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Scaled scores for key stage 1 tests announced

Note: This story is about the 2016 scaled scores. Here are the 2017 key stage 1 scaled scores.

The Department for Education has today released the marks pupils needed in last month’s key stage 1 tests to achieve the government’s “expected” score.

Scaled scores this year replace “levels” for the first time. To meet government expectations, pupils must achieve 100 in their scaled scores. But what marks this equates to differs for each paper (maths; reading; grammar, punctuation and spelling).

It wasn’t known until today how many marks pupils would need to achieve the 100 score.

A government release states the marks required are:

– Maths: 37 out of 60

– Reading: 22 out of 40

– Grammar, punctuation and spelling: 25 out of 40

 

Reaction to scaled scores

Teachers took to Twitter to discuss the scores and how it affected their pupils.

One user, Primary Percival has worked out what the scaled scores convert to as a percentage:

 

In-depth scaled scores per subject

Maths

In maths, key stage 1 pupils must get 37 out of a possible 60 to be meeting expectations. The shaded boxes in the images, released today by the DfE, show the expected standard.

KS1 scaled scores - maths

 

Reading

For reading, children must get at least 22 out of 40:

KS1 scaled scores - reading

 

Grammar, punctuation and spelling

And for grammar, punctuation and spelling, they need to get 25 out of 40.

Primary schools did not have to make their KS1 pupils sit the GPS tests this year, after the test was found to have been available online for months.

Schools minister Nick Gibb launched a “root and branch” investigation into the leak.

KS1 scaled scores - spag

 

The DfE says the scaled scores (85 to 115) will remain the same in future years, but the marks needed to gain those scores might change.

Ben Fuller, lead assessment adviser at Herts for Learning, said: “In the provisional information that had been provided, an indicated range of 80-130 had been used.

“The change is interesting because it means the threshold score of 100 is now the mid-point of the range, whereas before it was slightly lower than the mid-point. Effectively, therefore, relative to the overall distribution of results, the expected standard has risen further.”

Teachers have until June 30 to submit their assessments.

Further details about the scaled scores are available on the DfE’s website.

 

Key stage 2

The scaled scores for key stage 2 SATs are not expected to be released until July 5. In January, the department released details of the accountability information for primary schools, based on the new assessment system.

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9 Comments

  1. Fiona Brodrick

    I have been an infant teacher for twenty years and I have taught mostly in year two. I was very familiar with levels and I never understood the need to change but I don’t want to be considered a dinosaur so I embraced the changes brought about this year. However as soon as I understood the extended curriculum in maths and English I very quickly had my reservations. I don’t think the content of these tests is age appropriate and I feel a lot of lower ks2 objectives have moved to y2. Since foundation is not as formal and children learn through play the pressure is on y1 and y2 teachers to help these young children a ridiculously and unrealistic standard! This has been confirmed as I’ve now seen the standardised scores and expected scores of achievement! Despite working tirelessly all year preparing my hard working children alongside my dedicated team of staff these results have deflated me and confirmed how far apart these new tests are from the old SATs. Needless to say I have spent part of my well earned half term( not mentioning the fact I have planning and reports to do!) worrying about the fallout of these results for my school, parents and most importantly, my pupils! Feeling demoralised, demotivated and angry!!!!

    • Like the old SATS, the new SATs is only an assessment, it will never be used for other purposes, so i really don’t understand why they are so many people opposing it.

  2. Jacqui Smith

    As a parent of a relatively high achieving child (for a small rural school that is)I don’t approve. My son actually enjoyed the test and I’m all for a challenge and improving ‘standards’. My issue is that we have lost a bench-mark to compare standards against and most of what I read hear is not proper statistical bench-marking. I would love to know how you plan to benchmark thee statistics against prior years. Also I have to add that children do not need to know what a ‘phoneme’ is more important is how to use it and spell it! The name is irrelevant unless you are planning to do a degree in English Literature which is a little premature for a primary child. It’s uite interesting what they have done but I am not convinced it’s an improvement. Would love to hear your thoughts on this.

    • I find parents in England are hard to please. On one hand they demand schools to increase standards, but on the other hand they oppose to any changes to policy, curriculum and SATs. The only problems i find in schools are no “real” punishment to disruptive students and studies are too exam oriented. SATs is not the problem.

  3. Julie Dunn

    teaching to levels was awful enough, now it’s a number. I think it’s just another ploy to change the measuring stick so that we can’t have a comparison year by year or decade by decade. It’s just game playing all over again. I’m so glad I’m early retired and don’t have to inflict these meaningless numbers on a child who is just starting on their educational journey. I agree with the first comment, why change what people are used to and have just grasped. The answer is, it’s a game to make us believe it’s all working fine, that Ofsted is effective and standards are rising. Just compare a six year old today with one 25 years ago. You can’t because there’s no standard measure. When does average not mean average? When it’s applied in education!

  4. Angel

    My daughter is in Year 2. I have gone to see her teacher about her SATs ks1 result. She got scaled score 115 in Maths (58 out of 60) and 114 in Reading (38 out of 40). My daughter has done much better than I thought. I am personally love challenge and prefer school give my daughter more tests/exercise papers to do in school. That’s the way to find out where she is and spend the time efficiently on the area she is weak. In my view, nothing wrong to lift up the standards.