Key stage 3: Year 6 to 7 transition

Ofsted’s 2015 report KS3: The wasted years? claimed that key stage 3 is not a high priority for many secondary schools in timetabling, assessment and the monitoring of pupils’ progress – and that school leaders prioritise the pastoral over the academic needs of pupils during transition from primary school. The secret to an effective key stage 3, I believe, is a better transition process, a better curriculum, better homework and better assessment. In this next article in the series, we will examine why improving the transition between primary and secondary schools is so important...

According to Galton (1999), almost 40 per cent of children fail to make expected progress during the year immediately following a change of schools and Department for Education (DfE) data from 2011 shows that average progress drops between key stage 2 and 3 for reading, writing and maths. Moreover, the effects of transition are amplified by risk factors such as poverty and ethnicity.