Vol. 17 No. 2 (2026)
Research Article

Reimagining Assessment for a Future 3 Curriculum: Principles and Insights from Geography

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Emma Rawlings Smith
AQA, Manchester, United Kingdom
Uwe Krause
Fontys University of Applied Sciences, Tilburg, The Netherlands | Ege University, Izmir, Türkiye
Bio
Design principles for Future 3 assessment
DOI: https://doi.org/10.48088/ejg.e.raw.17.2.346.358
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Published 2026-08-08

Keywords

  • assessment,
  • Future 3 curriculum,
  • epistemic access,
  • powerful disciplinary knowledge,
  • teacher agency

How to Cite

Rawlings Smith, Emma, and Uwe Krause. 2026. “Reimagining Assessment for a Future 3 Curriculum: Principles and Insights from Geography”. European Journal of Geography 17 (2):S.346-S.358. https://doi.org/10.48088/ejg.e.raw.17.2.346.358.

Copyright (c) 2026 Emma Rawlings Smith, Uwe Krause

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Received 2026-05-17
Accepted 2026-07-19
Published 2026-08-08

Abstract

A future-orientated liberatory curriculum has the potential to equip children and young people with the knowledge, understanding and capabilities needed to understand and navigate our complex and rapidly changing world. This is only possible if we support students to develop intellectually powerful ways of thinking, understanding, analysing, explaining and finding out, paired with complementary assessment practices. Much existing literature on powerful knowledge is focused on curriculum thinking (what should be taught) rather than on assessment (how learning is measured). This is a significant omission, given the powerful influence of assessment on curriculum enactment and classroom practice. This theoretical paper identifies persistent tensions between curriculum intentions that emphasise conceptual understanding, relational thinking and epistemic engagement and assessment regimes that prioritise coverage, predictability and measurability. Next, it contends that for a Future 3 curriculum to be fully realised, assessment practices must be re‑imagined, recognising complex disciplinary performances rather than isolated forms of propositional knowledge. The paper concludes by outlining seven key principles for assessment design aligned with Future 3 curriculum thinking and illustrates these through examples drawn from upper secondary geography across international education systems.

Highlights:

  • Curriculum and assessment systems shape access to powerful disciplinary knowledge in geography education.
  • Seven design principles are presented that align future 3 curriculum and assessment.
  • International insights are used to evidence how Future 3 assessment can be realised.
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