Assessment Content for Scotland
The following content is available for schools in Scotland to use. If you are a school in England or Wales, please visit the relevant pages.
ASN solutions for your Scottish setting
Our Scottish frameworks let schools assess pupils against the Curriculum for Excellence, from the Milestones through to Fourth Level.
Scottish schools have been using B Squared to show progress for pupils with additional support needs since 2001. We worked in partnership with Redburn School and Fir Park Secondary School in North Lanarkshire to create content that breaks the Curriculum for Excellence benchmarks down into the smaller steps pupils with ASN need. We have kept it up to date as the Benchmarks and Milestones have changed.
Compare our Scottish assessment frameworks with the Milestones and the Curriculum for Excellence levels, so you can see which framework best suits your pupils.
Assessment frameworks Comparison ChartAdditional frameworks and FREE frameworks
Our additional frameworks, including area of need and neurodiversity, help schools support pupils with SEND and show progress more holistically.
We also offer a range of frameworks that are FREE* for schools using Connecting Steps.
Pre-Early to Fourth Level
Curriculum for Excellence
This framework breaks the CfE benchmarks down into smaller steps, so schools can show the progress pupils with ASN make as they work towards a number of benchmarks, rather than towards one benchmark at a time. It gives staff a common language of achievement throughout a child’s schooling and supports robust assessment judgements and reporting on curriculum level achievement.
Core
Curriculum for Excellence Core covers Literacy, Numeracy and Health and Wellbeing.
It is available from Pre-Early to First Level, Second Level, Third Level or Fourth Level, so schools can choose the range that suits their pupils.
Plus
Curriculum for Excellence Plus covers all other areas of the Curriculum for Excellence (apart from Gaelic), including Expressive Arts, Languages, Religious and Moral Education (RMPS at Secondary), Sciences, Social Studies and Technologies.
Steps to Excellence identifies success criteria to help learners achieve the benchmarks at Early, First, Second, Third and Fourth Level.
The pricing for our Curriculum for Excellence frameworks is based on the number of students and the levels required – view our Scottish order form for details.
The best inclusive and equitable solution for pupils with ASN
“Connecting Steps from B Squared is the best inclusive and equitable solution for the assessment of our pupils with Additional Support Needs.” Aisling Boyle, Quality Improvement Officer – Inclusive Education Services, South Lanarkshire Council (SLC)
Evidence Learning with Evisense
Evidencing progress is a big part of the Curriculum for Excellence, which is why our schools in Scotland use Connecting Steps and Evisense together. Evisense, our evidence for learning platform, lets staff capture photos, videos and observations, link them to the statements in Connecting Steps and share them securely with parents. For pupils working within the Milestones, who may not produce written work, photos and videos are the best way to show what they can do. Schools can also use Evisense to collect evidence for QS National courses and print it out for each pupil.
Find out more about EvisenseSpecialist
Milestones
Our Milestones framework shows progress for pupils with complex needs working below Early level. It is based on Education Scotland’s Milestones for foundation skills, literacy, numeracy and health and wellbeing.
These pupils often progress in small steps, such as reacting to stimulus or making choices. Clear areas help staff plan next steps and show that progress.
Our Milestones content is organised into the following areas:
- Communication – Attention Skills, Preference and Choice, Interaction
- Making Connections – Cognitive
- Self and Expression – Awareness, Regulation
- Functional Movement
For schools already using Connecting Steps, the Milestones framework can be added from just £100 for up to 30 students.
Personal Development (Alternative Provision)
Using the Personal Development Assessment Model (PDAM) created by Philip Parker (founder of InspirEd), this framework is designed specifically for Alternative Provision settings. It helps staff identify barriers, track progress and support successful reintegration into mainstream education wherever appropriate.
This framework focuses on the wider personal development that underpins engagement with learning. Development is assessed across five key domains, giving staff a clear picture of each pupil’s strengths, needs, triggers and progress:
Emotional Self & Identity
Personal Management & Independence
Relationships & Communication
Thinking & Achievement
Society & Citizenship
The framework provides clear evidence of pupil development and aligns with key areas of the Ofsted School Inspection Toolkit, including inclusion, behaviour, personal development, and progress from starting points. It supports targeted intervention, tracks development over time, and helps leaders demonstrate effective support strategies and oversight of pupils placed in Alternative Provision.
For schools already using Connecting Steps, the Personal Development (Alternative Provision) framework can be added from just £50 for up to 30 students.
Post-16
Steps 4 Life
Steps 4 Life is a broad and flexible assessment framework designed to prepare learners with SEND for adulthood. It covers a wide range of academic skills, life skills, and employability skills, supporting young people as they move towards greater independence, further education, or the world of work.
