SATs

Year 2 SATs Support 2022

SATs are national tests that children take twice during their primary school life. Firstly, at the end of Key Stage 1 (KS1) in Year 2, and then secondly, at the end of Key Stage 2 (KS2) in Year 6. These standardised tests are actually known as End of Key Stage Tests and Assessments, but most people know them as SATs (Standard Assessment Tests) .

SATs are an indicator of the progress your child has made at school so far. They are not a measure of whether your child is passing or failing; they simply show what level your child is currently working to.

At the end of Year 2, children take SATs in:

Reading
English grammar, punctuation and spelling
Maths

Unlike KS2 SATs, KS1 SATs don’t have to be administered according to a nationally-set timetable in a specific week. Schools are free to manage the timetable and will aim to administer the tests in the classroom in a low-stress, low-key way; some children won’t even be aware they’ve taken them!

December 2023

Date	Activity
May 2022	Key stage 1 test period
Week commencing Monday 6th June 2022	Phonics screening check week

KS1 Maths

Paper 1: arithmetic, worth 25 marks and taking around 15 minutes.
Paper 2: mathematical fluency, problem-solving and reasoning, worth 35 marks and taking 35 minutes, with a break if necessary. There are a variety of question types: multiple choice, matching, true/false, constrained (e.g. completing a chart or table; drawing a shape) and less constrained (e.g. where children have to show or explain their method).

Children are not allowed to use any tools such as calculators or number lines.

Children taking Key Stage 1 SATs may also sit two separate papers in grammar, spelling and punctuation:

Paper 1: a 20-word spelling test taking approximately 15 minutes and worth 20 marks.
Paper 2: a grammar, punctuation and vocabulary test, in two sections of around 10 minutes each (with a break between, if necessary), worth 20 marks. This will involve a mixture of selecting the right answers e.g. through multiple choice, and writing short answers.

KS1 Reading SATs

Paper 1 consists of a selection of texts totalling 400 to 700 words, with questions interspersed
Paper 2 comprises a reading booklet of a selection of passages totalling 800 to 1100 words. Children will write their answers in a separate booklet

Each paper is worth 50 per cent of the marks, and should take around 30 minutes, but children are not be strictly timed, as the tests are not intended to assess children’s ability to work at speed. The texts in the reading papers cover a range of fiction, non-fiction and poetry, and get progressively more difficult towards the end of the test. Teachers have the option to stop the test at any point that they feel is appropriate for a particular child.

There are a variety of question types:

Multiple choice
Ranking/ordering, e.g. ‘Number the events below to show in which order they happened in the story’
Matching, e.g. ‘Match the character to the job that they do in the story’
Labelling, e.g. ‘Label the text to show the title’
Find and copy, e.g. ‘Find and copy one word that shows what the weather was like in the story’
Short answer, e.g. ‘What does the bear eat?’
Open-ended answer, e.g. ‘Why did Lucy write the letter to her grandmother? Give two reasons’

How will the tests be marked?

Although the tests are set externally, they are marked by teachers within the school. Children are given a scaled score. Their raw score – the actual number of marks they get – is translated into a scaled score (a conversion score that allows results to be compared year-on-year), where a score of 100 means the child is working at the expected standard.

A score below 100 indicates that the child needs more support, whereas a score of above 100 suggests the child is working at a higher level than expected for their age. The maximum score possible is 115, and the minimum is 85.

Teacher assessments are also used to build up a picture of your child’s learning and achievements. In addition, your child will receive an overall result saying whether they have achieved the required standard in the tests (your child’s actual results won’t be communicated to you unless you ask for them).

Y6 SATS explained

Pupils sit their second set of SATs at KS2 level in Year 6. These tests are more formal than those taken in KS1 and have set exam days as well as external marking in the majority of schools. Children will take exams in English reading comprehension, grammar, punctuation, spelling, mathematical reasoning, and arithmetic.

Once the KS2 SATs are complete, they will be sent away for external marking and children should receive their results towards the end of the summer term in July of Year 6. You will receive a report stating your child’s:

Raw score – simply, the actual number of marks they received in their SATs
Scaled score – a conversion score that allows results to be compared year-on-year
Expected standard – whether or not they have achieved the national standard