We abolished Sats and implemented our own methods

Send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

Parents in Spain believe schools are trying to cut costs by giving more homework to children (BSIP)

Richard Walker rightly asks in Wednesday's Letters why the assessment and addressing of children's educational needs is not left to their teachers. Could the Government be trying to assess teachers by imposing these tests on children? Surely not!

Here on the Isle of Man, where I've been fortunate to have spent more than forty years of my teaching career, we abolished SATS and OFSTED inspections years ago, replacing them with our own systems. Inspections are carried out on a local basis and pupil assessment at Foundation and Key Stages 1 and 2 Levels is a teacher-based continuous process. And guess what? The educational sky has NOT fallen in!

Sue Breadner

Douglas, Isle of Man

Is it me, or has Nicky Morgan's expression become more wild-eyed in recent weeks? She seemed such a placid alternative to the wild-eyed Michael Gove before the election. Now she looks either terrified or puzzled. I can't make up my mind whether she looks like a rabbit caught in the headlights or a rabbit sitting a Sats test.

Regards

Pete Thackeray

Bristol

In response to concerns about the recent SATS tests sat by pupils in English schools, the Department for Education released the following statement: “These tests should not be a cause of stress for pupils - they help teachers make sure children are learning to read, write and add up well. The truth is if they don't master literacy and numeracy early on, they risk being held behind and struggling for the rest of their lives - we are determined to prevent this by helping every child reach their full potential.”

This is a masterpiece in rhetorical sleight of hand. It's the modern politician's gift to so conflate words with action, and intention with outcome, that they would have us believe there is no difference between them. The tests "should not" cause stress, and so they ignore the clear professional and personal feedback that they do and, in an act of self-deification, say 'because I say it, it is so". It's insidious. If they had acknowledged the testimonies of the many parents, children and teachers, but stated that the positives still outweighed the negatives, it would at least have been honest. But instead we're asked to believe that the politician's words of intention carry more weight, are somehow more true.

"The truth" is something they appear to have ownership of. They assure us that without the mastery of literacy and numeracy skills in early life, children "risk being held behind and struggling for the rest of their lives". This is true, but while we focus on this, they hope we won't notice that the idea that these punitive and narrow tests improve literacy and numeracy is deeply contested. In an act of (self?) deceit, we're asked to conflate their apparently altruistic determination to help, with the actual consequences of their actions.

And most damning is the subtext that we're asked to accept, a subtext that lies behind our politicians' policies in so many areas of public life: that without the guidance, correction and target setting and measuring of the political classes, teachers would be unable to, well, teach. The tests "help teachers make sure children are learning to read, write and add up well". Any teacher worth their salt would tell you the usefulness of such summative testing is very limited, and the sense of stress and failure it can generate can be entirely self-defeating. The very students who are likely to struggle "for the rest of their lives" are the very students whose self-confidence and resilience is damaged by tests they know they'll fail. The tests don't help teachers or pupils, but they do help the politicians try to persuade us that they're doing something. Because, presumably, without the politician's "determined" efforts, teachers would be damned to accept mediocrity and the failure of swathes of our children.

Richard Pyke

Swansea

I don't disagree with a lot of what Ben Chu says about public schools ' charitable status. But it is outrageous to describe sports and education facilties as 'peripheral to any educational purpose'. Numerous studies have shown what a rounded musical education can do in terms of student achievement. And I don't think, in this day and age, anyone needs seriously to have to defend sport as part of the curriculum. Share them, please, but don't cast doubt on their worth.

Michael Dempsey

London

Brexit Boys

If Boris Johnson is indeed the 'Poster-Boy' for Brexit, as you claim today, does that make Jacob Rees-Mogg the Four-Poster-Boy?

Jo Mumford

Cotswolds

People who wish the UK to remain in the EU are using the desperate tactic of labelling their opponents "extremists".

British men and women have struggled over hundreds of years to obtain democracy and freedom, not to be ruled by an unelected, undemocratic and wasteful EU.

Mark Richards

Brighton

One last chance for the residents surrounding Heathrow

Heathrow’s latest attempt to convince us that they should have a third runway will cut little ice with those of us who live near the Airport. The Airport Expansion report last July, actually quite sympathetic to Heathrow’s case, conceded that:

a) There was already an ‘exceedance’ of NOx above the critical level in this area

b) In the event of expansion a considerably worse scenario would develop with regard to air pollution.

In my particular community, just south of the Airport , we have additional worries about new railway schemes related to the expansion plans. The suggested routes involve tracks going round and under the historic and beautiful village of Stanwell which John Betjeman described as ‘the loveliest village in Middlesex’.

Given that Surrey and Spelthorne, the local borough, are pretty uncritically pro-Heathrow expansion the only hope for local residents is that Mr Cameron and his Cabinet colleagues will see reason and refuse the expansion request.

Rev Andrew McLuskey

Staines