I grew up in the 80's in the North of England (not a time our schools shone) and but for a single good teacher I'd have ended up in the equivalent of the remedial group (likely for the rest of my school career), she understood that the reason I wasn't learning wasn't because I wasn't capable but because I wasn't interested, she realised I liked science and computers so she binned the assigned books and got me reading about those instead.
30 years later I have a solid career as a programmer and I still love science.
This "teach the test, pass the test, teach the next test" style of schooling is fucking absurd, Daniel had to study for SAT's for FFS.
Standardised testing at 7 is insane, just the way school years are broken up means you have kids nearly a year apart in age at that age so the variance from that is huge.
Most governments are happy with rule-following drones who do as they are told and pay their taxes.