Some teachers are being asked to provide data on students’ progress every two to three weeks, a new research report has revealed.

The Department for Education-commissioned research on Assessment Without Levels asked teachers and senior leaders in 42 primary and secondary schools about their experiences of assessment since national curriculum levels were scrapped in 2014.

The study, by researchers at the National Foundation for Educational Research, found that most interviewees reported that there had been no change to the frequency in which they had to submit assessment data onto the school’s tracking system, but where there had been a change, it was most likely that recording had increased.

“One explanation provided by a secondary senior leader for the increase was that schools were tracking pupil progress more closely because they felt that they could not easily judge how their pupils were doing in relation to pupils in other schools,” the report said.

And it found that while teachers were typically expected to enter data every term or half term, some secondary schools were far more demanding.

“Some secondary schools had a requirement for data to be recorded after every six or eight lessons, which meant that for subjects such as English and maths the recording requirement could be as frequent as every two to three weeks,” the report said.

James Pembroke, an assessment data expert, said: “It’s a massive workload issue and a fallacy to believe that this [recording data so frequently] helps improve learning in any way.

“Teachers know where their students are, but they are then told to record that in a system, not for their benefit but for someone who has oversight.

“Teachers under the cosh will conscientiously enter this data but it’s fanciful to think this improves practice or improves learning.”

The report also found that formal testing has increased in some schools after the end of levels meant teachers were less confident at assessing where pupils were in relation to their peers nationally.

National curriculum levels were originally intended to be used to report pupils’ attainment in the statutory tests and teacher assessments at the end of each key stage.

Each subject had a set of criteria to describe what a pupil at each level could do, and teachers assessed pupils against these criteria to judge what level the pupil was at.

Over time, a framework of levels and sublevels was used by all schools to describe pupils’ attainment at all ages.

But there was criticism that levels did not give a true picture of children’s abilities because children could be at the same level but know different things and the system was scrapped in 2014 leaving schools to devise their own assessment systems.

The DfE has been approached for comment.