spelling tests and general moan

[Bart]

My y1 son has just had the results of his 160 word spelling test. He got 126 correct. His teacher has given no indication of which he got wrong but I suspect that some of the 34 errors will have been due to backwards letters or big flicks on the end of letters making them look like other letters. All the children are to take the test again on June 21st. I am really sad at the prospect of more weeks learning these words.

Does anyone else have to do this?


I`ve written a note asking his teacher to tell me what the errors are and if any are due to backwards letters etc. Is this cheeky of me or reasonable?

[Bart]

Thanks k. He/we are very pleased with him. She must want blood for an A though! 2.5 more days and we`re away from her and her test forever!

[Kayleigh]

That's great Bart. Your ds must be pleased
Just seen this thread and couldn't believe the amount of spellings in one test. It seems an awful lot for a 5/6 year old. My ds1 is almost 6 in year 1 and has just progressed from 5 to 7 spellings each week.

[Bart]

He got 139/160 yet I`ve just got his report and she has given him a B Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!

[Bart]

Wish you were our teacher megi. We`ve been going through the spellings he got wrong during half term - just a few a day. I try to do it with no pressure but I feel a bit like a Nazi soldier - following orders and swatting up for the test.

[megi]

Am a year 1 teacher.

Would never even think about giving children this young any kind of spelling test - children this young simply do not have a long enough concentration span to cope with the length of time the test would take to administer!
Learning should be fun and done through play!
It is a well known fact that children promptly forget obscure spellings that they have learnt in order to take a test - so there is no point in them! - This is even the case for older pupils - 80% of GCSE students would fail the exam if they were to re-take 2 months later - so what is the point of applying the same principal to 5 and 6 year olds?
I teach in a school which achieves amongst the highest KS1 and KS2 SATS results in Surrey, the younger children do not even know they are being tested - so this is proof that children do not need to learn in such a formal manner. - Surely it is a school's responsibility to give the children the tools which allow them to learn and achieve their full potential, and these tools can be used throughout life!(unlike some of the strange spellings people have put on this message board that their poor children have been told to learn, entirely out of context) - School is about developing confident, happy children who can problem solve and learn indpendently - not how many spellings they get correct from the national literacy strategy on any given day!!!!!

[fisil]

I don't want to defend the teacher because her behaviour does sound out of order, but it appears to me like the behaviour of someone under undue pressure. It sounds to me like someone is pressurizing her to come up with results and she is feeling like she's got to do something. What she's doing is an old-fashioned and counterproductive approach, but one that certainly would make her look like she's doing something in the eyes of those she is answerable to. It sounds to me like she is following a policy of "fulfillment". The original and best example of this was after WW1 when the Treaty of Versailles made impossible demands upon Germany. Rather than protest (which they realised they were totally powerless to do) Germany instead went for a policy of following the treaty to the absolute letter. This of course ended in other countries having to come to her rescue, the depression and hyper-inflation and the eventual consequences that we all know of. Now, I'm not saying that this teacher is about to start WW3, but I would suggest that her strange behaviour is a misguided response to some higher pressures.

It is horrible the amount of pressure teachers and pupils are put under, and heartbreaking when it is such a tiny child having to go through this.

[Bart]

Hello hmb, I thanked her for suggesting that ds only worked on 104 but said that we didnt want to single him out from his classmates. I put that in a note along with my feelings that we feel 5/6 y.o shouldnt have to cope with this sort of test as it takes all the fun and wonder out of school. In order to soften the tone of the letter I put in a line that said Im sure it was the National Curriculum forcing the testing and not what any of us would want in an ideal world. <br /> <br /> I didint know how it would go down but she seemed quite smiley for the rest of the week, even asking for some help in the library.

[countrylady]

How did things go when you picked up your ds after school, Bart? Talking of spelling reminded me of when our dd was in Year 2 and she had a teacher who couldn't spell very well. Often the lists of words to learn had spelling-mistakes on them! I couldn't bear to teach my dd the wrong spelling so corrected the words and asked about this politely at parents' evening. She accepted it saying she was often in a hurry when she wrote the words, but was cold towards me for the rest of the year. What can one do in these circumstances that is for the best?

[Bart]

Not a private school but yes the school does well in SATS. We even appear in times best state school list. Teacher is 50 ish (not more than 55) and yes is probably old fashioned.

Thanks all, I feel validated by the comments of so many other mumsnetters agreeing that this sort of test isn`t good for Y1 children.

[CODalmighty]

no teats evenr for ds1 year 1. has almost finished reading scheme so cant be too bad

[twogorgeousboys]

Early Years teacher person here.