The framework is built around real-world learning, helping learners develop the practical knowledge and confidence they need for everyday life. Steps 4 Life can be used with individuals aged 14 to 25 and beyond, and is ideal for schools, colleges, alternative provisions, and care settings. Whether students are working towards full independence, semi-independent living, or supported living, Steps 4 Life provides a clear structure to recognise and celebrate every step of progress.
For schools already using Connecting Steps, the Steps 4 Life framework can be added from just £500 for up to 30 students.
The Steps 4 Life assessment content is available in 3 packs and covers the following areas:
Academic Skills Pack
English
Maths
PSD (Including Relationships & Sex Education)
Digital Skills
Life Skills Pack
Food
Independence
Self care
Travel
Employability Skills Pack
Identify a job
Getting a job
Geography
Your rights
Workplace routines
Workplace skills
Communication & Interaction
The Communication and Interaction framework supports schools in assessing and developing how pupils express themselves, understand others, and interact socially. It breaks communication down into clear, manageable areas, recognising that individuals can communicate in many different ways — through speech, signing, symbols, gestures, or behaviour.
Designed for use alongside our other frameworks, Communication and Interaction helps staff pinpoint where support is needed, plan targeted interventions, and track small but important steps of progress. It provides a flexible, strengths-based approach to communication development, whether pupils are using emerging language skills or working towards more complex social communication.
Each area goes from level 1 (birth – 3 months) to level 16 (13 – 15years). The levels are based on typical development and students are likely to be working across a number of different levels, based on their needs.
For schools already using Connecting Steps, the Communication & Interaction framework can be added from just £175 for up to 30 students.
Clear, manageable areas
Executive Function
Executive functions are the mental processes that help us manage time, regulate emotions, prioritise, focus, and adapt to new challenges – and they continue developing well into our late twenties. The proposed SEND reforms are naming Executive Function as a standalone area of development for the first time, meaning schools will increasingly need to identify, track, and evidence support in this area.
Our Executive Function framework, developed in collaboration with Victoria Bagnall from Connections in Mind, helps staff notice, celebrate, and support the development of key executive function skills over time. It covers from age 4 to preparing for university/employment, across 11 areas and 5 levels of development. This provides a structured, consistent way to track progress, giving staff a clearer picture of each pupil’s strengths, challenges, and next steps.
For schools already using Connecting Steps, the Executive Function framework can be added from just £175 for up to 30 students.
Covering the following areas:
Social, Emotional and Mental Health (SEMH)
The SEMH framework supports schools in assessing and developing pupils’ social, emotional, and mental health skills. It breaks SEMH down into clear areas like recognising emotions, managing feelings, building positive relationships, and making social decisions – skills that are critical for learning, wellbeing, and life beyond school.
Designed to be used alongside our other frameworks, the SEMH framework helps staff identify specific strengths and needs, plan targeted support, and track meaningful steps of progress. It promotes a proactive, strengths-based approach to supporting pupils’ emotional wellbeing and social development, not just reacting when difficulties arise.
Each area goes from level 1 (birth – 1 year) to level 11 (13 – 15years). The levels are based on typical development and students are likely to be working across a number of different levels, based on their needs.
For schools already using Connecting Steps, the SEMH framework can be added from just £250 for up to 30 students.
Covering the following areas:
Autism Progress
Autism Progress is a profiling tool designed to help schools, colleges, and care settings better understand how autism presents in each individual. It focuses on four key areas — Communication, Social Interaction, Flexibility of Thought, and Emotional Regulation — recognising that autistic individuals often have very spiky profiles, with strengths and needs across different areas.
Autism Progress allows staff to build a detailed, personalised profile, whether or not a formal diagnosis is in place. It provides clear descriptors and practical strategies to reduce barriers, promote wellbeing, and support learning and participation at every stage of development.
For schools already using Connecting Steps, the Autism Progress framework can be added from just £250 for up to 30 students.
Autism Progress helps build a profile of an individual’s autism in the following areas:
Communication
Flexibility of Thought
Social Interaction
Emotional Regulation
Each area goes from level 1 (around birth) to level 17 (early adulthood). A significant benefit of Autism Progress are the strategies that it contains, we have worked with experts to create a list of strategies for each area and each level to help support your students.
guide sample pages autism progress websiteFREE Frameworks*
QS Nationals 1 – 6
Our software includes free frameworks for over 100 Qualifications Scotland (QS) National 1 to 6 courses and modules. The content is used exactly as QS publishes it, without breaking it down into smaller steps. Every course was added because a school asked for it. If yours isn’t there yet, get in touch and we’ll add it.
Schools can also use Evisense, our evidence system, to collect evidence for each course. Link the evidence to the criteria, then print it or save it as a PDF for each pupil.
