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Can we check if whichever exam board we do go with that they are looking to run the exam long term.

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Can we check if whichever exam board we do go with that they are looking to run the exam long term.

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If we go with Agored can the certificate say Agored/NOCN? I am worried that Agored is not known well enough outside of Wales and a lot of our students move to other parts of the UK.

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If we go with Agored can the certificate say Agored/NOCN? I am worried that Agored is not known well enough outside of Wales and a lot of our students move to other parts of the UK.

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Firstly with regard to making our own resources and dispensing with books, I am concerned not only with the extra work load for teachers but also the waste of resources that we already have, namely course books and expensive software which provide effective teaching and learning resources for our students.    Secondly AGORED is not a nationally recognised qualification like Cambridge or Trinity.  Our more academic students are not likely to be attracted to study for credits, rather they want portable qualifications so that they can use them elsewhere.  Finally, I do not feel that we have the experience or knowledge to write examination papers with the complicated criteria and validity that is required at high levels.  

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Firstly with regard to making our own resources and dispensing with books, I am concerned not only with the extra work load for teachers but also the waste of resources that we already have, namely course books and expensive software which provide effective teaching and learning resources for our students.    Secondly AGORED is not a nationally recognised qualification like Cambridge or Trinity.  Our more academic students are not likely to be attracted to study for credits, rather they want portable qualifications so that they can use them elsewhere.  Finally, I do not feel that we have the experience or knowledge to write examination papers with the complicated criteria and validity that is required at high levels.  

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I haven't read others comments so I could be repeating things - sorry!

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I haven't read others comments so I could be repeating things - sorry!

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We can change quals now if we have to, as we should all be teaching to the outcomes (which are ESOL core curriculum based), but my concerns are :
1. We'll have to be very careful that the assessments are meaningful as, at the moment, I think 'How will I get my students to pass this exam?' and I'm afraid this will change to 'How can I stop my students from passing these Agored units as they aren't ready for the next level?'.  I'm usually more surprised at the people who actually pass an exam than by those who don't.
2. Following on from this, we could get to a stage where we'll have mixed ability classes again.  Should we use this opportunity to look at provision as a whole as it is difficult to manage young/old/educated/uneducated students in a class - especially at the lower levels.  I say this because, the less academic either don't make it to L1+ or aren't interested in L1+.  At the lower levels, it is very difficult to mange the 19 year old who is flying through the lesson and the 45 year old woman who left school at 7, can't read or write in her own language, and is still on the first exercise.  Could we not separate or stream some classes?  (BTW I have some students who have Steps Final, but still struggle to read very simple words in class, and I've had to check to see if they have achieved)
3.  If at the moment we are teaching to an exam, aren't we just going to teach to an Agored assessment - one that everyone in the department has seen. Surely this is a lot worse than an unseen exam??
4. Will partial accreditation satisfy the college for attainment? Just wondering how the equivalent credits will be spread out during the year.  Will the college accept a 3 credit Agored unit in place of a 9 credit Cambridge cert?  Also will we?  If someone manages to achieve all 9 credits by January in writing and then drops out, doesn't that mean we've assessed them at the wrong level and they maybe left out of boredom?

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I do wonder if it's all very risky to change at this point. We could spend so much time adjusting to a new system instead of spending time planning and delivering better lessons which might actually help the students improve their skills - and thereby improve the pass rate (I know you say you will minimise work, but we know realistically it will take a lot of extra time just to get our heads round it, we have enough distracting admin to do as it is) .

We have only been doing Cambridge exams for a year, it was the first time we did them last year and despite this many of our results have improved on previous years (albeit not up to the national comparators yet) - surely we can learn from last year and improve our results again? Surely it would be better to put our efforts into improving the students skills this year rather than changing to a different system which we don't know / have no experience of - just people talking / worrying about it has already become distracting enough. We could even end up with a worse pass rate if we don't have the time and energy to get the students

Why not instead change one of the regular teaching sessions into a dedicated literacy session where we do more intense practice of reading / writing skills aside from the textbook, with the aim of getting the students' literacy skills to the right level by the end of the course? We could alternate between teachers on PT courses, and instead of ILP target sessions on FT courses - given that most of their targets are reading/writing ones anyway. The higher levels could use some of the materials from the Edexcel L1/L2 literacy books we used a few years ago. I've used the 'Writing in Paragraphs' book with Entry 3 before and they found it very helpful. Am sure if we divvy it up we could find plenty of better literacy resources to help us improve our literacy teaching.

On a skills based course where they are developing overall skills to a certain standard, it doesn't seem to make sense to me to have it separated into different assessments throughout the year. Students should be developing their skills to achieve the level by the end of the course. There are a few outcomes which can be taught discretely (e.g. alphabetical order), but mostly improving writing and reading is much more of a dynamic process, and especially in writing, one of the outcomes cannot really be achieved without the others (e.g. you can't really put together a good text without good sentences made up of words which make sense and overall are spelt correctly!)

