The information from APP judgements is only valuable if the judgements are secure and in line with national standards. Everyone involved needs the reassurance that APP judgements are consistent within and between schools.

Teachers' assessment judgements should be consistent between colleagues in the years above and below, within school and in transition between schools. The Roles and responsibilities chart outlines who should be responsible for the APP activities in school to ensure that teacher assessment judgements are consistent, reliable and matched to national standards.

In-school standardisation and moderation

Standardisation and moderation are central activities of the APP approach to ensure consistency of judgements within school. They have different functions and occur at different stages in the assessment process.

• Standardisation is designed to ensure that national standards are understood and can be applied consistently. It occurs:
  • before teachers assess their pupils initially
  • from time to time, to review and strengthen teachers' judgements within AFs or ATs as appropriate.
• Moderation is designed to check that national standards have been applied consistently, and occurs after teachers have made their assessments.

These activities need to be rigorous and manageable without being too time consuming. Help for planning and managing these activities is provided in the Guidance for planning and supporting in-school standardisation and moderation  (PDF 0.16 Mb)

Watch APP pilot school leaders and teachers walk through their experience of standardisation and moderation.

Securing national standards