National Reading and Numeracy Personalised Assessments: administration handbook

Introduction

The purpose of national personalised assessments

They are designed to support learning and teaching as part of schools’ wider assessment arrangements under Curriculum for Wales. The assessments are for formative use, meaning that all maintained schools have information on the reading and numeracy skills of their learners and a common understanding of strengths and areas for improvement in these skills. When planning progression, teachers are encouraged to give full consideration to the skills identified by the assessments (not the scores alone), alongside any other relevant classroom-based information.

The assessments are focused on understanding learner progress and enabling the teacher to plan the learner’s next steps. The assessments should not be used for school performance or accountability purposes.

Requirements for 2024 to 2025

The assessments are mandatory. This means that learners in Years 2 to 9 in maintained schools (including community, voluntary-aided, voluntary-controlled and foundation) must take the national personalised assessments in reading and numeracy at least once during the school year. Numeracy is taken in 2 parts: Numeracy (Procedural) and Numeracy (Reasoning).

This handbook sets out the arrangements which must be followed for the National personalised assessments in Reading and Numeracy. It forms the National Reading and Numeracy Personalised Assessments: administration handbook for the purposes of the Education (Arrangements for Assessing Reading and Numeracy in the Curriculum for Wales) Regulations 2024. The handbook is given legal effect by those Regulations and as such it is statutory and must be complied with.

Benefits of personalised assessments

The online reading and numeracy assessments provide an individualised assessment experience that dynamically adjusts the level of challenge for each learner.

The personalised assessments are constructed from large banks of questions (and texts for the Reading personalised assessments) that are based on the continuum of skills in the National Literacy and Numeracy Framework (LNF).

The assessments are ‘adaptive’ which means that questions are selected based on the learner’s response to the previous question or questions. When learners answer questions correctly, they will receive more challenging questions, and when learners answer incorrectly, they will receive easier questions. This personalisation means that every learner will see a different set of questions, and the number of questions may vary.

Once the assessment system has covered areas across the curriculum and gathered sufficient information, the assessment ends. After the assessment, the system provides feedback on learners’ skills, their strengths and possible areas for development. This information can be used by teachers to help plan next steps and support learners with progression.

Timing of personalised assessments

Schools have the flexibility to schedule the personalised assessments at any point during the academic year that they consider is most beneficial to inform learning, teaching and progression planning.

Schools should note that there may be planned downtime for the personalised assessments system from time to time, which will be communicated via the assessment website.

Learners are required to take the personalised assessments at least once during the 2024 to 2025 academic year. Schools also have the option to use the assessments more than once during the academic year, which can be useful to support understanding of learner and group progress. If schools decide to use an assessment more than once, it is recommended that learners do not take the subsequent assessment in the same term as the first.

Learner well-being

Personalised assessments should not be a cause of worry for learners. It is very important that schools consider how the assessments are presented. The assessments should not be seen or presented as high-stakes assessments. They are intended to be a formative assessment tool to be used as part of assessment and progression planning. They are designed to support learning and teaching as part of schools’ wider assessment arrangements under the Curriculum for Wales.

Familiarisation assessments are available for learners to use at any time so that they can view and become accustomed to the different types of questions available in advance of taking an assessment. Aside from using these, ‘practising’ with questions should be avoided as this is inappropriate and unnecessary in the context of formative assessment and can cause anxiety for learners.

Learners are allowed to take rest breaks during an assessment if required. Please see the section headed ‘Rest breaks’ below. Additionally, the flexible nature of the assessments means that learners can complete the assessments at their own pace and at any time chosen by the teacher.

Using personalised assessments

Access to personalised assessments

Staff and learners access the personalised assessments through the Hwb platform, using their individual Hwb account logins. Detailed step-by-step guidance can be found in the user guide, which staff can access on the assessment website once logged in through Hwb.

Before learners can take personalised assessments:

the head teacher, or staff member acting on their behalf, must log in and accept the data and administration requirements, and assign functions and access for relevant staff
staff need to schedule and release assessments for learners by logging in to Hwb and navigating to the personalised assessments website
learners need to log in to Hwb and work through the familiarisation assessments so that they understand the question formats and how to navigate through the assessments

For information on how users find their Hwb usernames and passwords, please go to ‘Getting Started’.

Schools should note that the assessment website relies on data retrieved from schools’ management information systems (MIS) and that the personalised assessment data follows the learner when they move school. Schools must ensure that their MIS is up to date, and that their Hwb Provisioning Client runs successfully on a regular basis.

