To rip up SATS results without looking at them

[Mangetoutrodney]

School have said that DD might not pass her SATS as she is below the expected level. She’s not that confident anyway & I don’t think knowing that she had ‘failed’ them would help her.
Aibu to not even look at the results - to rip them up without looking at them so none of us know them. I kind of feel like I want to protect her & build up her confidence in other ways.
Apparently secondary school re test anyway so do i need to know them?

Your DD SATs results follow her all the way through high school.

Flight path grades are predicted based on these results, and when they get to GCSE's this is how their predicted results are formed.

They are even taken into account for A Levels with some adjustments for GCSE results. You need to know the level shes working at, whether you like it or not.

There is a strong correlation between SATS grades and GCSE grades. There's a government website where you can see this correlation subject by subject, and for every single subject offered at GCSE, there is a close relationship between SATS results and GCSE results. It is more important than you realise to read them

Even if DD secondary school re-tests before setting groups, the correlation between SATS and GCSE is still undeniable

I feel for you OP, SATs are horrific. They have ruined year 6 for my daughter as this is all they ve done. They weren't even allowed to do a Christmas show this year as 'they are under too much pressure with SATs' (teacher's words). I have told DD from the start they are completely meaningless, our secondaries don't set/stream based on them. The stress levels amongst some of her friends should never be experienced by 10/11 year olds. The whole thing needs abolishing, there was nothing like that when I left primary and others of my generation so why are they even necessary? I would either pull her out or rip them up!

I think ripping them up would be more likely to give the impression that you are upset with her results. Let's face it, you wouldn't be talking about ripping them up if she was hovering between expected and exceeding, would you?

And there's more than a passing chance that she'll find out at school, which could be far more upsetting for her.

Much better to look at the results and say "Well done, you've worked really hard to get XX marks. I'm proud of you. Now let's go for an ice cream to celebrate."

pouraglass that simply can’t be correct. As I said, my DC won’t sit SATS as they are at private school. If they go to a state secondary are you suggesting the teachers won’t be able to predict grades for them?

I hate the SATs. I hate the pressure my daughter and her classmates feel under and wish less of a fuss was made about them. As the mother of a child who goes to bed crying some nights worrying about them (despite me and other people in her life trying hard to calm her down) I don’t blame you one bit for wishing you could protect your daughter from the bloody things.

I’ve told my daughter that as long as she walks out of the test after it’s done knowing that she did her best and worked hard that’s all that matters, not the mark she gets. Sod what the school says.

Edwin,

That depends somewhat on the secondary.

Your child's results won't count in their progress results (used for league tables etc), though they will of course count in the 'headline' results.

There will therefore be slightly less pressure on the school to get their predictions 'absolutely right', and ultimately, when push comes to shove with scarce resources in increasingly cash-strapped schools, very slightly less emphasis on getting them over critical grade boundaries, especially if the school is under pressure in terms of league tables.

IME the approach to targets given to children with no SATs results is slightly variable - the data manager who posted on here earlier might be able to help. Some may be given 'middle of the road' targets, some similar targets to those seen as 'similar' in everyday performance in class.

All this glide pathway through school makes me annoyed too. I was lazy & did badly in school and was expected to fail. I didn’t really mature until I was about 15, started working & passed them all A-C. Then did Alevels & got a good degree. Some kids don’t really ‘get’ school until they mature s bit & I hope that might be the case for my DD. Writing kids off at 11 on the basis of some bloody narrow tests annoys me a lot

But, Pouraglass, actual flight paths are not linear. Predictions based on SATs (you’re talking about FFT data?) are only really accurate at cohort level. Even on an individual level, schools can pick different targets - aspirational, for example.

Certainly a child coming from a private school who was 'underperforming relative to their end of year 6 performance' in secondary wouldn't be under scrutiny in the same way as a similar child with SATs results.

Flight paths at individual level are bs.

