To make SEN kids do SAT’s?

[D3vonmaid]

My DD is in year 6 and doing SAT’s this week, she has learning difficulties and gets extra time but the whole thing is making her stressed, anxious and generally feel like sh1t about herself, as she can’t finish the papers in time. AIBU to think that kids with SEN shouldn’t have to sit these tests? It’s destroying her confidence and stressing her out. Plus as far as I can tell, it’s a massive waste of time for schools. What, exactly, is the benefit? To schools, pupils or teachers? None that I can see, but with considerable downsides all round.

SATs are for the school not the benefit of the child. The amount of kids I have seen coming out of DCs school today in tears, worn out faces, obviously not their happy selves they were last week.
one little girl looked extremely ill (which granted could have been her being extremely ill but that leaves one to question why she is forced to attend when she’s extremely ill) and I over heard my sons friend in the year above telling him how much hard work it was.
next year that will be my autistic child. I will absolutely be withdrawing him from SATs and if he cannot stay at school, I will take him for lovely days out, it’s stupid how much pressure is on 10&11 year old children. They should be worried about the latest bike, whose the faster runner, which person is going to captain their footie team, not weather or not they score on a stupid test.

My ds with dyslexia was withdrawn from the reading and writing papers in year 2 without me saying a word about it. I'm not sure if they're under more pressure to have them sit the tests for the y6 sats though. I agree it is an unnecessary pressure on kids, pupils and the teachers.

Neither. Their role is to enable the DfE, Ofsted, etc to judge schools' "effectiveness".

Will you also take him 'on lovely days out' when he's doing GCSE's?

Since the Prep schools aren’t doing them no one should be doing them, same as the ridiculous phonics screening.
They are a total waste of time and money.
Schools and children do not benefit from them, just some private company whose share holders are making a fortune out of them whilst their children are at the Prep school not doing them.

The school. By that I mean the school is judged by the results by Ofsted etc. They only benefit if the results are good but some Heads will push hard to get these results.

My SEN child is likely to go to university….it’s about individual approaches to kids but SATs (for all kids) are not meant to be a stressful process. For kids with SEN who are still going to be within the mainstream system, taking GCSE’s etc,it’s about learning coping skills and how to have resilience and that an exam doesn’t have to be full of stress….I feel it’s worse when kids end up in year 10/11 without ever having done a formal exam.

I say this as a SEN parent, we constantly push for inclusion and to be treated the same as the rest of the classroom. We can't pick and choose for when it suits us. Of course reasonable adjustments in place for SEN kids. I think all children should sit them. I hope for my son to get a job, he can't expect work to make massive adjustments and he won't have me / teacher there to hold his hand every minute of the day.

Depends on the SEN I guess. My kids have dyslexia and slow processing but got the highest level SATS and grades at gcse and A levels so there shouldn't be a blanket ban of SEN kids not doing anything!

I’m a secondary teacher and my DC will never sit a SATs paper. SEN or otherwise, I say keep your child off school so they can avoid the unnecessary test.

A decent secondary will effectively prepare children of all different natures for their GCSEs so no need to practise in Year 6.

My grandchildren's secondary school does their own tests at the beginning of year 7 and uses these for predictions anyway.

Schools dont need this info though, teacher assessment is a much better indicator of how uour kids are doing. School assessments in our area are standardised with the LA to ensure schools are in the same ball park.
Tests are purely for the Government figures

My DD is in the same boat she’s been bouncing out her stress on the trampoline. Luckily her teachers have been amazing and we’ve been keeping to routine at home. She’s proud of herself for trying and knows we all are too. Good luck, last day tomorrow. Sending you a hug 🤗

I'm so sorry the sats are upsetting your dd. My ds is doing his as well. He has learning disabilities but doesn't seem stressed about it, just his usual cheerful self. He gets a custard cream and a drink before each test so he is quite enjoying them I think. I think school should be doing their best to make it not stressful for the children and the ones who still can't cope need to be excused from doing them.

If a little girl was ill - I’d question why did her parents send her to school that day?

My SEN DD was given extra time for the tests they thought she'd get results. She wasn't given extra time for the ones she wouldn't get required results for, as the teacher thought it best she wasn't left for even longer to stress out/feel hopeless. Seemed sensible.

My daughter is autistic with slow processing. She gets an additional 20 mins. She hasn't completed any of the maths papers.

Her mental health is very fragile and she has had many meltdowns, tears, suicidal thoughts etc since starting Y6 because the pressure on these kids is immense.

SEN should not be in mainstream - simple as that. Either adequately fund mainstream to accomodate the additional needs of SEN or fund seperate schools/Small units where they can receive more targeted help.

Systems broken.

I don’t think it’s too bad for children to experience exam conditions early when the outcome has no bearing on their personal success.

My son is sitting his currently. He’s in a mainstream school but has ASD and an EHCP. I’ve been very clear with him that it’s just something to get through, we have no expectations other than him doing the best he can and he’s been fine.

I don’t think SEN should automatically be a reason not to participate.

She’s going to have to cope with living in a world which isn’t designed for her. Lots of us do and we do it with all the extra anxiety and stress you describe your daughter having.

Today I argued (my bad) with a colleague who sent me a document to edit that they’d C + P from a couple of different sources. They didn’t realise how much stress and difficulty a mixture of swirly fonts in weird colours causes me; I had no idea fonts don’t matter to other people.

We need to deal with these non-events being difficult and with important events like her SATS being difficult.

Could you try helping her with coping strategies, for the stress and the exam?

SEN should not be in mainstream

There are plenty of children with additional needs who are doing great in mainstream.

Your blanket statement is nonsense.

SATS are (by their very name) standardised assessment tests. They are very effective at predicting future performance at GCSE and A level for neurotypical children. They are useless (and potentially counterproductive) for children who are not neurotypical.

Year 6 SATS can result in neurodivergent children being prevented from accessing higher level GCSE papers by streaming them too early in secondary.

If any child can participate in them without damaging their mental health and with the parenting support to undo any subsequent inappropriate streaming - then of course there is no reason to avoid them.

If, however, the test itself or the results are likely to negatively impact on the child, then I think withdrawing them is a parental responsibility.

Absolutely

Apologies.. I'll rephrase - SEN without additional funding

Neither.

So should we exempt them from GCSEs too? End of year tests? Anything else that might cause stress? Or do we let them have full control over the education system. While we are at it, shall we let them bypass job interviews and driving tests in future?