So you have helped your child through their KS2 SATs and they’re going to secondary school in September. Now you learn they’re going to do CATs shortly after starting...
What are CATs? CATs (Cognitive Abilities Tests) are essentially intelligence tests that secondary schools use to set baselines and stream subjects. Many secondary schools use CATs to assess year 7 pupils’ potential within the first few weeks of term. CATs generally assess pupils in three distinct areas:
CATs help schools identify stronger and weaker pupils regardless of what they have learned in primary school. Unlike Key Stage 2 SATs they don’t attempt to test knowledge, only ability. Can I prepare my child for CATs? CATs are designed to be taken without any preparation so they give an accurate representation of a child’s current abilities and potential. That said, we think it’s important for children to have some familiarity about what might be asked. Past CATs papers are not available to buy or download however children can gain familiarity with the types of questions asked by using some of our 11+ range of books. Contact Education Matters on 01161 728 2000 or edmatters@ymail.com if you want to book your child in for tutoring tfor towards the CATS. We are open throughout the school holidays. To Kill a Mockingbird and Of Mice and Men are among the US literary classics to be dropped by a GCSE exam board after the education secretary called for more British works to be studied. Neither book is on OCR's draft GCSE English Literature syllabus in England. Michael Gove's overhaul has also seen Arthur Miller's The Crucible left out. The Department for Education said its document about new content for the subject published in December "doesn't ban any authors, books or genres". Labour said the changes were "ideological" and "backward-looking". 'Particular dislike' The new GCSE course content will include at least one play by William Shakespeare, a selection of work by the Romantic poets, a 19th Century novel, a selection of poetry since 1850 and a 20th Century novel or drama. OCR said the decision to drop the works by the US authors was because of the DfE's desire for the exam to be more "more focused on tradition" and there were fewer opportunities to include them in the new syllabus. Announcing his reforms last year, Mr Gove also said the new exam questions would be more rigorous and designed to ensure that pupils had read the whole book. Students might study a novel by actress Meera Syal Mr Gove, who studied English at Oxford University, has in the past highlighted his concern that pupils were reading Of Mice and Men in particular. Paul Dodd, OCR's head of GCSE and A-Level reform, said Mr Gove "had a particular dislike for Of Mice and Men and was disappointed that more than 90% of candidates were studying it". Steinbeck's six-chapter novella written in 1937 about displaced ranch workers during the Great Depression and Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird have become a mainstay of GCSE exams. Some academics have pointed out the reason schools opt to study the works is because they are accessible to students across a range of abilities. But OCR and the other exam boards have had to follow new DfE guidelines when drawing up their syllabuses for teaching from 2015. OCR's draft syllabus is about to be presented to exams regulator Ofqual for accreditation. About three-quarters of the books on it are from the "canon of English literature" and most are pre-20th Century. Pupils will still be able to study modern work by British authors. Anita and Me, Meera Syal's 1996 story of a British Punjabi girl in the Midlands, and Dennis Kelly's 2007 play about bullying, DNA, are understood to be among the most recent works included in the draft syllabus. Hannah has, once again, shown how hard work and determination lead to success. She has passed her GCSE science with flying colours. Well done Hannah! X |
Tracey BerminghamTutor to the 'Stars' Archives
December 2015
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