linked to your prior attainment progress measure
and trends over time.
o If you are choosing to undertake the Baseline assessment this year, you need to select your chosen provider by contacting and signing up
with them directly before 30th April 2015.
o If you have further questions for the DfE, you can contact their national enquiry line on 0370 000 2288 or go to: Reception baseline
assessment: guide to signing up your school on GOV.UK