Interesting take on phonics check results.

[agoodinnings]

www.theguardian.com/education/datablog/2014/sep/26/primary-school-teachers-game-phonics-check

It seems pretty compelling to me.

Ooh that's interesting. Any teachers prepared to hazard a guess what was going on?

There's still a sharp corner at 31 is it? Still some bias smoothed by different ideas of what the pass mark might be? Or a steep gradient of difficulty for the hardest questions?

I noticed this one today:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-22783399
which is also interesting I think.

My guess would be some schools tested until the child got 32 right then stopped. This year they had to keep going until the end as they didn't know the pass mark.

That wouldn't explain the dip down at 31 kim. May explain some of the peak at 32.

cat, that one you linked to was from 2013...

Oops, for some reason it came up on popular posts. Still interesting, but probably been discussed before then!

It is very odd. I know that this year we didn't know the pass mark to stop this happening.

Fwiw though I think the entire test is nonsense and proves nothing. I've know children who could read who have failed it.

I think the entire test is nonsense and proves nothing

Given that we now have a study which shows a very strong correlation between performance in the test and performance in reading at the end of KS1 it seems clear you are wrong.

I've know children who could read who have failed it

Often claimed by supporters of mixed methods. The evidence is that those children who "can read" who fail the test struggle as the vocabulary to which they are exposed increases. They don't have the tools to handle unfamiliar words. I struggle to see how a child can be classed as a good reader when they are unable to decode unfamiliar words.

"Did the words get harder from question 33onwards?" Yes
"Did some teachers stop once child scored 32 in previous years?" Possibly
"Did some teachers cheat?" Possibly some schools who have clung to mixed methods would feel under great pressure ..

Before the check many teachers were of the opinions hat the threshold would be higher than 32, after the check but prior to the threshold being announced in July there was a great deal of speculation among Y1 teachers that the threshold would be lower this year because they thought the check more difficult than previous years ...

As a Y1 teacher and SENCO I don't think there should be a need for a national screening check however the evidence suggests there is a need as schools weren't screening pupils internally.
The check certainly isn't nonsense as it's based on the method widely used by Educational Psychologists and researchers to identify possible difficulties (usually after a child has been struggling and fallen considerably behind) . It is a really useful diagnostic tool if used properly beyond looking at raw scores.

I'm not sure how much weight we should put on surveys that show that teachers aren't learning anything from the test. If teachers think all the test shows them is which children are good decoders and which aren't, then the issue isn't so much the test, it's the teaching.

If they know exactly which PGCs every single child is struggling with/ which are a problem for a significant proportion of the class and the length of words they can blend, then the test isn't going to tell them much. But I suspect those schools are probably the ones where nonsense word reading tests are used as assessment anyway so aren't too bothered by the check.

We thought the "pass mark" would be lower so that the govt could go into the election prattling on about how much they had improved early reading!

One of the questions posed in the study is: Did the words get harder after question 32?

Answer - yes, it did. This is something they claim they cannot answer, whereas it is really - wonder why they chose not to.

Whereas RiversideMum we thought the pass mark would be higher because the "test" itself seemed easier this year. We were overjoyed when it was announced it was 32 as we had quite a few children in the 30 - 34 category and half of those would not have passed with a higher threshold.

We had more children getting words 31 - 40 correct than 21 - 30 Hulababy. I was astounded how many sailed through the last 4 words!

If they were anything like our children they were probably discussing the words in the playground! Children who hadn't done the test could subconsciously have remembered them

Hmm, do we need a graph of scores vs order of taking test within the class? Don't think that's in the official stats!

Interesting Kimaroo our pupils weren't that interested in the check words I'm impressed they could recall pseudo words in the order they appeared in the check.

I didn't mention pseudo words or the order but there was a few odd ones like quemp or something that they thought were hilarious and they also remembered a couple of the 2 syllable real words that appeared. Just chit-chat in the playground.

Sorry but it simply wouldn't be helpful unless the child could firstly decode all 40 words correctly, secondly they would need to accurately recall the words in order and finally the others would need to memorise the words all in the space of break time

There was a at the end of my 15.54 post. I must remember to only post stuff that stands up to scrutiny.

seriously?

The school I work in train the children from day 1 in year 1 how to pass the test. They test them on old tests every term (including a September Baseline) and juggle the phonics groups around accordingly.

This year the head is pushing for 100percent pass rate but it's just not going to happen with the intake they've had!

Not sure what I think of the test tbh

It won't happen if they train them to the test ... only if they teach phonics well. I think only 11 schools out of 15675 achieved 100%