I don't want my son to sit his yr 6 SATS!

[mamauk]

Has anyone else taken their child out from school specifically to avoid the SATS? Is this 'allowed', I mean I am thinking my child's education is mine alone to decide...... and that I do not need 'permission' to do this?

My son was home educated until last year and decided to try school so as to have more opportunity to socialise on a more frequent basis.

My concerns:

~I feel this year, since Christmas, the emphasis of teaching in his class has been 'teaching to test'. Utterly geared towards these SATS tests. Thus the curriculum as a whole feels narrowed and limited and not a broad spectrum of learning one would hope in a year 6 setting. The teaching has been limited and narrowed down to Maths and English taking up lots of time.

~ I feel a more enjoyable and productive few months might have been had if this emphasis had not been on the SATS.

~ I feel this approach and high levels of anxiety (by teachers) has started to poison my son's feeling towards education. As mentioned previously, as a home educated child he believed he could/would/was good at anything he tried, and has been utterly squashed by the current teaching and constant assessment. he comes home telling me how much has has gotten 'wrong' . His self image is suffering. His self confidence and self esteem too, obviously. he seems sort of hesitant when talking, as if he might be getting something wrong! it is horrifying to see.

~Just reading this I am sort of wondering why the hell I allowed him to go to school! I feel now perhaps I should have taken further steps to simply increase outside social time when at home (we already did lots of groups and activities, my son is just super sociable).

~It all seems like such a wasted year, especially when ongoing teacher assessment happens anyway, as a matter of course.

~Can I contact the school and tell then he will not be coming in that week? What will they do? I don't feel I need 'permission'. But am wondering what might be the consequences.....? Anyone know?

The school already said that the results have no effect on subject streaming in High School, it's just a matter of league tables.

Opinions please!

thanks,

Claire

He is going to have a nasty shock in secondary school if he doesn't have a realistic appreciation of his own ability.

What does that have to do with my questions?

Are you sure it is right that he believes he is good at everything? He will be in for a nasty shock at senior school. Maybe he has got some stuff wrong?

Arbitrary testing of a child in a limited number of academic subjects has nothing to do with their abilities as human beings.

What I mean is he believed he was capable of anything. As in a child who looks at someone running fast and believes yes, one day they too could do that. The sort of happy belief that one feels as a child, when the world seems full of possibility ... remember that?

You have set him up to fail. You withdraw now, then he starts secondary and be realises he may not be very good at some subjects etc
Are you going to withdraw him from tests he will have on a weekly basis.

I don't know what you mean by allowed. You could keep him off for those days. It would be an unauthorised absence. Science is usually teacher assessment anyway. If you think testing and assessment is bad for your child, then maybe mainstream school is a bad choice. Is Steiner a possibility? Or some thing smaller and less exam focussed?

It's a bit late now isn't it! All your "problems" are to do with what has already happened, surely you should have done something at the time, rather than after the event.
As to what could happen, the absence will be recorded as unauthorised, depending on how your authority views it, you could be fined.

It's just a matter of league tables.

If you don't want him to sit the SATs pretend his ill, no point being awkward with the school.

But I think if you've signed him up for school, and everything that goes with Y6 then he may as well sit the damn SATs after putting in the work all year.

But - its the school you disagree with.

Keeping him at home sick for one week won't change the fact he's already spent last term studying for them.

I really fail to see how sitting the test is the problem (as opposed to sitting hundreds of practice papers)

You don't have to find out what marks he gets. You can throw the results envelope in the bin unopened.

You are not allowed to keep him off school for a week. And school are certainly not allowed to not let him sit them.

If he's sick that week school will probably ring you and probably pressure you to send him in.

They may send someone round to see him. If they think he isn't sick they could probably fine you.

I think, having decided to send him to school, you now have to play ball.

Alternatively you decide to HE him again.

But you can't pick and choose which bits of school he participates in.

Could it be that your home education hasn't served him well at all, and you're worried that the SATs will reveal that?

