Teaching unions have long hated SATs (Standard Assessment Tests) for seven, 11 and 14 year-olds, saying they give children a narrower education than they need because of the widespread practice of “teaching to the tests” in order to gain ground in school league tables.
The publication of national results this week and last has brought renewed calls for their abolition, coming after controversy over delays in the marking of this year’s exams.
The Association of Teachers and Lecturers said this week’s Key Stage 3 results for 14-year-olds were an “irrelevance”.
“No one will be interested in the results when young people apply for a job,” it said.
The Commons Schools Select Committee in May found that teaching to the test was widespread.
“The drive to meet Government-set targets has too often become the goal rather than the means to the end of providing the best possible education for all children,” it said.
The government says the national tests — only conducted in England — and external examinations at 16 are an important aspect of accountability in education. Good schools can focus on literacy and numeracy and take the tests in their stride, it believes.
What do you think?
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6 comments so far
SATS particularly at 11 are an important indicator of primary school academic performance. Results reflect the quality of the school intake, the quality of leadership (head teacher especially) and the general standards of teaching. They are an important and invaluable aid to parents.
For secondary schools GCSE and A level results provide the same function so that SATS at 14 are not so important.
But SATS do not indicate much about important non-academic factors such as politically-correct teaching biases (encouraged by the Labour Govt and OFSTED) or weak discipline and bullying, also present in a good number of state schools.
- Posted by Dr David BosworthScrap SATs! Please!
- Posted by ZThey are completely irrelevant to pupils’ progress and future, their curriculum is narrow, and the standards expected of pupils are ridiculously low. What is the point of a test in which there is no failing grade?
As an example of of how easy the tests are: I have taken my English SAT early, at age 12, and I easily achieved the highest grade - Level 7.
I ask something which many others have also asked.
What’s the point?
SATS are just a waste or time.
- Posted by makavelii should know. i took them last year.
a load of stress, and for what?
theyre there to keep pupils in place. nothing more, nothing less.
wether we pass or fail our SATS, it doesn’t make a diffrence. to any one. because employees never ask.
and i know that, beacuse i recently was on work experence, an i know it didnt matter what grades i got in my SATS, as long as i could turn up on time, sell the stuff…i was fine.
Yes - scrap them!
They are a bureaucratic pile of waste paper.
A waste of time and effort and ultimately meaningless.
- Posted by The Truth Is...SATs are another example of a sensible and necessary tool being corrupted to suit government propaganda requirements.
Of course it is necessary to test a child’s ability against a set standard at regular intervals throughout his/her education. How else would anyone, from the child’s own teacher up to the Minister Of Education, know whether the educational system was working?
The key requirements of such a system are that the standard is set at a level which will measure progress towards national educational requirements for 21st century jobs and that the results are used to improve teaching methods in order to progressively raise the standard.
The problem with the current system is that it has been corrupted into a time-wasting exercise in producing results which will allow the government to announce each year about “a further improvement in standards” when it and everyone in the teaching industry knows perfectly well that the higher marks are achieved simply by lowering the standard required to achieve those marks.
How do I know? The government’s own (reluctantly revealed) figures state that 3 million children left school within the past 10 years unable to read and write
properly.
If you want evidence of total failure, there it is.
- Posted by Mike TNO.
TEACHERS SHOULD TEACH CHILDREN. THEY SHOULD KNOW HOW TO READ, WRITE AND DO BASIC MATH IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL; OTHERWISE, THEY SHOULD NOT BE PROMOTED.
THE ARE CONSTANTLY PROMOTED THROUGH HIGH SCHOOL AND COLLEGE!
WE HAVE “IDIOT” NURSES AND DOCTORS ATTENDING TO HUMAN BEINGS! THIS IS SCARY.
- Posted by AMERICA-FIRST