The Educator Magazine U.K. Sept-Dec 2026 issue - Magazine - Page 62
POBBLE MODERATION · THOUGHT LEADERSHIP
What
Statutory
Moderation
Is Really For
Statutory moderation is feared by many.
I understand why. It externally validates the
judgements that sit inside our
accountability framework, and anything
tied to accountability carries weight.
But fear is not the only way to experience
it — and this year, across the trusts and
schools we worked with across the country,
it was rarely the feeling in the room.
Because here is what statutory moderation is actually about: robust judgements,
made on real, authentic, human-produced
writing, by children who have developed
extraordinary skill across their primary
years — writers motivated and inspired
by extraordinary teachers. When you hold
that truth at the centre, the whole process
changes character. It becomes a celebration
of what children can do.
Let me tell you what we saw.
Where children flourished, they
owned their writing
The strongest collections we saw had one
thing in common, and it wasn't a feature. It
was ownership. In these schools, purpose
and audience were clear, understood and
real. Children knew why they were writing
and who they were writing for, and,
crucially, they were genuinely allowed to
make choices. They had the opportunity
to sculpt and craft their own pieces, and
they took it. The writing that resulted was
unique, creative and characterful. These
children had been taught to reflect on their
writing both as writers and as readers of
their own work, and that dual awareness
came through on the page. These were
authors, not task-completers.
This is what strong, capable writing looks
like: the writing of children meeting the
age-related expectations of the primary
curriculum. Not a checklist met, but a writer
in genuine control, making deliberate,
purposeful choices and pulling them off.
Take dialogue. In these classrooms dialogue
was never just speech with the punctuation
in the right place. Because these children
understood what dialogue is for, they chose
to use it, and to use it effectively, when it
served the piece. It revealed character, it
carried tension, it earned its place. That is
craft, and it comes from understanding
and choice, not from coverage.
None of this happened by accident, and it
didn't happen at the expense of the basics
— it happened because of them. In these
schools children arrived in Year 6 with a
strong writing toolkit already in place:
fluent handwriting, confident spelling,
secure command of the punctuation taught
across KS1 and lower KS2, and dialogue
punctuation that had become automatic.
That foundation didn't mean the job was
done. It meant Year 6 teachers could hone
and extend these skills rather than build
them from scratch. It bought them
something precious: time. Time to let
children craft, choose and take real
ownership, because the mechanics were
no longer in the way.
Where judgements flowed, the
moderation culture was already
right
In schools and trusts with purposeful,
positive internal moderation, the
celebration conversations were effortless.
Judgements were robust and accurate
because they had already been shaped
through peer and senior-leader discussion
— not scrutiny, not criticism, but
genuine professional dialogue. These
schools had worked with us all year, and
they had followed the approaches we
champion: celebrate what the child can do;
read whole pieces aloud to one another
across the collection; let your assessment
framework shape the conversation, but lead
with what you enjoyed most as a reader.
Don't go on a feature-spotting hunt.
Don't bury children under child-facing
tick-lists they don't understand. Talk about
the writer's intent. Give guidance across the
year that is purposeful and motivational
— not feedback for its own sake, and not
endless “next steps” with no chance to act
on them.
And everywhere it worked, it was
a team effort
These are end of key stage judgements —
and they are team judgements. What stood
out this year was how many senior leaders
joined the celebration discussions:
headteachers, principals, MAT English leads,
sitting in, listening, celebrating. Leaders
who knew each and every writer by name.
It was a genuine pleasure to have them
with us.
To finish, I wrote personally to every Year
6 class whose writing we celebrated.
Then something wonderful happened:
headteachers wrote back to tell us they'd
surprised their Year 6 by reading those
letters aloud in the final assembly, or tucked
a copy in with each child's report. Because
that, surely, is the point. These children
were real authors. I was part of an
audience that enjoyed their writing — and
an audience owes its writers a response: this
is what I enjoyed, and this is why.
An approach like this doesn't happen by
chance. It happens by design. Delivering a
statutory duty with care, with celebration,
in a genuinely supportive way —
mirroring the best of internal moderation —
is non-negotiable for us. Our remote model
is what makes it consistent and scalable:
more training and support for every
moderator, unlimited training and 1:1
support calls for Year 6 teachers all year
round, and leaders across a MAT able to join
a celebration debrief in any region, live, at
the click of a button — no geography in the
way.
If your moderation window didn't feel like this,
it could have. And it should.
Pobble is a statutory moderation provider for academies, free schools and independent schools across England,
delivered in partnership witHackney Local Authority, wherever you are. And there is more to what we do:
maintained schools benefit too, through year-round moderation support and non-statutory moderation for
every year group, not just Year 6. If this is the moderation experience you want for your writers, let's talk.
