Rewards for completing SATs

I didn’t get a laptop but I did get DS a treat.

Just to put things in perspective. If people put piles and piles of shit on the sofa for Easter, then I can’t see how the concept of a little treat after SATS is a bad thing at all in comparison.

We’ve given gifts after SATs and right up to university. We've always given them before results to acknowledge effort.

After SATs, one of our children got a games console, one got a drawing tablet and we also had a takeaway on the evening that they finished.

I think what you did was completely proportionate. The other stuff is more what I would consider suitable for GCSEs or A levels.

But to all those saying SATs are irrelevant this is not strictly true. They do follow your kids through school at least until GCSE, either to determine sets and to predict GCSEs. Secondary schools definitely look at them to see where your child falls in a cohort.

Nothing for SATs here apart from the class had a little class party on the Friday afternoon I believe.

We did take each of our boys out for a celebratory family meal after they did the entrance exams for their secondary school. We did it after getting the results, but would have gone whether they got in or not because we billed it as celebrating knowing what school they would be going to as effort and bravery for taking the entrance exams deserves to be celebrated regardless of achievement (although thankfully they did both get in).

I took DS to the cinema

Agreed. We get a takeaway or go out for dinner when I’ve finished a new work qualification or similar 🤣

My son will be doing them next year. I'll tell him it is testing the school, not him and to not worry about it.

Very low key.

We went out for lunch on the Saturday after Sats (which we were gong to do anyway) and let him chose a new Warhammer kit which we’d have probably given him over half term as a project anyway. And praised the effort. He felt rewarded and we just brought forward a few half term treats.

Laptop is going to be useful for high school though I don’t think that’s too ‘out there’ as a y6 gift tbh, it’s a pretty necessary item these days but wrapped up as a nice gift 🤷‍♀️

Not a reward but a let's plan something nice at the weekend after trying your best. Not a fan of sats, as a teacher and parent. Whole topic to talk about there, so many issues as to why they're not conducive to or positive 😒

I took each of mine for a day out to London, one was for the theatre and the other an exhibition plus meal.

I wanted to mark the occasion as the schools make them such a stressful time, my youngest is ADHD so was particularly worried, very much in line with how I parent, hard work = high reward, it was how I was raised and I’ve done pretty well…and tbh any excuse to get to do a 1:1 activity and reward their hard work is a bonus for me!

We’re doing Disney World when eldest has finished GCSEs! Although we’d be doing a family holiday anyway of course lol.

Definitely not!

Here in Wales the kids in state schools have national testing every year from years 3-9. They take some GCSEs in year 10, the rest in year 11, AS levels in year 12 and A levels in year 13.

Supporting them at home as appropriate (age wise) and making sure that they know to do their best is plenty.

edited for poor spelling!

I think they got a donut.
Don't get dragged into competitive parenting.

A laptop... for SATs?! Absolutely crackers.

I agree not rewardingfor results, but for the fact os doing them.

I also am a big fan of celebrating everything. Life is hard very often. Why not celebrate and express appreciation for milestones!

We always celebrated the end of any exam period in a low key way, based on DC’s choice - be it a family meal or a favourite takeaway.

(Never rewarded specifically for achievement of results, going to the next academic stage was reward enough.)

We bought our daughter a smalll squishy after she did hers to reward her for taking them in her stride and working hard but not getting stressed or worried about it. We had explained to her that is more about testing the school and we wanted her to do her best but not to worry. We were more concerned with her state of mind then the results. My husband and I both work in schools and see some of the children getting so upset and pressured.

Glad to read of those making it low key.

This happened to my eldest. It is called a Flight Path and so based on his on SATs results his GCSE predictions were that he would get a 4/5 in English and a 5/6 in maths. School sets were based on SATs plus CATs that they did when they started secondary.

The issue for my child was they hit their stride at secondary and so their top working grade for maths was always a 7 despite actually getting 9s. Their maths teacher was SLT and even they could not override the system. It assumed you couldn't get more than a 2 grade increase. They got a 9 in maths and an 8 in English.

The moral of this story is my very average achieving primary child absolutely aced out their GCSEs, got 4 A stars at A level and went to an incredible university. As was pointed out to my child don't let some test at 11 define what you are capable of.

We never rewarded grades but the effort.

This thread has made me think we should. I kind of thought that Prom and all the stuff that goes with it was marking it but maybe we'll go out for a meal too.

One thing at the back of my mind is that I think secondary school GCSE targets often partially based on SATS. And the progress 8 metric certainly is. So while sets are basically there to measure primary schools the better they do in some schools the higher they expectation will be for their GCSEs which I think is good..

We’ll definitely mark the end of GCSE’s. A lot of hard work goes into them.

We also reward hard work- and DS1 has SEN so life in general is harder for him.

Our school did not do SATS (indy) and he is doing GCSEs now. I always gave him a pound for every house point he got - and when his GCSEs are over we are planning to get him something related to his special interest- but the deluxe version that he is mooning over not a second hand version which he planned to get himself with Christmas money.

I always think that I have to be rewarded to go to work via my salary so it's fair eough he is rewarded for his hard work and dealing with all the stress we put on these kids at a young age. He deserves a reward. It's hard enough for him to last through each school day.

Not really. DD did hers last year and the school gave them loads of rewards afterwards. Not specifically because of SATS but they could use their reward points (gained throughout the year) to buy treat afternoons, like pizza making, crafts, a football match... At least twice a week until the end of term they were doing a treat activity, in amongst rehearsing for the end of year play.

So we decided she had plenty of rewards to be getting on with there!

SATs results all come out on the same day - this year it’s Tuesday 7th July.

We didn’t reward them, but we (and our school) made them a very low key event, so the kids didn’t even really pay much attention to them. If there had been a big build up with lots of pressure, like you we’d have probably gone out for a pizza to celebrate the end, but that wasn’t the case for us.