David Cameron’s election manifesto pledge to make pupils resit their SATs in year 7 if they do not reach the “required standards” in year 6 would mean, for English alone, at least 100,000 year 7 students taking a test in the spring or summer terms, having just spent all of the previous year preparing for and taking national tests.
The major flaw in this proposal is the lack of substantial comment from the government on what would be put in place to make any difference in learning for those students between the testing points.
Anxiety about whether children are on track for good GCSE results that simply leads to re-testing, ignores the often repeated adage that measuring the pig doesn’t fatten it. Re-testing offers no guarantee of success and may indeed be harmful to students.
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