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Record keeping is highly important to track the progress of learners, to provide evidence for learners' achievement and courses' success.

The documents are used by external and internal bodies to check learners' success and achievement. Additionally, I think that the current situation we find ourselves in of predicting learners' grades, from past assessments, shows the importance of keeping accurate records and learners ensuring they try their best in all assessments, whether it be formative or summative.

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The course I teach is ESOL to adult learners in community settings. There are two assessment routes that my learners can take. Firstly they can complete examinations at the end of each part of the course, one speaking and listening assessment, one reading assessment and one writing assessment.

The second route is RARPA- Recognising and Recording Progress and Achievement. For this process, learners are set targets that are achievable during the course and then work towards achieving them. Overall, the aim is for these students to progress to be able to take the exam at some point in the future. However, if they are not able to yet, they can take the RARPA route which can provide more manageable goals for the learners.

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This form is completed at the end of the course as a guide of the information that needs to be shared with learners about their progression routes. The form also contains the outcome codes which are completed on the register to show where learners proceed to after their ESOL course. This information is used by the college to produce information about the impact of the courses that we teach and where learners move to next. This data is used internally by the college for the SAR (self assessment report) and also by external bodies e.g. OFSTED to see how the courses impact learners.

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This form is completed at the beginning of the course and covers all the areas that are required to be discussed in learners' inductions.

It covers vital areas such as health and safety and how the course is assessed. This form is convenient to use to ensure all areas have been covered, however, the areas have to be broken up into separate lessons and taught in engaging ways rather than just information being told to learners. This form is checked by internal and external visitors and observers to ensure all vital information has been shared with learners.

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Reflecting on the records I have and reading about assessment, I believe it would be useful to create a suitable record to use for 1:1 tutorials I have with students. I have conversations with learners regarding their progress/ targets/ exam entries etc. However, this is not recorded anywhere. In the next academic year I think it would be very beneficial to create a tutorial document to track discussions had with learners and keep as an ongoing record in their progress files. When learners are not entered for the exams we discuss goals for them to be entered at the next stage, to have these written down and signed by the learners may make the process feel more structured for the learners and set a clear track for them to follow.

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This is a log that I created to keep with my register. Unfortunately, some of my students have high levels of absence and miss important parts of the classes.

For me to be able to track patterns of absence/ reasons for absence and have evidence of this, I created this document.

I find it very helpful to provide an overview of absences and keeping it with the register reminds me to ask learners about their absence so they know it is important for their success.

If I see reoccurring patterns of reasons for the absence I can have a chat with students and offer support or signpost them to agencies that may be able to give support for any issues they may be having.

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This is a Trinity ESOL external reading exam paper. Learners take this exam at the end of the reading unit.

I believe this assessment does test appropriate skills for my learners. Task 1 is always an email or a letter written in an informal way, which is something that learners may receive and tests the understanding of different language used in real life situations.

Task 2- Is always based on jobs and employment, which is an important topic for my learners. When learning the skills needed for this part of the exam, the lessons are filled with useful job and employment skills and vocabulary.

Task 3- Is from a newspaper or magazine style article. This allows learners to understand different vocabulary and different styles of text.

Q22-24 -Alphabetical order- I think these questions are quite simple for Entry 2 learners and a lot of learners find them very easy. The main problem that occurs with this part of the assessment is that they don't understand what the assessment wants them to do. Perhaps because it is that simple.

I think this exam does test appropriate skills for my students and covers a range of reading skills, such as the purpose of a text, using images to find information, obtaining information and using language to work out the meaning of words.

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Formative assessment- speaking and listening 

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Formative assessment- speaking and listening 

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This formative assessment is a group discussion, which is one aspect of the speaking and listening exam. It provides picture prompts to aid the discussion and also question ideas to support learners.

At the bottom there are the curriculum outcomes that can be judged in three different ways as emerging, consolidating or established.

This formative assessment is handy to use to see how learners' group discussion skills are developing and give them feedback on areas they need to develop further from the 5 outcomes listed. They can be used as evidence for RARPA achievements and in the future, I would like to use this with peer assessment to allow learners to assess one another's speaking skills.

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This is an example of the Entry 2 ESOL writing exam paper that comes at the end of course as the final summative assessment. I believe this is a suitable assessment for the level of my ESOL learners. Task 1 is a form, this is a useful skill for learners to develop and be assessed on as it is a skill they need in real life quite frequently.

Recently with GDPR regulations practicing this skill has become more difficult. I have to remind learners not to put their real details into forms that I mark but this point is sometimes missed by learners. It is appropriate for the exam body but when completing mock exams it is a point that needs to be raised and can cause some confusion for learners.

Tasks 2 and 3 are suitable tasks for the level of my learners and are achievable. I find some of the writing tasks are a little obscure e.g. writing an email to describe new clothes you bought, might not be a very common occurrence in most people's everyday lives, but it does test the skill of structuring an email, describing items and English use generally.