However, the fact remains that a school will tend to put more effort in to push a child whose target is a 7 due to good SATS, but is currently working at a 5, than a child who is predicted a 5 and is getting a 5.

Writing kids off at 11 on the basis of some bloody narrow tests annoys me a lot

Bloody snap. It’s not right to use a test they do at 11 as a marker for how good their gcse results will be when they’re 16.

Thanks cantkeepawayforever I’ve never quite worked out what happens in that scenario. Presumably similar with children new to the country.

100 shouldn’t be thought of as a “pass” mark. It’s a standardised score so 100 is exactly average. 99 is therefore a tiny tiny bit below average which is fine! It’s not a “fail”!

There are exceptions of course where there is no data available, but secondary schools have contact with primary schools wherever possible to determine the acceptable flight path grades.

And of course, flight path grades are not always spot on, there are exceptions to that too, that can be reasons people under/over perform.

However, (I wish I could remember the bloody link to the website) there is a strong correlation between sats results and gcse results. I spent an entire day at the start of the school year having a meeting with all the other school staff about this. There are exceptions to everything of course, but generally, if you perform well in SATs you perform better in GCSE's and vice versa

Obviously there are exceptions to everything, but the data doesn't lie

I'm a Year 6 teacher and it's not as simple as pass/fail. You don't fail the SATs, you just end up working towards the expected standard. Some end up very close to the expected standard, some are way off, but you don't 'fail'. Has the teacher told you what her gaps are so you can help?

Secondary schools do retest but it's important to remember that her SATs scores set her GCSE targets. Just like the KS1 SATs scores set the targets for KS2 SATs. I don't agree with the system as children all achieve at different rates, but I don't think tearing them up and ignoring them is the right thing to do either.

@edwinbear, I hope you aren’t worrying about this. Of course secondary schools are able to assess your child on entry and will continue assessing them through their time at the school. My last school had a 240 entry each year and probably 20+ kids came in with no SATs score for a variety of reasons. We’d use internal assessments early on to help with initial setting.

It’s not right to use a test they do at 11 as a marker for how good their gcse results will be when they’re 16

However, that is the accountability measure for schools used by the Government. Until the government changes its accountability measures (and tbh progress while in the school is a LOT better than raw results), then schools will use them.

Challenge the government, rather than the schools.

No half decent secondary school would write a pupil off because of a low SATS result.

barbarian, absolutely. Especially as the mark the OP mentions is, in fact, 99 - pretty much bang on 'average', rather than being 'low'.

What kind of message are you trying to send to your dd? So what if she doesn't pass? And if it bothers you so much, why aren't you helping her, or getting a tutor or something? I hate when people say that sats are not important and that it's only important for schools. A lot of secondary schools set according to sats results and gcse targets are based on sats too, so she will kind of know how she did in her sats. Kids who "fail" sats get extra help too in year 7. You need to grow up and perhaps start helping your child not only academically but mentally too. I suppose it's affecting her self esteem because she knows how much it is affecting you, so maybe you are the problem and not sats. How is she going to cope in year 7 when they do tests all the time? How is she going to cope with gcse? are you going to rip the results too?

Not at all. SATs aren’t set for the benefit of children.

Testing isn’t education. It’s a terrible habit and I hope we all grow out of it

A lot depends on the teacher. When my son was in p3 he was meeting his maths targets. By the time he finished p4 he was still at p3 level, in fact his results were worse than those achieved at the same level the previous year. In p5 he had a fantastic teacher and the improvement in his maths was virtually unbelievable. When he went into p6 they shared teaching with p7, with children taught according to their abilities. He ended up in the top p6/7 group! In other words he apparently went from p3 level to p7 level in one year, all thanks to a wonderful teacher who recognised his abilities and took the time to nurture him. Hopefully your daughter will have a teacher(s) who nurtures her next year and she will come on in leaps and bounds!!

And just to add, at my dc school, the head teacher tells each child their results.

Celebrate what she has done and show her you are proud that she tried x