One of the key strengths of the OCR Nationals in ICT are their criteria-based coursework. The qualification is 100% coursework-based with no exam. Add to that the fact that the criteria are easily understood and you have the ability to get the maximum out of all your students.

Criteria-based marking does have its downsides though. The biggest one being that it is difficult to organise each student’s work to make sure that all of the criteria have been met.

Advantage National takes all of the strain and effort away from designing, delivering and managing coursework; freeing you to work with students to make sure their work is of the required quality.

Each unit contains a complete coursework task, broken down into manageable chunks and centred around a common theme.

Students are given clear video-based instructions and always know exactly what they have to do.

The tasks cover all abilities from pass through to distinction and save you the stress and worry of designing your own tasks to meet the required criteria.

Each criterion is clearly explained to the student using “Ella” - our avatar. Ella explains exactly what the student needs to do to achieve each criterion as well as what evidence is required for their portfolio.

Using this information students complete the required tasks and then use the interactive assessment grids built into the software to record exactly what they have done.

This is hugely motivating for students as they can see their qualification building over time and gain confidence from the process.

The great thing about student self-assessment is that it reduces teacher marking time. Having the students self-assess their works is a bit like proof reading, it eliminates silly mistakes and makes sure that all of the criteria have been met, or at least attempted.

This means that the teacher spends much less time giving the work back for amendment as it is more likely to be done right the first time.

Also marking is made easy with a series of online assessment grids for individuals or whole classes, allowing you to mark quickly from home or school. All marks are automatically recorded.

Teachers can view the progress of individuals, classes and whole year groups and summary pages automatically show how close students are to achieving a particular grade.

All marking done, by both students and teachers, is recorded by our data-tracking software and teachers can view this as an electronic mark book.

Having all of this information in one , easily accessible, place makes you more informed and able to deal with any students who are falling behind.