Assessments in other settings, for example pupil referral units (PRUs)

Learners in Years 2 to 9 who are registered in mainstream schools must take the personalised assessments at least once during each academic year. This includes learners who have dual registration in a mainstream school and at a PRU or special school (unless a disapplication decision has been made). The responsibility for ensuring the assessments are run rests with the head teacher of the mainstream school at which the learner is registered, who can arrange for the learner to take the personalised assessments in either setting. A learner only registered at a PRU does not have to take the assessments.

For PRU learners who are dual-registered, personalised assessments can be scheduled by teachers at either learning site. Both schools can access the learner’s feedback and progress reports.

Head teacher agreement and user management

Data protection is the responsibility of schools as independent data controllers. Schools need to ensure full compliance with the data protection principles in accordance with the Data Protection Act 2018 and UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR).

Schools must therefore ensure that access to data about individual learners complies with the UK GDPR. This includes access to data and reports related to the statutory national personalised assessments.

Schools have discretion as to which of their staff have access to assessments and reports. When making arrangements for their staff to schedule and facilitate the personalised assessments, schools must be mindful of the provisions of the Welsh Government’s ‘School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions (Wales) Document 2023 and guidance on school teachers' pay and conditions, September 2023’ or relevant terms and conditions.

In order for personalised assessments to be run in any school, the head teacher (or a suitable staff member acting on their behalf) must log in to the assessments website (accessed via Hwb) and assign functions and access for relevant staff to schedule and facilitate assessments and to view learner and group reports.

The head teacher is automatically assigned the ‘Administrate’ function, which enables them to manage other users’ functions. Further information on how to assign functions to staff can be found in section 3.8 of the user guide.

The head teacher (or suitable staff member acting on their behalf) also needs to agree that the personalised assessments will be run in accordance with this administration handbook and must re-sign this agreement for each academic year. Access for other staff members will be restricted until this has been signed.

The functions allocated by the head teacher determine which activities staff can undertake on the assessment website. Access can be restricted to particular year groups or classes, to ensure that staff are accessing relevant and appropriate information. The rights and roles allocated in the previous year will automatically carry over for staff remaining in post at the school, therefore the head teacher should review these functions and access requirements each academic year.

Scheduling assessments

Please note that the head teacher, or nominated staff member, must allocate access before users can schedule assessments or access feedback and reports.

Schools have the flexibility to schedule the personalised assessments throughout the academic year. Schools can schedule the assessments for individual learners, small groups or whole classes, in accordance with their preferences and their IT facilities. As the personalised assessments are different for each learner, there is no requirement for a whole class of learners to take the assessments at the same time.

Personalised assessments must be scheduled for a particular school day and be scheduled at least the day before the assessment is due to take place. They can be taken at any point during the school day. If a learner does not start an assessment on the scheduled day, it will be cancelled overnight, and the school can reschedule the assessment. If a learner starts an assessment on the scheduled day but does not complete it, the results will be submitted overnight unless the assessment is cancelled by the school. It is important in this situation that the assessment is cancelled and rescheduled by the school.

A step-by-step guide to scheduling assessments is available on the assessment website.

At the start of an assessment, learners are allocated a question (or text and set of questions) based on their curriculum year group. When scheduling, teachers can override this setting to select a different year group starting point if appropriate. Further information on this can be found in section 6.13 of the user guide.

When scheduling, staff members can also select accessibility options and colour changes as set out under ‘Modifications to personalised assessments’.

IT set up

The assessments have been designed to be compatible with a wide range of devices that have a modern browser installed. Before any assessments are run, devices should be fully charged and checked for updates. Further information on IT set up can be found in section 3 of the user guide.

Guidance on how schools can get the best out of their IT systems can also be found in the Education Digital Standards and Guidance.

Language

Numeracy personalised assessments can be taken in English or Welsh. The language of a learner’s assessment is chosen when a staff member schedules the assessment. A learner can view the question in the alternative language at any point during the assessment by clicking the ‘globe’ icon at the bottom of the screen.

When scheduling the Reading personalised assessments for learners, staff members select which assessments will be taken, English Reading or Welsh Reading. Questions and texts are not available in the alternative language as the assessments assess learners’ skills in reading each language. Requirements regarding which Reading personalised assessments learners should take are covered under the ‘Requirements for learners receiving education through the medium of Welsh’ detailed below.

