Explanatory note
(This note is not part of the Order)
Section 4(1) and (2) of the Education Reform Act 1988 places a duty on the Secretary of State to establish the National Curriculum by specifying by order appropriate attainment targets, programmes of study and assessment arrangements for each of the subjects.
This Order revokes the Education (National Curriculum) (Assessment Arrangements for English, Mathematics, Science, Technology, History and Geography) (Key Stage 1) Order 1992, and specifies assessment arrangements for English, mathematics and science subjects of the National Curriculum for pupils in the final year of the first key stage, as they apply to maintained schools in England.
Pupils are to be assessed by teachers on the basis of classroom work “teacher assessments” in all subjects by four weeks before the end of the summer term. A record of the results, consisting of pupils' levels of attainment in relation to each relevant attainment target, is to be made (article 4).
Standard tasks in English and mathematics, published by HMSO on behalf of the Secretary of State, are to be administered to pupils during the second half of the Spring term and up to four weeks before the end of the Summer term, and the results recorded (article 5).
Arrangements are set out for the verification of schools' assessment standards by the local education authority and an assessment authority for LEA-maintained and grant-maintained schools respectively. For this purpose a right to the production of documents and articles and a right of access to the school premises is conferred on such authorities (article 6).
Rules are specified for applying attainment target levels as determined by teacher assessment to produce subject levels of attainment in English, mathematics and science (article 7). These rules are modified in the case of pupils to whom provisions of the National Curriculum do not apply (article 8).
The Secretary of State is empowered to issue further documents, including standard tasks, to give full effect to the arrangements specified by the Order (article 9).