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Primary education

Join our Primary Education forum to discuss starting school and helping your child get the most out of it.

Original poster

Year six SATS

27 replies

Gorgeousfeet · 21/02/2025 10:18

My DD aged 11 is not an academic child and she has been struggling with her learning at school for a long time. Finally this year she has some support from her TA but she is getting increasingly frustrated and upset over things like homework. We are having full on meltdowns and tears because she doesn’t understand it and says school do not help her ( they do- a bit , but don’t make any adjustments for her)

My question is, now I am worrying about SATS and could I withdraw her from them?
Can anyone please help/ advise with this please. Thank you in advance.

OP posts:
SometimesCalmPerson · 21/02/2025 10:22

It wouldn’t be helpful to withdraw her from the tests. As rubbish as they are, they’re part of the system and it won’t get any easier to deal with at secondary school.

It sounds like the school is trying to help as much as they can, but there’s only so much they can do. If they thought your dd was far enough behind that she should be withdrawn from testing, they’d tell you.

Is tutoring a possibility?

TeenToTwenties · 21/02/2025 10:24

I would keep her in SATs if at all possible, but downplay them at home to help keep things in perspective. They are to see where she's at, it is ok to not be able to do things.Talk to the school about reining it in a bit.

Roll back on homework, keep home a safe haven.

We never even told DD her results, just that we were very proud of her.

Octavia64 · 21/02/2025 10:26

Children can be disapplied (withdrawn) from sats. The official advice is that schools should discuss this with parents and that it is appropriate if the child is working at ks1 level in year 6.

If the school want her to sit them and you don't it gets tricky.

yellowsun · 21/02/2025 10:32

My child was very anxious about SATS and ended up missing them due to COVID. Initially we were pleased but then reality hit at secondary- they are constantly testing and run regular formal assessment weeks. The SATs are a good opportunity to experience testing in a safe environment and are normally handled well in schools.

However, if your child is working below KS2 levels in any subject, it is likely they will be withdrawn from that test. Speak to their teacher if you are worried.

yellowsun · 21/02/2025 10:34

I didn’t answer your question about parents withdrawing - it is not parent choice to withdraw. If a child was ill on the day or a test, there are a certain number of days they have to complete it late. This is more stressful for the child as they have to be separated from their friends.

Definitely have a chat with the teacher about your worries.

Original poster
Gorgeousfeet · 21/02/2025 11:29

Thank you everyone for your support and help with this - I really appreciate it.

I will talk to her teacher .

OP posts:
mugglewump · 21/02/2025 11:34

Can you afford to get her a tutor to support her? It would seem there are gaps in her learning and if these could be filled it would boost her confidence and she would be less anxious about the SATS.

TeenToTwenties · 21/02/2025 12:38

If you do get a tutor I would focus on being more ready for secondary not the SATs themselves. (Which may be the same thing for maths and comprehension. However the grammar stuff is much less relevant fir secondary.)

Platypusxxp · 22/02/2025 15:38

I wouldnt withdraw her. They are used for gcse predictions and secondary sets.
At least with the results you will know what you are looking at so under 100 maybe unlikely to pass eng or maths. 104 might be a grade 5.
He tests are early may i think so even some extra reading books might her hee reading age and speed.
Maths do some practise sats papers.
From about this time in y6 i brought up dd sats maths about 10 so 104 to 114.
Obviously mathd especially gets harder at secondary so worth ensuring they can do the primary work

Iloveeverycat · 22/02/2025 15:54

Did you know you can get all the past sats tests online with mark schemes. I think if you know what is to coming it may not be as daunting. At that stage in school it is something that you could do yourself if you wanted to and may not need a tutor for. You can go through the questions together at their own pace to find which ones they are having difficulty with. It might be that it's just needs explaining differently so they understand. I found it very useful.

OhCrumbsWhereNow · 26/02/2025 14:30

yellowsun · 21/02/2025 10:34

I didn’t answer your question about parents withdrawing - it is not parent choice to withdraw. If a child was ill on the day or a test, there are a certain number of days they have to complete it late. This is more stressful for the child as they have to be separated from their friends.

Definitely have a chat with the teacher about your worries.

Actually parents do have a choice to withdraw.

You can just inform the school that they will not be sitting them.

I planned to do that with DD given her levels of SEN. In the end there were none due to Covid.

Secondary did CAT tests, NVR and assessed in class in order to set them, they do this for children coming from independent schools or overseas all the time, so not having SATs makes zero difference for your child in many ways.

It can also prevent them being stuck with a 'computer says' flightpath throughout secondary.

Original poster
Gorgeousfeet · 27/02/2025 13:52

Thank you everyone. We did an English paper recently and she found it incredibly difficult- I helped her most of the way. Tonight we have a maths one. It’s big and she’s already getting worked up over it. I am not sure if she can cope with it mentally . As dramatic as that sounds , and no matter how resilient I try and help her to be .
Recent report from school shows:
Reading raw score- 21/50. Scaled score 98
Writing raw score - 25/73 ( spag 2023 )
Maths raw score - 23/110 scaled score 91

Genuinely have no clue what these mean- please can anyone explain/ help me?

