By Anne Osborne, Foster Concepts

When leading workshops on evidencing learning, I often return to a research discussion we explore at the beginning: what changes when assessment starts with what learners can do and how their understanding is developing, rather than primarily identifying what they cannot yet do?

That developmental perspective has stayed with me. It asks us to recognise the thinking learners bring, notice growth and consider what would help their learning move forward.

This is what excites me about the PYP’s inquiry learning progressions. Their emphasis on growth, rather than a deficit view of learning, gives greater visibility to the developmental approach to assessment we discuss in those workshops. The IB explicitly identifies this emphasis in its introduction to the progressions. (IB, 2025a, p. 2)

Alongside that enthusiasm, I recognise how substantial the work can feel from a classroom teacher’s perspective. Understanding a progression is one thing; connecting it with subject expectations, interpreting evidence of learning and deciding what to plan next requires time and professional dialogue.

For me, the opportunity is to make those connections together. Shared examination of curriculum documents and learner evidence, supported by focused professional learning, can help teams establish what progression means in their context and where small refinements would be useful.

This is where I see Foster Concepts contributing: helping schools connect the principles with their existing curriculum and classroom practice, so that learning progressions become a useful part of planning and teaching.

What, then, might schools need to reconsider and what might already be in place?

What do learning progressions describe?

Learning progressions describe increasing sophistication in learning. They help educators and learners consider what is developing, interpret evidence of current learning and make decisions about what might come next.

The IB’s Inquiry learning progressions: Introduction explains their purpose in terms of connecting curriculum, assessment and pedagogy. They support purposeful planning for inquiry, recognising growth and conversations about future learning. (IB, 2025a, p. 2)

This developmental perspective has a substantial research history. Heritage (2008) explains how a clearer understanding of development within a domain can help teachers connect learning goals, formative assessment and instructional decisions. Identifying an expected outcome does not necessarily explain the learning that leads towards it.

What does increasing sophistication look like in the learning we are considering?

How do inquiry progressions fit within the PYP?

An important distinction is sometimes lost in the discussion.

The IB’s subject continuums provide examples of subject learning, including conceptual understandings and learning outcomes. Inquiry learning progressions give more detailed attention to selected inquiry skills and their development within and across subjects. They complement the approaches to learning; they do not describe the whole curriculum. (IB, 2025a, p. 5) ; (IB, 2025b, pp. 5–6)

The initial four inquiry progressions address observation, questioning, decision-making, and role- and turn-taking.

This matters for transdisciplinary learning. Learners draw on disciplinary knowledge, skills and conceptual understanding to investigate questions across and beyond subjects. Developing inquiry supports that investigation; knowledge gives learners something meaningful to question, observe, interpret and reconsider.

For schools, the opportunity is to examine how these elements work together.

1. Do our curriculum expectations make development clear?

Subject standards identify important learning. Some make the relationships between earlier and later understanding explicit. Others leave teachers with considerable interpretation to do.

An expectation such as “uses evidence to support an explanation” raises further questions. What counts as relevant evidence in this context? What subject knowledge is needed to interpret it? What distinguishes an initial explanation from a more convincing one? These are illustrative curriculum questions, rather than IB progression descriptors.

A school might need to clarify broad expectations, strengthen connections between units or make the development across years easier to follow. Where those relationships are already well articulated, focused refinement may be sufficient.

The IB’s curriculum FAQ describes its subject continuums as adaptable examples for schools developing their own curriculum. It also makes clear that inquiry progressions are neither a scope and sequence nor the sole tool for planning and assessment. (IB, 2025b, pp. 3-5)

The consideration is where greater clarity would help, not an assumption that every standard needs rewriting.

2. Does planning account for different starting points?

A shared learning intention does not mean that everyone begins with the same foundations.

The IB explains that its inquiry progression points are not attached to particular grades or fixed timescales. Learners may work across more than one point, and development can take different amounts of time. (IB, 2025a, pp. 3, 6)

For planning, this raises a practical question: how do we bring curriculum expectations and evidence of learners’ current understanding into the same conversation?

Clear goals remain important. Alongside them, teachers need room to reconsider the support, experiences and challenge that will help learners engage meaningfully.

The IB’s earlier research report explicitly discusses learning progressions as compatible with backward design, while also considering how evidence can reveal learning beyond what has been directly taught. This is a research discussion, rather than an instruction to replace one planning model with another. (IB, 2021, p. 3)

What would give us reason to adapt an existing plan?

3. Does assessment reveal development?

Assessment can tell us whether a learner completed an activity or met an expectation. A progression perspective also asks what their response reveals about developing understanding.

During a transdisciplinary inquiry into water use, for example, learners might create charts and recommend changes. Looking beyond the finished product, teachers could consider how learners interpret the data, explain their reasoning and use evidence to justify a recommendation. The purpose is to understand the learning well enough to respond.

The IB positions inquiry progressions as supporting ongoing observation, documentation, feedback and decisions about learning. Its guidance emphasises growth and recognises that development is not necessarily linear. (IB, 2025a, pp. 2, 6) ; (IB, 2025b, pp. 4–5)

Schools might therefore examine whether their existing assessment practices provide useful evidence of development and whether that evidence influences teaching.

Would we know what had become more sophisticated, and what still needed attention?

4. Do teachers share an understanding of growth?

A written description can support discussion, but colleagues may interpret it differently.

What does a more developed explanation look like? How much independence is involved? Does the learner demonstrate this understanding in several contexts, or in one familiar task?

For me, this makes collaborative interpretation an important consideration. Looking at learner responses together can reveal both strengths in curriculum documentation and places where descriptions need greater precision.

My concern remains that this work should be manageable. The aim is to make professional conversations and decisions more useful, rather than assume that more records will produce better understanding.

Can our team explain what growth looks like using evidence from learners?

5. Can learners participate in recognising their development?

The IB connects inquiry progressions with learner agency, goal-setting and assessment capability. Learners have a role in understanding their development and considering future learning. (IB, 2025a, pp. 2, 6)

This invites schools to consider how progression is communicated. Can learners recognise changes in their own thinking? Can they discuss what helped them, where they are uncertain and what they want to explore further? That requires thoughtful interpretation of the guidance in the school’s own context.

Where might a school begin?

The IB’s introduction encourages schools to consider their purpose, which inquiry progressions to engage with and how that work fits their context. It allows choices about the scope of engagement. (IB, 2025a, p. 7)

My own suggestion is to begin by examining the relationships already present:

These questions may reveal a need for substantial curriculum work. They may also reveal that small, thoughtful refinements would make existing progression clearer and more useful.

Through Foster Concepts, I help schools examine those connections and identify where refinement could support learning and teaching. The starting point is the school’s curriculum, its learners and the decisions teachers need to make.

Where is progression already working in your school and where are people having to make the connections for themselves?

Foster Concepts | [email protected]

This article presents independent professional interpretation and is not endorsed by the International Baccalaureate.

References

International Baccalaureate. (2021). Learning progressions: Research report . PYP Development Team. Used here for research context, rather than current implementation requirements.

International Baccalaureate. (2025a). Inquiry learning progressions: Introduction . April 2025. My IB access required.

International Baccalaureate. (2025b). PYP Curriculum resources 2024–2025: Frequently asked questions . My IB access required.

Heritage, M. (2008). Learning progressions: Supporting instruction and formative assessment . Council of Chief State School Officers.

A small AI confession: I have plenty of ideas. Writing them beautifully is another matter. AI helped me shape, organise and polish this piece, but the thinking, experience and opinions behind it are mine. I stand behind the ideas. AI just helped me persuade the sentences to cooperate.