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SATs tests limit children’s education, says teachers' leader

9 Apr 2010

SATs tests limit children’s education, says teachers' leaders

Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, has said national tests for 10 and 11-year-olds, formerly known as SATs, contravene the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Under the Convention, which Britain signed in 1991, children are entitled to a broad education which develops their "personalities, talents and abilities to their fullest potential".

Blower told the NUT annual conference in Liverpool that SATs only gave children the right to pass exams, not the right "to be educated in the round".

Labour and the Tories have pledged to keep SATs, although Labour is considering moving to more teacher assessment and the Conservatives argue the tests should be more rigorous and could be sat by pupils in their first year of secondary school.

The NUT, the biggest classroom union in England and Wales, is balloting headteachers and their deputies over whether to "frustrate the administration" of the Maths and English tests. Another union, the National Association of Head Teachers, is also conducting the ballot. The unions say they are confident that heads will vote to boycott the tests, which are sat by 600,000 children. Their boycott would take place on May 10, days after the next government came into power.

Blower told teachers: "Together we can ensure that it is teacher assessment… that informs parents and children how they are doing in school and together we can end league tables and SATs."

Read the full story in the Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/apr/06/nut-conference-sats-tests-blower

Tags: Children, Partners in Literacy, Policy, Reading Champions, Reading Connects, Schools & teaching, Young People

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