Primary 1 Tests

Part of the debate – in the Scottish Parliament at on 19 September 2018.

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Photo of Iain Gray Iain Gray Labour

I am clear that we on the Labour side of the chamber have no problem with teachers assessing pupils’ learning. Teachers assess pupils’ learning every day using a variety of techniques and diagnostic methodologies and, above all, they deploy their professional expertise to do so.

We also have no problem with the monitoring of literacy and numeracy standards in our schools. We encourage that, and not just nationally. We would like Scotland to re-enter the trends in international mathematics and science study, or TIMSS, and the progress in international reading literacy study, or PIRLS, international comparisons, which, as we found out last week, were ditched not for a good educational reason but to save money.

However, we have a problem with league tables and high-stakes testing, which is why, in 2003 when we were in Government, we got rid of it and replaced it with the literacy and numeracy survey. It did the job well in a statistically rigorous way that was accepted by teachers, educationalists and parents. The current Scottish Government did not improve it, as the OECD suggested, but instead abolished it.

O ur problem is with the Scottish Government’s national standardised tests, which purport to inform individual learning and monitor national standards at the same time with the same test.