CAT results - what do they actually mean?!

[EcoLady]

Letter home with y7 DD's CAT results. It gives her numbers and the average of her year group ... but nothing else about what they actually mean.

Have tried googling but have only come across techy equations that need other data to go in them (ABCD?). Does anyone know of anywhere that explains it all in simple terms please?

Thanks

Niceweather Thank you for this - it is really encouraging. I can't really explain how I felt when faced with this. Upset, despairing, angry - and my DS just sat there. Good to hear evidence that these predicitons are not as accurate as the school makes them out to be.

My son's CATS predicted a Level 5a in Science at the end of KS3 (Yr 9). He's now in Yr 8, is Level 6a and in top group, so CATS inaccurate. Difficult to overachieve in these tests but not difficult to underachieve.

I agree with Niceweather. My DS (year 7 at non selective prep), does well in verbal reasoning but nothing special in numerical or non verbal, so his overall average score is not outstanding. However, in his everyday school work and end of year exams he is generally in the top few of the top sets in all subjects. It perhaps shows that because his verbal reasoning is good he can be taught the principles of maths and science and will do well in an exam up to GCSE level. However, I would not say he is a natural scientist and perhaps will go down the arts route after GCSEs. But clearly too early to tell at the moment.
For those of you who have children in schools where they use the CAT scores to set the children I hope the school takes into consideration the ability of the child during lessons, tests and end of year exams. After all, these things are surely more akin to GCSEs than random reasoning tests.