Advice needed on how to support DD, year 9, please

[neva]

Her levels seem fine - mostly 6's and 7's. Overall feedback at parents' evenings is positive.

I spent a lot of time helping her with her end of year tests revision and it seemed to me that there were major gaps in her knowledge. For example, she had no idea how to conjugate verbs in any of the tenses in her languages, basic vocab seemed to be missing and she didn't appear to know where to start with trigonometry.

She is very bright, astute, makes great verbal contribution to classes, is quick to pick up ideas, overall has great promise. However, I am seriously worried now that she is going to struggle with her GCSE's.

What can I do? What questions should be asking the school? I don't want DD to be one of those bright students who fail to reach their potential as per that report mentioned in an earlier thread. Apart from anything else, she will be so unhappy with herself.

Thanks.

[noblegiraffe]

If she's a level 7 in maths then she probably won't know trigonometry as that is level 8 and she will learn it as grade B GCSE maths.

[neva]

Thanks noble. They have been taught trigonometry already I think. She recently sat entrance tests for an independent school and failed comprehensively. It was this, and my own observations, that have got me worried.

[Startail]

Basic trig is easy to teach her over the summer, if you know it yourself and easy toe arm from the CGP books and bite size if you don't.

Congregating verbs I cannot do. MFL is the one thing I'd have to pay for a tutor for. My comp. did a good job with top sets in everything except MFL which we all gave up in Y9 due to woeful teachers.

[Startail]

To learn (to arm? Auto correct needs to go back to school)

[SugarandSpice126]

Firstly, you say she is very bright, participates in class etc and she obviously also has your full support. I think that's a great basis to start from and I wouldn't worry too much.

If there are specific concerns about her missing out on learning certain things, could you ask about this in parents evening with relevant teachers? Or to avoid waiting so long, she could ask teachers when they are going to learn a particular topic and say that she doesn't feel they spent enough time on something. With trigonometry, did the teacher go through it or not spend much time on it? It could just be that's just something she didn't grasp the first time and will have to work harder at. How many things like that did she not understand in Maths?

If she's a hard worker and wants to do well then I'm sure she will, and you can ask teachers about bits you think she's missed out on.

[neva]

I think I will have to step up communication with the school; get all the teacher's email addresses; get a full set of GCSE text books at home (she is always forgetting to bring books home). All the verbs she needs to know are written in her language exercise books - but she doesn't seem to know that she is supposed to learn them by heart. Surely this is something they should be practising in class? It is lucky that I have noticed that she doesn't know this stuff - I can help her now. But what if I hadn't spotted it?!

[SugarandSpice126]

I think the buying of all the textbooks is going a bit overboard (unless you have enough money that it doesn't matter - textbooks can be really expensive!). At this age she needs to learn to remember to bring her textbooks home, ask teachers things she doesn't understand, and take charge of her education.

Is it a good school with good teachers or do you have doubts about it generally?

[tiredaftertwo]

I'd get the relevant CGP books to keep at home - they show you exactly what you need to know, very concisely, are cheap and very clear.

If she has the verbs all written out, then I would tend to think it has not clicked that she needs to learn them by heart, or maybe that had not been stressed enough.

In general, I would want to find out whether she is not being taught stuff, or whether it just hasn't quite clicked and come together, yet. what are the school's results like?