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?

I would not hide the results as your DD will be aware others have had their results and might feel that by not sharing them that it is something to be ashamed of. I would not make a big fuss of it maybe just focus on her progress, how hard she tried and positives she has achieved in primary school. Secondary school is very results orientated with lots of tests and setting by ability so hiding all this from her is not helpful.

@onetwothreex you literally know nothing about me. I was just trying to protect my DD- I wouldn’t rip them up in front of her- I just wouldn’t tell her the actual grade.

And actually, I can’t afford a tutor

If she got 99 in the Maths mock, and works hard from now to the time of the test, she is very likely to get at least the same, possibly better in the final tests. It's an average result, not a low one. Why not share it with her? Celebrate every added mark, not because 'it takes her over the magic 100', but because she will have worked hard for it and the improvement shows progress, which is always to be celebrated.

It is very likely that the school will tell her her grade OP. At our school they tell the children individually and then they all tell each other. So be prepared for that.

I get that you want to protect her but the chances are she's spent the last school year working for these exams. That should be acknowledged and celebrated, not brushed under the carpet.

Don't think you can withdraw from SATS.

From the school perspective if your DD didn't sit them she would be shown as a fail anyway

Is this true? My DS is only in Yr2, but his teacher told us they won't be putting him in for the SATS (there's no way he could pass them, he is well below average) and I must admit the cynical part of me did wonder whether it was for his benefit, or if it was because he would lower the school's average... But if they are marked as a fail if they don't take them regardless, that is interesting.

Whatever you think about SATs -
if you rip them up without looking you are saying to your dd I don't value your result or the effort you put in to get it. I am so sure your results are rubbish that I can't be bothered to look

If you open them and you praise your dd for her effort pass or fail then you are giving her the message that trying hard is worthwhile.
(Wow, dd you worked so hard, I'm so proud of your effort)

Flashinglights I think the school can make that decision (within strict criteria) but I don't think parents can. Obviously they can not send their children in when SATS are taking place, although I think there is about 5 day window afterwards, when they can still take them (as long as they have had no contact with anyone who has sat them)

if you rip your dd results you are not protecting her, you are doing the opposite! Fair enough you can't afford a tutor, but are you going to tell me you can't help her at home, especially when she is so close to get 100? It's not just the school job to help your dd, it's also your job!

Sats mean nothing. Absolutely nothing.

The only reason I bothered to look at dds was because her boring shite primary ruined her year 6 with constant fucking extra maths so I felt I owed her the decency of at least looking at them and saying well done.

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.

But it's a shit marker. Dd is already achieving 2 grades more than her Sats predicted.

I dont mind if my child fails their maths SATs, the school has said since reception that there's room for improvement, but done fuck all to progress them. Year 6 they wanted attendance at 7:45am revision sessions and easter holiday sessions.
Ffs i did less revision to pass my gcses! (And degree!)
I really tried to make it and couldn't drag my kids out, (or myself) to schlepp across our city. In the dark morning hours.
So i said no. Teacher wasnt pleased. So i told them I'm fine with whatever result, because it measures the school and will reflect the lack of help they gave in 6 years of schooling. Rather than coach them to pass. Let secondary see they need the extra help in that subject. Ideally they'd have cared about DCs actual understanding of the subject, more than about understanding enough to get through SATs.
On the other side, my child does really well at english, enjoys the subject, has a really good imagination for creative writing, but they showed no interest in push them into the high achiever/G&T set.
Meh, I'll save my pushing for GCSEs and Alevels, they actually matter. SATs dont go on a cv or applications.
If the school dont want to push them forwards in math or english, until it's time for SATs, then they can jog on.
Top school in the city (impossible to get in to) told us during our tour, they know SATs results are pointless, they retest gently, 3 times in year 7, so stream kids correctly. Then assess regularly so improving kids can move up and others can get more support through their schooling. Sounds much better.

@OP I'll look at the result and congratulate my child on their effort, they worked hard, which I appreciate and they have no clue they're 'failing' because neither school or myself tell them the mock results.
How you handle it will make a huge difference. Good luck @OP

Kolo, I'm so glad you're on this thread, along with others who speak sense.

OP, when I first saw your post, I thought, 'Yes, rip them up, show some solidarity with her', but in light of what others have said, I'm not sure. It probably won't help in the long run, if you undermine the school and the system, bad as it is.

The most important thing is your daughter's self-esteem, imo, and she needs to have some hope of success, some feeling of agency to carry her through her secondary schooling, or she could risk becoming disengaged and fed up, and wasting her time. But you sound like a lovely parent, and she knows you are on her side, which is far more important than anything else.

