National Agenda Parameter Testing in the UAE

To meet their obligations under the UAE National Agenda, schools in the UAE are encouraged to carry out formal assessment of students according to guidance from their school’s regulator.

This typically consists of ability testing at the start of the academic year followed by attainment and progress testing at the end.

For the academic year 2022-23 all private schools in Dubai, should be using a curriculum-specific assessment, along with cognitive ability tests and reading skills tests, that give data to provide schools with the tools to develop a comprehensive assessment plan tailored to students’ educational needs, as well as to triangulate all assessment information. This plan should help schools to monitor more effectively and support better learning outcomes.

The priorities for KHDA are that schools:

• Help school leaders and teachers establish a baseline of their students’ cognitive potential and achievement over time, and to facilitate necessary modifications to their learning
• Support schools to better understand the extent to which the achievements of students are aligned to their cognitive potential
• Help validate the school’s internal attainment and progress data
• Support schools with their whole school self-evaluation and improvement planning
• Facilitate KHDA’s role in (i) monitoring and quality assurance of schools and (ii) supporting national and Dubai priorities and strategies

The recommended components supplied by GL Education are:

• Reading skills – NGRT - To be carried out 3 times in the academic year
• Potential to learn – CAT4
• Academic achievement – PT Series

The New Group Reading Test (NGRT)

Developing literacy and reading ability is fundamental to a student’s ability to access the curriculum. The New Group Reading Test (NGRT) is a standardised, termly assessment that reliably measures reading skills to help you get to the root of any problems precisely and quickly. Particularly useful to identify EAL students who may appear to be competent readers but who could have weak comprehension skills, NGRT provides information about sentence completion and comprehension skills, allowing you to identify where difficulties lie. Being a termly assessment allows for regular monitoring of reading progress and measuring the impact of intervention. A student’s reading ability can be benchmarked using the Standardised Age Score (SAS).

The assessment is adaptive – questions are automatically presented based on a student’s ability as they complete them, so more able students can be challenged while weaker readers are kept engaged.

The Progress Test Series (PT Series)

The Progress Test Series (PT Series) helps accurately measure how your school and your students are performing in English, maths and science – and measure both in-year, and year on year progress.

Standardised on over 100,000 children, the easy-to-use tests assess knowledge, understanding and application of the core curriculum subjects, helping you to understand current levels of attainment and identify any gaps in learning at both an individual and cohort level.

Detailed reports analyse key dimensions of learning for each subject and provide a question-by-question breakdown to help identify those students who require more challenging targets and those who may need extra support.

CAT4

Provides a unique profile of students’ strengths and areas for development.

CAT4 is an assessment of developed abilities in areas known to make a difference to learning and achievement – namely verbal, non-verbal, quantitative and spatial reasoning – and provides you with an accurate analysis of potential student achievement.

Standardised on 25,000 students and verified every year based on analysis of a quarter of a million students, CAT4 provides you with valuable baselining data. It also gives reliable indicators for national tests and examinations, including Key Stage 2 indicators, GCSE and A level indicators.