As the school leaders' union, NAHT, submit its response to the Department for Education's independent Curriculum and Assessment Review call for evidence, Paul Whiteman, general secretary, commented:

“This is a golden opportunity to update a 10-year-old curriculum so that it is relevant, fully reflects the diversity of our society and prepares children and young people for their lives in the modern world.

“The national curriculum and qualification specifications are overcrowded and unmanageable. Reducing the overall burden of content could have a range of positive impacts - improving the quality of teaching and learning, enhancing pupils’ experiences of learning, increasing engagement, and creating the flexibility needed to ensure learning is relevant to pupils in every school community and better meet individual needs.

“The primary statutory assessment system, including SATs, does not support children’s progress, foster positive mental health, or encourage a broad and balanced curriculum. The Multiplication Tables Check, Phonics Screening Check and Key Stage 2 Grammar, Punctuation and Spelling test are unnecessary and should be scrapped.

“Young people have a wide range of abilities, strengths and ambitions and a much wider range of qualifications than GCSEs, A levels and T levels is necessary to meet those needs and to assess their achievements. What is needed is an offer which gives everyone the opportunity to access and achieve meaningful qualifications across a range of academic and vocational subjects using a variety of assessment methods.

“The curriculum and qualification offer has also been distorted by policies including the publication of narrow, high-stakes performance measures. Measures such as the EBacc must be scrapped and Progress 8 reformed if the government truly wants to encourage curriculum breadth and take up of the creative arts