SATS and 11+ why such a difference in expectation?

[gorionine]

I grew up abroad so learn about the UK school system as I go along with DD1.

As DD1 is now in year 6, we had in the last few month to get through the ordeal of choosing a high school. As DD's teachers have always been very happy with her work, we also got interested in grammar schools (the council next to ours has grammar school system so they are state ones)

She sat 2 11+ tests failed one and passed the other ,no tutoring (as I was completely oblivious of the fact 11+ was not the same as SATS) but did a few practice papers with her in the two weeks before the tests.

During this school holiday, her homework was to do a practice paper of sats , in condition (timed). I was surprised to see the difference in expectations between the two tests. I was expecting a bit of difference but there is a really big one.

Can someone explain to me why two different systems and when did it "split"?

They have never been the same and do mot pretend to be.
SATs are meant to be a measure of what the pupil knows and have questions clearly aimed at learning objectives from Natioal strategy. Thyey come in different levels so they can fairly closely match what your child is capable of. They do not have questions that deliberately catch children out.
11+ is about jumping through hoops so they can rank pupils and choose those who who will best fit in their school.

I guess one is about showing what they can do and one what they can't do.

So have both sytems always been there ?

""Thyey come in different levels so they can fairly closely match what your child is capable of. They do not have questions that deliberately catch children out.""

Thet might expalin why DD was so confident with the sats one then.

You also have to remember that sats will be sat by entire year groups (e.g. children of all academic abilities) and not all children will sit the 11+.

But mnistooaddictive is right; they have different objectives.

SATs are primarly a way of asessing achievement while the 11+ needs to judge potential

SATs are meant to be a measure of the school's ability to teach. The 11 plus is testing the child's ability to learn - the material is very similar to CAT tests done at the start of Secondary school. That is why the 11 plus often focuses on reasoning and the SATs test a body of knowledge that the child should know from school. So many children who may be as capable as your child may do poorly in the SATs because they attend a school that is not as good at teaching SATs knowledge as your child's is.

About 20% of children will get level 5 in their SATS, but our LEA only has grammar places for 5-10% of the children in state primaries within the LEA. Many of the places at the grammar will be given to children who live outside of the LEA or who went to a private prep school. So most children who get level 5s will not qualify for a grammar place (in some parts of Southern England this is not the case, but they are the exception).

The 11 plus is age standardised and the SATs are not, so the September born child who gets a 5C is not more capable than the August child who gets a 4A when age is taken into account.

And finally, many children are tutored for the eleven plus. Although many chuildren are tutored for the SATs too.

I have never noticed any trick questions in an 11 plus paper. They seem rational and straightforward to me.

In answer to your other question, SATs have not always been there. They are around 20+ years old. The 11 plus is older - my parents sat it 50+ years ago, but it is not sat everywhere and varies in different parts of the country. Most children will never sit the 11 plus.

SATs may well be abolished anyway. The KS3 ones have gone, and my DS was the last year to sit KS2 Science SATs.

"The 11 plus is age standardised and the SATs are not, so the September born child who gets a 5C is not more capable than the August child who gets a 4A when age is taken into account." I do not understand what you mean

I have not seen any tricked questions either in the 11+, just more subjects seem to be covered and the difficulty level is higher than the one of the sats paper DD just did (I do now understand from some posts that there are different levels up to level 5?) DD's one was level 3/4 and definitely too "easy" for her. does it mean that when the teacher will see how she did and maybe get her to try a more difficult one to see how she fares?

How does it work when the actual sats are done? Do they start on the level the teacher thinks they are at and then are given the "opportunity" to try an easier/more difficult one depending on the result? or they get mark on what the teacher has first given them even if the difficulty level is not necessarely accurate for that child?

So have both sytems always been there ?

No. The 11+ is ancient - a throwback to when the entire state sector was grammar school or secondary modern, with everyone taking (and being taught for) the 11+. Approximately 25% would go to grammar schools.

Now we only have a few grammars left, the state schools oddly seem to be barred from doing 11+ training.

SATs are relatively newfangled, and as others have said are mostly aimed at assessing the school rather than the individual pupil. They are attainment not aptitude tests. The 11+ tests may have questions which while not exactly 'trick' questions, may be novel and required thought rather than parrot tutoring.

The 11+ used to be the norm across the UK- every 11 yr old would sit it, and would go to either a grammar school, secondary modern or technical college. This continued until the 1960s when comprehensive education was introduced.

Bizarrely, some councils hung on to it; although they seem only to have hung on to the grammar schools and not the other two options.

SATs were introduced from 1991 and 1995 for 7 and
11 year olds respectively and provide teachers with a
snapshot of their pupils? attainment. However, since
1996 they have also been used to measure the success
of national strategies and the performance of a school
against national standards.

They are more than likely to be scrapped in the next year or so. Rightly so, IMO- they are worse than useless indicators of a child's or a school's performance.

Age standardisation (explained quite badly!)

In Primary schools, all children within a year group are assessed against SATs levels. A child born on 1st September is almost an entire year older than a child born on 31st August. So many children sat on the 'clever' table in primary schools tend to be born in September - January. They all sit the SATs at the same time and the age difference is not taken into account when calculating the scores.

In the 11 plus, age is taken into account. Pupils get a raw score of how many they got right. Usually, the mean score of September born is higher than the mean of the February, which is higher than that of the June children and so on.

So the examiners standardise the scores. They add points to the younger children's scores so that the top 2% of August marks become equivalent to the 2% of September marks and so on. This is done in a complex statistical way that is explained on the NFER website. The standardisation is based on the cohort's results, so the standardisation varies depending on the results of the specific children being tested.

