Authors against the SATs

Statement

We are children’s authors and illustrators concerned by the growing domination of the schools curriculum by the SAT tests. We believe that there is a danger that Year 2, Year 6 and Year 9 (seven year olds, eleven year olds and fourteen year olds respectively) are becoming years spent preparing for the tests. We think that children’s understanding, empathy, imagination and creativity are developed best by reading whole books, not by doing comprehension exercises on short excerpts and not from ticking boxes or giving one word answers. It is our view that reading for pleasure is being squeezed by the relentless pressure of testing and we are particularly concerned that the SATs and the preparation for them are creating an atmosphere of anxiety around the reading of literature. Resources now being channelled into testing could and should be redirected towards libraries, the training of librarians and book provision. As authors and illustrators, we are unable to exert any direct pressure on the education system so we would like to show our concern with the situation by supporting calls by some teachers’ unions and by the National Association for the Teaching of English for the abolition or phasing out of the SATs.

Supported by :

Beverley Naidoo,

Jamila Gavin,

Brian Keaney,

Lisa Kopper,

Carol Ann Duffy,

David Almond,

Alan Gibbons,

Robert and Brenda Swindells,

Linda Newbery,

Philip Pullman,

Michael Morpurgo,

John Shelley,

Elizabeth, Lindsay,

Penny Dolan,

Jane Ray,

David Belbin,

Michael Rosen,

Malcolm Rose,

Theresa Tomlinson,

Ann Jungman,

Geraldine McCaughrean,

Caroline Pitcher,

Ros Asquith,

Lionel Bender,

Rowena Edlin-White,

Paul Dowswell,

Stephanie Baudet,

Ian Whybrow,

Lionel Bender,

Sheridan Cain,

Tim Bowler,

Alison Leonard,

Abi Brown,

Malachy Doyle,

Lynn Huggins-Cooper,

Nicola Morgan,

Jonathan Emmett,

David Bedford,

Steve Weatherill,

Neil Arksey,

Denis Bond,

Melvin Burgess,

Georgia Byng,

Bernard Ashley,

Anna Perera,

Ted Dewan,

Diana Hendry,

Gwen Grant,

Steve Barlow,

Steve Skidmore,

Enid Richemont,

Bob Graham,

Tony Bradman,

Tony Mitton,

Debi Gliori,

Rachel Anderson,

Morris Gleizman,

Jeremy Strong,

Julie Bertagna,

Alison Prince,

Judith Nicholls,

Pauline Chandler,

Wendy Smith,

Martyn Beardsley,

Paul Geraghty,

Andrea Shavick,

Gill Vickery,

Mary Hoffman,

Val Bierman,

Keith Gray,

Graham Gardner,

Chris Powling,

Vivien French,

John Cunliffe,

Linda Kempton,

Lindsay Fraser,

Peter Buckman,

Shoo Rayner,

Elizabeth Laird,

Josephine Feeney,

Chris Riddell,

Ivan Jones,

Sally Gardner,

Brian Lux,

Waltraud Boxall,

Thomas Bloor

Pat Thompson,

Beth Webb

Diana Pullein-Thompson

And Rosie Rushton.

Contact :

Alan Gibbons

aagibbons@blueyonder.co.uk