Primary school sats

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The bairns primary school was obsessed with them. They had sessions on after school that were voluntary but the teacher wasn't happy if anyone missed them. All they did in year six was SATS work and practice papers.

She's now finding she's got gaps in her knowledge in secondary school. For example she's struggling with algebra as they didn't do the basics in primary school.
 
becs said:
The bairns primary school was obsessed with them. They had sessions on after school that were voluntary but the teacher wasn't happy if anyone missed them. All they did in year six was SATS work and practice papers.

She's now finding she's got gaps in her knowledge in secondary school. For example she's struggling with algebra as they didn't do the basics in primary school.
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I can understand why schools are. It influences data, league tables and "shows" progression. This in turn can influence desirability of a school & pupil numbers - if they fall the school receives less funding. Parents play their part in all of this.

That said I agree the system isnt fit for purpose & many kids struggle as you described.

What would be your alternative? I'm not a massive fan of schools/teachers doing their own assessments due to the inherent incentive to want to make yourself appear as favourable as possible
 
The alternative is that teachers stop putting undue pressure on children and stop making their final years in primary school pointlessly stressful and lacking in breadth of education.

Of course they have to accept lower SATs scores but so what, they can still achieve their aims as a school. Once they've taken a hit in results they can still show progression in future years.

Most secondary schools don't take them into account anyway in terms of streaming the Y7 intake and prefer to do their own assessments or even leave the streaming until a year or two in.

As a parent they're not worth stressing over IMO.
 
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General Zod said:
What would be your alternative? I'm not a massive fan of schools/teachers doing their own assessments due to the inherent incentive to want to make yourself appear as favourable as possible
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We did tests every year towards the end of the year in junior school. We were never told about it. You just went in and the desks were set out separately and we were told it was test day. That worked fine as there was no pressure on the bairns and the school used the test results to work out things like who needed extra help in certain areas.

Two terms of constant stress and constant pressure for 10/11 year olds on a test that means bugger all personally to them is absolutely ridiculous.

My Dad worked for one of the exam boards and was a key figure in getting the Key Stage 3 SATS abolished as he thought they were a waste of time. He preferred to spend his time teaching the GCSE curriculum as leaving school with a good maths qualification is of more benefit to the pupils themselves.
The Great Soprendo said:
As a parent they're not worth stressing over IMO.
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I told the bairn that when she was getting stressed about it. I said nobody in the future is ever going to ask what did you get in your KS2 SATS test. To be honest, I can't even remember what her result was!
 
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The Great Soprendo said:
The alternative is that teachers stop putting undue pressure on children and stop making their final years in primary school pointlessly stressful and lacking in breadth of education.

Of course they have to accept lower SATs scores but so what, they can still achieve their aims as a school. Once they've taken a hit in results they can still show progression in future years.

Most secondary schools don't take them into account anyway in terms of streaming the Y7 intake and prefer to do their own assessments or even leave the streaming until a year or two in.

As a parent they're not worth stressing over IMO.
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Agreed. Am not a fan of SATS & league tables, its the system & the way that schools are judged that needs to change. All I'm saying is under the current system I can understand why teachers & schools do what they do
becs said:
We did tests every year towards the end of the year in junior school. We were never told about it. You just went in and the desks were set out separately and we were told it was test day. That worked fine as there was no pressure on the bairns and the school used the test results to work out things like who needed extra help in certain areas.

Two terms of constant stress and constant pressure for 10/11 year olds on a test that means bugger all personally to them is absolutely ridiculous.

My Dad worked for one of the exam boards and was a key figure in getting the Key Stage 3 SATS abolished as he thought they were a waste of time. He preferred to spend his time teaching the GCSE curriculum as leaving school with a good maths qualification is of more benefit to the pupils themselves.