Familiarisation assessments

In advance of taking personalised assessments, schools should ensure learners have an opportunity to try familiarisation assessments in each subject. This will enable learners to view the question types and understand how to answer them, and also to become familiar with the navigation of the assessments. This is particularly important for the Numeracy (Reasoning) assessment which requires use of audio.

For learners with hearing impairment or similar accessibility requirements, both the stimulus questions within the Numeracy (Reasoning) assessments and the supporting PDF transcripts of the question texts are available for an adult to help the learner.

Adults may sign all or part of any question and record their sign language responses if appropriate, and if this is usual classroom practice. Further information can be found in section 6.1 of the user guide.

Familiarisation assessments are accessed on the assessment website via Hwb and can be used by learners at any time. Further information can be found in section 3.13 of the user guide.

Taking the assessments

Before a learner can take a personalised assessment, a staff member with the appropriate access to facilitate an assessment must release the assessment scheduled for the learner. Staff members have the option to release assessments for individual learners, or for a whole class.

Detailed guidance on how to schedule and facilitate assessments is available in the videos and sections 3.9 and 4.1 of the user guide, which also includes checklists for staff to use before and during an assessment.

Once an assessment has been released, the learner can access the assessment on the assessment website via Hwb using their Hwb login. Learners should navigate to the assessments website and click either ‘Numeracy (Procedural)’, ‘Numeracy (Reasoning)’, ‘English Reading’ or ‘Welsh Reading’.

Key features

Before the assessments have started, staff members should remind learners of key features of these assessments:

The purpose is to provide learners with information on their skills so that they understand what they can do and the areas they may need to work on.
Learners cannot go back to a previous answer and make amendments once they have moved on to the next question.
If learners get stuck on a particular question and cannot answer, they shouldn’t worry if they find it hard, they should just provide their best answer and move on to the next question.
Learners may need to scroll down on-screen to see the full question content. A notice will pop up on the screen to warn them of this.
If a learner encounters problems with their computer or device, they should raise their hand and advise a staff member (if they need to switch to another device mid-assessment, the assessment will resume where it left off).
Although there is no fixed end point in terms of duration for Numeracy (Reasoning), when the system has gathered enough information, the assessments will end automatically.
Numeracy (Procedural) assessments will end after 28 questions have been completed (or 29 questions if a trial item is included).
Reading assessments will end after 31 to 34 questions have been completed, which may include a trial item.

During the assessments, the staff member should:

check that learners are progressing through questions and moving on if they don't know the answer to a particular question
check that learners are working honestly and independently
check learners have paper and a pen or pencil for working out or notes
pause the assessment and encourage the learner to take a break, if they feel this would be beneficial to the learner

Staff should be aware that if there is an incident or interruption, assessments can be paused, resumed or cancelled on the assessment website.

Assessment conditions

Each learner receives a different set of questions, and therefore it is not necessary for whole classes to take the assessments at the same time. Schools can schedule assessments for individual learners, small groups or whole classes, depending on preferences and facilities available.

In order that teachers can gain the most accurate information about learners’ skills, schools should ensure that:

the room is set up to allow learners to work on devices independently
learners have all necessary resources (paper and a pen or pencil for any rough working out or notes), and for Numeracy (Reasoning) a calculator or manipulatives if applicable, plus headphones for accessing the audio element of the assessment
the work produced in the assessments is genuinely that of the learners
there is appropriate supervision at all times
the assessments are run according to this handbook

When their assessments have been released by a staff member in the assessment website, learners should navigate to Hwb and enter their Hwb login credentials. They should be given assistance entering these where required.

Assessment length

The personalised assessments do not have a fixed duration. Numeracy (Procedural) and Reading assessments have a fixed number of questions; Numeracy (Reasoning) does not have a fixed number of questions but stops when the system has made a reliable decision about the learner’s ability. Learners can work at their own pace. The staff member can use their professional judgement to determine how long to give the learner to complete the assessment based on classroom practice and learner well-being.

The staff member facilitating the assessments can and should encourage learners to move on through the questions, rather than spend too long on questions they cannot answer:

Numeracy (Procedural) personalised assessments generally last between 25 and 30 minutes.
Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessments generally last between 30 and 35 minutes.
Reading personalised assessments generally last between 20 and 40 minutes.

Before learners take the assessments, you will need to ensure that there is sufficient time to set up, including ensuring all devices are working and all learners have their Hwb account login details.

