Martin Ferguson

Supporting the assessment of KS3 English

Ashfield Girls’ High School

Ashfield Girls’ High School is an all-ability post-primary school in East Belfast with over 600 pupils.

Martin Ferguson is the Head of the English Department and teaches Year 8 to Year 14.

Martin takes us through how he developed an assessment rubric for use with the KS3 Communication Levels of Progression and the value that it has for standardisation and staff development. His focus is on collecting teachers’ judgements so that pupils can develop and this is summarised in a paper he wrote for We Learn NI – details in the Links section.


Key learning

  • The KS3 Levels of Progression provide a range of positive experiences for both teachers and pupils, in terms of direction of travel and expectations;

  • Feedback becomes more meaningful as pupils are involved in their learning because they can see what they are aiming for and how they can plan to get there;

  • It creates a ‘learning journey’ for pupils, rather than a race to a destination;

  • Levels of Progression provide staff with valuable opportunities to evaluate their teaching and focus on the classroom level learning, and the barriers that pupils may encounter along the way;

  • There is greater discussion around what progression looks like and this drives professional dialogue in relation to what works and what does not;

  • It also provides an aerial view of KS3 as standardisation can be built off the levels.


Points to consider when planning for (area in this case):

  • How do pupils in your school view progress in English?

  • Do they understand what progress means or what it looks like from one assessment to the next?

  • How has assessment been shaped by factors outside your department?

  • Progression Levels should be used to allow for informed transition from primary to secondary; this would create informed parents, give greater confidence to pupils [and teachers] who are anxious about transition, and will remove the fear of pupils being lost in the system and reduce outliers.

  • It would also put literacy and numeracy at the forefront of school planning and give coordinators the clout they need to make real changes. Pupils should be treated with the same care and afforded the same rigour of handover that we provide for hospital patients. Finessed versions of the Levels could be used in the SIMS system across all schools.