Assessment Information - Junior School

The assessment of pupils takes two main forms: formative and summative.

Formative assessment takes place daily. It allows teachers to monitor children’s progress across all subjects and ensures they receive the feedback they need to move forward in their learning. Teachers continually assess understanding in order to adapt planning and meet the needs of every child in each lesson. This ongoing process also informs longer-term planning, ensuring that every pupil is supported to make sustained progress.

adapt planning and meet the needs of every child 

Summative assessment provides a snapshot of performance and usually takes place at the end of a unit, term, or academic year. At St. Lawrence College, we combine information from standardised testing systems with teacher judgements based on classroom observations to ensure accuracy and reliability. Class teachers carry out regular assessment of academic achievement, with differentiation applied at every stage to meet individual needs.

Cambridge Early Years and Primary Insight Assessments

In the Early Years, two baseline assessments give teachers a snapshot of where children are in their learning when they begin school or nursery: ASPECTS (for 3–4-year-olds) and BASE (for 4–5-year-olds), both developed by Cambridge Insight. These provide valuable information about each child’s starting point.

From Year 1 onwards, pupils take part in Cambridge Primary Insight (for ages 5–11), a broad range of digital, adaptive, formative assessments from Cambridge Insight. These are used for diagnostic purposes and to track pupil progress effectively over time.

In Key Stage 2, assessment is supplemented by in-house subject reviews, and in Year 6, pupils undertake end-of-year attainment testing based on the Cambridge Primary curriculum. These tests measure pupils’ knowledge, understanding, and skills in the core subjects of English, Mathematics, and Science.