Personalised assessments: guidance for schools

After learners have completed their assessments, schools have access to a range of reports and feedback on their:

• skills

• progress

• age-standardised scores

Schools can use this information to help plan teaching and learning.

Requirements for this academic year are set out in the personalised assessments administration handbook.

To access the assessments you will need to sign in to Hwb. Once signed in, select the personalised assessments icon in your dashboard.

This video shows how to sign in to Hwb and access the personalised assessments website.

During this academic year, personalised assessments in reading and numeracy are mandatory for use in Years 2 to 9. The personalised assessments administration handbook sets out the requirements for this year.

It notes that:

• schools can schedule assessments at a time they consider most beneficial to support teaching, learning and progression

• learners must take each assessment once during the academic year (schools also have the option to take the assessments once more in the academic year)

Teachers are asked to ensure that all their learners use the familiarisation assessments on Hwb. That way learners will have a chance to try out the question types in advance of taking the assessments.

The user guide on the assessment website provides detailed practical information on:

• scheduling and delivering the assessments (including checklists)

• accessing reports

Personalised assessments are adaptive. This means that questions are selected based on the responses to previous questions. This provides a tailored assessment experience for each learner. It will help all learners develop their skills through understanding:

• what they can do

• the things they may need to work on

• what their next steps might be

The assessments provide schools with information on the skills of individual learners, groups and whole classes.

There is no ‘assessment window’ for personalised assessments. Timing is at the school’s discretion.

Learners can take the personalised assessments in small or large groups, depending on the school’s preferences and facilities. Schools do not need a large number of devices.

Age-standardised and progress scores for assessments taken from September 2023 take account of ‘learning time’. This supports a better understanding of progression under Curriculum for Wales.

From September 2023 onwards, scores for assessments will be calculated in line with a re-standardisation using the 2022 to 2023 cohort of learners as reference.

Support and guidance for schools

Support and guidance is available from the assessment website. After accessing the website click ‘Help’ to access:

• videos

• a user guide

• training materials

• familiarisation assessments

For support on the personalised assessments, please contact:

• the Assessment Helpdesk (for schools only) on 029 2026 5099 between 8am and 5pm, Monday to Friday

• help@personalisedassessments.wales

For support on managing school users’ Hwb accounts please contact hwb@gov.wales or 0300 0252525.

Personalised assessments: guidance for practitioners on feedback and progress reports for individual learners

Webinars for teachers are available on the personalised assessments system.

These school case studies highlight the use of personalised assessments to target and improve learner outcomes.

Using personalised assessments to complement their approaches to assessment at Ysgol Merllyn

Information for parents and carers is also available.

Views and experiences of learners, teachers and assessment experts

View the question types in the Numeracy (Procedural) personalised assessment for learners in Years 2 to 3

View the question types in the Numeracy (Procedural) personalised assessment for learners in Years 4 to 6

View the question types in the Numeracy (Procedural) personalised assessment for learners in Years 7 to 9