To thinks SATs don’t really matter?

[whodawhodaeho]

DD is year 6 and her class teacher( and year head) has told them that if they don’t do well in SATs then they’ll be put with the disruptive, badly behaved kids in ‘big’ school. Ie put in lower sets forever

I have told her this is nonsense - that the new school will assess her themselves up til Oct half term then stream sets for certain subjects (which they do - her DB is there ) and the SATs don’t matter.
And they continually assess and move kids around according to ability/ progress through school terms/ years

YABU - yes they matter, and yes secondary school will pay attention to the results

YANBU - they don’t really matter

We’ve had all sort of notifications from school about getting to bed early, being rested etc

DD actually has a very late night tonight as she’s got an audition for something and the travel means a 11pm Bedtime.

DH is wondering if we should miss the opportunity- I think there’s more to life that testing, particularly when the testing is SATs ( 11+ or GCSE or similar would be different.)

I think some secondary schools do look at sat results and do the initial sets based on them. Some schools are better than others at moving sets around.

My sons secondary kept the initial sets until christmas on the first year. At that point they moved a few people around.

Regardless, I think its a silly thing to tell children to motivate them and someone has to go in the bottom set so those people will feel crap about themselves even if they worked hard.

At DDs school the original streaming was done using SATs.
Their target grades come from SATs.

However they assess them regularly and tweak the sets if necessary.

The school are out of order for pushing thay false message onto the children when sats measure the teaching rather than the children's individual academic capabilities.

Our school is pushing the "says only show us one tiny part of who you are" message.

That headteacher is bonkers! My son didn't reach the standard in his sats - he is in mixed classes with all abilities. Secondary schools assess again they don't rely on sats. A lot of y7 is consolidation making sure kids really have the basics in place.
Sounds like the ht is under massive stress and filtering it down to kids. Ht shouldn't be that stressed, nor should they be frightening their y6.

I know for a fact that DD school will not use the SATs as streaming at the beginning. Their ‘sets’ don’t start until after the October half term

YANBU. I didn't even do them. My mum and dad booked a week holiday!

SATs are principally used to hold primary schools to account to ensure they have taught their pupils to the correct standard. Secondary schools are the pupils themselves aren't really affected by the results.

So much pressure on the kids, My dd is doing Sats today. My thinking is what will be will be,We have done all we can. I am lucky I guess in the fact that she couldnt get to school quick enough today but fully appreciate not every child will feel like that. I wouldnt have told the kids personally if I were a teacher I would have just had a different week where we were doing tests! Thankfully I am not a teacher!!

If the teacher really said that then I would put in a formal complaint.
Children in the bottom sets aren't there because they are "badly behaved".
Revolting thing to say about children.
Teachers who say things like that shouldn't be anywhere near children.

then they’ll be put with the disruptive, badly behaved kids in ‘big’ school
Did the head really say this? What a disgusting comment to make about children that may not be great academically, I am shocked with this comment would seriously question the Head and is also well known that referring to secondary as "big" is so outdated how old is the Head?

Their target grades will be based on SATS and their secondary schools will be measured against this. So I think the results do have some relevance, but it is limited. I'm pretty sure that most secondary schools do their own assessment and move kids around between sets as required...it tends to be pretty fluid.

I don't think that pressure should be piled upon 11 year old children at all. They are too young for that.

I honestly really doubt that's been said by the Headteacher tbh... far more likely to have come from one of the other kids.

I really hate how lower ability kids are classed as disruptive.

That said, some schools use SATs for initial setting, others don't. No good school would keep a child in the wrong set just because of SATs results.

However, Secondary schools are measured on improvement from SATs to GCSEs, and this may impact who they choose to give interventions to. Also some schools do reports based on base SATs score and do too well you'll be forever 'underachieving'. So SATs do matter.

Somewhere inbetween. They aren't everything and they aren't nothing either. If your child can't reach the expected standard because they haven't mastered the contents then that's obviously going to reflect in their ability to perform at secondary but yes, most secondaries will carry out some testing themselves - and later look at class performance.

Stupid thing to tell a child regardless, was it really a teacher who said that? Shame on them if so.

‘then they’ll be put with the disruptive, badly behaved kids in ‘big’ school
Did the head really say this? ‘

the head of hear year did - a good teacher usually but can be a bit unorthodox at times.
DD said they were doing revision and lots of kids were messing around- so I suppose it came out of frustration.

DH is flapping about the late night tonight - DD usually in bed around 9pm - but this is an unusual opp for her and even if she is a bit tired tomorrow I’m not sure it would really affect her ‘performance’ in SATs - she is where she is

You could say the same about GCSEs and A Levels - they don’t define you and life will work out right regardless of grades.

However it is an important assessment measure both for the children and the school and in some cases will define which set they’re put in. YABU for downplaying the importance and letting her have an 11pm bedtime unless the audition is the final stage for something life changing.

What I don't understand about sats and the whole "it can lead to predicted grades at GCSE" thing is sats are just English and Maths. How can the results children get in English and Maths have any indication of how well they will do in GCSE history/geography/textiles/drama/design/Spanish/PE/science/food tech/dance/music......
You could be an amazingly talented actor, artist, sports person or just really really obsessed with history - but not great at maths so scored low on sats.
(Sorry - not really relevant to your post @whodawhodaeho. Just me rambling...

However it is an important assessment measure both for the children and the school and in some cases will define which set they’re put in.
So surely all the more important not to stress young kids out about it because they have not yet developed the skills to deal with nerves and stress so it is likely to do more harm than good. Keeping them calm, playing it down is far more likely to help. The Head needs to find a better way of dealing with disruptive kids than frightening the life out of them! We were fed this kinda of crap back in the 80s the world will end if you don't do well in whatever exam thought we moved on from this 🙄

This . So much.

DD now 14 would absolutely be classed as lower ability in most subjects, no unusual circumstances or SEN, she just unfortunately really struggles and despite my pushing throughout primary just fell through the cracks probably because she was a good kid and not disruptive.

She works so bloody hard though. Her results never reflect her efforts, it genuinely hurts my heart sometimes to see.

By comparison her incredibly clever and bright cousins (whose academic achievements are constantly shoved down our throat) can just do the minimum if they want.

At the secondary school where I work the students are set before they arrive based on SATs. They do some tests here too but they don’t move sets based on them.
It may be that not many schools do this (at my last school students were set after 4 weeks based on our tests) but definitely a student who didn’t bother in their SATs would end up in a low set at my school and may find it hard to get out again.

If the Head actually said that I’d make a formal complaint. Awful way to speak about kids who may be less academically able for whatever reason. And yes it’s silly to make such a big thing of SATS.

TeenDivided

It’s not that low ability kids are disruptive but it is true that disruptive kids are likely to be in low sets since they muck about and don’t listen. Unfortunately this means that beautifully behaved low ability students in many cases don’t get the level of teaching they should as the teacher is too busy with crowd control.

@Gymrabbit what does your school do for children who don't take sats?
Where I live quite a lot of children go to private school for primary (where they don't take sats) but state for secondary. How do you decide which sets they go in?

come on we did exams in 1977 to show what set to be in in comprehensive school.
although the teacher's comments dont sound the best