There has been a sharp rise in the number of appeals against 11-year-olds reading scores, after the introduction of a new controversial test this year.

This year 6,314 schools asked for a marking review of reading papers, involving more than 21,500 children, according to provisional statistics from the Department for Education released today.

The reading test was described as particularly tough this year, with children in tears after taking it.

The statistics reveal that 3,165 schools questioned the marks given for spelling, punctuation and grammar (Spag) in 7,020 papers and 2,025 schools asked for 3,827 maths papers to be reviewed.

Source: DfE SFR 53/2016 Review outcomes of KS2 national curriculum assessments in England 2016

But reviews which resulted in a change in a child’s standard were less likely in reading than in the other subjects.

In reading, 8.6 per cent of reviews resulted in a change - with 1,800 children achieving the expected standard after the review, 11 now not achieving the standard and 19,776 having no change.

The highest change in results was in maths where more than one in eight (12.6 per cent) of the papers reviewed resulted in a different outcome. The statistics show that 460 children were marked as now achieving the standard and two not doing so. In Spag, 12 per cent of reviews were successful - 811 children were remarked as having achieved the expected standard. None were marked down.

The DfE describes a review as successful if a pupils’ marks are corrected in either direction. Meaning a “successful” review is one where the change means that a pupil either achieves the expected standard, does not achieve the expected standard or has a change of three or more marks to the raw score.

The DfE points out that the criteria for a successful review changed in 2016, and as a result the figures are not comparable to previous years, because the review provides schools with more opportunities to apply for a review than in previous years.

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