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This is a formative assessment task designed by the college to assess students' writing. It is designed in a very similar way to the writing summative exam set by Trinity College London.

I think this is an appropriate assessment as it tests many of the skills that would be assessed in the real exam and also allows an opportunity for students to show skills which they may be developing for their RARPA targets.

The negative to this formative assessment (and the same goes for the final summative exam) is that students are being asked to handwrite an email. This is not something that you would do in real life, and perhaps to move forward with the times and skills learners need, we should be getting them to type these emails. Firstly to show their level of English but secondly to improve their IT skills.

In terms of feedback, there is an area for marking students' performance against three of the curriculum areas. I also write comments and give individualised feedback on students' writing to allow them to use the formative assessment to progress in their writing.

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This is a simple document that I created to have a clear overview of students' targets which I can have on my desk in the classroom. If I am using a course outcome for the student as a RARPA target, then I highlight this and write notes when I have evidence that the target is completed. The document allows me to collate the information from the ILP files and find it quickly rather than having to spend time in the lesson looking through ILP files.

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This document is used to moderate decisions made about RARPA targets if learners have met their targets or not.

It is important that this record is kept and completed correctly to ensure effective moderation and evaluation of the RARPA system.

This is used by the college to track and monitor what is happening within the courses but also by the external verifiers who look at this information as evidence that moderation has taken place for each course.

I think this document is fit for purpose, as there is space for comments by both parties to document the discussions they have had regarding the moderation process.

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This form is used if I want to request an additional support assessment for one of my learners. This is the starting point to share information about what I have noted for learners in the classroom, their backgrounds and my reasons for why they would need support. This is an important document to keep in my records to monitor the assessment of learners needing additional support and provide evidence for the ALS team to put methods into place to support my learners.

This form covers a lot of areas that learners may need support with and opens a dialogue with the ALS team about what I believe is needed for my student.

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Most weeks I give learners homework to complete and we have a weekly spelling test. I use this document to keep a record of their homework completion and spelling test scores so that I can monitor who is completing this work or not.

I also use the spelling test record as an indication of who has been learning their spellings each week.

This is a simple tracking document but I believe it serves its purpose as further information about learning outcomes can be added to the writing/ reading/ speaking and listening tracker.

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This is a student-friendly record of learning. Learners can complete different sections throughout the course when they have been taught about that area. It provides a formative assessment and evidence of their learning, I mark students' work within this learning record and it helps me to assess their understanding of the main parts of the curriculum for their course.

This is kept in their ILP file so it is easy to see the progress made between the diagnostic and during the course.

Work completed in the learning record can also be used as evidence of learners' understanding for their RARPA targets therefore it is used internally and can be used externally.

I think this document is designed well and it covers the main points of the curriculum. I find it helpful to also have my own copy and document when each section has been completed. The one thing I would change about this is to make some of the boxes larger, especially for the higher-level classes. If learners make a mistake, there is not a great deal of space for them to try again.

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At the start of the year and following the diagnostic assessment, this profile is completed to give an overview of the class. It allows me to record important information about learners' needs and abilities and also background information.

Throughout lesson planning, this document is then used to ensure that learners' needs are being met and inclusion takes place within the classroom. It is also an effective document for other teachers who may cover the class to read so that they are able to get a snapshot of the students.

In my group profile, I included information about what ability I thought each student was. I found this useful at the beginning of the year however, when students progressed in their learning the ability level they were in changed and needed to be updated. Therefore, I may not include that in my group profile next year and leave the focus on the individual comments and how to support them.

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This is used throughout the year to track reading progress. It is used internally by tutors to track learners' scores in reading papers.

This is a very simple document. To improve this document, more detail could be recorded on learners' achievement for the different types of questions as the exams follow the same format.

This will then highlight which skills need to be practised by the whole class or particular learners, therefore, making it a more useful assessment record.

All three of these trackers have become even more valuable documents in the current climate of assessing learners for exams which they are not able to sit due to the lockdown. For our Trinity examinations, I need to give an average of the learners' scores for their reading papers. The reading papers have been returned to the students but having this document allows me to easily find that information. This highlights even more, why we need to keep documents tracking students' progress/ learning and understanding.

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This is similar to the speaking and listening tracker (left) but used to keep track of writing throughout the year.

It has the same problems as the speaking and listening tracker in the way that it is a document for the whole class and I think the same suggestions for the speaking and listening tracker would help to improve the writing tracker.

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This document is designed to be used throughout the year to track the learners' progress in relation to speaking and listening outcomes. It is designed to be used from diagnostic until the end of the course.

I keep mine updated with dates of different achievements in the class and how students are progressing.

This tracker is practical, however, at times it is difficult to keep it up to date in real-time and is updated in reflection, which is not the ideal way to use it. To improve my use of this tracker, I think it would be advantageous to have 1 large sheet printed for each learner. This would allow me to update the tracker in class as events take place/ in line with formative assessments. This document is used internally but is also a helpful document to write comments which can be used for RARPA evidence of progress.

