Worrying times for your child's primary education. Stop the chaos. Come on DfE you 'require improvement'

[MillyDLA]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-36182120

Head teachers concerns about the chaos your children are going through.

[mrz]

Let's see who posted the SPAG test online

[MillyDLA]

Does that mean there is panic again in the system?

[mrz]

I don't know about panic but it's yet another example of them not knowing what's going on. Key stage 1 tests can be administered any time in May

[MillyDLA]

So a big chance that information could be shared. So much for all the security around receiving, storing and administering tests!

The education system is a sorry mess.

[Rosebud05]

It also doesn't much matter if the tests are shared because they only contribute to teacher assessment, which is possible without these tests, making them a complete waste of time.

[Rosebud05]

The KS1 tests that is.

[mrz]

It's really worrying that the DfE don't seem to know that or that the tests can be administered any time this month.

[admission]

I think that the comment about the DfE not knowing that the KS1 tests are over a period of time, not a set day, is also true of parents who have decided to withdraw their child from school for the day.
I am quite happy to accept that the KS1 tests this year have been badly organised and mired in chaos and that school staff, pupils and parents deserve better. But there is a need, as it is for every year group, to know what pupils have mastered and that to me seems to be better achieved by a non-threatening ( to the pupil) test of their capability.

[HarveySchlumpfenburger]

The KS1 parents aren't aiming to remove their children from the test. It's just a protest to make a point.

If this was a non-threatening test, I might agree. But it has been made into something else. There are other ways of knowing what children have mastered that would work better in this age group.

The balance was about right in the old system. Sticking a high stakes test into KS1 and expecting children to sit it under strict exam condition is ridiculous.. Particularly when some of the papers may well be significantly above the level of many of the children raking it.

[HarveySchlumpfenburger]

It's also not really the job of parents to have a grip of what's going on. The DfE really should.

The OP's title has reminded me of this.

michaelt1979.wordpress.com/2016/03/27/unfair/

There's still a bit of work to do before they get to requires improvement.

[catkind]

The words piss-up and brewery spring to mind.

But as far as KS1 tests go, they were very much non-threatening to the kids in DS' class. In his words - "oh yeah, we did some puzzle books. We're doing some more in a couple of weeks." (They were in the early group for SPAG.) He has no idea it's something special.
I don't know how threatened the teachers felt! They certainly sounded unimpressed with the whole grammar business reading between the lines at the parents' meeting.

[mrz]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-36196384

[HarveySchlumpfenburger]

Whoops

More vital grammar that might not be as vital as we are told.

[HarveySchlumpfenburger]

Sorry, I think I've just duplicated part of Nick Gibb's interview

[Feenie]

Personally, I can't hear it too many times, so don't worry

[HarveySchlumpfenburger]

Somewhat unsurprisingly, Nicky Morgan has cancelled the web chat on the TES forum. I was looking forward to that.

[Feenie]

Me too! God knows what she was thinking arranging it in the first place.

[HarveySchlumpfenburger]

'The NASUWT speech went really well, maybe I can try a webchat'

[Feenie]

[HarveySchlumpfenburger]

'There is no reverse gear when it comes to our education reforms'

'This is about being a listening government and I would consider myself to be a listening secretary of state.'

Of course, if there's no reverse gear, then today's announcement must be a U-turn. Explains the lack of webchat, but she must regret that NASUWT speech.