Calculators in yr 6 sat this year?

[BaBaSheep]

Just wonder if any primary school teachers will be able to confirm or comment. Will calculators be used in year 6 sat this year? Will there be no calculators at all?

normally its one paper of each - why would that change

I also thought it was one of each too.

I have heard that the SATS are changing to NO calculator tests so as to give a higher weighting to mental calculations. However I'm not sure when this will come into force. Definitely by the time my Yr 3 dd does SATs, this is what her school informed us.

Teachers please.......

they are teaching ... why not look up on the dfe site

Had a brief checked on dfe site but not clear to me or may be I don't know where to look.

Looks like both papers will be non calculator ones here although haven't found anything definitive on the dfe website yet.

Oh joy yet more returning to traditional values crap.

My dyslexic DD1 (who has just got an A in her GCSE mock) wasted her first year at senior school redoing L4, due to the amount of tables and metal maths in SATs as they are now.

No calculators and massively tightening up in extra time only makes her life and those who follow her with similar difficulties lives unnecessarily harder.

Not all dyslexic (other SpLD), DCs are as bright, confident and down right stubborn as DD1, but they all deserve the chance to achieve the best results they can at the end of a reasonably happy school experience. and V

Hi just a parent with a bias for no calculators

info from DofE

and I quote:

Changes for the academic year 2013 to 2014

1.1 Calculators in the mathematics tests

Calculators are not allowed in any of the levels 3-5 mathematics tests. The standard required to achieve each level will remain the same. This may mean a larger change than usual in the level thresholds for mathematics to account for any difference in difficulty between the tests in 2014 and those in previous years.

Calculators continue to be allowed in the level 6 Paper 2 test.

info source: www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/269973/assessment_and_reporting_arrangements_-_key_stage_2.pdf - page 5 for no calculators NC L3 - 5 KS2 SATs.

HTH

It's definitely no calculators for L3-5. I have no problems with this as long as the questions are appropriately set. DD2 is doing SATs this year and any test SATs they do are being marked discounting the calculator questions - she's fine with it. It means you can't afford careless errors and have to be solid in showing your working out but what I've seen so far looks very doable as long as the method and problem solving skills have been taught as they should have been.

It seems to be that the split between papers will be one on numbers - %, fractions, conversions, multiplication/division and all that - and the other on space/shapes and data handling.

She will be doing L6 and has a calculator for that.

Official guidance is that the paper won't change. Looking at last year's, there are no questions that absolutely needed a calculator, but schools will need to ensure children can do long multiplication and short division otherwise there will be a few marks lost. The other issue is speed. Some children who might have finished with a calculator won't without.

The impression given is that level thresholds won't change, which might lead to a dip in results, but it is not entirely clear yet.

Sooty, to be clear - above relates to the level 3-5 paper. L6 unchanged.

Sooty??? Sorry!

Even in the calculator tests there were never many questions that it was worth using a calculator for anyway.

There is no calculator paper this year.

As others have said, there will be no calculator paper this year.

There has been no information yet about how the two papers will be different. In the past, Paper B (the calculator one) has used much larger numbers in calculations. We don't know whether this year's 2 papers will be of equal difficulty or whether (one suggestion) one will be mostly calculation (Money, measures, time, fractions, decimals and percentages) and the other will be largely shape (angles, symmetry, reflection/rotation/translation) and data handling.

One current problem is what to give the Y6s as a practice test - we could give them an old A+B but without a calculator or 2 Paper As from different years, but that still does not give us a chance to accurately level the papers.

Has anyone tried the new sample reading test out on their class?

You're not supposed to - advice is not to use it, but I have no idea why, or what to use instead.

Sample materials can be downloaded from this page. These are provided for illustrative purposes, as an indication of what future key stage 2 English reading tests that are not ‘themed’ will look like. They are not intended to be used as a practice test.

Hey Feenie,

indeed.

We used it on Wednesday - in contravention of the bold warning above - just to give them (and us) an idea of the practicalities of how the read/answer/read/answer/read/answer format would go.

We had suggested that they should spend roughly 20 mins on each text and to read the text twice before answering it.

However, many of the children with 4A/5C targets spent too long on the central story section and missed a lot of answers in the final section.

Interestingly, I then levelled the results on last year's old reading thresholds and got levels that I would have expected (one or two sublevels up from last summer).

So I guess we await further information from on high.

Sorry for hijacking thread...

I asked ds2 abotu the sat, he did the normal one and alsomthe higher level maths.

He said they didnt need the calcultor for the normal level sats or the level 6 paper. He is bright I guess,and likes mental maths but he isnt a genius.

Level 6 for maths and level 5 for his other sats.

I think we are very lucky that thr primary school did not make a big deal about sats and we certianly didnt I just said try to do your best but in th big scheme of thimgs sats dont matter!

Ds1 didnt take soem sats as eh was home educated until year 5, he I now in ur 10 and on course for a and a*grades at gcse, his sats levels or lack of have made no difference.

Along with obsession over reading levles this obsession with sats is soemthing I dont understand and certainly dotn see reflected in rl, most paremts arent that bothered!

Not for the level 3-5 papers but they are using them for the level 6 paper.

That's interesting, kingscote. I'm sure we'll end up using them as well - what else are we supposed to do! There are a few children who I think will probably benefit from the extra time though - the phrase 'in their own time' made us smile with this particular cohort - they could be there for up to a week!

So is it your understanding that they will have more than one hour for the test? Inside the sample paper it says 'you have one hour', and the text is the same length as before, even though they will be doing it in 3 chunks.

For my 'Level 4 or bust' children I am strongly considering advising them to ignore the third text and just focus on answering every question in the first 2 sections as fully as possible.

The texts in the levels 3-5 English reading booklet will not be linked by a theme. The booklet will contain three or four texts. The least demanding text will come first with the following texts increasing in level of difficulty.
Instead of being given 15 minutes reading time and 45 minutes to answer the questions, children will have a total of one hour to read the texts and complete the questions at their own pace.

I read that as answering questions at their own pace, but I can see exactly what you mean now. It's not tremendously clear, is it? And if they only have one hour then there really isn't any difference at all between that and the old test. I think your interpretation is probably correct, but the use of the phrase 'own pace' is very misleading. Our Y6 teacher is on her update training next week, will get her to check.