SATs - explaining why they are important to my Y6 DS

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My son is currently in a state primary but will be going to an independent secondary school. He is sitting all the Level 6 SATs. He is questioning me as to why SATs are important and why people are getting so stressed about them versus any other assessment. I haven't told him that his secondary school will in all likelihood ignore his SATs results.

What do you think I can tell him? Why ARE they so important?

I think practicing papers is important - not necssairly for content learning but the process of sitting a test.

You'd be surprised hwo many students including up to GCSE and A Level are not able to read and understand the question properly hence give a wrong answer.

Getting used to the process is not the same as cramming. A good teacher IMO will feed in test style questions towards the middle/end of a topic after content has been delivered hence building up exam technique throughout the year and not madly at the end.

I do get it is a means to an end, its political, its not always a true reflection of a childs learning. But I do think there has to be some cut off point where a child is measured to check their outcomes - so yes we all jump through the hoops.

It the way the system is, it is what counts as currency for a great deal of vocational and academic athways beyond formal education.

I'm quite looking forward to the last 1/2 term without the bean-counting, but with lots of other things that matter. A welcome respite before the next seven years of data-delusions.

It's sad actually. DCs Primary school was quite laid back at the beginning but seem to be getting more pushy every year. They have a good OFSTED report so I assume they're feeling pressured from other directions

You can thank Mr Gove and Mr Wilshaw for that, with their ever increasing demands for the amount of progress a child should make over their primary years.

If the school's Good OFSTED was given post-Jan 2013 then the reason they got a Good is because of the pressure from OFSTED wrt data and progress. Inspection results under the new framework depend almost entirely on the school's progress measure, ie, how far each child has moved since they started in Reception and if you can't show every child making the right level of progress then you have no hope of getting a Good or Outstanding, no matter what else you do.

If the inspection was 2012 or earlier then the pressure will be on to get the measures to acceptable levels before they are re-inspected.

The pressure around SATs is not the school's fault. It's Mr Gove's for deciding to judge the quality of a school based on the children's performance on one particular day.

YY Rose

I can remember my last couple of years teaching GCSE with someone trotting down from the office to tell me the targets had increased for this n that student in my subject - no input frome the subject specialit whatsoever. I used to feel undermined completely - that students may have done well elsewhere so they bump them up across the board...I suppose it depends how you use target and communicate it to the students.

Well Im out of it all now. i shudder at the thought of going back unless I was allowed my fantasy classroom or the one i used have before last

I hope to stay within education in some shape or form.

My dd's school has really pushed them this year, three booster lessons a week after school, and then they demanded she attend six half day sessions in the Easter holidays. They rang me up up on the first session of the holidays to ask why she wasn't there. I was unamused.
She's my 4th child through that school, they've never pushed them this hard before.

sounds a bit much dwerf

3 children through my school and this is the first year they have offered booster lessons

That's what I thought. I told them that her brother was up from uni and we had some family time planned.

She was worried that she was going to be in trouble for not going to the holiday sessions, this infuriated me even more. Surely one of the joys of childhood is school holidays?

Probably like many others we were in the position that other things were actually more important than the SATS that the school was obsessing about focusing on for DS in Y6. Things that would affect which secondary he would go to.

A music audition was the most important thing ds did in Y6, and he did well at this, though ultimately got into the school on other criteria (including sibling)

I think, on the whole though, it's quite good for them to have some end of primary test which everyone takes quite seriously - as long as the school don't go completely OTT stress wise. If they do then I'd certainly counter this by telling my DC truthfully that the tests are more important for the school than for them individually, but that it's all good practice. And still to do your best.

I think my DC both got broadly level 5's, but I couldn't be absolutely sure. They're now in Y7 and Y10.

That's appalling Dwerf!

I'd have told them it was because we were in Tenerife! We always go on holiday at Easter as we can't often get the time in the summer.

I told DS2 that the sole purpose of SATS was to see if he could get better grades than his brother who had sat them 2 years previously. Which, as he is hugely competitive, he did with no stress and no complaining.

Win win really as the school were happy, DS2 was happy and the independent secondary he was going to probably couldn't give a stuff so there was no other possible benefit.

Presumably SATs and the 11+ are testing incredibly different things though so it is hard to say which is "harder".

If the tests do what they are supposed to I would expect a very well taught but only just above average in ability child to do well on L6 papers but not pass the 11+. While a very badly taught genius would pass the 11+ but not the L6.