Spelling Test of 160 words?

The school should be utterly ashamed of itself for putting small children through this.

Your little boy getting 126/160 - what a trouper, most adults would have fallen asleep at spelling number 77.

Yes, there are target groups of words that children need to be able to spell by the end of Y2 (according to National Curriculum guidelines) but that doesn't mean that 5 and 6 year olds should sit for hours on end in spelling "boot camps".

This kind of treatment of very young children at school makes me very very angry. Grrrrrrrrrrrr.

[HATCHETT]

My girls are in yr 1. When they started in reception we had a list of about 150 words which we were told they should know by the end of yr2. However I've done most of the teaching of these words with them at home.
They occassionally get a list of 10 words home to learn but no proper test. Teacher says the lists coming home are only for those children she thinks can cope with learning words & it's meant to be fun for them, not meant as a 'test'.
If I didn't teach them they would probably never learn them. However, still a goog school!!

[morsey]

Bart, does your son go to a private school or a school with very good SAT's results? That might explain the excessive pressure on getting 160 spellings correct. Or is the teacher very old (or just old fashioned!) or new and inexperienced?

[roisin]

I agree with you Bart, pulling him from the tests will single him out.

I don't agree with all that sort of testing though - our school certainly don't do anything on that sort of scale even with yr2s. They just work on the words gradually through the year.

[Bart]

Any ideas? got to pick ds up in a little over an hour.

If no input ideas come from you folks I thought I`d just say that I dont want him pulled from the tests because that would single him out. Am I a wimp?

[Bart]

To be truthful the school test the kids over 3 days but to my 6 y.o an extra night to revise makes v. little difference. I think the flash card testing of reading the key words is a bit rum too. The 6 words that the teacher said he couldn`t read he just read to his dad - no problem. I think its the time pressure that stops him with her.

[LIZS]

I'd be cross too. Shouldn't the "test" relate primarily to the y1 and R words with the year 2's being introduced into classroom work gradually over the rest of the term and into the next year. I'm afraid I do not see the logic behind all this pressure on kids 6 or younger except to try to boost the SAT results which are still a year away. I think 160 words being tested at once is overwhelming and demotivating for any kids who may struggle to meet the Year 1 targets.

Hope you manage to resolve this happily.

[Bart]

I spoke to the teacher this morning to return ds test papers and ask about his key word test (they also get tested to check if they can read the 160 words when they are presented quickly on flash cards). As I was leaving she said that "if I didint feel ds was up to the 160 word test, if I thought that it was too much for him, he could just have a 104 word test (ie drop Y2 words)". <br /> <br /> I dont want to make DS odd man out. It isnt the point who can or cant cope. I question if any 5/6 y.o should be asked to cope. Ds is quite able and would see being singled out as a reflection on his performance.

Im a bit cross now and am trying to think of what to say when I collect DS at 3 oclock.

Any advice would be welcome.

[victoriapeckham]

My y3 son is given 10 words a week. He must look up in the dictionary and write down the definitions, then he s tested on the words at end of week.

But get this, one of words was spelt wrong by the teacher. It was "heifty". Did teacher mean "hefty" or, since they were doing exceptions to i before e principle, "heifer"?

Frankly I was pretty alarmed that someone teaching my child is such a bad speller. (I'd noticed before she d corrected words on my son's essay which I knew were right). So what do I do? I am wondering whether she will read out word "heifty" tomorrow when he does test. I made him write down definition for word "heifer". I ve a feeling my son, or someone else in class, will tell her "heifty" is not a word!

[Bart]

She sent home ds test papers yesterday. I went through them so now know exactly how he did (I even found she had tested 4 words twice but left 4 out). I have to send the test papers back in today. The teacher didn`t speak to me at all, just put the stuff in ds bag - bit cold really.

[robinw]

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[robinw]

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[Yorkiegirl]

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[marbeth]

HI Bart

In my son's year 1 class they get 6 spellings a week of the high frequency words.There were 45 high frequency words for reception like am and the, which the class got tested on this year.However the remainder of the 160 high frequency words are to be learnt over year 1 and two.At the end of year two children would be expected to know all the words.

[Bart]

The 160 words are the 160 most frequently used words in the literacy strategy. Some of them are very easy like an and and but others like sister, brother and said are quite tricky. The list also includes there and their and where and were plus to too and two.

Thanks for all your replies, they give moral support but serve to make me more cross with his teacher/school. Not sure what to do next.

I sent a letter in today saying I was dismayed at the prospect of a retest on June 21st, and asked her to tell me the words that ds got wrong.