Y6 & SATs - what did you do / plan on doing

[MissEDashwood]

Hi there,

We've not really heard anything about SATs, but I know they can be a big deal at this age, as they're often used to help put children in the right groups at Secondary School.

I was wondering had any parents given them much thought? Do you anticipate doing extra work at home to give them the best possible chance?

Are there any websites that jazz it all up, so the child is learning and it's an enjoyable experience? I think the BBC has a good selection of resources. Are there any books that stand out fro the rest?

Is your attitude in line with school that they are important, or are you indifferent, your DC will achieve what they achieve with minimal stress?

I just wondered what other parents view points are, as I've got the idea of incentivising grades with money, plus doing extra work, mock papers etc to support DD in the best possible way.

Part of me thinks it's extra stress not needed, the other part wants her to put all her effort in, incentivising and end extra support, if made fun won't be a big deal.

With school starting I'm on the fence and need to decide what to do. So opinions of every perspective are welcome.

Thank you 

My DS is only 2, so I'm responding as a teacher.

SATs results are hugely important to me in so far as it makes a huge difference to the sxhool what we achieve. There is immense pressure on teachers to achieve results. However, as a person, I care far more about the children I reach than the results they will achieve. The tests are simply not worth the stress.

To be honest, schools are still trying to work out what they mean in terms of secondary predictions. Secondary schools in my area have never really paid much attention to results, since they know that children will be hot-housed in the months before.

My advice to parents is always to encourage their child to do their best - not for me, not for SATs, but for themselves. I would much rather see and teach a happy child than someone struggling with the pressure. If you want to help, talk with the teacher about individual areas of strenth and weakness.

I hate that many schools allow SATs to define Year 6.

Apologies for typos, I'm terrible at typing in my phone!

I didn't do any extra work with any of mine. Just told them to do their best.
Here sats aren't used for sets in secondary, they have their own exams earlier in the year. The schools also have their first induction before sat results are released.

I am a teacher and have a son going into Y6. I won't do anything SATS related with him unless he specifically asks me to- the schools put enough pressure on the poor kids. Secondary schools don't look at the results; they are there purely to assess schools' performance. He will also be reassessed in Y7 and placed into sets accordingly.
It's so easy to forget that they are only 10 years old. I don't remember any kind of pressure like that when i was in primary (i have very fond memories) and i don't want my son feeling it either.

Most secondary schools won't pay attention to SATS results and do their own tests for setting purposes.

SATS are for measuring the school and the teachers rather than the pupils really. I don't intend doing anything particular with DS1 this year.

For context, I am a director of a primary multi-academy trust.

Did not do any extra with mine - local secondary does not use them for setting but DOES use them for targets - so be aware that kids will be measured against their sats results and told "well done" even if they are not doing their best work.

(my eldest DD felt ill in sats week so got some rubbish results...)

I have a DS about to start yr 7, so we've just been through SATs year. In all honesty, it was a pretty crap year. Huge focus by the school on SATs prep for most of the year. Seemed like everything else took a back seat. DS was bored, the class was stressed, and for first time ever we had times when he said he didn't want to go to school.

We didn't do any past papers outside school. Even though the school sent home a packet of them on last day of term before the Easter holidays and texted all parents to encourage us to get our children to do them.

All we said to him was that we expected him to listen to the teacher, do the work and try his best.

DS got great results btw.

I've got the idea of incentivising grades with money, plus doing extra work, mock papers etc to support DD in the best possible way.

Well, I disagree with incentivising grades with money even at GCSE, so that was out for me. I think that is unnecessary stress to put on a 10/11yo. Also, if you have more than one child, they may be of differing ability so money for grades seems very unfair to me, as the more able will end up with better grades AND more money so they win twice.

For my DDs y6 SATs we stressed it was good to try the best they can, but the results don't matter in the same way as GCSEs.

We worked a bit on exam technique (i.e. not panicking, picking up the questions they could do first, going back and filling in later). This was important for DD2 who initially with tests would think she had to attempt all questions, even the ones way above her ability, and then would rush the simpler ones she could do.

But we worked more on the stuff they would need to do well in secondary, so core maths Yes, comprehension Yes, complicated grammar, No. The emphasis was on improving skills not on 'passing' SATs.

They will probably do plenty of mock papers at school, so you really don't need to do that.

imo You don't need to do anything particularly different in y6 to whatever you might have done in y5. And certainly not for the sake of a SATs score. However, continuing to encourage reading at home, help with areas they struggle with, is good to do.

All I did was make sure they went to bed at a decent time, sent them off with a good breakfast and gave them a well-earned treat at the end of the week.

They did really well, but have already forgotten about the whole thing and it will make no real difference to them.

It's tough. There are 2 schools close to us- DD goes to one, her friend to the other. Friend was sending DD pics of the massive amount of SATS prep she had to do, and the school sent the parents a list of " helpful" prep books to buy. DDs school was a lot more relaxed- few practice papers etc but nothing too hardcore. They even went on their year 6 residential trip 3 weeks before SATS (it's a lot cheaper apparently as demand is so low!)
However, the stars results for the pusher school were better, and they were assessed right before the summer holidays and rated "outstanding". All the children feed into the same local secondary which does use SATS as one of its measures for streaming, and of course to set estimated gcse grades. Obviously if someone is obviously in the wrong group they will be moved during year 7 but imo often the stream you start in becomes a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy.

