Cubitt Town Junior School: Keeping SATs revision playful

Cubitt Town Junior School is a 3-form entry Primary School in London’s Isle of Dogs district. The school have been using now>press>play to enhance their curriculum and SATs revision since 2018. We are delighted to be helping them provide a welcoming, caring, and positive ethos where pupils achieve well due to their high standard of teaching and exciting curriculum.

In this case study, Year 6 class teacher Miriyan Talbot-Sikkens shares her pupils’ feedback on our immersive, audio-based SATs Experiences.

How we revise for SATs with now>press>play

After several weeks of intense “application of skills” to answer test papers to the best of their ability I decided to use the now>press>play SATs Experiences.

We use now>press>play across the curriculum so when I told my class they could whack on the headphones to do some SATS revision they were delighted!

School children revise for their SATs using Now Press Play. They're wearing a blue school uniform and pink headphones, and writing on worksheets as they listen.

The audio nature of now>press>play meant that children who usually struggle with reading speed and decoding were able to purely hone-in on their comprehension skills. This gave them a much needed confidence boost.

What makes now>press>play’s SATs Experiences effective

The storylines for the SATs Experiences were engaging and quite thrilling; very age-appropriate and it tapped into their genre interests. This was important as SATS can be a stressful time. To be able to use a revision resource that not only tests their abilities but also engages their imagination and playfulness was extremely useful – the children even commented on how fun SATs could be!

The questions were closely linked to the curriculum so, from a teaching point of view, it enabled the children to consolidate some of their “reading” and grammar skills and enabled me to see where some of the gaps were.

Water ripples in a swimming pool, from Now Press Play's SATs Maths Experience. Caption: Quietly leave the sports hall and go back to the swimming pool. You need to find the room shaped like a pentagon.
now>press>play's SATs Experiences include Reading, SPAG, and Maths revision.

In terms of keeping creativity alive during SATs, this definitely hit the spot!

Here are a few quotes from the children about the now>press>play SATs Experiences and revision resources:

“You can really imagine what is happening and, when you act it out, it’s like you really are in that world.”

“Having the headsets on really puts you in the world of the story and helps you understand what is happening.”

“You feel the feelings like you really are the character in the story.”

“It helps you think about what you would do in a situation like that.”

“It encourages you to read more in an enthusiastic way.”

We have created our SATs Experiences to engage and excite children with the revision process. 

Click to listen to extracts of our SPAGSATs Maths, and SATs Reading Experiences, where pupils become the main character in a story and use their investigative skills to help bring it to its resolution whilst practicing essential skills and knowledge for the SATs papers.

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