If you are scheduling for a group of learners or a whole class, you may need to plan a suitable activity for those who finish their assessment ahead of the rest of the group.

Rest breaks

Rest breaks may be given to learners of any age at any time during the assessment, and an assessment may be spread throughout the school day. It is recommended that staff members give particular consideration to learners with additional learning or health needs as well as younger learners, and that learners in Years 2 and 3 have rest breaks. The length of the break is at the discretion of the school. Staff members can decide when or if breaks are appropriate for other learners.

The staff member can pause the assessment at any time during the assessment, and learners can log out of the assessment and then log back in after the break. It is important that the staff member pauses the learner assessment when a break is given, otherwise the learner will be able to access it from a different device.

The assessment must be completed in a single day. If a learner cannot complete it in a single day the assessment should be cancelled by the school and rescheduled, otherwise the results will be uploaded overnight.

When an assessment is paused or stopped, the results for the questions the learner has answered will be uploaded at 5.00 p.m. on the day the assessment is taken unless the assessment is cancelled. An assessment with submitted answers cannot be restarted.

Absence

Should a learner be absent on the day of a scheduled assessment, the assessment can be rescheduled for another time. If the learner has not started the assessment, it will automatically be cancelled overnight. If a learner has started the assessment but cannot complete it, for example because they are sent home ill, then the assessment should be cancelled by the school.

After the assessments

Feedback and reports

A range of reports (for individual learners, groups of learners and whole classes) are available to those staff members with ‘Administrate’ or ‘Facilitate and analyse’ functions. Head teachers should ensure these functions are set early in the school year to allow teachers access to reports to support their classroom planning.

Feedback on skills for individual learners who have taken Numeracy (Procedural) and Reading personalised assessments is usually available on the assessment website the day after assessments are completed. Staff can review feedback before releasing this to the learner's Hwb account. Further information on how to release the report to the learner can be found in section 5.3 of the user guide. Reports must be released to the learner who can then share with their parents or carers while logged into Hwb.

Feedback on skills for individual learners who have taken the Numeracy (Reasoning) assessment is usually available on the assessment website the day after assessments have been taken. This feedback report is teacher-facilitated and cannot be released to the learner.

On completion of the Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessments, staff will have access to sample questions (via the learner feedback report and group skills profile report) which they can use with learners to support the development of reasoning skills.

Progress reports for each assessment are also usually available the day after assessments are completed. Progress reports include a progress chart which is automatically updated after each assessment, and also an age-standardised score for the learner’s most recent assessment. Staff can release these to the learner in the same way they do with feedback reports. Further information on how to do this can be found in section 5.4 of the user guide. Reports must be released to the learners who can then share with their parents or carers while logged into Hwb.

Other reports available to schools to support planning and progression include skills profiles and progress reports for groups and classes. Training materials on making use of the information in the reports are available on the assessment website and on Hwb.

Sharing reports with parents and carers

The Provision of Information by Head Teachers to Parents and Adult Pupils (Wales) Regulations 2022 (“end of year reports”) require that a brief commentary on the results of the assessments be included in the end of year report to parents and carers.

We strongly advise that the commentary in the end of year report includes the following reports ('personalised assessment reports'):

the individual learner progress report in all subjects
the feedback report for Numeracy (Procedural) and Reading (feedback for Numeracy (Reasoning) is teacher-facilitated and will not result in a report for issue direct to parents and carers)

The requirement to provide the end of year report in writing to parents and carers is mandatory. In addition to that, schools are encouraged to share the personalised assessment reports with parents and carers while the information is current, they do not have to wait until the end of the year. For example, in addition to the end of year report teachers could provide the personalised assessment reports on-screen at a parents’ evening or printed out and shared at the end of term, alongside and in the context of other information on the learner’s progress.

If the assessments are taken twice during the academic year, then parents and carers should receive sets of personalised assessments reports both times.

Consideration should be given to how reporting is provided to learners, parents and carers who do not have access to a suitable device outside of the school environment, which is more likely to be the case for those from lower-income households.

All learners in our education system should be supported to achieve their potential and aspirations.