This assessment record is kept as a record for myself and not shared with the learners. If a document was created for each learner it could be shared with them and therefore keep a more detailed overview of how they are progressing. In order to keep it more up to date in real-time learners could take more responsibility for including key dates and then I could add comments about how the student is completing that task.

It could also be used as a tool in peer assessment- learners could leave comments on the task that they have assessed with a partner.

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Individual Learning and Progress Record (ILP) 

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Individual Learning and Progress Record (ILP) 

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This is a large file that is used throughout the course to keep a record of learners' progress. It is designed to be a record that is suitable for learners to use as well as tutors. There are opportunities to capture feedback and work that has been completed. I have taken some sections out of this file to discuss in more depth in separate posts.

This file also contains spaces for learners to record information about employability, British values, technology, safeguarding and Prevent. This is a useful record to have for when external agencies/ internal bodies are looking at the course documentation, as they can easily see learners understanding/ learning about these areas, which are required within the curriculum. It is helpful to see the learners' understanding and response after teaching on those particular topics. Additionally, I can see their understanding and what key points they have taken from the lesson.

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Each learner has an ILP file to track their progress. When learners complete their diagnostic tasks they are given an assessment on each course outcome, they are assessed again twice during the course (assessment takes place for other areas, but twice that is recorded in the ILP). The assessment is based on a scale of 1-5 of how well students are demonstrating each skill in the diagnostic tasks/ formative assessments in the class.

Students are also given individual targets which can be used for their RARPA targets. These are SMART targets e.g. Use full stops and capital letters accurately in two pieces of writing.

This document is kept within a file that is used frequently in the classroom and students are made aware of their individual targets. As a record to track assessment, I think they are easy to use and easy for learners to understand. Each learner has their own file and they can be easily accessed during lessons.

Learners leave comments to review their progress at the end of each part of the course.

The outcomes/ targets require evidence to be collected. So if learners are not taking an exam and are following the RARPA route, then they have individual targets and evidence is collected in line with these and stored in their ILP files.

The targets are used internally by me as the tutor and the students to see their progress and improvements, they are also used for RARPA as evidence of their achievements which is subject to monitoring by an external body and internal moderation.

One difficulty I find with this assessment record is the 1-5 scale. I don't think there is enough clarity on what the statements mean for example 'Can do this some of the time' e.g. is this some of the time in that lesson, some of the time throughout the course or some of the time during that week. I think it is open to interpretation and can be used in different ways. When completing these records for our RARPA moderation I discussed this with my mentor and lead tutors to try and gain a deeper understanding of the evidence required to meet these criteria. I personally would change this 1-5 scale to a different way of measuring if the targets have been achieved.

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ILP files Pages 13-20

During the first two weeks of the course, all students complete a diagnostic assessment. They complete an assessment on speaking and listening, reading and writing. Students complete these independently, I mark these and give feedback/ feedforward to the learners.

The diagnostic tasks are very similar to tasks that would be set for each exam. The reason for this is to allow me to understand where the learners are at the moment in their learning and what they need to improve to achieve their goal for that level.

The diagnostic assessments allow me to set targets for learners with a discussion about the areas needed for improvement and set goals for them.

These are used as an internal form of assessment and are kept to see where students start in their learning journey. They are also used as evidence for the RARPA process which can be used internally and externally to show where students began and why a particular target has been set.

These records are great for the learners to see where they started and the progress they have made throughout the course. The reading and writing assessments are straightforward to complete.

The difficulty with managing these assessments is the speaking assessment as it requires the tutor to listen to each student one-to-one which does take a large amount of time. However, over the years I have learnt to stagger how I conduct these assessments so that students are completing different assessments at different times and also I record students speaking to allow me time to listen back and truly assess their starting point linked to speaking.

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This is the starting point for all learners that join an ESOL class. The college organises enrollment sessions throughout September/ January which learners drop in to and complete the initial assessment with an ESOL tutor. There are tasks to complete for speaking and listening/ reading and writing.

This document can be used as an assessment for all levels. When I first meet a student and ask them general questions, I get an impression of what level they may be. This assessment allows me to look deeply at each student and focus on their different skills. Often learners join that are confident at speaking but may not be at the same level in writing, this is why an initial assessment that covers the different skills is very important which this assessment does.

This record is used internally and given to each tutor before their new classes begin so they can have an idea of the students that will be in their class. This is very useful to be able to understand some of the challenges learners may have before meeting them. There is also information on the initial assessment about students' backgrounds which helps to build a picture of the class.

I find these records very useful to get an opening snapshot of each learner. The other benefit is that they provide a record of the starting ability of a student and are effective to show their progress in the assessment process, especially looking at RARPA documentation.

The problem with this record is when tutors do not complete them with enough detail. Sometimes during the initial assessments, there are a lot of learners to assess and it can mean tutors are not able to fully complete the assessment record with much detail.