Assessment

In French as much as in English, assessment plays a key role at Da Vinci, both because it enhances the learning process, and because it gives parents and children the opportunity to look back on the knowledge acquired and its transformation into skills.

At the Da Vinci school, assessments are a natural part of the exercises that children are used to doing. Assessments are not there to demotivate the child, but to find out what has been achieved and where they can be helped further, in a positive and constructive spirit. This ensures that the child retains confidence in itself and its skills throughout the school career.

The first assessment at Da Vinci, a diagnostic assessment, takes place at the beginning of the year: the teacher analyzes the children's situations, needs, profiles and prerequisites. This makes it possible to situate the children, their level, their abilities and their skills, and thus to define the individual and collective objectives of the class. The departmental assessment tools developed by the Inspection Académique for kindergarten are also used in this context, and will be throughout the year.

Secondly, during the year, formative evaluation consists, for the Da Vinci teacher, in gathering information to assess the quality of learning achieved. It shows him where his students are and how his teaching program is progressing in relation to a given objective. The teacher can then refocus the pedagogical action (remediation) and set up individually readjusted situations, taking advantage of small class sizes.

Formative assessments at Da Vinci take place naturally, throughout the year, every day, around quizzes, presentations, etc. for the older children, while the younger ones are assessed by observing their behavior, their psychomotor development, comparing their productions with those of the beginning of the year, and so on.

Depending on age, formative assessment focuses on the objectives set, on active situations: taking on autonomy and responsibility, awareness of weaknesses and strengths, willingness to progress, experiencing an individual and/or collective adventure, on the smooth running of a practical project, on the ability to inform others. A portfolio brings together the work the child has produced over the course of the school year, the teacher's assessments and comments on the child's work, and the measures to be taken to help the child improve his or her learning.

The Da Vinci School is committed to defining formative evaluation grids common to the entire teaching team, on which these observations are recorded. In addition, the national assessments for CE1 and CM2, as well as the international equivalent, are also used at the appropriate time and communicated to parents who so wish.

At the end of the year, the summative evaluation, like an assessment, measures the skills acquired and focuses on the final learning objective. The level expected reflects the ambition of the Da Vinci school.

The Da Vinci School does not use the French grading system, based on 10s or 20s, which is increasingly criticized elsewhere in France for focusing on shortcomings. What does a 5/10 mark in reading mean for a primary school pupil? That he can't read well? That he's not comfortable reading in front of his classmates? That the teacher didn't teach him how to read properly? ... This grading system is particularly subjective, because you need to know what you're grading: the ephemeral acquisition of knowledge at a given moment, or a child's true competence?

Thus, in the same way as in international schools around the world, the level of skills and knowledge of children at the Da Vinci School is evaluated on the criteria:
• acquired,

• currently being acquired,

• not acquired.

The assessments are given in relation to the general expectations of the age group.

By associating the possibility of remediation with each criterion assessed, children have the opportunity to learn in a way that focuses on their weak points, much more effectively than a 10/20 mark on a paper.

From this point of view, assessment is much more based on the skills to be attained than on a raw result. This is because competency-based assessment enables everyone at Da Vinci to know at all times what the student has acquired, and what he or she has mastered less or not at all.

Competency-based assessment enables Da Vinci to recognize what children are good at, and to help them develop self-confidence, self-esteem and self-respect. A 3/20 mark on a paper does not reflect this image, and can destroy a child's self-confidence for good.

It also gives the child the right to make mistakes, by assessing learning over time, valuing recent progress and questioning it when it has not been consolidated.

Last but not least, Da Vinci's competency-based assessment gives children and their families a clear idea of what they are working on and what is expected of them.

At Da Vinci School, the only pressure children feel when faced with competency-based assessments is the pressure to succeed, not the fear of failure.