Yr 3 Report and Curriculum Levels

[Rowgtfc72]

Just had DDS report. She has achieved the National Standard in all subjects. Little concerned as she left yr 2 with all level 3c and now she's average?
Cannot find any documents which indicate how these results line up against the old NC levels and am unsure if she's doing well or just coasting.
The school was Ofsteded last year and pulled up for not pushing the more capable pupils.
DD very rarely has homework, when she does its easy, and she says no adult has heard her read since Christmas.
We have parents evening on Friday where I hope it will be made clearer but should I be concerned?
I don't have a wonderkid in her defence, she's just keen to learn and there is quite a handful of pupils in this position.

[TeenAndTween]

We had a talk at our school on how they are going to do the reports.

One thing I remember was that because topics have been pulled down the years, a child who was slightly ahead last year (like your DC) may well this year be 'on target'. It doesn't necessarily mean she has made less progress than others, just a moving/changing of the goalposts.

Ask the school whether you should be concerned, I suspect the answer will be not.

You could ask 'is she maintaining her relative position in the class, or is she slipping downwards?' That should be an OK question as you aren't asking where in the class she is.

[redskybynight]

There is "more" in the new curriculum than the old one. so arguably children have to do better to remain "average".

Assuming your school has adopted a "working towards national expections", "met national expectations", "mastery" sort of grading system, "meeting expectations" doesn't mean she is average! It means she's achieved what she should have, but hasn't done enough to get the mastery level. I'd say it was quite a big jump to go from 3c across the board, to getting to "mastery" in Y3. DD (not sure how reliably) informs me that very few (think 2 or 3) children are being assessed at the top level in her Year 4 class with a significant proportion in "working towards" due to the amount of catching up they've had to do this year.

[disclaimer, a view from a parent, am sure a teacher will be along in a moment]


If you have specific issues with the school, youshould of course bring these up.

[Rowgtfc72]

Thanks for prompt replies!
I have absolutely no interest in where she is in the class, but she's bright and very good at coasting so need to know shes still trying!
The school put out a flyer telling us what the letter codes on the report meant but what I, and a lot of other parents would have found helpful, is a bit more information. A lot of DDS friends got 'working towards' and their parents are worried now.

[ShipwreckedAndComatose]

I would feed this back to the school. I think with schools devising their own reporting systems, any feedback on what could be helpful in the future will improve what you get reported to you.

[Rowgtfc72]

Not a bad idea thanks.

[Galena]

Our school reports progress as well as attainment.

[Fleurdelise]

My DD is in year 3 and I am eager to see the report when it comes out.

We have been told at the last parents evening that due to the curriculum change the children that were above average last year will probably be only on target this year and the ones who finished last year on target will be below expectations.

The teacher assured us she is doing her best to catch up but she will not put extreme pressure on the kids therefore we should not be extremely worried as they will do some more catch up in year 4.

So as I said I am looking forward to see what her report comes out at and probably do some work during the summer to help if needed.

[WhattodowithMum]

My DD was on the old levels. She left yr2 with 3s (they didn't break down sub levels for us.). Then at the end of year 3, she was given 3s with sub levels and she seemed to have made no progress. When I queried it, the teacher explained that she must have been a 3c in her subjects at the end of yr2.

Then year 4 seemed to be a bit of a nothing year. By the start if year5 I was alarmed and put some attention on it. She is now at the end of year 6. She has sat level 6 sats in all her subjects. We'll have to see how she does. I have been told that outside moderators came to look at her writing, and judged her to be a high level 6, borderline level 7. I think that's great.

My limited experience gives me the impression that when the teachers are judging a child's progress for the year, they tend to be conservative. I think they don't want to "inflate" the levels. They wouldn't want to be over optimistic and put a child under undo pressure. Year after year teachers make conservative judgements anchored by the previous year's conservative judgement. Then, you get the end of primary school, when the results are marked externally and suddenly the child seems to make a massive leap.

That's my story. Just one data point.

[AmazonGrace]

Whattodo, did you do to help your DD?

I have to say, I'm also slightly concerned with regards to ds report. Apparently a strong 3C in maths at the end of Y2, now most of the ticks are 'within expectations' with just a couple 'exceeding'

[AmazonGrace]

He's in Y3.

[ShipwreckedAndComatose]

But expectations have changed and the curriculum is different.
You need to discuss it with the teachers if you have specific concerns but you can't really compare last year's report with this year's as they are a different thing

[gymboywalton]

the expectations have changed MASSIVELY. We are expecting so much of 7/8 year olds it's unreal.

For example last year we expected children to be able to tell the time to the nearest 15 minute interval. This year, just to be able to tick one box , the child needs to be able to tell the time to the nearest minute, be able to read both the 12 and 24 hour clocks, use roman numerals etc

The goalposts have moved in a way that is just ridiculous. I have spent time with 7 year olds helping them to identify acute and obtuse angles when they still don't know their times tables properly.

Please don't think that your child is not making progress because they don't seem to be doing as well as last year-they are-they are doing a great job.

[gymboywalton]

here is a link to a the maths curriculum

www.primarycurriculum.me.uk/year3/mathematics

now a child has to tick every single one of those criteria before they can be described as having MET the expectations.

[WhattodowithMum]

Amazon

Bond books; making sure she knew her times tables inside and out; and making sure she understood how times tables relates to factors/multiples. The basis of most "tricky" primary school maths. For some reason our school did not teach this intensively. So later, things like adding and subtracting fractions, or working out ratios/proportions seems difficult.

We ignored the teacher about reading "the classics." She hated them all and reading the classics = no reading. I scoured book lists to find ideas on books she might like and let her read anything she wanted to read. We kept to an early bedtime with the proviso she could stay up 30min to an hour to read if she wanted to do so. That way there was built in reading time. Obviously, we are one TV in the living room family and she didn't have any hand held computers to revert to instead.

