Edexcel GCSE Science will have 40% internal assessment, not the 70% as reported in the TES. Internal assessment should not to be confused with coursework which in its existing form is sometimes seen as an “extra” that gets in the way of the teaching. Internal assessment in this model is very much part of our teaching and breaks down as follows.
10% is for the assessment of practical skills. Teachers who have first hand knowledge of their students are the only ones who can assess these skills.
30% will be based on short assignments. The assignments are set externally, there are 12 in total, and the teacher chooses three of these. Because the assignments are integral to the teaching of the course, the other assignments can be used to formatively assess the students and prepare them for assignments chosen for the summative assessment. Teachers will have the flexibility to choose the particular assignments that they feel suit their students best. Each assignment is designed to be completed within a normal lesson, and this should reduce rather than encourage dishonesty
GCSE Additional Science will also have 40% internal assessment, but centres may increase this to 70% if they choose to do so. The compulsory internal assessment will be similar to that for GCSE Science. The additional internal assessment will be devised by the centres themselves and marked to generic criteria – written communication, analysis and applications & implications of science. This will allow teachers to devise types of assessment that best suits their students, and exemplars will be available for guidance. Again, it is envisaged that each assignment could be completed within a normal lesson time.
All internal assessment, with the exception of the 10% practical skills, will be subjected to moderation.
We hope that teachers will see these types of internal assessment positively. It allows teachers to give students credit for the work they do in the natural course of delivering the specification, and it offers teachers the chance to be flexible and innovative in how they assess their students.
