Testing for primary pupils at 5 and ranking at 11 - what do you think?

[SarahMumsnet]

The Deputy PM Nick Clegg has today unveiled a set of proposals around testing for primary school children.

Under the proposals, pupils aged 11 - who are already tested under the SATs - will be divided by their results into "ability bands" of 10%, and that information will be shared with parents, so that they can see how their children rank nationally.

Clegg also announced that he'll be launching a consultation on whether or not to bring in a "baseline" test at the start of the Reception year in order to establish where children are, and whether they need additional support.

However, teachers' unions have already raised objections to the proposals, with the leader of the National Association of Head Teachers, Russell Hobby, saying that "The vast majority of teachers are unhappy with the need to rank students."

What do you reckon? Does more testing - and more grading around the results - benefit children (and schools)? Or do we risk a return to the days of labelling children as successes and failures before they've hit their teens?

Quite right - more teachers, teaching smaller class sizes is the way forward, not testing! Simply thinking about the 'summer babies' versus September/October 'natural (!) leaders' and the real difference in individual's development, you will know that children develop at different times, depending on so many factors. And then there's the 'gender gap' issue... How can testing be the right way forward? If anything, it will accentuate both of these issues and leave children feeling even less confident…. You can't measure the children, but you could do a better job by spending the money in supporting the teachers in a positive way, in a that develops their ability to teach well.

If you know your dcs will be tested as soon as they put a foot into the school system. You (many parents) will prepare your kids to make sure your dcs are not disadvantaged by prejudice because of lower scores. So how can such testing present an accurate true picture. The league table already creates much damage and very inaccurate performance measure of many schools. Dd1's school by the league table (if you believe it!) is a very high performing school. However many parents are so disappointed by the time our dcs are into about year 4 and more so in yr5 and yr6. The school (like many high performing school) all the HT cares is the sat results and the top set kids. I don't know if it really bothers him or not despite knowing many of his pupils have tutoring outside school hours. The school's priority is no longer about preparing kids for life but preparing kids sat.
Since in yr5 and more so in yr6 many parents feel that our kids are being treated as more and more like exam monkeys.
It is not entirely the schools or the teachers fault but the obsession of competition between schools and the nc targets against every age and every term. From my parental experience such system only favour early bloomers and wealthier kids.

I bet there's not a child in the land who does not really know it's position in the class by age 11. Even if teachers do their best to hide marks children tell each other. They all know who are the brain boxes of the class and who aren't so I don't expect this will change things.

The one thing most parents want to know on teacher parent evenings is where is their child in the class related to the other children too.

Also some children are very competitive and can benefit if they are vying for the highest marks. They will all be marked by GCSE and A level (and degree if they do one) and ultimately by employers.

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When reading the new proposals it did nothing short of break my heart. TEACH TEACH TEACH TEACH and help children to reach their own individual potential. In what world is it ever ethical to write a child off at the age of 10. They should be ashamed.

Does he have shares in some private tuition companies because, at the end of the day, no parent wants to be told that their child, at the age of 11, is below national standards. In fact many parents want to hear that their child is bright (quite rightly so too). This is going to result in increased tuition to buy parents piece of mind that their child does have a future to look forward to.

In the areas where there are still Grammar schools/selective schools, private tuition does a booming trade.

On the back of all the private tuition, standards will appear to rise and the politicians will spin us the line that it was all their own doing as schools have improved under their remit.

What's more, what will the performance measurement at the age of 11 be used for? The child will be moving onto secondary school which will carry out their own assessments. Is this not just duplicating what is already being done?

If it is to be used as a way of assessing the performance of a school, isn't that what Ofsted/SATs do? So again wouldn't this be duplicating what is already being done?