St Colmcille’s Primary School trialled TAPS Focused Assessment plans and developed new TAPS-NI activities like Taste Test and Scavenger sort. By selecting one skills focus for each lesson, teachers were able to make judgements about the pupils in their class using any pupil recording and discussion.

For example, in the P2 (age 5-6) Taste test activity pupils predicted and then tasted to identify the flavour of unknown drinks. They discussed how we knew the flavour and what senses we used to work it out. Children meeting the objective were able to discuss how their senses helped them:

“This pupil was able to tell me that the flavour of the drink was orange juice. She initially knew by the taste, but she also commented that the colour helped her. She noted too that the drink had an ‘orangey smell’.”

St Colmcille’s Primary School, Ballymena, County Antrim.

Further details about the TAPS-NI project can be found here.