School tests report
ePolitix.com Stakeholders comment on the news that the children's, schools and families committee has published a report on testing and assessment.
The report suggests that, in some cases, the focus on testing in schools is denying children their right to a rounded education.
Response from:
- Association of Teachers and Lecturers
- General Teaching Council
- National Union of Teachers
- Voice: the union for educational professionals
Party response: Liberal Democrat
David Laws, children, schools and families spokesperson, said: "This report confirms that English pupils are tested externally more than any other children in the world.
"Credible testing and assessment is vital, but there is a real risk that incessant testing is distorting the curriculum and driving the joy out of learning.
"The government should consider scaling back the extent of national testing, with more school assessment and early intervention to tackle literacy and numeracy problems. External testing could be reserved for ages 11, 16 and 18 - which would save hundreds of millions of pounds each year.
"There is a real concern that improved results are being driven by obsessive 'teaching to the test', rather than by actual improvements in education.
"The new independent qualifications body should randomly test a sample of children every year, so that we really know what is happening to standards."
Stakeholder response: Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL)
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Dr Mary Bousted, ATL general secretary, said: "The government should finally accept enough is enough. The current testing of children is damaging their education and demoralising teachers.
Stakeholder response: General Teaching Council for England
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Keith Bartley, GTC chief executive, said: "We need a system that supports children's learning first and foremost. Effective approaches to pupil learning should be developed through teachers' professionalism and judgement and should involve pupils becoming active participants in their own learning.
"National tests are being used for too many purposes and children are losing out as a result. It is important that schools are accountable – particularly to parents and pupils but also to the taxpayer and the local community.
"But the way that national tests feed into high stakes league tables puts the reputation of the school and the head teacher on the line in ways that are excessive and unfair.
"Teachers' own assessment skills should be used more extensively and we need to find much better and more meaningful ways of giving parents the information they need about their own child's progress and the overall performance of the school.
"There is such a strong consensus within the education community and beyond on this issue and this has been well captured by the select committee report.
"The government would reap a huge harvest of goodwill by responding positively to this report and releasing children and teachers from the shackles of a system that is simply not fit for purpose."
Stakeholder response: The National Union of Teachers
Christine Blower, acting general secretary, of the National Union of Teachers, said: "The government now stands isolated on the future of national curriculum testing. It has steadfastly resisted the mounting evidence of the damage caused by the tests to the curriculum and children's learning.
"We have now in England an enormous, oppressive and contradictory edifice for school accountability which stifles initiative and creativity in schools.
"The select committee rightly points to the poisonous effects of testing, national targets and school performance tables. However, the last thing schools need is a continuation of school performance tables in an expanded form.
"There is only one logical move now which can be taken by the government. It should initiate an independent review of the testing regime and school accountability. It should draw on the experiences of countries in other parts of the United Kingdom, which have stripped out from their schools the testing regime which schools in England still have to endure.
Stakeholder response: Voice: the union for educational professionals
To send a comment to Voice, click here
Philip Parkin, general secretary of Voice: the union for education professionals, said: "We are pleased that both Panorama and the committee reports have highlighted the excessive and counter-productive pressure excessive testing places on both pupils and those who teach them.
"Schools should be about educating children, not teaching them to pass tests in an inflexible, mechanical process. Tests have a place in education, but our pupils are currently over-tested. We start testing earlier. We test more frequently. We test more subjects in this country than elsewhere.
"We need to move education away from rigid teaching to tests under a restricted curriculum in order to allow more appropriate measures of individual pupils' performance and development, and a broader, more rounded education.
"At the moment it seems that these tests are designed to suit the government's agenda rather than the interests of pupils.
"We need to put the power back into the hands of the people who are the experts in this – the teachers and fellow education professionals – rather than have everything controlled rigidly by central government.
"As personalised learning becomes the focus of attention, it is time for the government to have the courage to bring this obsessive testing regime to an end.
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