Support

Local authorities or regional education consortia working on the local authorities’ behalf are encouraged to work with schools from time to time, to support the formative purpose of personalised assessments and share good practice. There is no legal requirement for schools to share assessment scores with local authorities. The personalised assessments should not be used for school performance or accountability purposes.

on the personalised assessments, including managing user access, scheduling and taking assessments, as well as accessing feedback and reports, is available in the user guide on the assessment website. Training materials in the form of pre-recorded webinars are also available on the assessment website and Hwb. For further support, schools can contact the Assessment Helpdesk on 029 2026 5099 or help@personalisedassessments.wales

Specific requirements for Numeracy (Procedural) and Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessments

The Numeracy assessment is taken in 2 parts, Numeracy (Procedural) and Numeracy (Reasoning), for each curriculum year group. The Numeracy (Procedural) assessment focuses on numerical facts and procedures, the tools needed to apply numeracy within a range of contexts. The Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessment provides information on how well learners can apply their procedural skills to solve numerical problems.

It is possible that some Year 2 learners may not be ready to apply their procedural skills to the problems and contexts designed for Year 2 in the bank of questions for the Numeracy (Reasoning) assessments. Schools are advised to proceed with the Year 2 Numeracy (Procedural) personalised assessments first, and then to use their professional judgement regarding whether to use the Numeracy (Reasoning) assessments with some or all of their Year 2 learners.

Schools are reminded that, when scheduling, staff can start an assessment with questions designed for a lower year group if they consider that a lower starting difficulty would be appropriate. Head teachers are also reminded that they have the discretion to disapply the assessment for individual learners who are not working at the lowest difficulty level questions in the personalised assessments question bank. Following an assessment, teachers are encouraged to use the sample questions supplied with the reports to support their learners to develop their reasoning skills.

The use of calculators and manipulatives

Numeracy (Procedural) personalised assessment

Calculators and other tools are not allowed to be used for the procedural assessment.

Learners should have access to paper and pens or pencils and should be encouraged to use them for their working out.

Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessment

Year 2 and Year 3 learners may have access to a calculator and other tools which can include manipulatives for the assessment if they normally use them in class.

Learners in Years 4 to 9 should all have access to a calculator. They may also use other tools, which can include manipulatives (if deemed appropriate by the teacher), for the assessment.

Learners should also have access to paper and pens or pencils and should be encouraged to use them for their working out.

Structure of the Numeracy assessments

Each Numeracy (Procedural) personalised assessment is tailored to the learner’s responses. The first question in an assessment is selected to be appropriate for a learner in their current curriculum year, although teachers can override this where necessary if a learner is working at a level significantly below this. Subsequent questions are selected from the bank of questions as outlined under ‘Benefits of personalised assessments’ above. There is no fixed end point in terms of time duration for Numeracy (Procedural) assessments. However, the assessment will end after 28 questions have been completed.

Each Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessment is also tailored to the learner’s responses, in a similar way to the Numeracy (Procedural) personalised assessments. However, the content of the assessments varies in some ways. There are 2 question types in Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessments, namely:

single mark questions
multi-mark questions (with hints)

These questions are used to structure the assessment as follows:

for Years 4 to 9, the assessment begins with single-mark questions before progressing to individual multi-mark questions with hints. The assessment concludes with the stimulus section, namely information pages and audio content on which a number of single- and multi-mark questions are based
for Years 2 to 3, the assessment comprises single-mark questions followed by the stimulus section described above

For this assessment, learners will access an audio file and must have a set of headphones attached to their device.

It is important to note that learners cannot go back once they have moved on to the next question.

Timing

Numeracy (Procedural) personalised assessment

Learners will work at their own pace, and the length of an assessment will typically be between 25 and 30 minutes.

Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessments

Learners will work at their own pace, and the length of an assessment will typically be between 30 and 35 minutes.

Familiarisation assessments

Familiarisation assessments are provided for staff to use with learners prior to taking the assessment. Following this introductory use, they can also be taken by learners on their own.

They are divided into sets:

Years 2 to 3
Years 4 to 6
Years 7 to 9

Each familiarisation assessment contains 8 or 9 questions or information screens, which include examples of each of the question types used in the personalised assessments.

For Numeracy (Reasoning), the assessment includes audio content and the use of hints. It is therefore very important that staff use a familiarisation assessment with their learners beforehand so that learners can experience and understand how the hint questions work.

For learners with hearing impairment or similar accessibility requirements, supporting PDF transcripts of the question texts are available for an adult to help the learner with the stimulus questions within the Numeracy (Reasoning) assessments.

Some learners may not be familiar with some of the question types or may not have completed assessments on computer. It is very important, therefore, that you spend time familiarising learners with these materials so that when they take an assessment it will provide the best information on their skills.

