To have not known kids have to attain grade 4 in maths?

You can read the examiners' report for yourself

https://cdn.sanity.io/files/p28bar15/green/73a9338732e85a74859119202001c59b741ac89f.pdf

Seems like quite a few struggled with that two way table.

You said "Working towards Grade 4"

The point is - it's covered in KS2, covered in KS3, covered at GCSE

Covered again and again and again. I don't know how you can keep make it interesting for pupils when they are doing the same stuff again and again

But pupils still struggle to remember / apply

I am also quite capable of assessing the difficulty of a question.
And thankyou for mathsplaining about the conversion graph.
Q15 - yes, I bet it did trip people up.
The mean question just requires people to understand that sometimes a mean isn't useful.

"mathsplaining"

You said "Get those right and you have about 38 marks - and a lot of that is covered regularly in KS2 maths." and now you're admitting that kids aren't going to get all those marks.

And as I've said before, covered in KS2 maths doesn't mean learned in KS2 maths, and it definitely doesn't mean remembered from KS2 maths.

And it doesn't mean that they don't need to understand any of the more difficult topics to get a grade 4.

What do you think of Q18?

Worth 6 marks

https://cdn.sanity.io/files/p28bar15/green/9b429174169effa582d6d1bf9aea89777ea0e7eb.pdf

It's a 2 way table.
Pupils have to work out 4/9 of 36 and then complete the table.

Then some probability.

How many of your pupils would struggle with that - and what would they struggle with?

And Q23

A value for money question worth 5 marks

I didn't say a child working towards a Grade 4 would get all those marks.However, I do think that a lot of topics on there are covered in KS2 maths - and again regularly at KS3 and in GCSE.

I am also quite capable of assessing the difficulty of a question.

And thankyou for mathsplaining about the conversion graph.

Q15 - yes, I bet it did trip people up.

The mean question just requires people to understand that sometimes a mean isn't useful.

However - do you think that there is a lot of stuff in that paper that is covered extensively in KS2 maths?

That's the question. I think there is a lot of stuff in that paper that is covered in KS2.

And then in KS3
And then in GCSE

The same stuff again and again and again.

There's even a question on edges of a triangular prism.

Why do you think that a child who is working towards a grade 4 would get all those marks? I suspect you are also quite poor at assessing the difficulty of a question - the conversion graph has a tricky scale and also asks you to work out a value that doesn't appear on the graph. The mean question requires you to know about the impact of outliers. Your money Q6 uses 'credit' 'debit' and 'balance'. Q15 I suspect tripped up an awful lot of kids, very tricksy.

A kid who is going to get a grade 4 has to know some of the trickier topics because they aren't going to get full marks on the easier topics. I've got a current group some of whom will scrape a grade 4, some of whom who will just miss it and some who will miss it by miles. The ones who have the best chance of scraping a grade 4 do know Pythagoras and other grade 4 topics.

@RampantIvy who accused you btw? I assume other parents when you told them how much revising your DD did?

I did similar stuff.

Sorry, Higher.

You do need to know whether you are talking about Higher or Foundation papers.

It changes each year but the boundaries are remarkably low in Maths. 60% will get you a 7 lots of years!

I skimmed the SATs and GCSE and thought the GCSE was clearly harder than the SATs. There is more variety in the GCSE both in topics and how they are presented.
I could imagine a 'greater depth' child possibly being able to attempt a lot of the GCSE Foundation paper and possibly pass if accurate enough, but not an 'average' (mean? median? mode?) year 6. I'm not convinced though, as there are a host of topics in GCSE just not covered at primary.

I'll give you that. I had always thought it was around 50 - 55% but it's not.It's clearly around 65%

The system is designed so that roughly a third will ‘fail’ to reach that grade. So pretty easy to get a 1-3.
It isn’t a case necessarily of not being able to do basic Maths and English. They may have those skills. But 2/3 of the year group scored higher and so they didn’t get the 4.
If we want to assess what students can do and for the outside world to know what students who reach a certain standard can do, we’ve got completely the wrong grading system for that!

@cakeorwine using AQA since that is the board you mentioned, last summer you needed 157/240 at foundation for a 4, so more than 50 to 55%.

I was accused of being a pushy parent when DD sat iGCSE maths in the January of year 11 (the school entered some of the pupils early and the only exam in January was iGCSE). Apart from Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day she did a past maths paper every day for practice.

I also leanred a lot more maths when checking her papers against the mark scheme.

No it's not.

That's a Grade 5

AQA Foundation Maths - calculator 2023

https://cdn.sanity.io/files/p28bar15/green/9b429174169effa582d6d1bf9aea89777ea0e7eb.pdf

1. Converting cm to m
2. Increase a negative temperature by 5C
3. Percentage of a grid that's covered
4. Basic algebra
5. Mixed fractions - convert to a decimal (What is 9/4)
6. Bank statements - credit and debit
7. Magic square to make 120 by multiplying
8. Conversion graph
9. Estimating an answer
10. Working out the mean of 5 numbers
11. Converting imperial weights
12. Ratio in cooking
13. More complex algebra
14. Working out the cost of a golf trip
15. Probability

Get those right and you have about 38 marks - and a lot of that is covered regularly in KS2 maths.

There's also some nice 3 and 4 markers where some more marks can be picked up.

e..g Q23 - looking at value for money

Grade 4 is 75%, not 50%.

A lot more?

Looking at the Foundation papers, what knowledge do you think you need to get a Grade 4 - ie about 50% to 55% that is not covered on KS2 maths curriculum?

That's a very specific question - clearly things like Pythagoras aren't covered at KS2 but you don't really need to know Pythagoras to get a Grade 4.

No, you don’t need to know the whole syllabus but you need to know a lot more maths to get a grade 4 on foundation than is on the KS2 curriculum.

But..do you need to know all that stuff to get a Grade 4?

Yes - there is more complex stats etc on the Foundation paper - but you only need about 50% to get a Grade 4 so you can get away with not knowing the more complex stuff on a Foundation paper if you are confident enough with about half the questions.

Obviously there is some overlap in the types of questions and people go 'oooh you have to multiply fractions on the SATs paper and also have to multiply fractions on the GCSE paper and think that means they are the same difficulty.

But it's missing out the much, much bigger syllabus that is covered at GCSE. All the formal algebra, a much larger amount of geometry, probability, stats as well as calculator methods. Kids have to know much more and a lot of it is more abstract.

What is your degree/chosen profession?

You've seen the KS2 SATs papers and you know the Foundation papers.

How much harder do you think they are?