the new curriculum - a question

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A friend told me today that Explore Learning had informed her with the new curriculum a child who is currently a 2a will actually only be a 1a. and that the children in Yr1 who will do the old SATS next year will then be a year behind? what?

I am sure this can't be right.

a) the levels won't exist?
b) how could they downgrade by a whole level, what on earth will they do with all the average or below average children?

I don't understand. Is the new curriculum much much harder? Could someone please enlighten me?

Do the current Yr1 children do the new curriculum from September but with the old style SATS questions or the old curriculum and the old SATS?

thank you

Your friend is wrong on some points, but right on one.

National curriculum levels won't exist next year.

Levels are not being downgraded by a full level. However, it was suggested to me by our local authority advisor that the expectations in writing for a child who is currently year 1, will look more like the level 2a descriptors now (rather than 2b) by the time they reach year 2. This follows the raised expectation for the current year 1 children who followed the new EYFS in 2012/13.

I can't comment on your question about sats as I can't remember the answer!

They're raising the bar so the teachers don't reach their performance related pay targets. Particularly in maths I hear.

Next year's year 2 will be following the old curriculum and the old style SATS assessment.

ah ok.

so my daughter having above expected levels at the end of year 1 should be normal then rather than very good if the expectations for her year aren't 1b/a like they used to be?

There have never been any national expectations for Y1 only for Y2 & Y6.

Children going into Y2 & Y6 in September will be following the current curriculum and assessed as this year. So for your daughter nothing is changing until she goes into Y3.

The content of the curriculum is changing some things have been added, some things removed and some things moved down from the year above, so it isn't quite as simple as saying "above expected" will be "normal"

thanks mrz.

I will go back to thinking she is very clever then! luckily she learns whatever she gets a chance to so should cope.

I have a feeling Explore Learning are plumbing a new low in trying to scare parents into thinking they need to sign their children up for additional tutoring.

well I did wonder that Rafa but I thought it was worth checking.

I have a feeling Explore Learning are plumbing a new low in trying to scare parents into thinking they need to sign their children up for additional tutoring.

Haha, that sounds about right!

I've been wondering, though, how children who are already a bit further on in the system will be expected to "catch up" with the new expectations, as they won't have covered so much ground in the earlier years.

DD has just finished year 4, and will presumably be among the first cohort to take the new year 6 tests. She is already working above the current expectations, so I'm not specifically concerned for her, but for those children currently working at the expected level for their age (I know there are no expected levels except in year 2/6, but I mean those who would normally be on track to get a 4b in year 6), is there an expectation that they should somehow cover all of the additional requirements in year 5 and year 6? Would this not put them (and their teachers) under a huge amount of pressure?

The other thing I don't really understand is how teachers are supposed to get all children to these higher levels. Our school has relatively high expectations for its pupils, and the teachers seem to do a very good job of stretching all children to the best of their ability - for some, that might mean helping them reach the expected levels, but for many, it means exceeding those expectations. There is no cap on what the children can currently achieve, and so I don't understand how simply raising the expectations is going to make much difference - unless this is aimed primarily at schools which have much lower aspirations for their pupils?

that is what I have been thinking, Some children just aren't capable of achieving any higher than they are already doing. Our school could probably do with a poke as I don't think they extend as much as they should for the more able so perhaps this will 'encourage' them to do so and in turn they may find that the 'expected' children step up as well but there will always be some who struggle so this will make their lives much harder.

@Jinsei, I think you're assuming this stuff is based on 100% pure and reliable 'criterion referencing' i.e. what children can do.

I think where they draw the lines for the SATS thresholds is a teensy bit political. This year's national SATS statistics will be fascinating given that these children spent their entire KS2 on Mr Gove's new-improved watch and it's the run up to an election.

SATS thresholds jump around a bit e.g. L5 Reading was 36/50 last year and 32/50 this year. I struggle to imagine how they can independently and accurately measure the relative difficulty of successive exams, but it's quite easy to imagine them moving the thresholds around until the percentages of children who attain any given level is 'right'.

Perhaps I'm too cynical?

Perhaps I'm too cynical?

Sadly, I think you're probably right. I hate the idea of people playing politics when it concerns the education of our kids. I'm glad that Gove has gone, but not yet convinced that Nicky Morgan is going to be a huge improvement.

PS: They said they expected something like 16% to fall short of the floor standard (a scaled score of 100) for the new end-primary assessment the year after next.

That percentage just happens to be approximately one standard deviation to the left of mean for a normal distribution, which makes me think the number has as much to do with making pretty executive graphs as children's competencies.

so do we think next year's SATS will be overinflatedly high or underinflatedly low? followed by what for the new ones. do they want the new ones to look rigourous and therefore will make them low.

we all know they did lowered the last lot of O'levels and raised the first lot of GCSEs to make them look successful.

Which do you think would get most votes?

Yes they could drop just a little and we'll get talk of 'rigor' with an undercurrent of heroic nation-saving 'no pain, no gain'. Or they could go up just a little and we'll get talk of modest early signs of the government's strategy paying off.

DD has just finished Y6 and I did care about the SATS results but was more interested in the teacher assessments (in her case the two were consistent). I trust that particular teacher's assessments whereas SATS scores are clearly a snapshot that is vulnerable to luck of the day and lots of other forces.

Just one: What's the 'margin of error' for the marking and reporting of SATS results?

They won't give a damn about next year's. The results will be after the election. This year's are the last lot to be released before the next election. That's what people will have in mind when they vote.

Actually, with an election date of 7th May, they probably won't have sat the tests before the next election, never mind releasing the results.

before or after election I still think there will be some fiddling going on. I don't recall where the O-level/GCSE changes came in relation to elections but every time they do a big fiddle they want it to look successful but it is hard to know which way they would want it to go.

They may not be in power to be doing the fiddling.

Not sure which way anybody else would want it to go though.

good point

but I have to say I don't think any of the options are any good education wise sadly.