For learners in Years 2 to 6, it is recommended that you read the familiarisation questions aloud and work through each question, checking that learners are clear about how to complete each question.

For learners in Years 7 to 9, you do not have to read the questions aloud, but you must ensure that learners are clear about how to complete each of the different types of question and should discuss the most appropriate approach for each of them.

Familiarisation assessments may be accessed at any time. They should be taken shortly before a personalised assessment (though not necessarily in the same lesson due to time constraints and in case learners become tired).

Setting the language of the assessment

When scheduling a Numeracy personalised assessment for learners, staff members can select whether the assessment will be taken in English or Welsh. In either case, the alternative language version of the question will be available as a pop-up window at any time. Clicking on the globe icon at the bottom of the screen allows learners to see the assessment content in the other language.

The alternative language version is displayed as an image and the learner cannot enter an answer in the alternative language. In Numeracy (Reasoning) a learner can access the audio in the other language by using the globe icon and selecting the audio on the relevant screen.

Responding to questions from learners

The assessment questions may be read aloud to learners if needed. No help should be given with any of the numerical content of the questions.

You should answer questions such as ‘Is this the right one?’ by saying ‘Choose the one you think is the correct one’.

Facilitating a Numeracy personalised assessment

Before the assessment has started, staff members should remind learners of the key features of the assessments and remind them of the following:

If they need help reading a question, they should raise their hand and ask a staff member (who may read the question aloud to the learner but should not help with the numerical content).
If they want to see the question in the alternative language (English or Welsh) they should click the globe icon at the bottom of the screen. If they want to hear the audio section in the alternative language in the Numeracy (Reasoning) assessment they should click the globe icon and select the audio on the relevant screen.
They are encouraged to and can use paper and a pen or pencil for working out, but they must type their answer on-screen.
The length of the assessment is not a reflection of the learner's ability and learners should work at their own pace. The assessment’s length will vary for each learner, but they will generally last between 25 and 35 minutes depending on how fast the learner works and how many questions they receive.

During the assessment, the staff member should:

check that calculators and other tools are not being used for the Numeracy (Procedural) assessment
check that learners are working independently
check learners have paper and a pen or pencil for working out or notes
encourage learners to progress through the assessment at a pace that suits them
check that learners do have access to calculators or manipulatives (if appropriate) for the Numeracy (Reasoning) assessment, and that they have headphones ready to use for the audio section
tell learners not to worry if they get a difficult question and encourage learners to provide their best answer and then move on to the next question if they are unsure of the answer
pause the assessment and encourage the learner to take a break, if they feel this would be beneficial to the learner

Specific requirements for Reading personalised assessments

Structure of the assessment

Reading assessments have been structured into 3 sections to adapt the difficulty level more gradually. The initial questions will be at a difficulty appropriate for learners in that curriculum year, although teachers can override this where necessary if a learner is working at a level significantly below.

As learners progress through the sections, the year group range of questions presented widens. Depending on the starting year group, learners will receive a combination of standalone, sentence completion and short, medium and long texts. The number of questions presented to learners will range from 31 to 34, as a trial question may occasionally be added. For details see user guide section 4.3.3.

It is important to note that learners cannot go back once they have moved on to the next question.

Timing

Learners will work at their own pace, and the length of an assessment will typically be about 20 to 40 minutes.

Familiarisation assessments

Familiarisation assessments are provided for staff to use with learners prior to taking the assessment. There are 3 familiarisation assessments: Years 2 to 3, Years 4 to 6 and Years 7 to 9.

Each familiarisation assessment contains one text and a range of questions, which include examples of each of the question types used in the personalised assessments. A sentence completion question is included in the familiarisation assessments for Years 2 to 3 and Years 4 to 6.

It is very important that you spend time familiarising learners with these assessments so that when they take an assessment it provides the best information on their skills.

Familiarisation assessments can be found by teachers in the familiarisation assessment tab and may be accessed at any time. They should be taken shortly before a personalised assessment (though not necessarily in the same lesson due to time constraints and in case learners become tired).

The questions are presented in a fixed order to enable staff to talk a whole class through a familiarisation assessment, for example by reading the text and the questions together, and discussing the answers and how to respond.

Requirements for learners receiving education through the medium of Welsh

Learners in Year 2 to 3 in Welsh-medium education are required to take the Welsh Reading personalised assessments only. A learner will be regarded as attending Welsh-medium education for the purposes of the assessments where, in the opinion of the head teacher, the majority of that learner's lessons are taught through the medium of Welsh.

