Cross Sectoral Moderation as a Means of Promoting Communities of Practice

Joint sector collaboration through the introduction of moderation events increase teacher confidence in the assessment judgements of the other sector and builds sustainable communities of practice. This research was conducted over a four-year period involving 518 participants: teaching staff, head teachers, and education authority quality improvement officers. Participants agreed to parts of the moderation events being recorded and also provided short written comments after each event. Focus groups were employed as a means investigating staff opinion of the other sector and of monitoring any changing opinion over the life of the project. A total of 56 participants volunteered to keep logs for a period of 6 months following their initial involvement with cross-sectoral moderation. The aims of this research included: * encouraging open discussion about teaching methods and assessment criteria, * providing a cross-sector forum for staff to grade and discuss samples of work, * establishing a model of moderation that could be used across the authority, * investigating the opinions each sector held about the other. The research examines various aspects of moderation and concludes that moderation when used for future enhancement does aid the formation of sustainable communities of practice.