Boba Maths

Year 6 · SATs preparation

Year 6 online SATs test maker

Set a SATs-style test that pupils take on their own iPad, laptop or Chromebook. Choose the questions and the paper, share a five-letter class code, and the pupils type their first name and answer on the screen. Every test marks itself. When the class has finished you see who got what, which questions were hardest and the commonest wrong answers, and you can download it all as an Excel spreadsheet.

1 Which questions?
2 Which paper, and how long?

A full Arithmetic paper has 36 questions for 40 marks, including four 2-mark long multiplication and long division questions. A half paper has two of those and half of the 1-mark questions. The reasoning papers keep the mix of 1-, 2- and 3-mark questions of a real test, halved for a half paper.

3 Options

How online tests work

  1. Create the test. Choose the questions, the paper and the length. You get a class code.
  2. Pupils join. They go to the pupil page, type the code and their first name, and answer on the screen. Answers are typed into boxes, or chosen by tapping. Fractions are typed like 3/4 and mixed numbers like 2 1/4.
  3. They press Submit. The test is marked straight away. Each pupil sees their score if you left that option on.
  4. You see the class. The results page updates every few seconds while pupils work. Download the Excel spreadsheet for marks per question for every pupil, the questions the class found hardest (worst first) with the commonest wrong answers, and every answer typed.

Questions teachers ask

What do pupils need?

Any device with a web browser: an iPad, a Chromebook or a laptop. There are no accounts or passwords. They need a first name and the class code.

What is stored, and for how long?

Only each pupil's first name, the answers they typed and how long they took. Nothing else about them is collected. Everything is deleted automatically 30 days after you make the test, or straight away if you press Delete on the results page. Please tell pupils to use only their first name. See the privacy page.

How are the answers marked?

The computer marks the typed answers. It accepts sensible variations: with or without the comma in 1,087, with or without a £ sign or unit, and spaces. Fractions must be written in the form asked for (for example in the simplest form). Every question is worth full marks for the right answer and no marks otherwise, so a 2-mark or 3-mark question that would earn a mark for working on paper scores 0 here if the final answer is wrong. You can see exactly what each pupil typed in the spreadsheet if you want to give credit.

Are all question styles included?

Questions that need drawing on a picture, or a written explanation, cannot be marked by a computer, so they are left out of online tests. The rest of the paper follows the order, topics and marks of a real test. Use the generated SATs-style questions or the SATs past questions pages to print those.

Can pupils cheat?

This is practice, not a secure exam. The marking runs in the pupil's browser, but your results page and the spreadsheet mark the typed answers again themselves, so a pupil cannot change their score, only their answers.

Real past questions are Crown copyright (Standards and Testing Agency) and are used under the Open Government Licence v3.0. This site is not affiliated with, or endorsed by, the Standards and Testing Agency or the Department for Education.