To think it won't help me or ds to know he's in the bottom 10% of children

[Minifingers]

when he leaves primary? Or my oldest ds to know he's probably in the top 10%?

This is what the government is suggesting - that children are ranked into 10 ability bands when they leave primary.

I know how able or otherwise my children are - I read their school reports, I look at their SATS results, I talk to their teachers.

What will ranking them in this way do other than give them an overwhelming sense of failure or complacency?

"Schools have done base line tests on nursery and reception kids for years. Its not about branding children as failures, its making sure that children who need it get refered to speech and language therapy or audiology."

This test is not about identifying children with special needs so that their learning needs can be met. This should have happened long before the end of primary. And it's not the brief of the test to identify dyslexia, ASD, speech and language difficulties that haven't already been identified by teachers when a child has been in full time education for 7 years......

I wonder how long before they would set a target saying that everyone had to be in the top 50 % ? .......

levels are not had to understand, and you can see progess. all the percentage bands tell you is their relative position in the country. you have no idea if they have gone from the top of their band to the bottom, or vice versa.

I can't understand how this will work for small schools.

Will the brightest child automatically be in the top rank? and the lowest in the bottom?

Being the brightest in a small school and top rank may not equal the same level as a child in a larger school, simply because they don't have enough other children as a comparison.

This year our Y6 has 7 pupils would the school have to rank one child in 7 different ranks? or could we fall to 5 ranks if not done on percentages and two children could be ranked equal.

Or could the school face the ranking 1-6 and then having one child ranked 10th, base on national levels. How would that child feel knowing it is 4 away from his/her peers. It's one thing knowing your bottom of the class but to find out just how far away you are could look like a mountain to climb.

I have several friends who are Primary school teachers, so I know that schools normally do a baseline assessment when a child starts school - its the bit that says 'The new tests would be subject to external supervision: outside examiners would assess papers but would not sit in on the tests' that concerns me...

you know what don't be too concerned about the level of your sons abilities at 11 he is still very young he may blossom as he gets older I,m fourty now when I went to secondary school I was placed in the middle set for everything I have never been that academic but I,m a successful mental health nurse my sisters friend however placed in the top set did well in all her exams [I struggled] has never done very much with her life

The way I look at it is, DH and I both passed our 11+ and both failed our GCSE's.

One test at 11 makes no difference. Consistent low level monitoring and support throughout school would probably make more difference.

throckenholt. not long i suspect!

reallytired National curriculum sublevels for Y6 SATs don't exist, not officially. Sublevels are made up, people find them on the Internet etc. But levels were never meant to be split into sublevels.

Those saying levels are easy to understand are obviously ignoring the billions of threads on here saying 'my DS got level blah, is that any good/reason to be concerned?'

Clutching, children will be placed in ability bands according to national results, not class results.

I wrote this on another thread, but will repeat it. Many areas already rank children into bands for secondary school transfer. This is not new to me. However, my area has 5 bands of 20%, not 10 bands and they use Y5 results rather than Y6. This banding system ensures a fully comprehensive intake in secondary schools. School places are allocated on distance, and there is usually a different distance for each band which changes each year depending on the number of applications.

from the BBC news page about this :

The current minimum is 60% of pupils achieving the expected level at Sats tests for English and maths. This would be replaced with an 85% minimum - but the current levels are being scrapped, so this would be 85% based on an assessment that has still to be decided.

Love the last line

Agree with poster further up who said this idea was invented by men who'd been to private schools where they were ranked every year and at which they were always near the top. 'Didn't do me any harm' hurrumph hurrumph.
And also the poster who said that it will be used as a stick to beat teachers with instead of cutting class sizes and increasing resources. 'Look you failures at state school, why aren't you doing as well as the private schools? It's not because you don't have small class sizes and weed out any challenging kids, no it's because you don't have competitive sports days and let everyone know their position in the class'.