To put it simply, if you child gets 86% and is born in September, and a child botn in August gets 84%, the August child gets to go to grammar school and your child doesn't.

I should add, your child's results sheet will show their standardised score, not their original raw score.

MillyR, DD is very "cross" at her teacher because she decided to make them do the science one even though it is not comnpuilsary any more. She was even more ennoyed when I told her I kind of agreed with her teacher.

My approach to tests is that they are there to pinpoint thinks she could have to work a bit harder on, not to make her feel bad if she does not have great results. With that perspective in mind I have no real problem with more subjects tested. I seem to have trouble understanding the importance of any test as a "national" gage of children/teachers ability though.

I do not remember when I was little that a school was judged according to how well the end of years exams were performed. I think in my days it was rather more a matter of different children abilities rather than different schools ability to teach IYWIM? Pretty much every parent would have happily sent their children to the local primary without feeling bad/having to worry because of the school failing reputation.

What is comprehensive education? Sorry I realise I sound very ignorant but it seems very complicated to me, as an outsider. I also feel the systems have changed many times in a short periode of time (half a century) Does the school system change according to whichever political party leads the country?

So the raw scores could be August - 84 and September -86, but could then become standardised as August - 88 and September - 86, so that individual August child is ranked higher than that individual September child.

Thanks MillyR! I do understand better now (Age standardisation)you did not explain baddly BTW, I am just very clueless!

Just to clarify - the 11+ is not age-standardised everywhere. I am in Essex and age is not taken into consideration here.

gorionine - "comprehensive" describes the school intake, as in it would educate children of all ability levels as opposed to a grammar school which would select on ability.

I can only give my personal opinion on the value of tests. Many people on MN will give you a variety of opinions and many of them are teachers are very well-informed.

I don't think there is any value in SATs in their current form. I think there is a value in having some method of assessing the school's ability to teach the national curriculum, or some teachers would just decide not to teach maths all year (as happened at my school in the eighties!) but there is no need for children to be individually assessed and the results published.

The 11 plus is not perfect, but nobody can come up with a replacement. It should only be seen as an entrance exam - you should forget about it afterwards.

Comprehensive schools seem to be on the way out - they are being called Academies or specialist colleges instead.

A comprehensive school is one that is capable of educating children of all abilities.

I agree with Milly about SATs- CATs tests (which most pupils sit in year 7) are a far better indicator of pupil aptitude IME.

When decidind which SAts paper to give, the teacher needs to allow them room to do better than expected but not so it is too hard for them to achieve anything.
Academies or specialist colleges are still comprehensive if there is no academic entrance criteria.

'but there is no need for children to be individually assessed and the results published'

Sorry, off message here but surely a DC needs to be tested but the results only made available to the LEA, the school and the parents! How on earth else would it be possible to flag up the class that hadn't learned maths for a year?!

Also, be aware that the idea that: 'Bizarrely, some councils hung on to it (the 11+); although they seem only to have hung on to the grammar schools and not the other two options (SM and technical schools)- can't be 100% true. If you live close to a grammar (many have done away with catchments so as to be able to cream off the very brightest from a wider area) the remaining schools can't really be classified as' comprehensive' IF they've had the cleverest removed!

tethersend, is the verbal/non verbal reasoning CATS test very different to the verbal/non verbal reasonning of the 11+ ? I am getting more and more confused.

By ampere Tue 23-Feb-10 10:39:08 ""Sorry, off message here but surely a DC needs to be tested but the results only made available to the LEA, the school and the parents! How on earth else would it be possible to flag up the class that hadn't learned maths for a year?!""

Surely parents would raised the subject "How is DC doing with his numeracy?" at a parent evening and then it would come out (before the end of the year)that they have not done any math at all? Or would the teacher lie and say they are doing great?

Do I gather that you haven't seen the recent Dispatches programmes on the state of Maths teaching in some Primary schools? link

I think that SATS are a good idea if they are published on a school-wide basis, not on an individual basis. That way it highlights if there is a problem with the quality of teaching. How else do you know - unless it is when you find out too late to remedy the situation?

Thanks for the link Senua, I thought the programm was on soon I have missed it. I will watch it with DH as cannot figure out how to see it on 4oD myself!

gorionine: you are assuming an involved, committed parent! Not all would attend parents evening, many are a bit intimidated by schools and teachers; some wouldn't quite understand what a teacher was getting at.

Also, whilst a school might not actually lie as such there are huge economies that can be made with the truth! And one teacher's 'Johnny is doing fine at maths' could be another's 'I'm setting Johnny p*ss easy work so he can't fail'. Nationally set standards can't be messed with in the same way.

As for CATS and 11+ I think there are a lot of similarities, to be honest. Many secondary schools take note of a DC's SATS from Y6 but still CAT in Y7 as the 2 tests reveal different qualities.

I think you can assume I am fairly naive as well (on top of being an involved committed parent of course)

Thank you all, you have really answered a lot of my questions.

Actually,I do not know if I should thank you for it as I am now more worried than ever before about school test and the way things are taught!

"Surely parents would raised the subject "How is DC doing with his numeracy?" at a parent evening and then it would come out (before the end of the year)that they have not done any math at all? Or would the teacher lie and say they are doing great?"

The Dispatches programme was quite scary. They had a sample quiz where they asked teachers to do questions aimed at 11 year old ability. Only one teacher (out of about 150 IIRC) got it 100% right.
So would you like to rely on a teacher's POV (where they may be so bad themselves that they cannot comprehend, let alone teach) or an external, impartial assessment by experts?