SATs 2023 English Questions - were they really difficult?

[BDutton]

The BBC just shared some questions from this year's English SATs. Do you think they were hard and/or misleading?
Should the answers be so dumbed down as to clearly offer just ONE OBVIOUS answer to a question?
Are the children meant to really KNOW facts, or infer information from the text, which clearly gives clues (such as Texas is the state, since the text mentions "the state of Texas" and "the city of Austin", etc.)
And finally, if the SATS purpose is to measure progress and identify areas of help, isn't it what they are doing?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-65624697

I'm a Year 6 teacher. The third text and related questions in the Year 6 SATS comprehension paper were significantly harder than previous papers.

However the bell curve that all the results will sit on will just be adjusted so that the grade boundaries reflect the complexities/difficulty of the test so it's not too worrying.

I also think that the average user on this app will say the questions weren't too hard but what people need to think about us the overall demographic of the UK, not just what they know. Many children from deprived areas would not be as familiar with texts that difficult.

If you write the questions so that they can be answered with knowledge then they are not really testing comprehension, so making it about the US is a bit more of a leveller to test who can actually read the question. You have to switch your mindset into finding the answer in the question/text rather than trying to recall it from fact which is not what the state/city question was after.

Also there will have to be a couple of questions that really target the top 10% as a differentiator.

Some questions are in the bbc link in the op inc that one. No usa geography knowledge needed. It was a comprehension question.

Maybe rather than implying the texts should be shorter or they should have more time children should be encouraged to read more at home and get off their devices.
Yes, rather than design a suitable test paper that is appropriate for the bell curve of Year 6 students, we should magically expect to be able to wave a magic wand to ensure all children have an arbitrary amount of reading time at home.

🤔

Tell parents to read with their children and suggest to children they read. Why hasn't anyone thought of that?

I think next year at KS2 SATs time, the BBC education correspondent and the teaching union bosses should all be made to sit the SATs papers, in timed conditions.

That's the point. The kids shouldn't be aware of this it's the adults putting pressure on them because they are concerned about league tables. The whole thing sucks.

@Dixiechickonhols I had a look at the link. The question doesn't look to bad - but I am not 10/11 anymore. I don't know how I would have found it at that age.

As many people seem to just be glossing over this link pasted above helpfully (sorry scrolled odwn and can't see who posted now from phone) - the point is not how hard three (or indeed any) questions were but that there was an enormous amount - more than ever before - to read and that is why most kids ran out of time.

My daughter did the test, she finished fine BUT she is a) a very fast reader b) has just done a fair bit of prep and practice at comprehension tests in order to get into the academically selective grammar school. Not a single one of her other friends - who I would say probably mostly comprise the top 5-10% of her class, which is probably a bog-standard primary with a broad socio-economic catchment area in London including a lot of kids whose first language isn't English - finished the test.

That link again - https://www.tes.com/magazine/analysis/primary/why-years-sats-reading-paper-was-so-difficult

No. It’s the adults putting pressure on the adults. Results affect league tables, affect intake, affect funding and affect Ofsted. It’s all a vicious circle.

Just tried those questions on DD who said they were easy, she's a year older though but we live abroad and she's never had formal English teaching (it's English as a foreign language instead so just basic vocabulary and grammar so far)
But that's just a snapshot, the whole exam might be a whole different matter, I don't know how fast she reads but I reckon not very fast. Would like to try doing the whole test, timed, on her but she'd probably not be up for it

Did you time her?

Yes the adults putting the adults under pressure are the worst. But there's no need for the children to feel so much pressure.

We teacb our Y6 children a broad and balanced curriculum. We practice twice a year - the process is so formal that it would come as a huge shock if we didn’t and still our children feel the pressure. How could they not with such ridiculous formality? Covered walls, external markers, tables in rows, papers not opened until they are in the test room, silence for 60 minutes, talking seen as cheating, results reported to parents, DfE and secondary school (as if transition isn’t already scary enough), escorts to the toilet, nothing on desks. Shall I go on, or do you get it now?

Ffs, practise

Teaching union boss? Why?

All very well advocating the random reading of not v well written texts etc to improve SATS performance but problem is most ch/adults do not know how to use a thesaurus/dictionary therefore many do not know synonyms meanings or antonyms of words - plus most teachers have neither IQ nor enthusiasm for English language - I am a primary/secondary /adult Ed teacher who has opted out of this education system which only serves to undereducate people to render them more compliant and more easily coerced and controlled 👍🏿☘️

• this is my leitmotif ‘The limit if your language is the limit of your world’ Wittgenstein

most teachers have neither IQ nor enthusiasm for English language - I am a primary/secondary /adult Ed teacher who has opted out of this education system

I hesitate to say this, given the haemorrhaging of good teachers within the profession, but we are richer without stinking attitudes like that.

Several points here.

They have highlighted the easier questions - I’ve seen the test.

Presuming children have conceptual knowledge to know these answers off the bat is immense privilege. A complete lack of understanding at the high levels of deprivation and poor cultural capital.

The texts and questions were so wordy that children had roughly about 29 seconds per question. That’s around half the time for GCSE students and we are talking about 10-11 year olds. The texts and questions were significantly longer than any previous.

The press release is designed to get the hard of thinking whining about teachers and they are easy to spot.

They were hard. The paper was far too long and didn't allow enough time for pupils to write their answers. Also, several of the questions were quite ambiguous. The examples given have been carefully picked to defend the level the tests were at. Dont believe everything you read.

My daughter sat the test and found it hard. She said the teachers looked concerned. My colleague who has a daughter same age in a different school said the same and they emailed the parents to say it was a hard test that day.

I appreciate it may have been easy for many and adults are saying it is but my daughter is at meeting expectations grade and found it hard.

Tests shouldn't be easy but there should have been a reasonable time to complete it

I haven’t seen the paper in it’s entirety but there seem to be 2 main criticisms. Firstly there was too much text to ready and so made the questions rushed and secondly the questions were too vague or unclear. I have looked at the questions they released and they all seemed super straightforward and not vague at all. Some were stretching but I think the most able children could have done well. I am baffled that a child aged 11 may not have heard of Texas. That is rather worrying in itself but it was clearly written so cannot see how any child would have got that wrong. There may be a genuine criticism as to the amount of reading needed. There should be consistency year of year and they may have got it wrong this year. That should be looked at for future years. In the end they standardise the marks though so I’m not sure why there is so much upset.

The point is not whether adults found them difficult but whether a significant proportion of children found them too difficult. I have a y6 class. We have done many past papers. On average about four kids in my class failed to finish in the time given. On the 2023 paper near all of them were still writing at the end. That means it was too much for the time allowed. Some of my greater depth and solidly expected children struggled with the questions. If teachers and children found them more challenging than in previous years and many didn't finish then it is clear that the government did not get this one right.

.In the end they standardise the marks though so I’m not sure why there is so much upset.

If by that you mean that they wait until they are marked and then decide the magic 100 mark so that a certain section of the bell curve don’t meet it every time, then indeed they do. Thereby manipulating the percentage pass to their own ends each year. There was a ramping up of difficulty across all papers this year. I wonder what the agenda could possibly be, so close to an election year? 🤔

Your children are being manipulated to fit whatever narrative they feel like spinning this year.