We all know that there is a real depth of feeling around Sats, particularly this year after a reading paper reportedly left children in tears.

Of course, none of us want to see young people upset and it is awful to think of children so stressed by a test that they end up crying over it. But these stories felt so different to what we experienced in our schools, where our pupils seemed to be relatively unfazed by the tests.

How do we know that? For the past few years, we have surveyed our key stage 2 pupils straight after they have taken the tests to ask them what they really think and feel about Sats, and the results each year are clear: they really don’t worry about them.

In fact, every year, hundreds of pupils agree that they actually enjoy taking these tests.

Sats stress: is it inevitable?

I firmly believe this is the result of our fantastic staff’s efforts to create a calm and supportive environment during Sats. Instead of building up pressure, everyone is focused on making sure our schools are as calm and supportive as possible.

More than that, though, it’s the result of a tremendous amount of hard work over the course of the year where we build up our children’s emotional resilience, helping them understand that low-stakes testing is a normal part of school life.

Pupils are well prepared for taking Sats because they’re used to taking practice papers in low-pressure situations. It’s not about teaching to the test, but rather getting pupils used to taking tests and normalising it so that it’s just not a big deal.

Then, when Sats come, our children are confident they have the knowledge and skills with which to excel.

If children are struggling during the year, we can identify this early and implement appropriate interventions so that they’re not worried when heading into the tests. This might be providing additional support for improving their reading fluency or targeted small group or one-to-one support to build confidence in key skills.

In addition, our “11b411” enrichment programme - 11 memorable experiences by the time they leave us for secondary school - is designed to get children out of their comfort zone and develop a can-do attitude.

We don’t do this to help them pass tests but rather to help them become confident, ambitious and well-adjusted adults. However, I’m sure that showing them how strong they are in tackling obstacles has a fortuitous byproduct in helping them feel confident taking Sats.

Resilience in primary children

Of course, we also offer practical support on the day: bringing our children in for breakfast to make sure they’re fuelled up and happy ahead of the day, while also making sure we’ve got arrangements in place to collect children from home if there are any concerns about absenteeism.

It’s about removing potential barriers to our children’s success, so the whole exam process is as smooth as possible.

Looking at the results themselves, our children are happiest taking the maths paper. Every year, nearly half of the surveyed pupils declared that maths was the easiest subject.

This makes sense, though - with this paper, they know what’s coming to a much greater extent.

With the reading paper, the texts they’ll be studying can vary widely - so it is perhaps no surprise that this is consistently regarded as the most difficult subject. But with maths, our children know what types of questions they’ll face and will have strategies to handle these.

It’s encouraging to see our children are so comfortable taking on their maths papers, but we have no intention of resting on our laurels.

As the largest primary-only multi-academy trust in the country, we feel a responsibility to put reading at the absolute heart of what we do. That’s why we’ve already launched a new reading strategy that will dig deep into the support that children need to improve.

I’m optimistic that this will make a real difference when it comes to tackling next year’s Sats, and I’m genuinely interested to see how it affects next year’s survey.

While reading might still be listed as the most difficult subject, I am confident that our children will once again brush aside any concerns about the tests and show us all how capable they are.

Sats shouldn’t be some monstrous experience that our children are subjected to, but rather a fair and useful means of assessing their progress. If we place pupils under pressure then they’ll hate the experience, so instead let’s do all we can to take the pressure off.

That doesn’t just happen on the day but rather is a continuous process throughout the year. This is the perfect time to think about what the new academic year will bring, and how we can start the process of preparing pupils to take these tests in their stride.

Cathie Paine is the chief executive of REAch2 Academy Trust