AIBU to take DD off of doing her SATS (YR 6)

[gotthearse]

She is really stressed. She has always found her school work difficult and spent much of her time on an IEP. Has slowly done some catching up, but she has to work twice as hard as everyone else to achieve this improvement.

Her school has always been quite high-performing with the no of kids hitting the target (whatever it is ) in mid 90's (%). The changes to the curriculum have put everyone in a spin - the teaching staff and the kids.

They are caning it at the moment with 3 45-minute practice tests per week, 12 spellings to learn, pages of maths, English and science revision books to do, plus extra classes in maths and English, and extra booster maths homework on top. She hates all of it. She had 40 pages of questions to complete over half term. I have to Google the English to help her with it - utter bollocks grammar that I don't know and have never needed to.

Its utterly destroyed her confidence doing weekly tests and seeing her low marks compared to others. She used to bounce into school and now she hates it and looks grey. She cries all the time and I hate it and feel resentful that this is being done to my DD in the name of "raising standards". I am scared that it will give her a life-long disposition to anxiety. She is 10 FFS.

So I am on the verge of saying NO, she won't be doing them. The school really don't want me to do this and say I'll be the first parent to ever do this, and that it will look bad on them. My main concern is her best interests and what's happening at the moment feels entirely at odds with this. They say she'll miss out on seeing how much she has progressed, but they have already told me they are pleased with her and that's all I personally need to know.

Its not a case of "letting her off" when things get tough. She is working her arse off. Universally everyone is saying this years SATS are so much harder with the double whammy that its on stuff they have not previously been taught. They only thing I think we are going to achieve is further eroding her confidence when she gets the marks back.

So AIBU to do this? School think I am. Be gentle, I'm fragile too.

Dd3s school have offered everything that the OPs school does but there is no pressure to do any of them. We have no homework and never have!! I have bought some revision books and dd has enjoyed doing them.

Mine son is y6 too. His school get excellent results, he is not academically gifted and is getting extra time on the tests. They got no homework in half term although they do get roughly an hour and a half per week usually. What your school is doing is not good for any of the children and I can see my son being v stressed if it was this way. We are relaxed about SATs at home, which helps too. I think it's good exam practice s be so be doing exams from summer in y7 so one extra year of practice is fine. Exam techniques are always useful and worth as much as the actual knowledge!

I spoke to the teacher, explained that my dcs' mental health was starting to suffer - one had started to self harm, the other was talking about being depressed and sad. So I told their teachers that mental health was the top priority for me, it was more important than education.

Dcs were working v hard but teacher always wanted more, they found the constant push to be soul destroying.....so I said if I judged things weren't improving I would pull them out and home educate. For my dcs it was never about the exams because I had told them over and over again that the Sats were a school performance measure and made diddly squat different to their future - it was the pressure the teacher's were putting on them, that quiet word sorted it out. That year I knew a few parents who felt compelled to have a similar chat with the teachers.
Poor kids and how much pressure must the teachers be under to be approaching education in such a destructive fashion?

My son has problems with anxiety. I removed him from Sats because he hated all the stress of it and I sent him there to learn not do constant tests. They were not happy but did not complain.

I think this a problem with the school rather than the actual SATs.
My son's school called them 'quizzes' and they barely knew they were doing anything.

Not putting the children under pressure was so important to them. This was Yr2 though and I can see in Yr6 it would be tricky to play them down as much.

Bottom line, these tests reflect on the school and how well they have been teaching. They should not be doing so much extra work and putting so much pressure on the kids. I would be having strong words with the school. Do any other parents feel the same?

Personally I think your school has it all wrong. None of my children were that aware they were taking them. Yes they practised, they knew what they were for (to see where the children are at with their learning) but they weren't stressed or put on about it. That's three different children at three separate schools.

You have the following options:
a) stay at school and do SATs
b) stay at school and do SATs but drop any homework
c) stay at school, and keep at home over SATs and don't do SATs prep at home. she will still almost certainly have to do all the SATs prep at school though
d) deregister and home-school
e) move schools to somewhere with a more sensible ethos

I'd be tempted to do (e) with a letter to the governors.

I think the only way to ensure she doesn't do the SATS is to home educate. I may be wrong but is it the current Year 6s that 'fail' SATS retake them again in Year 7? You may just be postponing them if that's the case.

