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SATS support thread for parents

271 replies

simpson · 08/05/2016 22:02

As yr6 SATS start tomorrow, I thought it might be a good idea to start a support thread for parents to say how their DC are finding them.

DS has had a very chilled day due to the lovely weather: loads of water fights and he walked to the corner shop with his younger sister for the first time (with no adult) and loads of ice cream etc.

He went to bed very chilled but am sure the nerves will kick in in the morning!!

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PeaceLoveGonk · 09/05/2016 17:48

Teen&Tween - I think you may have a point. I also think that you and I are the only ones on MN with DC who are not high fliers Wink

mercifulTehlu · 09/05/2016 17:48

Dd said it was easy, but she's good at the reading comp and the spag. If she's going to find any bits hard, it'll be the maths.

Fortunately the Head (who's also the yr4-6 teacher) is a wonderful man and has managed to make them want to do well without making them feel worried. He did tell me it was a surprisingly hard test today though. I doubt there will have been any tears even from the less able ones. There seems to be a cold going around the class though - dd came down with it yesterday and lots have sore throats and sniffles, which is unfortunate timing.

PonderingProsecco · 09/05/2016 17:49

My ds, who is playing Minecraft at present, said it was ok.
I have a horrible feeling this probably means he missed the point all the way through!
He admitted to one very silly answer he did [laughing as he said it!] which I cannot share as gives away subject matter...
Was a delilberately silly answer cos he hadn't a clue....

ihearttc · 09/05/2016 17:52

Ive posted on the other thread as well but DS1 is quite able (top set if that means anything anymore!) but has been in a complete state for the last month. They have done huge amounts of practice reading comprehensions which he hates as he finds them incredibly difficult despite being able to "read" very well he struggles to understand the sort of answers they expect so just freaks out and writes anything. Fully expected him to come out of school in tears but was really happy and upbeat...I asked how it was and he said it was better than the Mock one and no where near as bad as he expected. He did all but 2 questions but one of the ones he missed had 3 marks.
Im dreading SPAG tomorrow

MuddhaOfSuburbia · 09/05/2016 17:53

Bloody Nora this is awful

SATs were bad enough last year when my.dds sat them

Poor little mites. What is this country doing to its kids

And of course we know who's generating the stress, dont we

Yep teachers

(at least that's what Nick Gibb-iirc- said on the today programme. Which is neat. So NOTHING is the fault of these amateurs in govt, its the way the teachers are handling it)

HmmHmmHmm

oktimetodoit · 09/05/2016 17:59

Ds came out fine, said it was ok. Missed some questions. Told him I'm proud he tried his best. I didn't ask anymore questions because I don't care I'm just glad he is chilled and enjoying the mahoosive ice-cream sundae we have just made Grin.

HemanOrSheRa · 09/05/2016 18:05

My ds, who is playing Minecraft at present, said it was ok.
I have a horrible feeling this probably means he missed the point all the way through! Yes, Pondering I have the same feeling about my DS! To be honest, he's happy and glad the SATs are underway (which means they will soon be over!), so I really couldn't care less!

PiqueABoo · 09/05/2016 18:15

TeenAndTween "More able children expect to be able to understand and answer all the questions, so get more upset when they can't."

When DD did SATs a couple of years ago the process encouraged far too much perfectionism for comfort, so I'm for exams where it is extremely rare for a child to be able to answer all the questions.

That said this is Reading and an L6 Reading SAT pass was notoriously elusive/random, so it seems a little bit odd that this year's "more able's" expectations wouldn't have been set with that in mind.

ineedaholidaynow · 09/05/2016 19:18

DS said he finished in time, but no time to check. He is an able student but the Reading paper is usually his worst. I think he may have missed the point too. But he is relaxed so I am not asking him any more questions about it.

His teacher said it was a very tough paper and there were a number of pupils who struggled. She said she felt so sad for them, as she had managed to get the whole class to the level required for last year, so if the Government hadn't changed things so drastically most of them should have been able to pass this year.

HemanOrSheRa · 09/05/2016 19:23

Well, I've just asked DS about the paper. He can't recall any of it Confused. Maybe just as well.

Original poster
simpson · 09/05/2016 19:36

Tbh I will be breathing a sigh of relief this time tomorrow Grin

He is a bit of a maths geek (yes, I know it could still all go wrong!) but tomorrow is the one he is worried about (6/20 in mock SPAG Sad).

OP posts:
Original poster
simpson · 09/05/2016 19:37

Sorry, did LOL at "he can't recall any of it!"

OP posts:
ineedaholidaynow · 09/05/2016 19:54

DS has talked more about the snacks provided by the teacher than he has about the test Grin

HemanOrSheRa · 09/05/2016 20:04

Grin He reckons he finished it with 3 minutes to spare. Whatever 'it' was has all fallen out of his head now!

validusername · 09/05/2016 20:52

DD (probably would have got level 5 in old levels) said she found it tough and missed the last question as she ran out of time. She seemed very tired and just mentally drained which isn't like her at all.

But she is enjoying the bacon sandwiches the school are providing for breakfast and the extra play times!

Brokenbiscuit · 09/05/2016 21:59

DD didn't finish it.Sad

She is an excellent reader - was assessed as a 5a in year 5 and got 40/40 on the last practice paper that she did in school. She said that she found the questions quite ambiguous today, and she wasted time trying to work out what they were looking for.

Her friend said that she didn't understand half of the vocabulary. Apparently dd only spoke to two children who finished.