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I think it would be more than possible to adapt to an Agored-style  system even now. We have a considerable amount of exam resources that we have adapted already. It would allow our students to focus on individual reading and writing skills in a way that they aren't at the moment. We get them doing mocks in Jan/Feb time and that leaves only the first term to get them used to the task types. Under the new system we could get them focusing on the skills they need for the upcoming exam in certain Integrated Skills sessions,. This would avoid "teaching to the exam."

Sophie's idea of doing two Cambridge and Agored may also deal with some workload issues.

However, I do share concerns that Agored may not carry the same weight as Cambridge. (The NOCNs someone linked to earlier look interesting, however). In addition, with the best will in the world we may have unforeseen issues with a changeover. I realise we need to address the results, but it would be helpful to have a year's grace. Also, is it possible to change the qual aim of the course at this point in the term?

Sandor

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Well, at least it's let me in this time. PGCE group project may be relevent. It's a bridging course for non-native speakers partially educated in the medium of English.

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Well, at least it's let me in this time. PGCE group project may be relevent. It's a bridging course for non-native speakers partially educated in the medium of English.

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Except, aren't our results lowest over L1 and L2, especially reading?! So this may not help our results!

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I would agree with all of what Emma has said below and part of what Sophie has said above! 

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I would agree with all of what Emma has said below and part of what Sophie has said above! 

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I don't think new strategies should be formally introduced this year - it is not fair on the teachers nor the students; teachers already have their schemes of work in place/course books and students have ''signed-up' to do Cambridge qualifications (and paid £30 for books). I'm not optimistic we would get all of this sorted in time before Christmas.

I agree with Sophie, most students who go on to Level 1 and 2 do so with the intention of mainstream education afterwards, and most colleges and institutions may not accept Agored. Could we use the new Agored plan for E1 to E3 and reserve Cambridge (or Trinity) for L1 & L2?

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Very good point Emma, very much agree with that!

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Although I understand we need to change in order to improve success rate, I feel that  trying to do this when we are well into the year, will cause a lot of confusion, extra work and it might make things worse. Will it be wiser to take some time to put a strategy and plan in place before we start turning things around?

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I can understand that this looks like the only option for us at the moment – and I can see it working! However….these are my worries at the moment:

If we do change to Agored this year, will we have time to properly discuss and create the assessments? Our schemes of work, teaching styles and textbooks are already geared towards Cambridge, and the students are expecting Cambridge exams. Is there any way we could have a ‘transition year’ this year? We could continue with the Cambridge exams, but perhaps use the Agored materials as mocks, like a test run with some of the exact materials we plan to use for 17/18. That way we could see what works well without it affecting our results. We could also have lots of time over summer to meet in specialist groups and discuss ideas / get creating.

Also, without the ‘pressure’ of external formal exams, and with the (perhaps unfair) Agored ‘soft’ reputation, the students mightn’t take the exams so seriously. We would have to all be on the same page in explaining the exam situation, and I’m guessing we would still do exams in the hall, bring ID cards….etc?

We would need to announce it to the students at the same time and worded in the same way. Rumours spread like wildfire and people will be panicking! Perhaps we could have a powerpoint with all the info so that we are all giving the same reasons / explanations.

In order for the lessons to be more skills based, we should maybe think about a different textbook or perhaps only use a textbook for grammar and not use the structure of following a coursebook from start to finish.

I am not sure about the some students doing Agored / some doing Cambridge idea… only because I think this might cause a lot of squabbling between students and may cause teacher resentment. We are also then (indirectly) saying ourselves that ‘Agored isn’t as difficult’ which would be a bad message to send out.

Sorry it’s so long. I had to get it all out before I empty my brain for half term :D  - Emma

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I agree that two qual aims per level (as suggested by Vero) might be the way to go. However what I think we should do is identify those students that aren't likely to pass and that only those students should do Agored . The other students would do Cambridge/ Trinity. The advantage would be that there would be a lot less marking/ moderating/ IVing involved than if all students did AGORED.

Sophie

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As I understand it the 75% attainment figure for ESOL CAVC 2015/16 is based on the no of students in the class from November who have achieved. Of the 106 students, who were in my classes from November, 18 withdrew (17%). On average only 3 students out of a possible 20 left from my 5 classes between November 2015 and June 2016. This means that even if all the remaining students passed their qualifications, the possible attainment was already down to 83%. Historically, a withdrawal rate of 17% is much lower than at merger when the figure was 40%-50% from one academic year to the next. ESOL learners have nearly always good reasons for leaving the provision. I cannot see how we can reduce withdrawals any further. So, even if we had a fail percentage rate of only 8% with Agored Cymru wouldn’t this mean the overall attainment rate would not have improved? What sort of pass rate are we aiming for with Agored Cymru?

We could be changing all our provision dramatically and increasing teachers’ workload for a small or no difference in attainment and offering the student an unrecognisable qual outside Wales.

