ABSTRACT
Formal educational evaluation is a comparatively new undertaking and like any new venture is in the period of rule definition, refinement and development. In the UK, evaluation can be seen to be rooted in the early work of the Schools Council in the 1960s. Educational research has its roots in scientific approaches to enquiry and interpretation. In the early days of educational research there was an almost universal adoption and acceptance of scientific method. The use of control groups, the accumulation of statistical data and the formulation of generalizations and new hypotheses characterized research in education well into the mid 1950s. The National Curriculum has been constructed using two main planks; subject divisions and the application of a set of aims and objectives for those subjects. Mathematics, English and Science have been the priority areas and these will be followed by History, Geography and Design and Technology.
