School reports results came as a surprise

Christ it's Y1. Calm down.

I didn't realise people were this intense so early in school.

Handwriting naturally changes enormously as they learn.

Surely the best thing to do is just carry on reading together, having fun with numbers and helping your child learn about the world.

Making it intense at this stage is a sure fire way to put them off learning.

Your child is making progress as expected and it's never a linear path. Some take a bit longer with the basics then fly. Some grasp things earlier but then progress more slowly.

It's worth keeping an eye on (and you already sound very engaged) but not worth creating stress for all of you.

He’s not doing fine, according to the teacher. He’s working below expected. He needs extra support and the OP is understandably dismayed that this info wasn’t communicated at parents’ eve.

Off topic slightly but can anyone give ideas of English games or extra English resources for this age group. My DD is also working towards in 2 areas but the English is my concern. She’s autistic in a mainstream school and her speech is still delayed though much more improved so that was expected.
She had 32/40 in the phonics screening so just scaled through but as her concentration is not there, we knew she would have messed about that day.
If your child is not ND, then there should have been indications and I’ll ask the school.
Can anyone give an idea of English and writing games and resources you use for 6 and 7 year olds

I would be upset too, OP. I would also query it, given that he passed his phonics test by some margin - that indicates that he is working at the expected level in phonics if nothing else.

I can only imagine that PP who are so critical don't understand the current system, because working towards would mean that he is NOT doing ok. The school should have communicated that to you before now. Also, it's not a class ranking system and the levels of ability in the rest of the class should have no bearing on your DC's levels.

Some of these comments are bizarre! OP, you don't sound unhinged at all, you sound like a caring and supportive parent who wants to help their child. As a former primary school teacher, the fact that this is the first time school have communicated this to you is very poor indeed. As several other posters have said, nothing in an end of year report should ever come as a surprise. It's good that you can speak with them next week - I would definitely ask them to give you their exact reasoning for working towards, especially in reading given the phonics score. I wouldn't be surprised if they backtrack!

The good news is that you have the summer to support your DS, and a lot can be achieved over 6 weeks should you wish 😊 Most children regress by half a term over the summer, so catching up in any weaker areas is entirely possible, especially as it doesn't even sound like he is particularly struggling anyway (despite the levels in the report). I used the Doodle app with both of my two for maths and they always found it really fun and I liked the structure.of it following the curriculum.

If it helps, my son (now just finished year 11 at a top grammar school and predicted fantastic grades), got a similarly surprising report in year 3. When I challenged his teachers they were unable to give me any real reasons - basically he was a quiet, hard working and well behaved kid with awful handwriting (now requires a laptop as his handwriting is caused by medical issues that hadn't been discovered back then) and they just never bothered to look past his handwriting and assumed he was behind in all areas just because he was behind in one.

I don’t think any school report - especially if negative or not meeting expectations should be a shock when read. So I think this should have been flagged to the parents months ago, it shouldn’t be a surprise on report day.

Had it been flagged at Christmas the parents could opt to do more at home, get a tutor (yes he is very young but it’s the parents choice - they may think 1 hour of maths tuition a week is well worth it), use daily maths apps, books etc.

Op next year I’d be asking for regular monthly catch up meetings to make sure I dont get a surprise report.You may find you are then kept up to date.

Op get work books or an app like doodle maths /english and complete the entire year one syllabus again over summer. Then look at getting the year 2 books.

The quiet kids get forgotten….. local primary literally forgot my son in a swimming pool (and didn’t think it was a big issue).
We went private after that, and its worth every penny although we strictly speaking can’t afford it.

I can see where you're coming from.

I would expect the teacher at parents evening to indicate whether a child is at ARE or working towards etc.

So either she/he didnt comment on it at parents evening, or they did or at least gave you the impression your dc was on track to be at the expected level, and they've had a drop since then.

I would ask:

• has something changed since parents evening since you weren't aware then this was the level
• what the school's plan

In my experience, it's actually not a bad thing as in my dc's school my child working below then got lots of interventions, small group work etc which has been great and she's now up to ARE in year 5.

“Working towards” in all areas is NOT “normal, doing fine” though is it? Normal would be “meeting expectations”. You might be “working towards” in one or two areas, but not across the board.

“Working towards” in all areas would trigger an intervention and SEN assessment in DS’s school (which is a London state school with 40% FSM, not a leafy suburb).