Finally, we wanted to send her to a selective private school and we realised that her writing wasn't great. So in a last minute panic (6 months before exams) we got a writing tutor. This lady was pure gold and our DD learned a lot from her. DD never would have listened to us. We ended up paying for 13 hours worth of tutoring. We were against it at first, but I have to admit DD really blossomed. We were so impressed, we tried to find a maths tutor too. (Yes we really did change our mind whole heartedly about tutors.) But we never found anyone decent. So we did old admissions papers with DD ourselves, bottoming out any concepts that she was missing.

That 6 months of 11+ prep, must have benefitted her generally. But it wasn't focussed on SATS it was focussed on private school 11+ admissions. DD said that SATs maths was much easier, but that the level 6 reading comprehension paper was just as difficult.

Phew, that's a looong answer, but I wanted to be straight with you. In short, I think if you are staying within the state system, then just making sure they get hooked on reading and really understand their times tables/factors/multiples will be enough. If you live in London and want to have a go at the selective private schools, that would just be a foundation.

[Rowgtfc72]

Thanks for that info gym. So DD is doing well to just be meeting expectations. Just need the teacher to tell me she's not coasting and all will be well!
Looking at the maths info I'm pretty sure I didn't cover some of that till I was eleven yrs old never mind eight!

[AmazonGrace]

Whatodo, thank you. It sounds like you worked very hard with your DD.

DS is very able with regards to English, had 'exceeding expectations' across the board but Maths was always his stronger subject according to past reports.

I have managed to speak to the teacher and I'm not sure I'm any clearer really. Just been told that DS is at the top end of the class for Maths, that he is doing very well and he's achieving great things often doing Y4 work. This could reflect in the couple of 'exceeding expectations' he had on his Maths report.

I sound disappointed, I'm not. I just DS to continue at this level and not start to go backwards, much like I did really. I hated Maths at school and was pretty bad at it, I suppose I just want the best for him as we all do for our dc. These new reports with three descriptions of attainment aren't that detailed, although there is a lovely write up from the teachers and Head.

I'll keep on at home, it's hard motivating DS to do work for me sometimes, he's not much for homework either and we sometimes have a battle with this but we'll knuckle down and try harder.

[GhoulWithADragonTattoo]

My DCs are in Y2 and Reception so both on the same curriculum as in earlier years. Everything I hear about the new curriculum terrifies me. I haven't had EOY reports yet but am so worried about the moving to Y3 and Y1 with these sorts if expectations ( and they aren't struggling) :(

[Fleurdelise]

According to the link above I believe my dd should tick all the boxes but why is school doing stuff more advanced than written in the link above?

My dd is not too of the class, in fact she says she is somewhere in the middle so I can't see why she would do things more advanced rather than concentrate on the ones in the curriculum?

To give you an example she finished all her times tables (as in, she has passed all the times tables tests from 1-12 times tables). But she is probably a bit slow at applying what she knows in word problems. Sometimes she does it really quick other times she struggles with simple concepts like last night she had a problem where you needed to find the difference between 51 and 26 and while she explain what she needed to do (find the difference) she started counting on from 26 to 51 even though she finds column subtraction easy.

Shouldn't school concentrate on the weak areas rather than race through all the times tables when the requirements are only certain time tables?

Sorry, long post.

[TeenAndTween]

(But fleur counting on is the method I would use to do that calculation in my head, and I would do it that way even if I had paper to hand. 4 to get to 30, 20 to get to 50 plus 1 more makes 25. So although you might be right, that's not a great example.)

[Fleurdelise]

I know that is not a great example and any method that works is fine but what I wanted to say is that she needs more practice applying what she knows in word problems so why racing through all the times tables when you can concentrate on weaker areas.

Her thinking she's middle of the class in maths (they don't seem to have ability groups anymore, just challenges) does make me wonder what top of the class are able to do.

She is August born so I am not worried as she isn't even 8 yet but I am amazed what the expectations from 7 year olds are.

At that age I was still perfecting my writing and doing simple addition/subtraction. No time tables.

I do have a good job so I don't really see the point of pushing so much info in their heads so early.

Besides most of the other European countries start schooling at 6 (not 4 as my dd) but that is a different discussion I guess.

[Rowgtfc72]

Have just had our parents meeting. DD has moved up two sub levels in all subject apart from reading where she is a 5c.
I've had the new curriculum explained to me. DD is one of a handful meeting expectations, most pupils are levelled as working towards. I can see next year being a bit of a nightmare year!
The school appreciate the new levels haven't been explained very well, apparently they're using these last few months as a settling in for the new curriculum as it doesn't legally have to be implemented till sept.
I don't envy the staff trying to bring this new system in, it all sounds a bit arse about face to me!

[redskybynight]

So she is 5c in reading (presumably under old system) and only meets expectations under the new one? That sounds like an impossible jump!

[mrz]

Rowgtfc the new curriculum had to be implemented from September 2014! ????

[ShipwreckedAndComatose]

The new curriculum has had to be in place from last September (2014) Schools are reporting levels in year 2, year 6 and year 8 for the last time this summer. Schools are being given a year's grace to replace level reporting to parents in all other years.

Then the expectation is levels will no longer be used at all. Any school keeping levels will have to justify this to OFSTED as it goes against the Government's advice.

The levels you have been reported do not link in with the new curriculum and so are limited in their usefulness.

[ShipwreckedAndComatose]

I'm a KS3 co-ordinator with a child currently in year 5. My question for mrz is about what would be replacing SATs for year 6.

Is there any recent development on this? What will be happening next May and how might it be reported to parents and secondary schools? I haven't heard anything except vague expectations that there will be something.