Including…
– English and Literacy
– Mathematics, Applications of Mathematics and Numeracy
– Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Science
– And much more…
Education for Sustainable Development Goals
This free framework is based on UNESCO’s Education for Sustainable Development Goals: Learning Objectives. It has a single level covering all 17 goals, with learning objectives split into three types: cognitive (knowing), socio-emotional (feeling) and behavioural (doing). It supports Learning for Sustainability, an entitlement for every learner in Scotland and a key part of the Scottish Government’s Target 2030 action plan.
Developing the Young Workforce
This free framework is based on Education Scotland’s Career Education Standard ‘I can’ statements. They describe what learners can do as they learn about the world of work, from talking about the jobs people do to preparing CVs and interviews.
The statements are a starting point for talking with learners about what success could look like. Schools can track progress in Connecting Steps. In Evisense, they can record those conversations, and the progress that follows, using photos, videos and observations as evidence.
Areas covered…
– Skills
– Ambitions
– Enterprise
– Preparing for work
Stages covered…
– Early Level (pre-school and P1)
– First Level (to the end of P4)
– Second Level (to the end of P7)
– Broad General Education (S1–S3)
– Senior Phase (S4–S6 and college)
Skills for Learning, Life and Work
This free framework is based on Education Scotland’s Building the Curriculum 4. It covers the skills Curriculum for Excellence aims to develop in every learner, from pre-school to college. The framework is linked to Steps to Excellence, so the assessments Scottish schools already make also show progress in these skills, without assessing twice.
Areas covered…
– Literacy across learning
– Numeracy across learning
– Thinking skills across learning
– Health and wellbeing across learning
– Personal learning planning & career management learning
– Working with others
– Leadership
– Physical co-ordination and movement
– Enterprise and employability
*FREE for the number of Connecting Steps licences you have.
An Easy Way to Show Progress for Pupils working on the Milestones and Curriculum for Excellence (CFE)
B Squared has worked with schools in North Lanarkshire to create products to support evidencing of the CfE experiences and outcomes (Es & Os) and the tracking of CfE assessment benchmarks and pre-early level milestones.
Scottish Schools have been using B Squared products to show progress for pupils with SEN since 2001. After Education Scotland’s (Foghlam Alba) formation in 2011, schools began to implement the Curriculum for Excellence (CfE), this included using Education Scotland’s own tracking system.
Working in Partnership with Schools in Scotland
In 2015 Redburn School in North Lanarkshire were struggling to show the small steps of progress their complex needs pupils made. The headteacher had spent a long time researching what schools used in Scotland and struggled to find a suitable solution. They had to look at what schools used in England. They purchased our Connecting Steps assessment software and our P Level assessment content and were able to show that their pupils were making progress.
This worked, but there were a number of differences between the Scottish and English education system. In 2016 we began to work in partnership with Redburn School and Fir Park Secondary School to develop assessment content for the Curriculum for Excellence (CFE). Over a 3 year period we went through a number of variations of our content due to the release of the Benchmarks, the Milestones and then the updated Milestones. As the guidance changed, we updated our assessment content.
Assessing Progress for Pupils with SEN with the Curriculum for Excellence
Pupils with SEN do make progress, but sometimes it is at a much lower rate. Schools want and need to show progress, they want to demonstrate the progress their pupils with SEN make. For the majority of pupils with SEN, the benchmarks are still too big, they need smaller steps to work through. Pupils also shouldn’t be working directly towards the benchmarks, they should be participating in a variety of learning opportunities that work towards a number of benchmarks. Our Steps 2 Excellence framework supports these smaller steps of progress and show pupils progressing towards a number of benchmarks.
Evidencing progress is a big part of the Curriculum for Excellence and this is why all our schools in Scotland use Connecting Steps and Evisense together. Connecting Steps assessment software helps teachers to show progress, plan next steps and gives the whole school picture around assessment and progress. Evisense is our easy to use evidence of learning platform where staff can capture and share evidence. The evidence can be linked to the statements within Connecting Steps, creating a strong link between evidence and assessment.
Assessing Progress within the Milestones
Education Scotland introduced the Milestones a number of years ago with Milestones for foundation skills, literacy and numeracy. In 2019, they updated the Milestones to include Health and Wellbeing and made a number of other changes. The Milestones are for pupils working below Early level and cover the important early developmental milestones.
It is important to evidence the progress pupils working within the Milestones make. These pupils aren’t producing written work, they will be reacting to stimulus, making decisions, playing etc. To evidence this progress and their achievements, you need to use photos and videos. Evisense, our evidence system makes collecting and sharing evidence easy.
Evidence Progress with QS National Qualifications
All schools in Scotland who use Connecting Steps and Evisense can access our QS National 1 to 6 content for free. A number of schools are using Evisense to evidence pupil’s achievements towards the QS National qualifications. In a few clicks you can print out books of evidence for different courses or modules.
