What type of portfolios do you use?

• What to keep; • What to replace; • What to update; • Whether the portfolios will be of year/groups.

Remember, portfolios are “evidence of what teachers assess as demonstrating various levels of attainment in the three core subjects” (Wintle & Harrison, 1999, p.134). They provide opportunities for teachers to test their judgements against those of other schools. In-service training days are perfect opportunities for teachers to do so. Such times can lead to a high level of cooperation. Therefore, your close working with other subject coordinators will be critical in the compilation of portfolios.

What type of portfolios do you use?

It is recommended that you use exemplar portfolios when determining the attainment of capabilities of ICT across the school. Kennewell et al. (2000, p.81) states that they contain “a set of work from a particular student from whom there is a general agreement about the level of attainment.” Exemplar portfolios provide a point of reference for teachers to use in comparing other students’ work performance. For primary schools particularly in Australia, portfolios would be needed from Foundation (Level 1) to Year 6 (Level 4). In the UK, primary schools could have portfolios at levels 1, 2 and 3 for Key Stage 1, and for 2 to 5 at Key Stage 2 (Kennewell et al., 2000, p.81)

A portfolio would need to contain:

• The task context and objectives; • The process of development for the work – plans, draft, comments on decisions made etc; • The resources available; • The help given by teachers and peers concerning ICT (not concerning other subject matter for which the student might have required assistance).

(Kennewell et al., 2000, p.81)

Research states that “it is important that the approaches to assessment are designed to support the teaching approaches adopted” as discussed earlier (Kennewell et al., 2000, p. 81). Furthermore, if teachers are to make effective judgements about a student’s ICT capability then it is crucial that they “consider the quality of the students’ response to a task of the choices made and techniques used, but the complexity of the task, the way they tackled it and the help they received to finish it” (Kennewell et al., 2000, 81). You need to match the evidence from a student’s work performance to the level descriptions in the ICT capability Learning Continuum of the Australian Curriculum or of that from the UK National Curriculum.

There are three successful approaches to schemes of work based on different models of curriculum organisation in secondary schools:

• Discrete model – treated the same way as other subjects and the ICT department has its own scheme of work and assessment procedures; • Cross-curricular model – this is where ICT teaching and assessment is integrated throughout the curriculum. Here it is important as the ICT coordinator to work with the other subject leaders and negotiate adjustments to ensure that student progression and continuity occur in ICT capability;

If your school’s model is of the cross-curricular approach, then you will need to put careful thought into the design of the assessment system. Where a discrete model is implemented studies have indicated teachers use the assessment process to students’ ICT capability development (see below).

Figure 1. Monitoring and assessment in secondary schools (Kennewell et al., 2000, p. 83)

Following are three levels at which assessment, recording and reporting are carried. For each, it is essential that you provide advice to subject teachers concerning the expectations of students along with a recording framework with task-specific prompts (Kennewell et al., 2000, p. 82-3).

Lesson-based assessments Purpose: to monitor the progress of individual pupils, to evaluate the effectiveness of the lesson, and to plan specific oral feedback to pupils for the next lesson.

• Identify the learning objectives for the lesson. • Devise opportunities for pupils to engage with the objectives. • Set criteria for success in terms of process and outcome. • For each pupil, note whether success was achieved independently, with some help, with much help, or was not achieved. • Note the implications for the next lesson.

This process need not require detailed records for each pupil, and lengthy checklists are inappropriate.

Task-based assessment Purpose: to ascertain the National Curriculum level of pupil’s work and to provide written feedback to pupils on their skills and needs for development.