Sounds like poor communication, I was aware of one of our children being a little behind from the teacher at parents evening, she then pulled me to one side to explain that he was emerging rather then expected in his report.
Im fully aware as a parent that there are things he struggles with but he’s only just 5 so not worried.
One of my eldest children had a new teacher for one year and I was totally blindsided by his report that year, behind in lots of things and I was told he wouldn’t catch up before leaving primary school……
Previous reports and parents evening had put him at expected for most things. We got extra tutoring for him, his next report from a teacher the following year said he was ahead or expected in all areas bar one and now he’s in secondary, he’s in the top 1/3 of his year group.
I wouldn’t panic keep an eye on the early part of next year and ask his new teacher after he’s settled if he seems to be struggling with anything.
I never got to the bottom of our one off emerging report and put it down to something going awry that school year with their assessments etc

Some of the replies are very rude. It is appropriate for the parent of a 6yo to want to support him and understand the best way to do this.

With what you have said about the reading, it sounds strange he hasn't achieved the expected standard. I would go to the meeting and explore why that is. Hopefully you will either come away knowing why or knowing it is probably an oversight and you don't need to worry too much. It may be in a busy class, the teacher hasn't observed things, although she has the phonics check and his book band to consider.

I have 2 DCs. My eldest was super confident but my youngest is a bit less so. At the start of year 1 his teacher was a bit puzzled as she said he speaks well using a good range of vocabulary but doesn't know what many of the words mean when she asks him. We were fairly sure he often did know, or at least had some idea, but was worried about getting it wrong or simply didn't want the attention. His teacher has been great and he has grown in confidence and will now answer questions. In contrast, he was a bit wary of his Reception teacher and so I don't think she ever saw the boy we saw at home. We read his Reception report as a picture of his school presentation influenced by confidence in that setting.

You sound like you were expecting the teacher to know at the start of y1 that your child wouldn’t reach ARE. The assessment isn’t done until the end of the year so the information wasn’t there to give you.

You were aware that you child needed help with attention and presentation so it’s not like you were told nothing, and I don’t see how you’ve drawn the conclusion that your child was forgotten about. Without knowing you and your husband, obviously I can’t tell, but it’s not uncommon for parents to blame teachers where they realise their child doesn’t have the natural high ability they want them to have.

If your child had been forgotten about, they wouldn’t have done so well in their phonics screening or be reading as well as you say.

If your child is younger in the year, this could affect things too.

While I agree that nothing in the report should come as a surprise, the level of surprise experienced by parents is influenced by their understanding of assessment and reporting and their perception or expectation of their child’s ability.

He’s in year 1. I’m sure he’s doing absolutely fine. Relax.

I knew someone would eventually post something ridiculous like this.

I homeschooled my eldest in lockdowns in year r and then year 1. It was awful but it did show me that we needed to be far more invested at home. We had been doing reading and the things they suggest to teach numbers but that experience made me realize we needed to be checking learning of the curriculum weekly. We bought the cpg books and started working through to ensure she had a good grounding in what she needed.

Also school books are useless for reading. Buy buff chip and kipper series and read one a day with your ds. If he's keen and grasping phonics then if he was my ds Id have wanted him to have finished the bands by yr 1.

It sounds like you had either a below par teacher or an overworked teacher with a lot of challenging behaviour so your child got missed. I’d expect there to be some communication for a child working towards age related. Over summer I would practice what they have been working on in maths, writing and phonics. Hopefully you will get a better teacher next year and you know now to push for information.

Maybe he has made good progress from his starting point but that is still a bit behind the top achievers in his class. Half the class will likely be below.

No - these are age related expectations intended to be what most kids without learning difficulties can achieve. It would be unusual to half the class to be below. In lots of schools it might only be 10-20% of the class.

That’s not how it works.

That's good there is an opportunity to discuss it next week, I would definitely attend. Rather than being confrontational make sure you use the school based evidence rather than 'at home he can do xyz' because maybe at school they don't do this. The phonics assessment is a good starting point for reading. I would be asking what phonics group they are in (you might already know that) and query which group would have been expected for year 1 (as this is where it does sound like he is working at year 1 standards).
Many schools start sending home school books at the end of term so that will also allow you to see what his work in school looks like and topics covered. If you see lots of corrections then this would indicate that they have had help to fix their work so not at that level maybe. My children's school use green pen so you can spot this.

Maybe he has made good progress from his starting point but that is still a bit behind the top achievers in his class. Half the class will likely be below.

I’m wondering if the teacher selected the wrong option from the drop down menu for the working towards/ meeting expectations? His reading sounds like it is going well, struggling to see how he isn't meeting expectations there. What book band/ book scheme is he on?

They teacher is marked against the highest achievers and lowest ability - middles get missed.

I'd argue the opposite. Current educational approach is based on levelling, which means a curriculum pitched at the middle and a closing the gap between lower attainers and that bulk of the class. It's widely acknowledged that higher attainers aren't served especially well by it.

If you want your child to make progress in school, ideally you should be spending a minimum of 30 minutes a day reading with him as that will help him make the most progress.

This is rubbish. 10 mins is fine for a 5-6. Little and often is more effective than a long session that is off putting. Both mine were GD for reading and we never once pushed 30 mins reading at home until they were old enough to choose to.