I do understand. My Y6 DS has struggled throughout school and the extra pressure they are under is enormous. I'm a governor at our school and recently visited the Y6 class to talk with them. They said it was hard work but kept telling me that the tests were test the teacher and not them. Your school sounds like they are putting pressure on everyone which isn't right. If I was you I would definitely be talking to the school. Good luck.

Yanbu my son is the same but in yr5 and already stressing he isnt academic at all and didnt read properly untill yr 3 , its far too much stress for 10/11 yr old children i was at school back in the 80,s and vaguely remember doing richmond tests there was no pressure at all i was in set two out of three for everything throughout seconadery school and did ok academically not brilliantly but not bad either

I work in a secondary and have known several children that did not take their year 6 SATS.
My own year 6 DD is about to take them and I have told her not to give them a second thought as they are of no benefit to her, they only benefit her primary school.
Your daughter's school should be making special provision for her anxiety. Ask to speak to the SENCO and discuss what can be done to make this less stressful for your daughter.
At the end of the day, the SATS results do not matter to you or your daughter and you would be perfectly reasonablr to refuse to make her do them.

The retaking in y7 bonkers idea has been scrapped I believe.

I'd remove her. They're not necessary, and the run up seems to be causing more harm than good.

Quite frankly, the school needs to wind their neck in with the guilt trips too. It's not your fault that their tactics are forcing a child to not cope.

My son is in y5. His school are already aware that he will not be sitting SATs next year and they have taken it well. They get that my decision is about him, not them.

Good luck.

That's a shocking amount of pressure the school are putting on them. Nothing like dd1 experienced the year before the harder SATs came in. I hope dd2 doesn't get pressured like that next year when she takes them. I wouldn't blame you for taking your dd out.

YABU Secondary will be significantly more stressful and you will be setting her up to believe you will give her time off every time she has tests. Deal with the real issues as it not normal for children to become this stressed.

Robster the child has an IEP. That means additional or special needs. Wind it down a bit yeah?

You need to go into school and talk over these issues with the CT and the SENCo. Does she qualify for extra time/support? Has the school applied for this? The stress over these tests is ridiculous. Last year was the first year of the new style tests. Some schools were badly prepared for them.
Nothing is worth harming your DC's mental health. I think the school need to tone it down a bit. Taking her out of school would be harmful in general since she will miss out on fun things after the tests are over. What you do during SATs week is up to you but I would say to your dd that the tests are to judge the school not her. Good luck.

Queen,on the PE threads when parents of kids with Sen who struggle at sport suggested they might keep their child off sports day they were told they should teach them to man up and get on with it.

I find it really annoying that physical Sens like Dyspraxia,sensory etc always seem to be regarded as less deserving of sympathy and understanding.

All SEN need empathy and understanding. I don't think there needs to be any disparity in help for the two. There does need to be compromise though.

It's apparent that this child is not functioning well as it stands, and the school aren't being receptive to her needs. If the school were being helpful I'd be on board with seeing how far she can go. They're not though, and quite frankly I don't see why a child should be put through the mill mentally just so some daft 'no skips' figure can be maintained. In this situation I'd put the mental wellbeing above the need to 'man up' any day of the week.

Equally, if the very thought of a sports day made a child incapable of functioning then some accommodation needs to be made to ease that anxiety. My own child doesn't deal well with hanging around while stuff goes to hell in a handcart, which seems to happen at some point during most sports days; so he takes part in one race at the beginning, cheers for the others for as long as he can cope, then goes inside with his 1:1 to work or read. Compromise that works for him.

You might find this child and many others in their class are not coping with the school approach, it may have nothing to do with SEN and everything to do with the pressure that is put on children in this class by the school's desperate need to perform well in the league tables. I get that some schools manage to deal with Sats appropriately and the stress on the dcs is measured, but I don't believe they all do and schools putting sustained and heavy pressure on kids need to be confronted.

Thank you so much everyone for your responses. I have carefully read each and every one. I have spoken to the school and whilst initally promising, thay havent quite followed through yet. I am going to ask for a written plan to address her MH, including no bollockings for incomplete homework, I am the adult and I will be the one making decisions about when she has done enough for one day. And also a plan about the testing as the results are really distressing her. And she has broken out in eczema :( And finally I want the governers to give the whole business some consideration. Its not to get anyone in trouble but they clearly have lost the plot with this. I'll see how this goes. I am torn re allowing her to sit them, it feels like tacit approval if I do. I'm not going to deregister and homeschool as I think that would distress her more again, and we dont really have the resources to see that one through. But thank you thank you for being my barometer on this one it really has helped me collect my thoughts.

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