You might have to do some damage limitation (especially when other parents or children boast about their results).

I think the best thing to do is simply to behave as if the results are of little or no significance. Tell her what other posters have suggested, and that you are proud of her anyway, for the lovely person she is and how hard she has worked, and there's more to life than SATs. You can always tell her how you were a late developer, to reassure her that her future isn't all decided at age 11. Maybe even ask her and/or her teacher what she finds most difficult and see if you can help her at all - but in the spirit of 'we can do this if you want to give it a go, but you'll be fine anyway'?

Ignore her results, or 'forget' about them unless she reminds you, or ask her whether she wants to know them. Show her how little you care about them, and how much more you care about her. Good luck.

You don't 'pass' or 'fail' sats - you get a score.
You should see the teacher/head about the wording they are using to the children. Telling children that they have 'failed' the mocks is very wrong. They may have got a 'low' score but they have not failed. At all.

One take-home message from this thread, for anyone whose child is year 5 or lower: when you go round secondary schools - ask how they use SATs. I mentioned the school which cut children off from learning languages age 11 on the basis of SATs. The school we put first on the form, the maths teacher said "we spend a lot of year 7 showing them maths is interesting after the damage done by SATs."

(I'm struggling with the fact that extra time for children with dyslexia is at the discretion of the school, so DS's school only authorises extra time for children likely to fail. Despite DS getting freaked out by distractions, freaked out by other children starting to answer the comprehension questions before he's finished reading the text, frustrated that the teacher tells him "check your work" when he runs out of time before he can do this. The one occasion where they gave him extra time, he got all the maths questions right bar one.)

Don't you want to know where she needs support so you can help her at home? The bar for passing is quite low so I'd think if she fails she does need some extra help from you rather than ripping up the results in a temper.

Will you get the results? Most schools don't send them out, as it's not that kind of test. It's just to measure the schools effectiveness not the kids achievement.
Just read them with her quickly and celebrate that she did her best and they're over now.

A test or exam is not a reflection of her worth or how good a human being she is. It is just a test, all she can go is give it her best shot and no one can ask her more than that.
I wouldn't tear up the results but be ready to do a nice activity after you receive them. Whether she got a good score or not, it is worth recompensing the effort.

The school are wrong to use terms pass and fail. Your child will get a standardised score. There is not a pass mark!

I totally understand wanting to rip them up but it's probably a good idea to find out what they are. Teachers shouldn't tell kids they have failed or are failing etc though.

Presumably you've already chosen a secondary school. What is their policy on streaming/setting/mixed ability? In my DS1's school in year 7, teaching is mixed ability including maths.

Secondary schools need to look beyond SATs at primary school, and anyone still to choose secondary school, maybe this is something to note when choosing secondary. An academy primary school practically next door to DS1's secondary was found to have cheated in its 2018 SATS, and Panorama featured a small chain running primaries in a neighbouring borough and that they cheated in SATs as well. I found this of interest because my son's primary school's governors had to resist being forced to join this very same chain in 2013.

I would try to take the pressure of your DD, SAT's don't matter.

Yes high school may use them to know what groups/sets they put your child in when they start but they will stream your child into the correct set.

My DD1 only just got 4 in her SAT's but is in the top sets in all her classes and is predicted to get 7's, 8's in her GCSE's.

Y6 is awful, I sympathise. DD2 had a hellish time and the pressure was horrible - I absolutely agree that your DD should just do her best but the results will not define her, or predict her likely GCSE grades in 5 years time.
DD was like a different child in Y7 so good luck with the last few weeks until the tests in May, get them done and then look forward to all the fun end of year stuff.
Are you confident with the secondary she's going to?

At my kids school GCSE target grades are based on lots of things of which data is just one.More recent tests are weighted more heavily.cats and yellis testing are important even postcode and parents socioeconomic category as included in the formula

At my kids school GCSE target grades are based on lots of things of which data is just one.

Absolutely - DC's school, along with many others, uses FFT to gnerate predictions.

However, what the school is MEASURED against, in Government league table and the gov.uk website of school comparison (and also in Ofsted's frameworks for inspection, though not all schools have been inspected under the latest versions) is progress from SATs grades. Progress8 is just that - progress from KS2 SATs compared with the cohort of children with the same SATs starting point.

So a school can choose to SET its targets however it wants (it isn't measured by its target grades) - but ultimately its aim will be to perform well in (amongst others) the progress measures, which are from KS2 SATs.

Most schools don't send them out, as it's not that kind of test Legally, the school MUST report KS2 SATs results to parents, including comparative data for the school and for pupils nationally.

Section 11 of this document covers what must be reported