Year 6 - after SATS - does it get easier?

[rupsmiu]

hello! My DD has had a rough time this year in yr6 - a bright kid roped into dull as dishwater constant revision with her complaining she's not learning anything new, with (in her words) an "intimidating" teacher. This has led to panic attacks, school refusal, anxiety, mysterious headaches and ailments and so on. We have done our best to resolve it with the school but not much progress made and teacher has been so unhelpful. None of this was happening in previous years.

We are trying to push through the last few weeks and tell her it will get better!

Apparently the teachers are now saying that it won't necessarily be easier after SATS as they have a lot of "secondary preparation" to do which will be extra work. Does anyone have any idea what this means?

I read on MN that the weeks after SATS are meant to be lots of fun and more laid back so now I am stressing a bit that DD will be even more unhappy. It's all we could do to help her through the last term or so and is taking a lot of home support, bribes and so on.

I just think, FGS why do the teachers have to do this - put the fear of god into them about SATS as well as scaring the kids saying how "hard" secondary will be and not even give them a bit of a break after SATs?

I do wish the teacher would remember the kids are still kids and need a bit of bloody support after such a difficult term.

Despairing a bit at this stage and hoping things lighten up a bit after SATs. So fed up with this for DDs sake.

Would love to know what happens after SATS and what this supposed difficult "secondary preparation" will be?

If she is struggling so much why is she still there? Why not take her out of school until September.

That’s not my experience at all.

They had a secondary transition day which is obviously organised by the new schools but apart from that it was only some PSHE lessons where they discussed worries about secondary and how to deal with them. For example a child might worry about not knowing where a classroom is and they discuss solutions. Some kids may have older siblings at the schools so know that everyone is given a map or year 7 teachers walk classes to their next one at the start.

Apart from that it was lots of DT and fun days which they missed out on because of SATS.

Straight after Yr6 SATS, our school switches to working on the end of school play which they all love. They also put on lots of fun Leavers activities like trips and parties.
They have a number of transition days at the secondary schools as well which are also fun.

That sounds tough OP. My own experience is that it’s always been standard here to do plenty of ‘fun’ stuff after the SATs - trips, end-of-year productions, ‘Discovery Days’, outdoor learning and so on, in addition to all the secondary transition activities.

But I have to say I do sense a bit of a sea change in DD’s school since the the majority of pupils starting moving on to the new zero tolerance academy that was built locally a few years back - lots more homework, lots more murmurings about having to prep them for the strict regime there, less emphasis on the arts (as they’re not given a priority at the secondary) etc. What are your catchment secondaries like? Could this be a factor at all?

It varies from school to school.

In DD's school, nothing much changed after SATs - they still had the curriculum to finish. However, they hadn't gone all serious over SATs, so Y6 didn't feel much different to Y5. They covered all subjects all through the year.

In a friend's school down the road, they did loads of prep for SATs from January, alternating 'testing week' with 'learning week' from January right up to SATs, and after SATs they switched to the 'creative' elements of the curriculum with more art, geography, drama etc. and the school play. So those children had quite a different end to the year.

In my dcs primary school there is a real shift from the pressure of SATs to the fun stuff after it. It's all about the residential, rehearsal for the end of term performance, lots of games on the field. The only secondary school related stuff is the transition days

Ours do this. Aside from the mandatory maths and English, post SATs is just the school play, PE, trips to things like the water park, art, etc.

Not my experience of either my own school or my kids school.
We do the best we can to prepare them for sats. I’ve never, in 8 years, had a child in my year 6 group with ‘exam stress’.
I presume you are not fussing about their importance at home?
After sats most of the curriculum carries on as it has through the rest of the year. They have a residential and a play to do.
A couple of secondary transition sessions.
That’s it!

Oh that's a shame OP, after SATS our school is great, it's just loads of things like 'art day' trips out, let's play a massive game of rounders, dance day etc etc, the absolute minimum of 'formal work' is done.

Hope things get a bit easier for DD.

DDs school switch straight into creative mode after SATS, a play, a fundraising project, trips etc.

Secondary school does not require that much prep, the first half term is purposefully lower key, lots of recapping to bring the children from different schools to the same level in the foundation knowledge that they need to move forward with KS3 work. There are plenty of secondary creative subjects they could cover if they wanted to and teach basic food tech skills, photography, music and drama if they want to do secondary school things or fun applicable maths games and science investigations.

There maybe some writing work to be done after SATS, but there is usually school play, residential, transition days to look forward to.

Do they have any of these planned @rupsmiu

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There maybe some writing to get through ( in our authority, we find out on the Friday of SATs week if writing is going to be moderated soo there might be a final push to check every genre and feature needed is in place!) But there is then a diet of plays, PE and residential. However, it's amazing that many children ( and not just the neurodiverse) prefer the consistency of timetabled lessons and moan about the changes!

Does your school have any trips or a residential booked?

Are they doing any leaving events like a BBQ or disco and/or a school play?

If they've got these planned then obviously there are some fun activities to look forward to. If there's nothing planned I wouldn't be impressed.

I hate how SATs have impacted on year 6. My DD was also very bored and didn't have a great teacher at all for that year. She did enjoy the fun stuff during summer term though.

Things improved again when she started Secondary and could actually do some proper learning again.

Sorry to say if this is causing great anxiety and stress, the next years are likely to be tough. Young people are struggling terribly. GCSEs then A-Levels bring SO many mental health issues
It's good you've identified it now care if you can get some therapy for her to learn to manage this stress as it gets worse.

After the SATs, my DD's school year will probably be focusing on rehearsals for the end of year production. After half-term they will be on their week residential trip away. Then the rest of the term will hopefully just be a mixture of forest school, rehearsals and getting excited for the production & end of year party. There's 1 transition day at the secondary school in early July and the kids have been given a list of books to choose from to read between now and September but that's about it.

It relaxes a bit in my kids' school but as it's a year 5/6 class - the curriculum structure does keep running as much as possible - but the year 6 kids all go on the bus into town for bowling and McDonalds as a post-SATs treat, then there's residential for those kids in the school who want to go (from Y4 upwards and they all go off to the seaside), and sports day - so it generally chills out a lot anyway naturally.