Gah 😩

OP posts:
Decklededge · 27/02/2025 14:05

Your daughter's scores aren't that bad (I'm a Year 6 teacher).
The scaled score to pass is 100. Therefore, she's nearly achieving it in reading.
She's quite a way off in Maths but thar would be something a tutor could rea help with.
Her teacher will be giving lots of input to help her gain extra marks for the SPaG paper too.

Decklededge · 27/02/2025 14:06

I'm also guessing that your daughter struggles with spelling from those scores.

Decklededge · 27/02/2025 14:07

Sorry for typos in post!

Octavia64 · 27/02/2025 14:19

Those scores are pretty ok.

The reading in particular is nearly at the age related expectations (100).

Maths is below but honestly I've seen many children with much lower scores.

Original poster
Gorgeousfeet · 27/02/2025 14:39

Thank you so much for your reply. We need to definitely work more on the maths . Spellings aren’t great either to be honest. I will talk to her teacher - see if there is anything else I can be doing to help her.
Thank you again for being super helpful.

OP posts:
BigSilly · 02/03/2025 09:58

No a parent cannot withdraw their child.

Hoppinggreen · 02/03/2025 10:03

DD did no prep at all for SATs, I told her that they were just some tests to see how they were doing and to do her best and not worry. To be fair she quite likes exams so they weren't a big deal for her.
DS didn't do them (covid) but I would have told him the same and would have refused any extra classes or interventions for him if not during normal lesson time
I really don't know why some schools and parents (not saying you are OP) get so wound up about them.

Caaarrrl · 02/03/2025 11:07

Gorgeousfeet · 27/02/2025 13:52

Thank you everyone. We did an English paper recently and she found it incredibly difficult- I helped her most of the way. Tonight we have a maths one. It’s big and she’s already getting worked up over it. I am not sure if she can cope with it mentally . As dramatic as that sounds , and no matter how resilient I try and help her to be .
Recent report from school shows:
Reading raw score- 21/50. Scaled score 98
Writing raw score - 25/73 ( spag 2023 )
Maths raw score - 23/110 scaled score 91

Genuinely have no clue what these mean- please can anyone explain/ help me?

Gah 😩

I'm a year 6 teacher. Her reading score is almost meeting Age Related Expectations (ARE). A scaled score of 100 is ARE in all of the assessments. Depending on when these results are from, she should be able to increase to 100 in reading just from quality first teaching in class. In maths, focus on getting as many marks from the arithmetic paper as she can. You can help her at home with this. Mathsbot is a free website that you can work through arithmetic questions with her. Times tables are also great to overlearn with her. Regardless of the SATs and her results in these, arithmetic and tables are vital for her secondary school maths journey.

I'd be very surprised if school would be able remove her from the assessments because she is not far enough behind ARE. If we could do that, then we'd all have great results because we'd just remove any children that were not ARE!

Caaarrrl · 02/03/2025 11:13

Just to add, there is no parental rights to withdraw from SATs and the head would need to provide evidence that your child is incapable of accessing the tests. The scores of your child prove that they are capable of accessing them but maybe not achieving ARE.

OhCrumbsWhereNow · 02/03/2025 11:16

Caaarrrl · 02/03/2025 11:13

Just to add, there is no parental rights to withdraw from SATs and the head would need to provide evidence that your child is incapable of accessing the tests. The scores of your child prove that they are capable of accessing them but maybe not achieving ARE.

There may not be an "official" route but you absolutely can just say they are not sitting them.

Not much they can do to stop you.

Caaarrrl · 02/03/2025 12:37

OhCrumbsWhereNow · 02/03/2025 11:16

There may not be an "official" route but you absolutely can just say they are not sitting them.

Not much they can do to stop you.

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Well, obviously. But the same could be said about anything the parent doesn't want the child to do. That's up to the parent.

BigSilly · 02/03/2025 16:29

Caaarrrl · 02/03/2025 12:37

Well, obviously. But the same could be said about anything the parent doesn't want the child to do. That's up to the parent.

Show quote history

You can certainly say your child is not sitting them, but the school will still put them in unless the HT decides their academics are so bad they can't access the papers or there is any other exceptional reason why the child would not cope
If you choose yo send your child to the school, apart from RE and collective worship, and offsiye trips, you have no say on what they do there

Melancholyflower · 03/03/2025 22:45

OhCrumbsWhereNow · 02/03/2025 11:16

There may not be an "official" route but you absolutely can just say they are not sitting them.

Not much they can do to stop you.

Show quote history

If you send your child into school on those days the child will be expected to sit and do the tests.