RemeliaKey Stage 2 tests Year 6
KS2 SATs: what is sat, when, and how it is scored
The Key Stage 2 tests, set by the Standards and Testing Agency (STA). Sat by children at state schools in England; schools set the day within the national timetable. The week of the second Monday of May of Year 6.
Checked against the sources on 3 October 2026. Every date below is quoted from STA’s pages on gov.uk.
What is sat
Three maths papers and three in English, on paper.
Written answers on paper: arithmetic, two reasoning papers, reading, grammar and punctuation, and a spelling test of twenty words. The Key Stage 2 programme of study in maths and English, to the end of Year 6.
Mathematics
- Paper 1: arithmetic, 30 minutes
- Paper 2: reasoning, 40 minutes
- Paper 3: reasoning, 40 minutes
English
- Reading booklet / answer booklet: reading, 60 minutes
- Paper 1: questions (grammar, punctuation), 45 minutes, 50 marks
- Paper 2: spelling, 20 words
When
In May of Year 6, in one national week.
The week of the second Monday of May of Year 6. The multiplication tables check is earlier, in June of Year 4.
| School year | Key Stage 2 test week (Year 6) | Results to schools | Multiplication tables check window (Year 4) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 to 2027 | Monday 10 May to Thursday 13 May 2027 | Not yet published | The two weeks from Monday 7 June 2027 |
| 2027 to 2028 | Monday 8 May to Thursday 11 May 2028 | Not yet published | The two weeks from Monday 5 June 2028 |
In STA’s words
“The statutory key stage 2 tests are timetabled from Monday 10 May to Thursday 13 May 2027”
“Schools must administer the multiplication tables check within the 2-week period from Monday 7 June 2027”
“The statutory key stage 2 tests are timetabled from Monday 8 May to Thursday 11 May 2028”
“Schools must administer the multiplication tables check within the 2-week period from Monday 5 June 2028”
For 2025 to 2026, results reached schools on Thursday 16 July 2026.
“Test results will be available to view and download from the NCA Portal from 7:30am on Thursday 16 July”
Source: gov.uk, 2026 key stage 2 assessment and reporting arrangements
Scaled scores
100 is the expected standard.
Each test’s raw marks are converted to a scaled score from 80 to 120, using a table STA publishes each July. 100 or more is the expected standard; 110 or more, the higher standard.
“The lowest scaled score that can be awarded on a KS2 test is 80. The highest scaled score is 120. Pupils scoring at least 100 will have met the expected standard in the test.”
Past papers
STA’s own papers and mark schemes are on gov.uk.
STA publishes each year’s test papers and mark schemes once the tests are over, to download.
Source: gov.uk, National curriculum assessments: past test materials
Year 4 Multiplication tables check
The multiplication tables check, in June of Year 4.
Set by STA and taken at school, on screen; the window’s dates are in the timetable above.
What is checked
- 25 multiplication facts, from 2 × 2 to 12 × 12: six seconds to answer each, three seconds between.
- The 6, 7, 8, 9 and 12 tables carry the most facts; between three and seven come from the 2, 5 and 10 tables, and the 1 table is never asked.
- Answers are typed; when the time for a question runs out, the next one comes on its own.
How Remelia practises it
- Once a week, from March of Year 4 until the window closes, for a child studying maths: that week’s different day is a practice check in the same shape, 25 facts drawn the way STA builds a check, timed rows of six seconds each.
- No clock is shown, as in the real check, and daily practice never has a countdown.
- Your child sees how many they got right, beside their own last five checks, and nothing else. The weekly letter tells a grown-up which tables they miss most.
- It comes on its own, dated from your child’s year group: nothing to choose, and no school needed.
In Remelia
What Remelia practises for SATs.
Papers made fresh by Remelia in the style of STA’s tests: none of STA’s questions is reproduced. A parent chooses KS2 SATs in the parents’ app, alone or beside schools.
- SATs arithmetic (STA’s Paper 1: arithmetic): Calculations only. The child writes each answer in the box under it, and can work in the space beside.
- SATs reasoning (STA’s Paper 2 / Paper 3: reasoning): Problems in words, tables and pictures. The child writes each answer in the box under it; some have a box to show the method.
- SATs grammar and punctuation (STA’s Paper 1: questions (grammar, punctuation)): Short questions on grammar, punctuation and vocabulary. The child ticks a box, writes a letter, or writes a word or a sentence in the booklet.
- SATs spelling (STA’s Paper 2: spelling): Sentences with a word missing. You read each word, the sentence and the word again from the script page; the child writes the word in the gap.
- SATs reading (STA’s Reading booklet / answer booklet): A reading booklet of texts, the easiest first, then questions on each: words to find and copy, short written answers, ticks, a true or false table and, on the whole paper, questions to explain for two or three marks.
- A timed mock of all six papers, at STA’s minutes (215 minutes in all, the spelling read aloud and not strictly timed), run by a grown-up, who marks it.
- Scaled scores, as a rough guide. A grown-up enters the raw mark of a whole paper; the app adds up the set and reads it on STA’s 2026 table. A practice paper made here is not STA’s paper, so a scaled score from it is a rough guide, not a prediction.
- The whole Key Stage 2 programme in maths and English, Years 3 to 6, in the order school teaches it, with Year 6 weighted most.
Remelia is not affiliated with the Standards and Testing Agency or the Department for Education.