The teaching union NUT is demanding that the 2016 SATs for KS1 and KS2 be suspended after exemplification materials are released too late in the year and present unrealistic standards.
In September 2015, the government released a framework for teachers to use as a guide towards preparing their children for SATs. However the recent release of the exemplification materials, which detail expected standards in assessment, present unachieveable boundaries (with levels set much higher than last year) and unrealistic workloads according to the UK’s leading teachers’ union.
A spokesperson for the NUT has stated:
“As if this weren’t bad enough, the criteria for assessment will change again in September for the new school year. The Government’s pattern of behaviour suggests that these will also be delivered late, and cause further turbulence and needless stress…The negative effects on pupils’ well-being and teachers’ morale should be plain.”
Today, the NUT meet with other teaching unions to discuss stopping the governments ‘badly thought-out and damaging process.’ With assessments starting in May, it is without doubt that the next few months for both teachers and their pupils are going to be stressful.
Managing Director of KSOL, Aron Dhunna, believes that as long as successive governments continue to change educational goals, it will remain unstable:
“It is important to test children as it sets a benchmark in their progress, enabling intervention by parents and teachers whenever it is needed. However, for testing to provide effective and useful results, the curriculum needs to be stable and whilst ever changing goverments attempt to interfere, education will remain unstable.”
