top of page
Along with being a primary school teacher and leader, blogging is where this all started for Aidan. If it wasn't for his passion for writing and sharing his learning and experiences, he wouldn't be working as an education consultant with schools across the country today. Shared best practice should be available to all and here on the Aidan Severs Consulting blog you can get ideas for making a difference in your own school. The blog is also a great place to learn exactly the kind of work that Aidan can partner with your school on.
Supporting Children's Time Management in KS2 Reading SATs
If you’ve ever watched a Year 6 child run out of time in the reading paper, you’ll know the issue isn’t always understanding. It’s knowing what to do first, what to spend time on and what to leave. The encouraging thing is this: time management in the KS2 reading SATs is teachable and is something that can be worked upon right up until the tests arrive - in fact, it's often just the icing on the cake. Here are five ideas for how you can help children with their time managemen
Aidan Severs
Apr 284 min read
Teaching Reading: A Sequence To Ensure Whole Text Comprehension
I've noticed an uptick in people downloading Year 6 SATs resources, and if your thoughts are turning to KS2 SATs then you might want to have a little explore of the resources I've got available to help you and your pupils: https://www.aidansevers.com/the-sats-collection Seeing the folk downloading these resources puts me in mind of a recent conversation with a former colleague who told me that the 6 lesson sequence we developed is still being used successfully in my last sc
Aidan Severs
Feb 252 min read
SATs 2026: Answering 3-Mark Reading SATs Questions - An Update
Since I last wrote about helping children to answer 3-mark questions, the way those questions are asked has changed. Whilst much of the advice given in the previous blog post still stands (indeed I will be referring to it a lot in this one), it needs a little update. As part of this update, I have expanded the matching resource which can be downloaded here: Let's have a look at the 6 (2 per test) 3-mark questions from the 2022, 2023 and 2024 papers: 2024: 3-Mark Reading Quest
Aidan Severs
Nov 5, 20245 min read
5 Ways To Help Children To Access The KS2 Reading SATs
Not many year 6 teachers want to spend months going through past papers, and indeed, many past papers now don't match the rigour and complexity of the more recent tests. There's also a growing (and welcome) trend of moving away from reading lessons being death by comprehension questions which require a written answer and are organised by the SATs reading domains. But, it's never a bad idea to help children to feel like the tests are familiar, and there are some things about t
Aidan Severs
Jan 5, 20243 min read
Times Tables Fluency and the KS2 SATs
How important is times tables fluency for the KS2 SATs? I'd say quite important. When we are fluent in speaking a language, we can speak it without thinking much about it. That kind of fluency will be useful for year 6 children to have when it comes to the key stage 2 maths tests. Some time ago, I looked through the 2018 SATs papers to see just how many questions required some times tables knowledge. Here's what I discovered: In Paper 1 (Arithmetic) there are 19 out of 36 que
Aidan Severs
Nov 22, 20232 min read
A Year 6 Teacher's SATs Memoir: I Thought I'd Lost My Job
Ten years ago I really thought my teaching career had come to an end. It was definitely an overreaction but for a few days I had that...
Aidan Severs
Mar 15, 20234 min read
Brand new KS2 Reading SATs prep resource!
I've put together a new resource designed for year 6 teachers specifically focusing on the 3-mark questions in the KS2 reading test.
Aidan Severs
Feb 24, 20231 min read
6 Things To Remember For KS2 SATs Week 2026
It's 2022 Key Stage 2 Test week - SATs are upon us again after a 2-year hiatus. Remember these things as you prepare for the week ahead.
Aidan Severs
May 7, 20223 min read
Getting Ready For The KS2 Reading Test
If you're here for the resources, then here are the links: However, if you have a little more time, have a read about the thought process that has gone into the resource creation. But, before you start reading my bit, I can't stress how important it is that you read Penny Slater's blog series of reflections on analysis of the 2019 reading test (which is the last SATs reading test that we have). It is in 4 parts and it has been the reading of these that has brought me to write
Aidan Severs
Nov 3, 20215 min read
bottom of page