To ask quick SEN question - SATs

[Evermore1]

Just need some knowledge about children's or parent' rights in relation to SATs.
My 10 year old child is in year 6 and is dyslexic with a 4 year reading delay. But she is very bright, engaged, extremely articulate with excellent vocabulary and understanding, and she is clever. However, she is reading at year 2 level because of her dyslexia.
School have removed her from all SATs revision classes and anything SATs related without informing me. I've found out from other mums that their children have been attending extra sessions at school for SATs practice, but my DD has not been included, but school haven't discussed it with me.
I've now found out school have decided she's not doing her SATs.
She brought home a timetable yesterday and told me she'd been given it at school and was told she would be doing it whilst the rest of her year practice their SATs. It says things like 'Go in to the nursery and play with the nursery children' (the school has a nursery attached to it), and 'Craft', etc.
DD is today stating that she wants to do her SATs, she says she wants to be included and that she doesn't want to be singled out from the rest of her year group. She has been very clear about this with me today when I discussed it with her.
What I need to know is, do I as her parent have any rights about her doing SATs? Does she as a pupil have any rights? Or does the school have the authority to remove her from performing in SATs, and the authority to remove her from all the lessons and extra sessions the other children are having in preparation for sitting their SATs?
I need to be clear about things before I approach the school about this.
I am really unhappy with the way my DD is being dealt with, but I want to be accurate about the facts and what our rights our versus what the school's rights are.
Thank you to anyone out there who knows more than me about this!

When I say pass, I mean that they are working at a KS1 level and they have a form of SEN which means the SATs will put undue pressure on them.

If we pull a child out of SATs, you do know that still counts as a fail for the school? So there is no cheating, we don't gain anything apart from not seeing our children with sen extremely overwhelmed.

Just to clarify- is the timetable she's been given for a specific week (e.g. a mock SATS week) or for every week? More understandable if it's a one off if they have decided she isn't sitting the tests but totally unacceptable if it's an every week thing. Although Y6 is SATS year, every should be taught a full curriculum adapted to their needs if necessary, so that isn't OK.

The guidance is generally that if a child is working below the key stage (I.e. at year 2 level) then they shouldn't take the SATs - it depends whether her reading delay is causing her to work at that level in Maths too, in which case a reader wouldn't help.

I would assume that the school have made the decision in her best interests following the guidance as it won't help their data at all. They must assume she would score almost zero in every test otherwise it would be "worth" entering her if she could achieve any kind of scaled score. Did she do KS1 SATs?

However, all that said, this should have been agreed in discussion with you and with your daughter, so I'm really sorry its been done this way.

SATs tests are designed for children working at or above a particular standard. Children who are working below that standard should not be entered for the tests.

There would be no point your DD sitting the tests if she was unable to do or even have a reasonable go at the things being tested. It would just be a depressing and miserable experience for her.

There are special arrangements called "access arrangements" possible for children who have specific difficulties, but from what you say your dd wouldn't benefit from these. She could possibly have extra time, rest breaks, someone to read the maths papers to her, a scribe - but it doesn’t sound as if these would help. No reading help is allowed for the reading comprehension test.

There is no point her being tested on things she has not been taught or cannot do, and it would be wrong for the school to enter her for the tests if they assess her as working below the level needed. You can find, online, tests from past years, so you can see what they are like.

Having said all that, the school should definitely be discussing all this with you. Ask for a meeting.

Has your DD had a look at some Sats papers? If not, you can access old paper online for free. You could print off a reading one and a maths one and have a look through together.
If your DD isn't overwhelmed by them, then that would be a good conversation starter with the school.

I should have said, she could also have the Grammar and Punctuation test read to her, but wouldn’t be allowed any help in understanding the terms used.

If she is timetabled to do craft or playing with younger children during the tests themselves, plus one lot of practice tests, that’s reasonable. But if it’s a regular occurrence between now and May, it isn’t. Talk to the school.

It is mock SATs where I am this week, maybe the timetable is just for this week? Year 6 still have the rest of the curriculum to learn so I doubt that she could be timetabled out till May. I would ask for clarification.

Thank you everyone for your replies.
I am reading them all the great interest.
I didn't know I could access previous papers. I'm just looking through 2019 ones.
The maths she wouldn't be able to do, for sure.
The reading and the grammar are interesting.....she would not be able to read through that volume of words on a page in the time given. But I've just read through a few examples and what's interesting is that if I read it all out to her, her compression would be perfect, and she would memorise it all, and then if I read the questions out to her, I know full well she would be able to correctly and easily answer the questions verbally. In fact, regarding the reading papers, her understanding and interpretation of what the text is saying, her ability to remember and retain the text, and her ability to think through the answers in response to the text - if it were all done verbally - would be a lot stronger by far than some of her classmates who I know very well who can read easily and are sitting the sats.

She isn’t allowed a reader for the reading paper.

She should be getting extra time. My dc (autism) both get 25% extra time.

They can’t assess her reading if someone else does the reading for her.

Your dd may want to sit the tests but that doesn’t mean it’s what’s best for her. Setting her up to fail is not good for her. They need to be educating her at her own level and they can’t just shove her in reception when they’re doing sats work. She deserves to be taught what she needs to learn. I would be fighting for proper provision, not the SATs.

I used to teach. For the Reading SATs, teachers absolutely cannot read the paper to the children. They can read to them for all others, but it is not allowed for the Reading paper - because it is testing their reading ability, not just their comprehension. (I do think that this is hugely unfair on dyslexic children like your daughter btw. There are other things I also think are vastly unfair, like the fact that children CANNOT gain Expected for Writing SATs if their handwriting is messy - even if they write the most beautiful, sophisticated work in the world.)

Have you looked at this guidance for registering pupils for SATs?

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/key-stage-2-tests-guide-to-registering-pupils-for-the-tests

Children who are working 'below the standard' of the KS2 tests don't have to sit them - that means children who are working at KS1 or lower. But they could, for example, be disapplied from the Reading - but not from Maths, because they can access the Maths fine. Has your daughter been disapplied from everything? Because that seems crazy to me - she will be entitled to a reader for every other paper.

Also, I really do feel that disapplying her from the SATs is a conversation that should have been had between you and the class teacher / the head / the SENCO. Especially as your daughter really wants to do them. Sounds like she would qualify for extra time on the Reading paper.

If it were me, I'd be asking for a meeting with school pronto. And making sure they know she doesn't want this alternative timetable, and she's perfectly happy to have a go at the SATs revision that everyone else is doing.

Your daughter sounds lovely BTW! What a mature little girl.

The HT doesn’t need your consent to disapply DD from the SATS. The guidance explicitly states the HT has the final decision, although they should discuss it with you and DD would still count towards the statistics.