AIBU to think the SATs / 11+ pressure is nuts?

[MizzyDazzy]

My daughter is in year 4 and I think her school is quite high pressure. They have always done constant test papers and have now started converting the scores to standardised SATs marks and telling the kids where they are and if they are working towards, expected or greater depth.

This is clearly quite openly talked about in the classroom and my daughter is very aware of where she and everyone else is.

This has caused her to come home in tears the last few weeks over her scores. She’s dyslexic and hasn’t always found academics easy.

She got a solid expected in maths and just missed out in spag (got it for grammar but was dragged down by her spelling, which is her major issue with the dyslexia). They annoyingly didn’t tell the kids their English comp scores but hers was greater
depth.

I think she’s doing really well, particularly when I know it hasn’t been easy for her, but she is in floods of tears as she has some of the lowest scores in the class. I do believe she is one of the bottom as most of the children will go on to get greater depth in their SATs and most are already being tutored quite heavily for 11+. She is also in a number of intervention groups.

AIBU to think she’s done well and her school is just bonkers? Or are most kids across the country doing much better than this? For context her scores are, 107 maths, 98 spag (105 on grammar) and 132 English comp.

The parents WhatsApp’s is going crazy over the scores and breakout groups for 11+ “support” depending on what schools you will be targeting and this definitely spills into the classroom. She sat next to a girl who was saying she must have one of the worst scores as she had dropped 4 marks on a paper!

We don’t actually live in an 11+ area but boarder 2 with 2 of the top grammars in our doorstep that don’t have catchments. So people need almost full marks to get in to these schools and I think they’ve lost all sense of perspective.

I just find this all absolutely ridiculous and hate that I feel trapped in it. My daughter isn’t going to take the 11+ and SATs really are not that important. I’m debating taking my daughter out of the school because the pressure is just so stupid and clearly going to get worse. But she is very happy with her friends there and generally at school so moving her feels risky in a way. Plus I assume all schools in this area will be the same…

So if we leave her in the school how can I support her and help her feel confident / proud of what she has achieved? And stop this constant comparison?

Why are they practicing for SATS in year 4?

It sounds like the culture of the school is the problem. I'd ask for a meeting with the head of year.

That particular school is nuts, many are not. It's unlikely you will change the culture of the school so I think you either have to move your child or try to mitigate the damage being done at home (and probably leave the WhatsApp group)

even mentioning sats in year 4 is madness.

Yes academics are important but it’s only one part of what makes a well rounded child. Your schools approach sounds like a recipe for anxiety in children.

Definitely discuss this with the school. They should be sticking to the syllabus rather than SATS testing. It’s poor education just teaching to pass a test. I’d threaten to withdraw her from the tests. Although unfortunately the schools don’t usually care unless the child is anticipated to get greater depth across the board and improve the schools average results.

I wasn’t sure if this was normal or not… They’ve always done constant test papers at school, but this is the first time they’ve directly related them to the SATs for the kids. My year 1 son does tests every term as well.

I assume it’s because all the school cares about are their results.

Most state schools aren’t even thinking about sats in year 4 or year 5 for that matter.

it sounds like your child is in a school where parents are targeting high achieving secondaries that require very high marks to get in and yes, if parents are doing this the children will be aware and there will be talk in the classroom.

Regular tests to see where children are up to is normal, but most schools do it in a low key no pressure way!

That is crackers.
Talk about crushing a child's love of learning 🙄

I wouldn't take her out of school if she enjoys it and has friends there. What I would do is try and build her resilience.
The phrase I used to my dc's was there is a place in life for everyone.

It doesn't sound to me like they are. Most end of term assessments - which have been used in many schools for at least the past 15 years and probably much more - now use this terminology. It's nothing to do with Y6, it's where children are against current year group expectations. Under the old curriculum, children would be assessed as working at 3c of 4b or whatever. I don't tell the children their scores because I don't think Y4# benefit from knowing but many children are very keen to know and ask a lot.

Testing is standard but should be very low key. Genuinely, most children I've taught enjoy the assessments because they just do their best and never look at them again, unlike classwork where they have to look at corrections and keep trying with the trickier questions (in a test they just skip what they can't do).