I told the bairn that when she was getting stressed about it. I said nobody in the future is ever going to ask what did you get in your KS2 SATS test. To be honest, I can't even remember what her result was!
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Have a like for talking sense
 
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The Great Soprendo said:
As a parent they're not worth stressing over IMO.
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This is true but I have to admit something. I consider myself a lifelong committed socialist...but...when I'm looking for where my now 3 month old daughter is going to be educated I'm gonna check every bit of data I can on the available options and make sure she gets what looks the best, even if thats not what is best for everyone. There are obviously critical flaws in using sats as a measure and if it was anyone elses kid Id happily accept that. But mine's special. Im sure every other parent feels the same.
 
MattyM 09/109 said:
This is true but I have to admit something. I consider myself a lifelong committed socialist...but...when I'm looking for where my now 3 month old daughter is going to be educated I'm gonna check every bit of data I can on the available options and make sure she gets what looks the best, even if thats not what is best for everyone. There are obviously critical flaws in using sats as a measure and if it was anyone elses kid Id happily accept that. But mine's special. Im sure every other parent feels the same.
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Of course. But bear in mind the stats can be misleading. The primary school where mine went to had been going hell-for-leather with their Y6 kids on SATs, and getting amazing results. They then changed their approach for the year my youngest went through, putting much less emphasis on them, and their average scores went down, as you would expect. However she had a much better education in Y6 than her brother who went before, and it had no impact at all on her transition to the same secondary school.

Those kind of things might raise alarm bells if you look just at the stats. I accept it can be difficult to look beyond them if you don't have any other information though.
 
future employers might not ask for them, but at my school they determined what set you were in so you could learn with like minded people. end up in the bottom set and you could shoot yourself in the foot. about time people took exams more seriously and teach yourself the concept of sitting exams, rather than hearing people whine about how they aren't test takers etc.
 
You think sats are stressful , should have took the 11 plus. My headmaster drilled us to perfection on exam technique for the last year . Harrowing but I passed and I suppose it was important.
 
nyron4england said:
future employers might not ask for them, but at my school they determined what set you were in so you could learn with like minded people. end up in the bottom set and you could shoot yourself in the foot. about time people took exams more seriously and teach yourself the concept of sitting exams, rather than hearing people whine about how they aren't test takers etc.
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Not sure of the wisdom of the bottom set studying Firearms at GCSE but I'm sure they had their reasons.

I'm not sure many secondary schools pay huge amounts of attention to what happened in primary school when deciding which set to put children in; they prefer to make their own minds up. I know for a fact the one my children go to don't. In fact they don't even stream them until a couple of years in.
 
The Great Soprendo said:
Not sure of the wisdom of the bottom set studying Firearms at GCSE but I'm sure they had their reasons.

I'm not sure many secondary schools pay huge amounts of attention to what happened in primary school when deciding which set to put children in; they prefer to make their own minds up. I know for a fact the one my children go to don't. In fact they don't even stream them until a couple of years in.
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i did say at my school. when i went from year 6 to year 7, they used our ks2 sats to put us into sets, and im thankful they did. nothing more annoying than having to sit and wait for the slower kids to finish.
 
I think the measurement of quality in many walks of life is difficult whether its doctors waiting times or school performance. Stats are often gamed in some way so that the outcome looks good but the quality of the teaching or service is worse because of the measurement. I don't know what the solution is, but blunt tools don't seem to work
 
Curlyteeth said:
I think the measurement of quality in many walks of life is difficult whether its doctors waiting times or school performance. Stats are often gamed in some way so that the outcome looks good but the quality of the teaching or service is worse because of the measurement. I don't know what the solution is, but blunt tools don't seem to work
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Just shoot the slow kids.
Pretty obvious solution.
 
My kid was part of the first set to do them in the current format iirc. Dominated year 6, he didn't seemed phased by it though and did fine.
 
The pressure is on schools to show good results for league tables, so the pressure from governors is passed to the head, who passes it on to Y6 teachers and ultimately onto the children.

I work on a project that deals with Primary to Secondary transition so see the strain kids are put under with SATs on a yearly basis. Every year the Secondary school hardly takes the results at face value as they know some kids have had extra support and been spoonfed the information and do their own monitoring tests to set the kids anyway.
 
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