Praising stars is our way of communicating with you every half term. Students will receive an effort grade and a progress grade. This enables us to improve the quality and impact of intervention with our students. Please see below an example Praising Stars©  report.

We hold three praising stars parents evenings per Academic year. Where teachers wish to see students / parents for any reason it is marked clearly on the report. We use an online booking system to make appointments with staff. 

Assessment and Praising Stars

Assessment is mapped to National Curriculum age related expectation and Level 1/2 course assessment objectives as appropriate. Progression across each subject pathway is expertly planned so that learning in any one year builds effectively to the next. Feedback is regular and timely and occurs both during the lesson and through written feedback. Students are encouraged to engage with all feedback in dedicated Student Response Time (SRT) activities.

An ethic of excellence is promoted through our PROUD practice directing students to take pride in their work and strive for accuracy. Each half term students receive a Praising Stars report providing: academic assessment for each subject, effort grades, attendance details and progress over time.

Teachers estimate a prediction of the grade most likely to be achieved by students when they finish their time at the academy, this helps when deciding future pathways as well as current actions. The predictions are based on all aspects of current performances, as well as a student's attitude to learning, work ethic and aptitude for each subject and arise from the strong relationships our teachers have with our students and their experience of teaching and assessing.

The effort grade reflects the level of effort for that half term (Praising Stars 'cycle') and takes account of the effort exhibited for that half term only - each cycle starts afresh in terms of the effort grade.

Assessment information is used to effectively intervene with students and best meet their changing needs. Intervention is embedded into our feedback and assessment practices. A wide range of strategies are used within our teachers’ planning and responsive practices and beyond the lesson through small group tuition, after school or break time support, master classes, access to online learning programmes or in class support and targeted homework etc.

Effort (E1 - E4)

Parents/Carers must look at effort grades to measure your child's performance towards meeting/exceeding their target grades. This will provide a clear indication of work ethic in particular lessons.

E1 - Star students

E2 - Very promising

E3 - Hard working

E4 - WAKE UP CALL