Learners in Years 4 to 9 in Welsh-medium education are required to take both the Welsh and English Reading personalised assessments. There is no requirement for learners to take the Welsh Reading personalised assessment in English-medium education. A learner will be regarded as attending English-medium education for the purposes of the assessments where, in the opinion of the head teacher, the majority of that learner's lessons are taught through the medium of English.

When scheduling an assessment for learners, staff members select English or Welsh Reading personalised assessments as appropriate.

Facilitating a Reading personalised assessment

Before the assessment has started, staff members should remind learners of the key features of the assessments and remind them of the following:

When they have a text to read, they should read it carefully before they move on to the questions.
There will be an instruction to use the ‘Next’ button to answer the questions after the learners have read the text.
The questions (other than the sentence completion questions) will appear with a button that can be used to open the reading text so learners can refer back to it.
Learners can select the ‘X’ button to close the text.
If the text covers a question the text can be dragged to one side to view the question again.
Learners cannot have texts or questions read to them as this is an assessment of reading.
The length of the assessment is not a reflection of the learner's ability and learners should work at their own pace. The assessments will be about 20 to 40 minutes, but this will vary depending on how fast the learner works and how many texts and questions they receive.
If learners do not know the answer to the question, they should provide their best answer and then move on to the next question.

Modifications to personalised assessments

The assessments have been designed with learners’ access in mind. It is expected that nearly all learners will be able to access them without special arrangements. However, where accessible versions are needed the assessments have been devised to meet the widest possible range of access needs, and to work with a wide range of commonly used access technologies and usual access arrangements. Where possible, learners should be provided with support to access the assessments in the same way that it is provided to them in day-to-day classroom practice for computer-based working.

Section 6 of the user guide outlines further information on:

use of tactile diagrams and Braille Reading booklets (section 6.1)
colour changes (section 6.2.3)
using screen readers (section 6.3, although please note that screen readers cannot be used with a Reading personalised assessment as this is an assessment of the learner’s reading skills)
enlarged versions or magnification tools (section 6.4)
use of scribes (section 6.10)
use of readers (section 6.11, although please note that the instructions can be read to learners in the Reading personalised assessments, but the texts and questions must not be read)
audio content (section 6.9)
reading aloud (section 6.12)
quiet space (section 6.2.2)

Please note

Copies of the booklet of tactile diagrams for Numeracy (Procedural) can be obtained by contacting the Assessment Helpdesk on 029 2026 5099 or help@personalisedassessments.wales

For the Reading assessments, Braille reading booklets are available in grade 1 and grade 2 Braille. Copies of the booklets can be obtained by contacting the Assessment Helpdesk on 029 2026 5099 or help@personalisedassessments.wales

Staff must allow 2 weeks for delivery of these materials for any planned assessments.

British Sign Language

In the Numeracy (Procedural) and Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessments any question or instruction can be signed to the learner. The learner’s usual sign language support can be used to sign text to the learner, working at the learner’s own pace. You may sign all or part of any question and record the learner’s sign language responses if appropriate, and if this is usual classroom practice.

Learners who use and learn through British Sign Language will be dependent on competent interpreters of the assessment material who are able to work at a level appropriate for the assessment and are familiar with learners’ use of signs for subject-specific vocabulary.

For Numeracy (Reasoning) where audio narration supports the on-screen content, printable scripts are available to access and download for signing to learners. The audio narration script booklet can be obtained by contacting the Assessment Helpdesk on 029 2026 5099 or help@personalisedassessments.wales

In the Reading personalised assessments, only the instructions can be signed to the learners. Texts and questions cannot be read or signed to the learner as this is an assessment of the learner’s reading skills.

Additional communication support

Learners who receive additional communication support in the classroom to access learning should have access to the same support, in line with standard classroom practice for each learner, when taking online assessments.

Changing the assessment starting point

The first question presented in an assessment is determined by the learner’s current national curriculum year group. It is possible for teachers to change the starting question difficulty, by selecting a different curriculum year group to the group they are currently taught in. The override is available to teachers in the assessment website when scheduling an assessment for a learner. For further information see section 6.13 in the user guide.

Note that for learners in Year 2 the starting point in the Numeracy (Procedural) and Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessments is one of the easiest questions in the bank. For the Reading personalised assessments there are a number of easy texts and questions in the bank aimed at learners who are finding it difficult to access Year 2 reading skills in the LNF.

