In this tutorial we’re going to look at how Tapestry calculates Cherry Garden scores.

Cherry Garden works a little differently from our other frameworks: scores from the baseline and from earlier assessment periods carry through to later periods, so a child’s picture builds continuously rather than starting afresh each term. We’ll follow a score all the way from the observation it started in to the tracking screens it feeds.

Behind the scenes each refinement has a number, counting up from the lowest — on the account pictured here the refinements are Emerging (1), Developing (2) and Secure (3). Yours may have different names (see Using the Cherry Garden Framework), but the maths is the same.

Adding an observation

Everything starts with an observation. On the Add Observation page, click + Add Assessments, choose Cherry Garden from the Frameworks list, and drill into an area and aspect. Pick the Branch you’re assessing, tick a statement, and a Refinement selector appears beneath it.

The assessment picker drilled into Language & Communication with Branch 2 chosen, the statement Terminates interaction with an adult ticked, and its Refinement selector showing Emerging
A ticked statement with its Refinement selector.

The refinement you choose here is the score that observation contributes for the statement.

The Refinement dropdown open in the assessment picker, showing colour-coded Emerging, Developing and Secure options
Each refinement carries a colour — and, behind the scenes, a number.

Click Done and the assessment sits on the observation, ready to count as soon as you save.

The Assessments summary on the observation form, showing the Cherry Garden statement with its Branch 2 tag and Emerging refinement chip
The assessment on the observation, before saving.

Baseline and Statement screens

Those refinements surface on the Baseline and Statements screens.

A statement assessed by a single observation simply shows that observation’s refinement. Once two or more observations cover the same statement in the same period, the score becomes the mean of their refinements: a Secure (3) observation joined by an Emerging (1) gives (3 + 1) ÷ 2 = 2, so the statement shows Developing — labelled (average) on the baseline.

The baseline grid with a statement showing Developing (average), calculated from two observations with different refinements
Two observations averaging to D (average) on the baseline.

You never have to take a score on trust: click it and a Snapshot Details window lists every observation that contributed, alongside an Average refinement score panel when more than one is involved.

The Snapshot Details window showing the Average refinement score panel with a Developing chip and the contributing observations listed beneath it
Snapshot Details — the average, and the observations behind it.

Overriding

Sometimes your professional judgement doesn’t need evidence. Clicking the blue tick beneath a statement (or a branch heading, to do a whole branch at once) lets you set a refinement yourself.

An overridden statement is marked with a pencil icon, and the score you chose always wins — observations made afterwards won’t change it.

Overriding also unlocks the statement’s criteria checkboxes: they all tick themselves, and you untick the ones that don’t apply. To hand the statement back to the calculated score, click the cross that replaces the blue tick.

An overridden baseline statement showing Secure with a pencil icon, auto-ticked criteria, and the cross control for reverting to the calculated score
An override — the pencil, and the cross to revert.

Future periods

When a new assessment period starts, nothing is forgotten. A statement with no new evidence keeps its previous score, marked with a small black caret — hover over it and Tapestry explains: “Score taken entirely from past period”. The score keeps carrying forward, period after period, until a new observation or an override updates it.

The Statements screen with a carried-forward score showing its black caret and the tooltip reading Score taken entirely from past period
A carried-forward score, with its caret and tooltip.

Adding new assessments to future periods

As soon as new evidence arrives, the score recalculates — and the earlier evidence still counts. In the example below, the statement carried a Secure into Term 3; two Emerging observations and another Secure have since been recorded, and the score is the mean of all of them: (3 + 1 + 3 + 1) ÷ 4 = 2, so the statement now shows Developing — and the caret disappears, because the score is no longer taken entirely from the past.

The Statements screen where the previously carried statement now shows Developing without a caret, next to another statement still carrying its caret
New evidence arrives — the score recalculates and the caret goes.

How baseline works

The baseline is always treated as the starting point of a child’s assessment history on Tapestry. It has its own window, set in the Status box on the baseline screen: the start date defaults to the child’s first Cherry Garden assessment (or today, if there isn’t one), the end date to six weeks later, and a baseline can never span two academic years. Observations dated inside the window drive the baseline’s calculated scores, and the picture it establishes carries forward into the term periods just like any other earlier period.

The baseline Status box showing the Locked checkbox and the Start date and End date fields that define the baseline window
The baseline’s window, set in its Status box.

Our Cherry Garden: Baseline tutorial walks through the baseline screen itself — setting the window, assessing statements and locking the result.

Some final things to note

  • Criteria don’t affect the maths. The criteria checkboxes some statements carry are extra detail for you — scores are calculated from refinements alone, and the checkboxes only become editable on a statement you’ve overridden.
  • Locking freezes everything. Locking a snapshot writes its scores down and stops them moving. When you unlock, Tapestry asks whether to keep the assessments as overrides or to use its latest estimates — your own overrides survive either way.
The Status box while unlocking, asking whether to keep assessments as overrides or use Tapestry's latest estimates
Unlocking — the two choices for the frozen scores.
  • The same scores feed the analysis screens. Strand Scores totals each branch from the statement refinements — a statement scored Developing contributes 2 of its possible 3 — and the Progress screens compare the same cumulative picture across periods.
  • The Orchard grows from it too. Each child’s Cherry Garden Orchard draws a petal for every assessed statement, sized by its refinement.
The Cherry Garden Strand Scores screen for one child, showing each branch's proportion of statements, score out of maximum and percentage score
Strand Scores — the same refinements, totalled per branch.

And that’s the arithmetic! Observations supply refinements, statements average them, overrides trump them, quiet periods carry them forward, and every tracking screen reads from the same running picture.

Related tutorials