Year 6

Learn more about why our Year 6 pupils excel

Year 6 marks the culmination of a remarkable seven-year learning journey filled with challenge, excitement and friendship. In their final year at St Mary Magdalen’s, our children proudly step into their roles as school leaders and share the knowledge and skills they have developed with pupils across the school.

This begins with great enthusiasm in September, when all Year 6 pupils become prefects and we appoint our Head Boy and Girl, their deputies and the House Captains for each of our four school Houses: Campion, Fisher, Mayne and More. A huge sense of pride and achievement is felt as our pupils proudly wear their badges and carry out the responsibilities that come with them. In addition to this, our Year 6 pupils are always thrilled to become a buddy to one of our Reception pupils. We are always incredibly proud when we watch them guiding our very youngest children as they navigate the first steps of their journey through our school.

Year 6 key information

Learning and curriculum

Many more exciting traditions are enjoyed throughout the year, including our marvellous end-of-year Production, where our Year 6 pupils take centre stage in a performance which would not look out of place in the West End. Other highlights include our annual week-long residential visit and our fun-filled “Shop-til-you-drop” challenge where the children work in teams to arrange exciting activities across the school to raise money to buy a leaving gift for our new Reception class. These experiences develop life skills and prepare our pupils for the wide range of state and independent secondary schools that they move on to. Most importantly, the children leave us with wonderful memories of their time here at St Mary Magdalen’s.

Whilst all our pupils’ time at St Mary Magdalen’s must come to an end, the close bonds that are made at our school mean that they remain part of our community forever. Many of our pupils return to our school year after year to visit, support us with community projects, carry out work experience as they begin their future careers, and even go on to bring their own children to school as parents.

A St Mary Magdalen’s pupil is truly a member of our school family for life.

Year 6 Overview (PDF)

Assessments

In May each year, Year 6 pupils complete the Key Stage 2 SATs tests. These tests are statutory, and the children will be familiar with them as they will have completed the Key Stage 1 SATs assessments at the end of Year 2. The assessments include five tests completed over four days which are set by the government and are the same for every state-maintained school. The tests are:

Grammar, Punctuation and Spelling (one paper for Grammar and Punctuation x 45 minutes, one paper for spelling x 15 minutes)
Reading (1 hour)
Maths Arithmetic (30 minutes)
Maths Reasoning (two papers x 40 minutes each)

Our children will practise past papers in order to prepare them for the SATs and they will be familiar with the structure of the assessments, as each year group completes their own non-statutory assessments every year.

We have high standards at our school and our children achieve excellent results. We also ensure that our curriculum is not narrowed by the SATs, and we offer a broad curriculum that supports children in their end of year assessments, but is engaging and exciting too.

Your child’s results will be communicated to you in a written report at the end of the summer term, and you will also be able to talk to your child’s teacher about their progress and targets at our October and February Parents’ evenings.

Follow this link to learn more about the KS2 SATs tests:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2H2D1Ul4pjE