Yeah. I feel it is sort of too late in a way, you are right. He already spent most of this year cramming at at school. I am lamenting over it I guess. I had no idea it would be so highly focused upon these last months (had I know I may have acted differently after Christmas). He came home this weekend with three past papers to practice and it suddenly just seems so absurd a way to spend time.......

sunscorch -that made me laugh :)

"I think, having decided to send him to school, you now have to play ball.

Alternatively you decide to HE him again.

But you can't pick and choose which bits of school he participates in."

I agree. There are somethings I don't like my DC doing at school , but it comes as a package, and parent's can't pick and choose which bits their children do.

sunscorch -that made me laugh smile

HTH

Hopefully he will have a fantastic time at school after the SATs. DS1's teacher seemed to suddenly teach loads of fun things that there hadn't been time for earlier in the year.

Good point.

After SATs we have:

• residential trip
• school production
• sports day
• secondary school transition day

And loads of other things I don't know about.

I suspect you'll be much happier with his school then.

Like the others, I think it's a bit late now. 2 more weeks of the boring bits and then they spend a couple of months having fun, doing the trips and productions and extra art and sports and projects.

The second half of yr 2 and yr 6 have been the least exciting bits of school for my primary children, the months that do seem like just practise for a test, I'm not wild about sats at all. But taking them out makes it more of a big deal than just reminding them it's a test of the school and the teachers and not something for them to stress about.

I feel for you OP because I am getting cross about the whole 'there is only one answer and it's in the back of the book' school of thought of teaching. :(

I don't think you can realistically avoid them, but you can say to him I do not care one iota how you do on this test, treat it as a game, don't get worried about it because really it doesn't matter, it's just to check the TEACHERS are doing a good job not you

And good on ya for having the guts to HE him for as long as you did :)

You know you cannot make a child take them. Tell your son he doesn't have to fill out the test paper if he doesn't want to.
My DD is in a similar situation and I said if you fancy doing them go for it and if you don't you don't have to, nobody will make you or punish you.

Summer term is lots of fun though so I'm sure he'll enjoy school alot more once you get over half term.

Sorry if you have a nice kid, then you are putting more stress on them by telling them SATs are to test the teacher as
they will want to do well for the teacher.

What about your son - does he want to take the tests ? Surely he should have a say about what he wants to do.
In the long term SATs aren't a big deal and most secondary schools do other tests at the start of Y7 so the school shouldn't be putting too much pressure on the Y6 children. Bringing home past papers to practice, isn't really needed and you can opt out of this activity. However some schools do go to great lengths to make sure that ALL Y6 children are in school during SATs week. They will probably arrange for "sick" children to do the tests in a separate room and be collected by their parents afterwards.

He does not want to take them, he made that clear when I asked him. He also knows they are for the benefit of the school, that I told him also, I think it's just the pressure and monotony of the last few months taking it's toll.....

thank you whomovedmychocolate, I am still home educating my other 9 yr old ds who has no desire to go to school after seeing his brother attend, and also my young dd who (in my eyes at 4 yrs) is waaaayyyy to young for school and all it entails (for one thing, she likes to sleep in until 9am, the idea of waking her before she is ready would not be like kissing sleeping beauty awake, let me tell you...)

I think you're going to have lots of tough decisions to make over the next few years if he continues to go to school, but you continue to believe HE is better for him.

This is just the tip of the iceberg.

In general I really, really believe that if you send your child to school it is in the child's best interests for you to support the school.

You can change schools, or HE, but I don't see how undermining school is in your DSs best interest.

He has chosen to go to school. He now has to fit in and do what's expected of him. When he chose school he chose all of it.

"You know you cannot make a child take them. Tell your son he doesn't have to fill out the test paper if he doesn't want to.
My DD is in a similar situation and I said if you fancy doing them go for it and if you don't you don't have to, nobody will make you or punish you."

Will you tell that to your children when they are sitting their GCSEs as well? Whether you agree with SATS testing is irrelevant. I think that telling your child that tests are optional is giving the wrong message.

DD is in year 7 at high school. They have tests and milestones all the time. The KS2 SATS are good preparation for this. Also her high school uses the SATS results to set the children for year 7 and as a guideline for GCSE results.