Teacher Assessment vs Externally Marked SATS

[Catsmum]

Hi There,

Can anyone explain the difference between teacher assessed and externally marked SATS. Which carries more weight?

I received the SATs scores for my DS yesterday. In all 3 subjects, reading, writing and maths, the externally marked score was one grade higher than the teacher assessment score.

When I asked which scores the secondary school would receive I was told that the teacher assessed scores had already been given to the secondary school and would not be updated with the new scores, even though they were higher.

I am concerned that his new school will be organising sets according to scores which do not accurately reflect DS's ability.

Any thoughts?

Catsmum

[Guest55]

The Secondary will get the test levels if your LA is anything like mine as they are all circulated.

The teacher assessment should be more accurate as it's an asssessment of the work throughout the year. The tests can just be luck on the day - were the marks well over the threshold?

[wonderwoman]

KS2 writing is normally just teacher assessed this year.

I agree with Guest55 the teacher assessments tend to be more accurate, but the secondary school will get the test marks and will be judged on his progress from them. I wouldn't worry about setting at the beginning of Y7, secondary schools often do their own assessments / testing at the beginning of the year, or in the case of one of my DC's school on the induction day!

KS2 SAT results are far more important to the primary school than your child.

[mystery]

How can you know for certain which is more accurate?

Taking it one subject at a time ...... maths ..... child might be pretty lazy in your maths lessons and then pull out the stops on the test day and do what they are capable of. You can't get an extra load of maths right just by fluke can you? What if in the three weeks running up to SATS someone (a parent or tutor) covers some new material with them that they did not cover at school and as a result they go up a grade boundary ....... you won't have this on your teacher assessment records, but if the child can do it, the child can do it

Reading comprehension ....... without sitting a child down to do a written reading comprehension you don't really know how they'll do in it do you? If you do them regularly enough in class it should tally with the tests? But what if the child tries harder in the real thing than usual and shows what they are truly capable of?

Writing ------- it kind of seems fair enough that one should be judged on one's every day writing standard ...... but again, what if you pull the stops out in the test?

Etc.

I hadn't realised that the secondary school gets the teacher assessment only, that seems tough to me.

[wonderwoman]

Secondary schools don't just get the teacher assessments, they get the SAT scores too. Writing this year is teacher assessed. It is possible to do better in the tests.

I assess my pupils every time they read and they have written comprehension exercises to complete on a weekly basis. An extended piece of writing is assessed each week and leveled. Maths is also assessed on a weekly basis, written and mental. This is APP (assessing pupil progress). It is all kept to provide evidence of attainment and progress. In fact I'm always assessing pupils every time I ask them a question.

KS2 tests are, I think, quite accurate if you are a level 4 or level 3, but not very accurate at level 5 because there are hardly any level 5 questions on the maths paper, or reading paper. So a teacher may have plenty of evidence to assess at 4a, but not enough at level 5 to assess them at that level, but it is quite possible the child gets a level 5 in the test. It doesn't mean either assessment is wrong, they are a good level 4 beginning to work at level 5.
I had one pupil a few years ago, who produced writing at 4c/4b, but with different elements each time. The SATs were externally marked then and the pupil managed to get everything in and achieve a level 5 (only just), it was the only piece of level 5 writing the pupil did all year!

Primary schools won't mind the higher marks at all - it's all a bonus - secondary schools might though.

[Guest55]

Mystery - a teacher assessment IS more accurate.

You can get a level 5 Maths in the paper by getting NO level 5 question correct - yes, it's that silly. Of course a child getting 90+ on the papers is virtually certain to be a 'real' level 5; hence my question about whether the score was near the threshold.

[yoyo123]

The grade is given according to a threshold so, a score 47 may give you a level 4 whereas one of 46 will give you a level 3. Similarly children may show a level of progress from 3a to 4c by only improving raw score by one, whereas a child could improve by e.g 9 marks but show no change in level.

Teacher assessment is over a period of time as has been said, it will also cover more than one genre of writing , the sats papers are a snapshot. If you have a child who is really good at writing stories and the sats paper requires them to write a radio advert then it may not show them at their best.

btw, the writing papers this year were moderated, we were marked up on our assessment of at least 3 children.

[Hera]

Given that there are people on this thread that understand what the sats levels mean I have a couple of probably very silly questions. This is the first year I have had sats level on reports apart form the year 2 ones and I am a bit confused.

In year 2 my current year 3 child got a 3 in everything apart from reading where she got a 4. In her year 3 end of year marks (in a new school) she got science 3b, maths 3a (teacher assessment) and 4c (optional sat result), writing 3b for both and English reading comprension 4c for both. To me this looks as if there has been no progress in year 3. Am I correct or do these levels not equate to the year 2 ones.

Also my child in year 5 has got 5b in maths and 5c in reading, 5c in writing, 5c in science and all the same for sats results and teacher assessment where relevant. Will these be based on the same papers he will sit in year 6 or are these easier papers?

[Guest55]

In year 2 my current year 3 child got a 3 in everything apart from reading where she got a 4. In her year 3 end of year marks (in a new school) she got science 3b, maths 3a (teacher assessment) and 4c (optional sat result), writing 3b for both and English reading comprension 4c for both. To me this looks as if there has been no progress in year 3. Am I correct or do these levels not equate to the year 2 ones.

Also my child in year 5 has got 5b in maths and 5c in reading, 5c in writing, 5c in science and all the same for sats results and teacher assessment where relevant. Will these be based on the same papers he will sit in year 6 or are these easier papers?

Year 3 levels A KS1 level 3 will usually be a 3c (just a 3) as they have not covered all level 3. In Bucks all KS1 level 4s are moderated by someone from the LA - do you know if this was done? Otherwise, yes it does look like little progress in reading but don't worry as this is well above most children.

Year 5 levels These are probably based on the optional tests which do slightly over-level I'm told, but still very good at this stage.

[Hera]

In Bucks all KS1 level 4s are moderated by someone from the LA - do you know if this was done? Otherwise, yes it does look like little progress in reading but don't worry as this is well above most children.

Thanks Guest55. I don't know if the level 4 was externally monitored. It was in a Barnet school. She has unfortunately had 2 school moves since then which may well have affected things this year. She is now in a herts school and the head before she started seemed surprised that she had a level 4 and had said it would be hard to show progress which I didn't really understand at the time. Perhaps it is just down to how different schools assess or the instability of this year. It is reassuring that there has been some progress, I hadn't considered the increments that the levels go up in, as at the end of year 2 you are just given a 3.