Also "hardness" of a paper does not allow for pass marks. It may be easier to get 50% on a hard paper than 95% on an easy one.

Finally, it may be more about how well the paper fits in with the person's innate ability and so very subjective. Many years ago dh and I went through a stage of being really into doing free online IQ tests. My "IQ" varied by 60 points on these tests depending on their make up. (Or more simply "was there lots of lovely maths in them")

The children are something like 7 months older when they sit SATS than they were at 11+
That makes a difference.

Pictures I'm afraid I got a little pissy with them. Although, to be fair, I was still in bed when they rang. It not being a school night, we'd all had a late night watching films.

Because I share care with my ex, I don't have them for many non-school nights, he has them every weekend. As it turned out, she would have been at school for all of 'my' days during the holidays. Sod that. I wanted to plan some fun stuff. We may not have much money but she would have missed out on late night film night, a night at her older sister's house and various other stuff. Perhaps a selfish reason (though not the only one) for refusing the holiday sessions but there you go.

She'd already achieved her targets at the last set of tests a couple of months ago, these are her last weeks at primary, why stress her out?

I thought the time pressure of instant recall to actually complete all 11+ questions is what makes the 11+ harder

They are important to a school because Ofsted are bothered by them. because Ofsted are bothered parents are bothered.
Parents and/or schools put pressure on dc to perform well for the school.
They aren't important in the slightest and parents should if they are so inclined make a stand and refuse to do them.They are to be scrapped soon anyway.

They're NOT being scrapped, they're being changed into much the same thing but for the new "improved" curriculum.

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If you've invested in it then the 11+ will obviously be superior (more difficult) than anything else on the planet.

They are important because the goverment says they are. They matter to the school, not to the children. My son will be placed according to the outcome of the CATs he does next month.

DS2 is being massively stressed about his SATs atm - he will be lucky to get a level 3 in his maths but will do much better in the others. The teacher is telling him that maths is by far the most important one so he is feeling very demoralised.

I have always been very supportive of our primary school, even over the years when it was in special measures and changed head all the time. My kids felt content and secure and the older two did OK academically. Not now Can't wait till all my kids are free of the school system - it's got so pressured and focused that children like my son simply don't fit.

Good practice for him if he' going to private school. They generally do loads of exams.

And it will be a feather in the cap of his primary school if he helps them get good results.

And it's not as if th stuff he's learned for SATs is special maths, English and Science that is only for SATs. He will use it again........!

The KS2 National Curriculum tests are timed too but writing an extended answer in the SATs requires much longer than 30 seconds

"My son will be placed according to the outcome of the CATs he does next month. "

The thing is, although secondaries do use CATs, state secondaries rely ONLY on CATs at their peril, as it might affect their ability to show progress for a child from KS2 to KS3, for example.

Say, for example, a child gets Level 5 in both parts of English at KS2. That is used, by the government, to set the secondary school targets for that child - against which Ofsted will measure the child's progress, which is a key measure in the judgment of the school.

If CATs results (again, a test taken on a single day) showed that this child should initially be placed in a low set 9or worse, in a low stream), the school has a dilemma. Can a child in a low stream get the L7 at least that is required by the end of KS3 given KS2 results?

Probably not. So the school has to decide - do they take SATS - with a pinch of salt - into account when setting that child?

My guess is, in this climate, few state secondaries will totally rely on CATs without a glance at SATs results, as the downside risk of ignoring the KS3 results required to ensure progress is 'good' is too high.

'they're just a thing you do in year 6 and it's good practice for sitting exams, but don't fret too much. You should always do your best in anything set you, and I'm sure you will.'?

teacher someone posted a link that was about the progress levels and measures of value added. I didnt read it closely but got the jist of it. The 3 levels is not evenly distributed across different levels of attainment - it shows a grid with sub levels > gcse grade.

I thought somone upthread said sats and cats together are a better predictor. Doesnt it depend on the individual school and what assessment package they opt into to - I know my last secondary (bla) outsourced this to a data processing place.

From my teacher POV the data levels and targets wre what you live and breath and are constantly beaten with...

11+ differences I think I'm write in saying that t also has different types of text - we are currently working through the recommended reading list to help with vocab. I have also noticed the 11+ requires problem solving ability of direct and indirect relationships that can be inverse. These type of problems require the child to have reached a certain stage in their congnitive development - it's to do with the ability to hold thing in short term memory while they process the calculation, thats the best I can explain it without getting into cog pyschology too much.

I k now there are problems solving on the KS2 assessments but Im not sure how they compare especially level 6.