Disapplication

Personalised assessments have been designed to allow as many learners as possible to have access to them and there is an expectation that nearly all learners will take them. Staff can change the level of difficulty for the start of each assessment (see section 6.13 of the user guide), where they consider it appropriate. There may, however, be a small number of learners who are unable to access the assessments, even with modifications in place.

There may be some learners, mainly but not exclusively in Year 2, who are not yet working at the level of the easiest questions in the bank for one or more of the personalised assessments. Schools have responsibility to identify learners who they consider are unable to:

work at the level of the easiest questions in the personalised assessments question bank
access the assessments with modifications in place

The decision that a learner should not take the personalised assessments is for the head teacher to make.

When deciding the head teacher must:

have regard to the disapplication guidance
consider whether any of the access arrangements would support the learner to access the personalised assessments

It is not necessary for head teachers to disapply or modify parts or all of the curriculum in order to do this.

All disapplication decisions must be made for each individual learner. For example, a learner disapplied from the Numeracy (Procedural) personalised assessment is not automatically disapplied from either the Numeracy (Reasoning) personalised assessment or the Reading personalised assessment.

To minimise any administrative burden for schools, there is no longer a requirement for head teachers to maintain a list of disapplications. However, if requested by their consortia or local authority, head teachers should be able to explain the grounds for the number of disapplications in their school, with regard to this handbook.

Disapplication on well-being grounds

Taking a personalised assessment should not be a cause of anxiety for any learner. Teachers may decide that there are instances where they believe a learner’s well-being would be adversely affected. In this academic year, head teachers may continue to make decisions for disapplication on well-being grounds, if they judge them appropriate. The decision should be made on an individual learner basis, and not for whole classes or year groups.

Learners who cannot access the personalised assessments even with modifications

Some learners’ additional learning or other needs will be sufficiently significant or severe that, in the view of the head teacher, they will not be able to access the personalised assessments even with full use of the modified personalised assessments and the access arrangements available.

Head teachers may therefore determine that such learners are not required to take the personalised assessments.

Learners who have an SEN statement or an IDP and for whom relevant sections of the curriculum have been disapplied

Some learners may have a statement of SEN (as provided for in section 113 of the Education Act 2002) or an individual development plan (IDP, as provided for in section 41 of the Additional Learning Needs and Education Tribunal (Wales) Act 2018) which may modify or disapply some or all of the curriculum.

In addition, under section 113 of the Education Act 2002 for the outgoing curriculum or under section 41 of the Curriculum and Assessment (Wales) Act 2021 for the new Curriculum for Wales, head teachers may temporarily disapply or modify the curriculum for a particular learner if, for the time being, it is inappropriate to offer the curriculum as it currently applies to them. Where such a disapplication has an effect on the literacy or numeracy elements of the curriculum such that the learner’s ability to access the personalised assessments would be adversely affected, the head teacher may determine that that learner need not take them.

Learners entering from different education systems and whose ability to access the personalised assessments cannot be established

Due to the facility to adjust the starting question of the assessments, and their year-round availability, it is unlikely that a school would consider disapplication on this basis.

However, if a school does not have time to determine a learner’s ability to access the personalised assessments before the end of the school year, for example because they have recently arrived from a different education system, the head teacher may determine that a learner need not take personalised assessments during that school year. This provision applies for that year’s personalised assessments only.

Disapplication in relation to learners with English as an additional language (EAL) or Welsh as an additional language (WAL)

Disapplication would be appropriate for relatively few EAL or WAL learners. Head teachers who take this option must be willing and able to explain their decision to their regional consortium or local authority and to the learner’s parents or carers.

When deciding the head teacher must have:

regard to the disapplication guidance
consider whether any of the access arrangements would support the learner to access the personalised assessments

Learners who are new to the UK education system

Learners from a non-English-based or non-Welsh-based education system (NEWBES) may not be disapplied from the personalised assessments solely for this reason. The personalised assessments are for formative use and therefore all learners must take them unless they cannot access them, or the school cannot assess their ability to do so.

To consider a learner as NEWBES, the following criteria must be satisfied:

the learner’s first language is not English or Welsh
the learner has arrived from a non-English-based or non-Welsh-based education system
the learner entered a United Kingdom (UK) education system on or after the start of the 2023 to 2024 school year (1 September 2023)