Dd heard this on the radio this morning and said 'what on earth would be the point', to which I said, yeah, it wouldn't have made life any easier last year to know who was best at maths out of Z and L, would it?'. She said, 'well, it's Z, everyone knows that.' 'OK, Z and K, then?'; 'Well, K, obviously: he's best at everything, everyone knows that.'

Everyone does know who's best - and who's worst, to be fair. Beyond that, really, what's the point? Other than to give K an inflated ego beyond the level it might already be at!

"But can you imagine telling a child where they rank in the whole country?"

I would prefer national curriculum sub levels to be made offical rather than comparing children across the UK. Such a ranking would show that children in Doncaster are not doing as well as well as children in Newham. Surely no one believes that EVERY child in DONCASTER is thick or there is something in the water in Newham that produces brains.

Such a statistic would only show up the children who live povety or attend shitty schools. It would do nothing to help the children involved.

I feel a measure of progress is better. If a child in the bottom 10% year 6 has made no progess since the start of reception then the school should be getting in the ed pych years ago and setting up a statement.

Prehaps the govenment should look at Carol Dweck work, and get children to develop a belief that they can learn and improve themselves.

teacherstoolbox.co.uk/T_Dweck.html

I think the "10 band" system sounds inhuman tbh. Also unweildly and pointless. But no surprise to the grabby SATS agenda that most parents and schools seem to compete in already.

Could I move to Scotland to get away from this nonsense. BTW, don't they have pretty good standards .

Sorry but how are the kids to know if the parents do not tell them?

If parents want to know more, they can just ask

They don't tell you, that's the problem!

I can see some merit in what's being proposed. As a parent I want to know more about my child's capabilities (and weaknesses) than the information we currently receive. And yes, it is helpful to know if your child is in the top 10%, bottom 20% or whatever. If you don't know where your child is in relation to his or her peers, how on earth do you know which secondary schools to aim for?

At a girls private school I attended for about 2 years in the 80s, we had class places every week. I really believe it was a good thing. Somehow it spurred you on to work that bit harder to get into the top 3. And that sense of achievement when you did it was fantastic. And not just at the top end either. If a child is near the bottom and makes good progress and moves up, that's a fantastic achievement too.

I really feel these days it's all very PC, you're only allowed to say positive things, your child's abilities compared to others is all very hush-hush. I think we forget sometimes that academic ability is only one aspect of a child's overall abilities. It's not a question of 'writing a child off'. It's accepting that some children are less academic and looking at their other talents whatever they might be. I know a boy who's a fantastic footballer and has been since the age of 3. He's not academic and doesn't enjoy school. If ranking was in place, I don't think his parents would either be surprised or upset at his position; he hopefully has a great future ahead of him. What on earth is wrong in saying that a child is not academic but has talent for art or sport or learning a trade? It's not a lesser option, just different.

Why stick your head in the sand or pretend your child is something that they're not? I think transparency and honesty about your child's abilities is a positive thing.

I'm actually quite shocked and saddened by the attitudes on this post. And if that's a reflection of parenting nowadays then I fear for the next generation.

So let me get this straight. You don't think it's worth finding out if your child is not only below average but in the bottom 10%?? Really? When would be a good time to find out? During his/her GCSE exams? A couple of weeks after when it's all too late?

My kids have all known from about year 1 which was the clever table and which was not. Do you not think kids realise? When one child is reading complex books and others can't read the word Dog....even a 6 year old can figure that one out!

Not finding out in case you 'brand' them and they feel sad because they've failed is completely missing the point. The idea is that you find out early enough so you can HELP THEM.

A couple of years back I could see my daughter's maths grades were not as high as I think they could have been. So I arranged for a tutor for a couple of months to boost her up. Her ICT grade was dropping so I spent a lot of time with her revising.

Ditto with my stepson. If he's struggling with his words, we practice until it's second nature. That's not punishing him or telling him he's thick...that's helping him achieve!

I just cannot understand how any parent can think not knowing helps their child at all...ever.