Last Updated on 24 June 2021 by Colette
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Now we’re fully back into the swing of the new school year; of homework, of reading books and of spellings – I thought I’d share with the newly updated Lett’s books for Key Stage 2 ahead of next year’s SATs.
Ben is only just into Year 4 so his Year 6 SATs are happily not even on his radar just yet but I know for those of you with children in Year 6, they are often a hot topic of conversation right from the start of the academic year. (Though whether this should be the case is another post entirely!)
The end of KS2 SATs tests have seen some big changes in recent years – ones which have had teachers tearing their hair out and which have moved the goal posts considerably for our children. Â What this does mean is that many of the older SATs resources are no longer as relevant as they could be – there will be areas missing, things which weren’t taught in KS2 before but are now or things which nobody had even heard of until recently – hello “fronted adverbials” – I’m looking at you! Â Honestly, these are the things we’ve always taught and used but which now seem to have fancy new names to confuse us and make things unnecessarily complicated for our pupils.
If you are looking to invest in resources to help your child with their KS2 SATs revision at home this year, it’s really important to ensure that these are up-to-date and enjoyable to use. After a full week of heavy duty SATS prep, the last thing your child wants to come home to is a load of dull and dreary revision – short, sharp bursts will work well broken up with lots of time to relax and have fun – Year 6 is hard work.
The Letts KS2 SATs Success range includes both a Revision Guide and Workbook for Maths, English and Grammar, Punctuation and Spelling (more commonly known these days as SPAG!)
The Revision Guides are set out in brightly coloured, bite sized chunks – they can be worked through from start to finish (though not all in one sitting of course) or dipped into as the need arises. I would suggest that, as a bonus, the Revision Guides would also make a helpful reference point for parents – our children are taught about things now which I didn’t even know existed till I was an adult and training to teach myself so a quick read through and refresh of your own subject knowledge would do no harm at all when it comes to supporting your child.
Each Revision Guide offers up plenty of reading but also suggestions for hands on activities and practice questions to help your child check their understanding. Every child learns in a different way – I know as an adult that just reading stuff isn’t enough for me – I have to talk about it, to put it into practice and do it for myself. As such I was particularly impressed to see that the updated Lett’s SATs Success Revision Guides come with a free audio book which works in conjunction with the book – you can see a little headphones icon throughout the book to show you where this is relevant. Accessing information in a variety of ways is always going to be superior to just reading page after page of text.
Running alongside the Revision Guide is a Workbook full of SATs style questions to work on including lots of handy tips to bear in mind. Of course all the answers are provided in the book so you can mark the work and see where any gaps are before referring back to the Revision Guide for extra guidance if you’ve got a bit stuck. I know I always loved a workbook as a kid so I’d have been pretty happy to sit down and work my way through this . . . please tell me I’m not the only one?!
So all in, if you’re looking to give your child a bit of focus to their revision, or you need a bit of a helping hand yourself to understand what on earth the past progressive tense is or your Roman numerals are a bit rusty, have a look at investing in the newly updated Letts SATs Success range.