I like the school and won't be moving DS BUT I will do more with him at home when he comes to do his.

I would encourage your child to do his/her best in Year 6 by encouraging completion of homework, reading for pleasure and learning spellings and times tables. All of these things will help to get the most out of Year 6 anyway and are also good preparation for SATs and secondary school. Past papers are used in schools for practice and to predict how the children will do - in the school where I work it was pretty relentless from Easter onwards and I think extra work at home would be overkill. Some secondary schools in our area definitely use the results to set and some don't.

I'm a year 6 teacher. Yes SATs mean more to the school than the child, and if they bomb it on the day, oh well, it won't impact them. That being said, the knowledge on the tests is what is expected for the end of KS2 so it's important they know the stuff even if they don't show it under exam conditions. It's important they know how to do the maths etc on the papers as this gets them ready for the next step and gets them ready for secondary.

Get them to read, lots and varied. Classic texts or very descriptive texts are good.

Do anything that the school asks you to do and encourage your child to work hard at school.

If there's anything your child struggles with, help them with it and practice at home.

Make sure they know times table fluently to 12x12.

That's it - not much else is needed.

Actually I take one of my points back - if the school asks them to do a million past papers at home, or do loads of homework over holidays, don't do that. That will just stress them out. I send no full past papers home.

It's SATs. A matter only of interest to the school. SATs work was done in school and we didn't allow it to creep into home time. Every time teachers told my DD that her SATs would impact where she could go to school (fucking liars) I told her that it wasn't true and not to worry.

Dd going into Y1 is very inquisitive and bright articulates really well but can't put it on paper. waiting until y2 to see whether dyslexia etc makes itself apparent. If she is struggling like this in y6 I will not be putting her through them I'm afraid.

Absolutely nothing.

My third child is going into Y6, and she will not be attending any of the 'Maths Clubs' or 'Holiday Revision Clubs' that they run for Y6. (It would be entirely different if they ran a real Maths Club.)

The mark my child gets will accurately reflect the school's teaching, not their cramming. The secondary will assess her in the first term of Y7, and place and move her accordingly.

Y6 will be stressful enough, and academically boring enough, that I'll not add more nonsense.

A teacher has posted her daughter's A Level English Language holiday homework on Twitter ...it's basically Y6 SATs questions

I did nothing with dd3. The school sent home a revision book but we were too busy doing other stuff. She got 110 or above in everything. Her secondary school don't use sats results to set them.

I'm not doing anything extra for my dd going into Y6. No point stressing her.

I read a couple of past papers and the marking notes online, just so that I knew what DS's were heading into.

Both boys have good oral language skills and this helped enormously with some of the English sats requirements. I did encourage correct language use at home, having read the papers. I also discussed with them use of language in different settings. We're in a Northern working class area with a fairly strong accent amoungst some of the DC's peer groups and there are a lot of colloquialisms in use.

We are a maths fairly strong family so just carried on with the school funded maths whizz programme for school/ home use. Working on moving on if we're not sure rather than getting hung up on something that doesn't seam right.

For English reading I encouraged lots of thinking and recall and interpretation with things we read at home, be it stories or holiday brochures.

I didn't just let it pass, nor did I push. Just worked it into life over the year. No regular sessions or formal lets talk SATs sessions.

I think the most important thing for children is to be exposed to lots of lovely stories. Read to them, listen to them read, get Ebooks etc. The SATs were awful for ds1. He is bright but has dyslexia and additional challenges. School put so much pressure on and sent home far to many practice papers. We completed what was asked and then worked on what ds1 really needed. My concern with ds1 is that he had so much support to get the results in his English that he got that he won't get the support he needs. If SATs were useful private schools and grammar schools would use them. My friends ds went to a pushy school but they were not concerned about SATs as most parents had had private tuition for the 11plus!

I will do nothing.

We will continue to make sure homework is done and that he has a ready supply of books to read. But that has nothing to do with sats.

I will tell him that they are important for the school, so he should try his best, but they have no meaning for him.

(We are probably going to home ed next year. So they really have no meaning)

I will try my absolute best to no let him get stressed and worried.

My oldest is going into Y6 and I see my role as protecting her from any stress that school tries to whip up and to keep her education as broad as possible.

I've already spoken to the Head re boosters ( they set up 'boosters' for Y5 literally the day after the Y6 SATS had ended...), and have made it clear that she won't be attending any/doing past papers etc.

Thank you for the feedback & dispelling some myths.

I'm thinking twice about the incentivising now as a child could work super hard and get a L4, another child puts little effort in and gets a L6.

I think if the school year will be all around SATs then extra pressure at home could be detrimental.

Thank you for your replies, they've definitely changed my way of thinking. We've always said as long as they do their best that's all we can ask. So being a bit hypocritical.

Part of it is this will be the last time we go through this bar GCSE's, so want to do it right, right is supporting the child not exerting pressure every angle possible. Thank you again.

I'm sure I answered a thread about this earlier on today.

DD is going into year 7 so did SATs last year. Her school took a low key approach and so did we. We didn't do anything specific and she did extremely well. So that worked for us.