SIMS Assessment Manager Blog

Category: Primary

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Assessment / Assessment Without Levels / Demonstration / Primary / Secondary

Extending SIMS Programme of Study Marksheets: Summative Assessment

Capita recently released a their new ‘programme of study marksheets‘. They allow teachers to record a grade against each and every statement in the entire national curriculum. They work well, but there’s no option to give an ‘overall’ summative assessment for a subject. Here’s a solution I worked out for a school that wanted a closer link between formative assessments and the overall strand and summative subject assessments. Why Summative Assessment Still Matters To explain,...

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Assessment Without Levels / Demonstration / Primary

SIMS and Chris Quigley Assessment

Several people have asked about SIMS and Chris Quigley assessment milestones. Well, here’s a system I developed for a school last week. As with most systems, the school wanted a few tweeks and changes to fit in with it’s existing system, but the flexibility of SIMS means that any changes are quick to make. Here’s a demo video to show you what it looks like: I’ve developed systems based on the popular Chris Quigley method...

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Advanced / Assessment Without Levels / Beginner / Intermediate / Primary / Secondary / Teacher App

Formative Assessment using SIMS

Why everything I thought I knew about assessment was wrong. Perhaps without noticing, the last few months have seen a massive shift in the assessment paradigm that held sway in most schools until the introduction of the new curriculum in 2014. With the new curriculum came the removal of the previous levels-based system. It has been replaced with nothing and schools are free to develop their own systems. I now realise that I was addicted to...

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Assessment Without Levels / Beginner / Demonstration / Primary / Secondary

Beta Testing SIMS Marksheets for the new National Curriculum

In the spring 2015 release of SIMS schools will have access to Capita’s new marksheets designed to allow schools to record assessment against the new national curriculum 2014. It’s the biggest new development in SIMS for several years as it constitutes their first attempt at adapting SIMS for formative assessment. Tip: If you’re a non-teacher and not familiar with the new national curriculum 2014 here’s a link to the curriculum documentation – now’s a good time...

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Assessment / Beginner / Intermediate / Primary / Secondary

SIMS in the MS Azure ‘Cloud’

When I visit schools I’m often frustrated that teachers and staff, fresh and keen to use the new assessment resources that we create, are held back by a lack of access to SIMS. It’s many years since the toughest technical obstacles to SIMS access were ironed out but many schools and local support units are still slow to remove the barriers for everyone who needs it. So I was interested when, At BETT 2015, Capita SIMS announced a new partnership with Microsoft to...

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Assessment / Primary / Secondary / Teacher App

The New SIMS Teacher App

Last week was BETT week – the annual education technology exhibition in London’s ExCeL. It gives education suppliers a global stage on which to launch their new products.  I visited on Thursday and Friday with a special interest in the new develops that Capita SIMS were showcasing. The New Teacher App for SIMS Capita’s main product launch at the show was their new SIMS Teacher App – an iPad app that links back to the...

Greentrees Primary School. Picture credit: Alan Bennett/Media Imaging Solutions 0

Assessment / Assessment Without Levels / Beginner / Primary / Secondary

Assessment Without Levels: Lessons from Last Term

This article was first published in December in my termly SIMS assessment newsletter which you can sign up for here. What Is Everybody Else Doing? I’ve visited lots of schools since September and almost every school has asked me this question quite early on during our meetings. Assessment without levels means that most school are looking for a sense of direction from other schools, which is understandable. There’s also an assumption that other schools must...

SIMS: Helping schools inspire 4

Analysis / Primary

First Look at the New SIMS ‘School Report’

Update: In the original version of this post I said that secondary schools would have to wait until spring 2014 for their version. I was wrong! Secondary schools can print a version of the school report that includes all the metric for 5+A*-C EM, P8 and A8 measures. One feature that I’ve been asked about many times by schools is a one-click analysis report that lists all the metrics used by RAISE online. Until now,...

SIMS: Helping schools inspire 0

Analysis / Assessment / Assessment Without Levels / Demonstration / Primary

SIMS and the Michael Tidd ‘Key Objectives’ system for KS1 and KS2

As readers of my other blog (assessmentwithoutlevels.com) will be aware, I’m working with an increasing number of schools to create assessment systems that don’t rely on levels and sublevels. Here’s the latest in a set of small demo systems that exist as a sort of ‘proof of concept’ for the various new pupil tracking systems which are being developed by schools, LAs and consultancies to respond to the demains of the new primary curriculum 2014. This time...