It sounds like that school is nuts as others have said!

What a dreadful school!
Even talking about SATS in Y4 is insane!
Just teaching to the SATS test will narrow an already pretty narrow curriculum and will turn the children off learning altogether.

Both my two hated Y6 because of the SATs focus and their school was fairly chill about it until the run up to the tests really. They were both fed up with school at the end of Primary and found it all boring but they each came into their own in Secondary with new subjects, more variety etc.

I would look to change schools if you can, that just sounds horrific for your child especially if she is dyslexic.
My youngest is dyslexic too & never passed a spelling test but concentrated on becoming amazing at SPAG & it carried her through SATs.
She's now at University, still can't spell but with a laptop, spell checker & other assistive tech it really doesn't matter.

I get the testing is probably normal, but it’s definitely not low key at her school as the teacher handed out the papers around the class telling everyone as she gave them the paper whether they were WTE EX or GD. So everyone could hear. The lowest scoring children then got taken out to go through what they got wrong with the TA.

She has always been made to go through the paper and do the corrections after every test.

A parent with a child in year 6 told me the children’s scores are on a chart on the classroom wall and get moved up and down with each paper so everyone can see how they’re doing. Her daughter came out one day buzzing as the big news was how one boy who always gets 100% dropped a mark.

Look for a different school, the culture is the issue.

That's completely unusual and unacceptable behaviour.

If you want to keep her in the school for social reasons, tell her that the tests are to make sure the school is teaching well so they want the best grades they can get, but it doesn't matter what grade she gets because it isn't about her.

But I wouldn't want my child in that environment. My DD3 is extremely bright and that culture in secondary broke her (along with bullying) and she's now in a special school, recovering.

yes maybe I should! Are you a teacher? Would her scores normally be bottom of the class?? Maths 107 and spag 98 - I get that’s a fail but 105 on just the grammar part as she’s never going to do well on the spelling.

Sorry to hear that happened to your daughter.

I have repeatedly told my daughter it’s a test of the school and she gets upset about letting her teacher and school down! She is an incredibly empathetic child.

That is too much pressure. DD is year 5. She has just done a round of tests. We were told at parents' evening her overall scores e.g. greater depth, but not her numerical marks. Whilst we could tell our DC, it doesn't have the same level of competitiveness, as it's much broader. Some of these kids are prepping for 11+ but they are not directly comparing this.

This is a poorly run school.

My daughter went to a prep where the majority of the kids do go on to grammar and independent and there was no open discussion of scores like this! The 11+ nonsense was confined to a WhatsApp group just for that, which DH and I didn't join.

DD went to a good inclusive comprehensive where she is middle of the road academically.

98 is not a fail! It is an assessment that she is meeting very nearly all of where they expect her to be for her year. My daughter is year 6 about to do SATS, she just got 99 on a maths practice paper. No one else knows in her class and she doesn’t know anyone else’s scores (other than kids chatting between themselves). The school sounds appalling to put children’s marks on display.

Sounds totally bizarre, our school is nothing like this. My DD is in Y4 and the only thing talked about at the moment is the Easter fayre and design a bonnet competition.

This does not happen in my kids school. My son is year 6. It's only this year they have been doing SATs papers. Each term from year 3 onwards they do an assessment paper for English and maths (which the school buys in) but it's not SATs and as a parent we then get told if they are working at greater depth, expected, below expected on their reports. It seems insane that they are doing SATs papers in year 4 when they are unlikely to have even covered all the curriculum.
It's also wrong that marks are being tracked for all the class to see. My son has a record of his own scores on the practice papers he has done but this is not shared with friends.
It sounds like your school has a particular focus on academics. Also although we are in a grammar school area there is no push from the school towards this. My son is one of only a handful going to the grammar school (and no we didn't tutor him either, so there was no pressure, and it's his own ability that has got him the place).

Well yes, this is ridiculous pressure.

However, did you pick the school (at least in part) because it has good academic results? Parents doing this is part of the problem as it puts pressure on schools to achieve them.

I don't think they are doing year 6 level SATs papers, I think it's year 4 curriculum so the papers are like the SATs papers but with that year's curriculum so then they use the SATs standardised scoring to tell them where they are at.