Please, could you let us know the comparative attainment figures for 2015/16 for all ESOL providers and the qualifications that they are doing? We need to pay particular attention to the larger ESOL providers such as Coleg Llandrillo who did Cambridge exams in 2015/16 are in 2016/17.
Haydn

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I’m not sure what the higher level students will think of
Agored units.  My level 2 group seem very concerned about the l2 qual and
what it equates to currently as it is.  I think they want a qualification
which has more prestige attached to it ie Cambridge.  Something
internationally recognised, or at least, marked externally.  Agored units
seem to work well at lower levels and I think there is merit in using them as a
back up to an exam, for those that drop out early or fail to turn up, or don’t
perform as well as expected.  However, as a student, I think I’d feel
short-changed with a collection of Agored units at the end of level 2. 

 

In fact, when I was at school,
alongside our Higher Chemistry, we did three internally assessed SCTOVEC (now
merged with the Scottish Examinations Board into SQA) modules throughout the
year as a back-up.  However, employers and HE aren’t so interested in
those…

 

Just a few thoughts Liz.  Bear in mind I am the new girl, but I do
understand the data aspect.  It’s not nice seeing all the red boxes. 
Appreciate that you have to do something major to protect the provision.

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I’m not sure what the higher level students will think of
Agored units.  My level 2 group seem very concerned about the l2 qual and
what it equates to currently as it is.  I think they want a qualification
which has more prestige attached to it ie Cambridge.  Something
internationally recognised, or at least, marked externally.  Agored units
seem to work well at lower levels and I think there is merit in using them as a
back up to an exam, for those that drop out early or fail to turn up, or don’t
perform as well as expected.  However, as a student, I think I’d feel
short-changed with a collection of Agored units at the end of level 2. 

 

In fact, when I was at school,
alongside our Higher Chemistry, we did three internally assessed SCTOVEC (now
merged with the Scottish Examinations Board into SQA) modules throughout the
year as a back-up.  However, employers and HE aren’t so interested in
those…

 

Just a few thoughts Liz.  Bear in mind I am the new girl, but I do
understand the data aspect.  It’s not nice seeing all the red boxes. 
Appreciate that you have to do something major to protect the provision.

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Forget assessment, let's all sit on a beach listening to the waves having conversational English... sorry, Liz, I was distracted by the 'calming' background ;-)

Suggestion to the left (by 'imposter' Liz?!) is a nice idea in theory - but would involve twice the work with two lots of assessments, not sure it's practical.

Am not really sure the Skills for Life Cambridge / Trinity exams are that well known outside of our ESOL circles anyway?- perhaps management could do a bit of research and ring around some of the other colleges in Wales and big ones in some of the English cities to see what they do / if they would accept Agored certs?

http://www.nocn.org.uk/assets/0001/2734/QS-Suite_of_ESOL_Skills_for_Life__QCF__.pdf (linked from Agored site) has the spec (outcomes / ass criteria same as Cambridge and all QCF boards)- I note it says 'NOCN has produced benchmark assessments which can be used by centres as they are, but there is the opportunity for centres to devise their own assessments, using the benchmark assessments as a guide for developing their own tasks.' - so we wouldn't be working from scratch and could even use theirs this year?

However, I also note it says:
"Tutors must judge when learners are ready to be assessed. Usually this will happen at the end of a programme of learning, although it is possible to assess the Speaking and Listening at stages throughout the learner’s programme of learning." - do they actually allow several assessments throughout the year in reading/writing as proposed? - it seems to suggest reading / writing is usually through a final summative assessment anyway? Is this any different to exams - except more work for us?!

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From Vero: I understand the reasons
why the college is looking for a highest attainment rate or pass rate. However,
I feel that by using only Agored units, we' be devaluing our provision and
lowering not necessarily the quality but our standards. I'm also worried that
we'd be losing more academic students who are looking for a nationally
recognized qualification to progress to higher education. I can't help thinking
that those students would be looking for other colleges to obtain either
Trinity or Cambridge qualifications. What I'm suggesting is a combination of
qualification aims attached to students. Enter all of them for Agored units (in
order to increase attainment figures), and when it comes to entering them for
exams in February / March, only enter the strongest ones. This would also
enable part time students to achieve one type of qualification in the first
year (instead of not being entered for exams), and possibly Cambridge (or
another exam board qualifications) the following year. What do you think?

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From Vero: I understand the reasons
why the college is looking for a highest attainment rate or pass rate. However,
I feel that by using only Agored units, we' be devaluing our provision and
lowering not necessarily the quality but our standards. I'm also worried that
we'd be losing more academic students who are looking for a nationally
recognized qualification to progress to higher education. I can't help thinking
that those students would be looking for other colleges to obtain either
Trinity or Cambridge qualifications. What I'm suggesting is a combination of
qualification aims attached to students. Enter all of them for Agored units (in
order to increase attainment figures), and when it comes to entering them for
exams in February / March, only enter the strongest ones. This would also
enable part time students to achieve one type of qualification in the first
year (instead of not being entered for exams), and possibly Cambridge (or
another exam board qualifications) the following year. What do you think?