1. Information for Parents
Year 6 SATS 2018
Information for Parents

2. When? Which subject?
Monday 14 May 2018 English grammar, punctuation and spelling Paper 1: questions English grammar, punctuation and spelling Paper 2: spelling
Tuesday 15 May 2018 English reading
Wednesday 16 May 2018 Mathematics Paper 1: arithmetic Mathematics Paper 2: reasoning
Thursday 17 May 2018 Mathematics Paper 3: reasoning

3. Writing?
Writing is not assessed through a ‘test’: writing is assessed by Year 6 teachers.
The government require teachers to assess several (6-8) lengthy examples of pupils’ writing against a set of objectives which indicate the ‘expected standard’ (see next screen). Teachers have to have evidence of the child applying the skill mentioned in the objective several times in different pieces to be able to say that they meet the objective. If all of the objectives can be seen to be met in the body of work then the child can be reported as being at the expected standard. If the child does not meet all of the objectives they cannot be assessed as being at the ‘expected standard’ and will be deemed to be working towards the standard.
There is a strict checking process by the LA to quality assure teacher judgements.

4. Working towards ‘expected standard’ objectives for writing
Criteria:
Write for a range of purposes
Use paragraphs to organise ideas
In narratives, describe settings and characters
In non-narrative writing, use simple devices to structure the writing and support the reader (e.g. headings, sub-headings and bullet points)
Use capital letters, full stops, question marks, commas for lists and apostrophes for contraction mostly correctly.
Spell correctly most words from the Year 3/4 spelling list and some words from the Year 5/6 spelling list
Write legibly (joining not necessary)

5. The ‘expected standard’ objectives
write effectively for a range of purposes and audiences, selecting language that shows good awareness of the reader (e.g. the use of the first person in a diary; direct address in instructions and persuasive writing)
in narratives, describe settings, characters and atmosphere
integrate dialogue in narratives to convey character and advance the action
select vocabulary and grammatical structures that reflect what the writing requires, doing this mostly appropriately (e.g. using contracted forms in dialogues in narrative; using passive verbs to affect how information is presented; using modal verbs to suggest degrees of possibility
In non-narrative writing, use simple devices to structure the writing and support the reader (e.g. headings, sub-headings and bullet points)
use a range of devices to build cohesion (e.g. conjunctions, adverbials of time and place, pronouns, synonyms) within and across paragraphs
use verb tenses consistently and correctly throughout their writing
use the range of punctuation taught at KS2 mostly correctly (e.g. inverted commas and other punctuation to indicate direct speech)
spell correctly most words from the Year 5/6 spelling list and use a dictionary to check the spelling of uncommon or more ambitious vocabulary
maintain legibility in joined handwriting when writing at speed.

6. How can I help my child to try to achieve the writing standard?
Encourage them to write regularly (keep a diary/ write sports reports/ book reviews/ letters/ blogs etc.)
Look at the child’s writing together and discuss punctuation corrections/ sentence structures used/ any errors with use of Standard English in their writing (was/ were; could’ve/ could of/ written vs wrote)
Read regularly together and discuss word meanings/ sentence structures/punctuation use
Practise the spellings from the lists (KS1/ Y34 and Y56) regularly not just for test week (when they then become forgotten) – keep revisiting previous spellings to ensure that they are retained.

7. Spelling, punctuation and grammar.
This test comprises 2 papers. The first Paper is known as the ‘short answers paper’. In this test, the children’s knowledge of grammar and punctuation is tested through mini exercises (45 minutes to complete).
The children are expected to know:
word classes (noun, verb, adjective, adverb, pronoun, preposition, connective and article); correct punctuation usage (full stops, capital letters, commas, speech marks (which are referred to as inverted commas not speech marks in the test), brackets, dashes, hyphens, apostrophes, semi colons and colons) and correct and precise grammatical terminology (clause, phrase, subordinate clause, main clause, direct speech, reported speech, active and passive, double negative, past tense, inverted commas, subjunctive, perfect and continuous tense)

8. Spelling, punctuation and grammar (continued)
The second paper is the spelling test. It includes 20 spellings.
The spellings reflect:
Phonic knowledge (letter strings i.e. ough/ ture/ ible or able/ qu)
Rules taught in class (‘ed’ always for past tense, take off ‘e’ before adding ‘ing’, i before e except after ‘c’)
Exceptions to taught rules (Science as an exception to i before e rule)
Correct homophone knowledge (which vs witch/ hear vs here)
High Frequency Words from the published word lists from the National Curriculum or National Strategies documents.