Thankfully, she didn't seem upset about it. Really sad for the kids who were in tears. Hope tomorrow is a better day!

abeltasman · 09/05/2016 23:05

Firstly, I had no idea there was an 'embargo' on discussing the content of the paper, as I haven't been told that information - probably useful to know, as my son told me verbatim some of the questions (which obviously I won't share here!). We agreed that some of the questions were bizarre, with some really unusual / archaic / plain wrong word definitions/usages. My son is pretty able, his weakest is the reading paper but he has worked really hard to get better. Even though he was confident about it this morning, he said that although he finished the paper he did feel like bursting into tears (all boy year, so he didn't!). He seemed quite pragmatic about it, and I have shared with him some of the funnier Spoof papers which he loved, and they definitely cheered him up (check out Michael Rosen's one on FB!). Not looking forward to the SPAG tomorrow, as that can be pretty horrid I can't answer it at all without help from DS. Grin
Good luck to all for the rest of the week. Can't believe quite how many papers they need to do, I am having flashbacks to GCSEs! And don't worry. It really doesn't matter, and that's the message our kids need to hear. I do feel sorry for the teachers though - I hope they come home to a cuddle from their mummies too, as they're going to need it..Confused

bicyclebell · 09/05/2016 23:34

Here is Michael Rosen's:

Nicky was a lovely girl who sparkled wheresoever she went. Her best friend was Nick who knew a lot about everything, like an encyclopedia at the bottom of our garden. One day they went on a safari trip to the moon where they went for a ride on the kind of thing that nice people go for rides on on the moon. In Tasmania there used to be an animal called the Tasmanian Devil, which died out thanks to human predation. Nicky and Nick are extremely able and clever people who are ultimately responsible for everything that goes on in schools. You are grateful. In a minute you will have some questions. Some of you won't be able to answer them. That's good because this means Nicky and Nick can turn you into an academy with their magic wands. You like academies and you want all schools to be academies, notwithstanding other circumstantial evidence.

  1. 'Human predation' means:

a) Human deprivation
b) Human impregnation
c) Human infestation
d) Human redaction

Tick one, or die.

  1. What does the word 'sparkled' mean?

Write 23 meanings in the space below.

  1. How many times has your father spoken to you about Tasmanian Devils? If none, proceed to the room marked 'unworthy'.
  1. Do you have an encyclopedia at the bottom of your garden? If you don't have a garden, ask your parents why not.
  1. Do you like Nicky and Nick? Tick 'yes'.
  1. The word 'notwithstanding' doesn't mean 'not with standing'. English: funny old language, eh? But not for you.
  1. Give four sentences which explain what this brilliant piece of writing is about.
  1. Explain why the people who wrote this test are anonymous.
  1. We're finding it rather hard to think of another question but we have to or Nicky and Nick won't give us another one of these very lucrative contracts. Can you think of a question? No, don't answer that one, because we won't be able to put it through a computer.
  1. Ah yes, we forgot the sequence one that Michael Gove said was important. Put the following into the correct sequence:

Nicky.
Notwithstanding
Nick.
Tasmanian Devil
Encylopedia

  1. The word 'sparkled' is

metaphorical
hyperbolic
elliptical
sparkly

Tick one.

  1. Count the full stops. Divide by 3. Take away the number you first thought of. Use Young's Modulus for Linear Expansion to determine whether any could have been semi-colons.

  2. Did you arrive in this country to live any time in the last 2 years? Do you think this test takes into consideration any of the incredible advances you have made in learning to speak, write, read and understand English?
    If your answers to these two questions are yes and no, we have at least achieved something.

  3. If you have got to the end of the test, please sit quietly looking at the clock. Do not avert your gaze.

  4. Avert means:

a small creature called a vert
a big creature called a vert
a green creature called a vert
a word meaning, may the heavens open and take me away from this rubbish?

goingmadinthecountry · 09/05/2016 23:51

As a Y6 teacher, I'll be happy if my lovely class get through the week smiling. The questions are stupid. None of mine cried today - hope we get to the end of the week in the same way. What kind of rubbish goal is that? When would it ever be deemed a good week if no-one cried?

DooWhop · 09/05/2016 23:59

My poor DS was in tears halfway through and didn't finish it. He's a bright boy and very eloquent but reading has never been his thing. He's a whizz at maths and has been getting 100% in all practice papers so at least he should end on a high.
He's so dejected after today. Have others been told they resit if they fail?!

Brokenbiscuit · 10/05/2016 00:05

Poor little lad, doo. Hope he's happy with the maths papers later in the week.

Goingmad, if you're anything like my dd's lovely year 6 teacher, you will get them through the week still smiling. I'm so grateful to all the wonderful teachers out there who are bending over backwards to support our children through this madness. It must be so depressing to see them struggling after all the work that has been invested, but your efforts to keep things in perspective for them really do make a difference.

DooWhop · 10/05/2016 00:13

Thanks broken. Me too. Sadly the y6 teacher is shocking.

HemanOrSheRa · 10/05/2016 00:23

Bless him Doo Sad. I believe that this Year 6 cohort will not have to resit the SATs. That only applies to pupils from 2017 onwards.

cruikshank · 10/05/2016 00:35

Do came home in tears having run out of time and not done the last two pages at all. He's been doing well on the (many many) practice papers they've done for reading and was working at level 5 in old money at the beginning of this year. He was always going to find the spag hard and after this one he'll probably fail said spag as well. Way to go to completely alienate a bright motivated hardworking child Nicky Morgan you utter cunt. I really wish I could pull him out of them .

Mandzi34 · 10/05/2016 06:42

This thread is so sad. My DS found it hard too. He said after the first text he felt as though he wasn't doing well at all as he wasn't sure his answers were what they were looking for. He had 45 seconds at the end to complete at least 5 questions, which he didn't manage to do :(. This was the first paper he didn't complete, despite being a quick reader/writer. So angry for all children and their teachers.