Connecting Steps
Connecting Steps is the most popular and effective assessment software for pupils with SEND. A wide range of frameworks that are built into Connecting Steps helps schools get up and running as quickly as possible.
Connecting Steps is the standard assessment system for pupils with SEND across a number of authorities in the UK. The simple interface, powerful features and flexible approach to progress means it works for a wide range of pupils. Connecting Steps V5 brings even more features and now works on iPads and other tablet devices.
Assess
Connecting Steps makes recording achievements simple. As well as being able to record the skills pupils achieve, you can also record the steps as they work towards it.
Engagement
Before pupils can achieve a skill, they need to engage. Connecting Steps can show the engagement levels of pupils and show the progress as engagement increases.
Graph
Connecting Steps makes showing small steps of progress simple. Progress can be shown in lots of ways, including engagement and non-linear progress.
Great Feedback
The best inclusive and equitable solution for pupils with ASN
“Connecting Steps from B Squared is the best inclusive and equitable solution for the assessment of our pupils with Additional Support Needs.” Aisling Boyle, Quality Improvement Officer – Inclusive Education Services, South Lanarkshire Council (SLC)
Want to find out how our products simplify assessment for schools in scotland?
Click on the button to arrange a FREE online meeting to find out how we can help make assessment easier for your school
Show Progress for
ALL Pupils
Within Connecting Steps we have frameworks for the Milestones, Curriculuum for Excellence from Early to Fourth Level and QS National 1 to 4.
Steps to Excellence
Using the experience and expertise of the teaching body at the two educational settings, we designed an assessment framework based on the CfE. The framework allows staff to use a common language of achievement throughout a child’s schooling. Teachers use this to support their robust assessment judgements and report on curriculum level achievement. Reinforced by a range of powerful reporting tools, this framework enables schools to represent detailed progress and achievement information to pupils, parents, staff, governors, local authorities and Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Education (HMIE). Steps to Excellence breaks down the content from the following curriculum areas:
- Expressive Arts
- Health and Wellbeing
- Languages
- Literacy
- Mathematics
- Religious and Moral Education (RMPS at Secondary)
- Sciences
- Social Studies
- Technologies
Steps to Excellence identifies success criteria to help learners achieve the benchmarks for each of the five curriculum levels:
- Early level
- First level
- Second level
- Third level
- Fourth level
Milestones
Our Milestones assessment allows schools to show progress for pupils with complex needs working below Early level. Our Milestones content is organised in to the following areas;
- Communication
- Attention Skills
- Preference and Choice
- Interaction
- Making Connections
- Cognitive
- Self and Expression
- Awareness
- Regulation
- Functional Movement
Evisense
Evisense is a powerful evidence for learning system. The social media style interface for staff and parents is simple to use, but extremely powerful. Our apps for iPhone, iPad, android (tablet and phone) and Kindle Fire means whatever device you are using, you can use the Evisense app.
A number of features make Evisense the most secure evidence for learning system. A number of controls ensure data is safe and evidence can only be accessed by the right people. If you use Evisense and Connecting Steps together, you can link evidence to the skills in Connecting Steps. You can then view the evidence from within Connecting Steps.
Capture
It is quick and simple to capture evidence. Use the Evisense app to capture photos, videos or audio recordings. Tag the evidence to a pupil, add your annotation and click Post.
Powerful Evidence
When you add evidence, you can link the evidence to a range of aspects like EHCP outcomes, IEP targets and more. You can then filter the evidence across the whole school.
Share
Share the evidence you collect with parents to help boost parental engagement. Schools can control parental access. It is up to you if parents can comment or add their own evidence.
Want to find out how our products simplifies assessment for schools in scotland?
Click on the button to arrange a FREE online meeting to find out how we can help make assessment easier for your school
Autism Progress
Autism Progress is based on SCERTS. It is designed to be used alongside the Milestones and Steps to Excellence to help profile a pupil’s autism. Autism Progress covers a neurotypical developmental range equivalent to birth to neurotypical 13 to 15 year old.
Autism Progress was developed with Scottish Autism, Autism Wessex and North East Autism Society. Autism Progress is a tool schools can use to help profile a pupils autism and how it impacts them and their learning. Autism Progerss has a range of skills spread over a set of progressive levels in the following areas of autism:
- Communication
- Flexibility of Thought
- Social Interaction
- Emotional Regulation
Each area goes from level 1 (around birth) to level 17 (early adulthood). A significant benefit of Autism Progress are the strategies developed to support development. We have worked with experts to create a list of strategies for each area and each level to help support your students.
For more information on using Autism Progress to profile a pupil’s autism, click here