Non-native English speakers thrive in school

paper, while school and union leaders warned that there had been a lack of guidance for schools on the new tests, and argued that the data gathered from the results is “misleading”.

School Standards Minister Nick Gibb said: “This year’s SATs are the first that test the new primary school curriculum in English and maths that we introduced in 2014. This new curriculum raises expectations and ensures pupils become more accomplished readers and are fluent in the basics of arithmetic, including timestables, long division and fractions.

“Many schools have responded well to this more rigorous curriculum, supporting their pupils to be leaving primary school better prepared for the demands of secondary school.”

Russell Hobby, general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, said: “This data is not worth the paper it is written on. The government itself has said that it cannot be used to trigger interventions in schools, nor can it be compared to previous years.”

Boys tend to perform worse than girls in Key Stage 2 assessments and this year’s figures show that this pattern has continued, despite the emphasis shifting to progress made, or value added, rather than purely on attainment.

As many as 57 per cent of girls achieve the expected standard — roughly equivalent to a level 4b in the old assessment levels — in reading, writing and mathematics compared to 50 per cent of boys.

The gap is larger than that seen in previous years — there was a six percentage point gap for the old expected standard in 2015 and 2014. However, despite their stronger performance overall, girls were found to have made less progress than boys in maths.

Girls did better than boys: Free school meal eligibility is still a key divide:

Eligibility for Free School Meals continues to be a key predictor in how well a child will perform at Key Stage 2. Just 35 per cent of FSM pupils achieved the expected standard across reading, writing and maths last year compared to 57 per cent for all other pupils.

There is a similar divide when it comes to making progress in individual subjects with the biggest gap coming in reading.

Those with summer birthdays were less likely to do well:

Age plays a surprisingly big role in how well pupils perform at KS2 with those born in September — i.e. the eldest in the class — being far more likely to achieve the expected standard in reading writing and maths.

Those with August birthdays — i.e. the youngest in the class — did worst.

The reverse is true when it comes to the amount of progress made, however, with younger pupils making larger improvements than their elder peers.