9. How can I help my child to try to achieve the SPAG standard?
Access grammar games online
Watch videos, read information and attempt mini tests to improve SPAG knowledge
Regularly practise spellings from the published lists and those which follow the rules and spelling patterns outlined in the national curriculum for Y6 pupils to know
Complete the CGP Books revision books.

10. Reading
The children have an hour to complete the reading paper. Pupils are advised to approach the test by reading one text and answering all the related questions before then moving on to the next text rather than reading all 3 texts to begin with. The questions are worth a total of 50 marks.
There will be 3 texts (a mixture of genres) in the reading booklet and they will not be related by theme. The children will write their responses in a separate answer booklet. There is a strong emphasis on the ‘higher order’ comprehension elements of the 2014 curriculum.
The texts and questions will be organised by level of difficulty, with the least demanding text coming first. The text difficulty and level of questioning will then increase as the children progress through the booklet. The onus will be on the child to organise their own time.
Teachers will also be required to submit a judgement about whether the child is at the expected standard by making a judgement about the child’s regular performance in Reading against the new national interim standard objectives.

11. How can I help my child to try to achieve the reading standard?
Read and discuss more demanding texts with your child (i.e. classics such as The Jungle Book/ Treasure Island) as these regularly are included as extracts on the papers. You might even want to whet their appetite for reading such novels by watching film/ animation versions of them first.
Access previous SAT papers and practise answering the comprehension questions so that your child gets used to the way questions are phrased.
They can be found on this site:
Please use the past papers from this site but avoid using the 2017 materials with your child as these will be given to the children close to the test in class under test conditions in order to give the children the most realistic preparation for the tests as possible.
Read and discuss poetry with your child.
Play ‘quick fact find games’ using non-fiction books. Challenge your child to find information from information books on topics of interest to them as quick as possible

12. Maths
There are 3 papers: Paper 1 – arithmetic; Paper 2 – reasoning and Paper3 – reasoning.
Paper 1 arithmetic assesses basic mathematical calculations. The children have 30 minutes to complete this test. There will be 36 questions and a total of 40 marks available. Straightforward calculations involving the four operations will be tested alongside more complex calculations with fractions (adding /subtracting /multiplying and dividing fractions). The 2 mark questions will focus on long multiplication and division.
Papers 2 and 3 each consist of a single test paper. Pupils will have 40 minutes to complete each test. Each paper will have questions worth a total of 35 marks. The reasoning papers place a far bigger emphasis this year on the more complex problem solving skills than in previous years SAT papers.
Teachers will also be required to submit a judgement about whether the child is at the expected standard by making a judgement about the child’s regular performance in Maths against the national interim standard objectives.

13. How can I help my child to try to achieve the maths standard?
Practise adding, subtracting multiplying and dividing with simple numbers mentally with rapid recall.
Practise column addition and subtraction skills and multiplication and division methods for larger numbers in order for children to become confident with these skills.
Practise adding subtracting multiplying and dividing with fractions.
Practise problem solving maths activities using past papers to build confidence using Past SAT papers.

14. Scaled scores
SAT results will come back to school in early July. For the KS2 tests a ‘scaled score’ of 100 will represent the ‘expected standard’.
A pupil’s scaled score will be based upon their raw score. The raw score being the total marks achieved in the test. This will then be translated into a scaled score using a conversion table.
Conversion tables will be published in July (around the 5th) for schools to see how raw scores translated to scaled scores. NOT PRIOR TO THE TESTS. The DfE will make the following available to schools about pupil performance:
Child’s raw score
Child’s scaled score
Confirmation or whether or not the child has attained the ‘expected standard’

15. Thank you for coming!!
Please feel free to browse the past papers and ask any additional questions.