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?

There is a saying 'you can't keep weighing the pig to make it fatter.'

All that time that will spent testing and teaching to be tested - is absolutely wasted time.

In south-east England it is normal to have uniform with shirt and tie from Reception in a state school and shirt, tie and suit from Reception in a private school.

Got any actual proof to back that up rrbrigi? I can't think of a single state primary in my large SE town where children wear shirts and ties.

spread that link FAR AND WIDE
www.gov.uk/government/consultations/new-national-curriculum-primary-assessment-and-accountability

That's a nice analogy fillyjonk.

Me either (shirt and ties at state primary). Actually, the only one in our borough that does, afaik, is the church school.

Less than a fifth of independent schools do SATs because they are 'counterproductive and corrosive' and 'a relentless grad-grinding experience'. That's down from 50% when they were first introduced.

www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/9558829/Private-schools-axe-crude-Sats-tests.html

So are they acknowledging the state system always been a lot more rigorous than the independent sector? Isn't it a contradiction to suggest there is underperformance in the state system when they can't even benchmark against private schools?

Do you know what I noticed? It is a few school who wants shirt and tie. I thougt it is the same in every state school, sorry. But here is the evidence and this is not a church school:

WINTER UNIFORM
All children should return in September in their Winter uniform. (If the weather is particularly warm we will review the wearing of ties).
Our dress code has two options for winter uniform. Parents can choose either Option 1 or Option 2 for their child.

Mid-grey tailored skirt or pinafore dress (straight skirts are not acceptable)
Mid-grey tailored trousers/shorts (flared or bootlegged styles are not acceptable)
White long/short sleeved shirt
White long/short sleeved shirt
Navy/gold tie 
Navy/gold tie 
Grey v-necked sweater or cardigan
Grey v-necked sweater or cardigan
Grey, navy or white socks or tights
Grey, navy or white socks or tights
 Ties are not required for the Summer Term but should be worn for the Autumn Term and Spring Term. Neither trousers nor skirts should have any jewellery or other adornments attached to them.

muminlondon I would like to know sooner than later if my child is in the bottom of the class. At least I know he needs help and I can give the help for him.

I wanted to say this to Ohhelpohnoitsa.

Well, round here uniform is flexible and involves polo shirts. Trousers, skirts, pinafores and shorts can all be black or grey, not one or the other. The kids look fine. The idea of putting a just-turned-four-year-old in a tie makes me want to weep, frankly.

my girls primary school had ties from age 4 : but then the uniform is one of the most distinctive in Saith Ken

It is different to height charts (but possibly not weight charts, which are controversial, as are BMI percentile charts) because educational ranking by percentile comes with a judgement of worth. The top 10% are thought of as better than the bottom 10% (indeed, better than the 90% below them). Height is far more neutral (although weight certainly does come with judgement).

And it in no way helps anyone. Schools work with the cohort they get, not national averages. And children aren't in competition. Learning isn't a zero sum game.

One school uniform with a tie does not a norm make... Incidentally the best performing state school in my bit has a polo shirt and sweatshirt uniform. Dressing like a young conservative doesn't actually have anything to do with teaching and learning.

i am concerned that some parents will deem their child to have failed if they are not in the top 10% this risks a 90% "failure rate."

i do object though to being told by a government bod on the radio that i do not understand levels. better than the exceeds/meets/not met expectations we are going to get in future. that gives no indication of progress.

rrbrigi ''muminlondon I would like to know sooner than later if my child is in the bottom of the class. At least I know he needs help and I can give the help for him.''

So you want to wait until the end of Y6 to find out?

By continuous assessment and data tracking, children with problems are identified very early on in primary school at the moment.

No, I meant I would like to know as soon as possible, so I can help him to catch up with the work.

Don't you get annual reports? An explanatory note with the report that tells you national expectations for the levels/sublevels of that specific year group (with the caveat that progress is never even, that there are spurts and plateaux)? Opportunities to check work and speak to the teacher once a term? Regular comments in a reading record?

If not, and it is a terrible shock to find your child is in the top 40% but not the top 30%, there is not much time for the school to do anything more as the results are given to you after you have already secured a secondary place and about a week before the end of term. I know I would just feel slightly unsettled but powerless. And how would you communicate that to your child - how would you expect them to respond?

I have to admit I haven't read everyone's post - so apologies to anyone who has also already said this.

It seems to me teachers feel that the NC Levels at KS1/ KS2 SATs already give relative rankings approximately.

Teachers also argue that they have a great deal of data on performance of individual children.

Parents posting on this seem to be saying that they'd like to know how their child is doing nationally (data that a local school might not hold initially) and often do not understand detail on their child's school performance in core subjects.

Schools should be more proactive - identifying earlier those pupils who are not achieving the notional attainment targets for that year and getting them extra help. It would be a huge improvement if teachers could be comfortable enough to openly discuss this with parents, possibly sending home extra work, hosting workshops to help parents understand what they can do, etc....

Our school is woefully slow to openly tell parents a DC isn't doing as well as expected. Years go by - i.e. DD1 didn't get reading support until Y4, when it was clear to us that by early-Y2 she was seriously behind her peers in the school.

Help did come (at home & at school) and it did make a difference - but primaries need to be more proactive and notional achievement targets need to be seen as minimum performance target for pupils (with the proviso that pupils with health issues/ special needs may not be able to make 'mainstream' targets). Also it shouldn't take parents becoming 'pushy' to get help for a child - it really should be something easily coped with by effective teaching/ senior management tracking of pupil progress.

It seems if the goal is to raise standards then that challenge has to start in primary so that secondaries are not struggling to get large portions of their entering Y7 cohort 'up to speed'.

I agree that a blank statement 'You're in the bottom 10%' seems harsh, but the reality is with KS2 results that you can see what percentage scored broad NC Levels nationally, so most parents already are given this information, but possibly not as bluntly. I also think that the point is what happens next.

Telling a child & their family their bottom 10% and doing nothing to rectify this doesn't seem an effective or helpful approach. (With the obvious proviso that this excludes those children suffering chronic illness/ disease and/or those with learning difficulties/ disabilities which may preclude 'mainstream' targets) If the lowest 25% (maybe more) are going to have resources targetted at them to improve their educational standard then although it would be upsetting to hear you're not meeting standard - if this is used as a means of identifying those pupils in need of additional support/ tuition and targetting resources to them, that does strike me as a good thing. But as many have mentioned the later this kind of intervention is left the harder making positive improvements becomes. Therefore, it may be better to ensure a basic standard of pupil progress tracking and speedy intervention - so that a DC unable to subtract is helped at the time, not years later.

However, in all this hoopla nobody seems to have clearly explained what the intention of formally ranking a child against ability bands (by 10% - top 10%, 10 - 20%, etc...) is meant to achieve - and frankly why devise such a system if you have no intention of doing anything once you've generated the data (labelled the child)?

PastSellByDate for the last two years there has been a new 'progress' measure - schools are meant to ensure pupils attain at least two levels of progress between KS1 and KS2. And Ofsted is now very strict on tracking data. So schools won't be able to avoid focusing on children at all ability levels rather just getting them to Level 4.

The other thing is that deciles are really misleading anyway. If you're ranked according to a fixed number of pupils you will find that although the majority of pupils are 4a-4c, and cluster around 4b, their deciles may span 20-70% even though there is little difference in marks between the top and bottom of them. A bit like the data dashboard where some grammar schools are in the 4th quintile despite being in the highest quintile of grammar schools (which is 6% of the population).

Make your views clear here
www.gov.uk/government/consultations/new-national-curriculum-primary-assessment-and-accountability

I think at the best 50% of pupils will think they have failed.

It is also counter to all research on brain function and psychology.

Oh sorry silly me "we just ignore all that kind of thing if it conflicts with how my private schools worked"; regardless of how strong the evidence is for how the brain works (CT Scans and so on).

Mum but the 2 levels progress doesn't help those in a weak school or those who matured after y2 Sats ie it goes against some children.

If it's a weak school Ofsted will probably use the progress measure to downgrade it. The governors/LA should then have an action plan - unless it's forced to become an academy (for which there's no justification IMO). But I agree it's a bit crude. And the govt obviously wants to widen the progress measure to justify testing at 5 but that's even cruder and more unreliable.