WWYD? School report is partly a work of fiction.

I would prefer to see honest statements like this. At least parents would know that their kids aren't concentrating, or are struggling with whatever parts of the curriculum, what their social life at school is really like, how good/bad they are at sports.

Parents have blinkered views on what their kids can do. Teachers have lots of kids to compare and normalise childrens true abilities and I think more honesty would be beneficial

I have no problem with writing stuff like

"If Jack focussed more consistently in lessons, he would be likely to reach his potential", or "Jack's attainment would be increased if he concentrated more and spent less time chatting"

However, if we wrote the kind of things that teachers used to, parents (especially MN parents) would be up in arms about it.

We can't win.

Talking peace - so true. At least you can look back a the report and know how you really were in the class.

I dont have a clue about what my children actually can do at school

And what is really sad about it is that when I was at school, teachers could be truthful.

TiP would do better if she worked harder
Tip should talk less and listen more
Tip made little contribution to the class other than her pleasing absence (yes really)

Nowadays, a school that wrote that would be pilloried by the Daily Mail and sued
so the whole thing is bland and tick box with euphemisms like "excitable" (PITA) "creative" (away with the fairies) "forthcoming" (a bully)

Maybe we should all ask our schools to write less and mean more.

Have identical!

Vicky it was no different with hand written reports. You still got a whole class with identical PE reports ( for example). The 3 children who were excellent would be noticed and get individual reports. The 3 who mucked around would be known and have individual reports, the other 25 would hVevidentical bland comments.

Really really depressing thread this, more so that it seems to be tacitly accepted. If it was a one-off and the school were mortified that would be fair enough but very clearly it's not.

I'm not sure what the solution is but it does look to be one of the areas where technology has allowed one too many corners to be cut.

It is really sad to read these comments.

I too have been disappointed at the vague comments in school reports that quite often you wonder who the report is about.

I remember specific words used on reports but never any suggestion on what the next steps are to move forward. We wait all year for feedback on our children (because if we ask the teacher anything then we are seen as a PIta) but then dont get anything useful or constructive that tells us where our kids are at.

The worst thing is getting identical comments on all your kids reports.

There has to be another solution for report writing that doesnt take the teachers weeks and weeks to do but gives parents an open and honest update.

I thought that with the national curriculum, work was marked and officially recorded by the form or subject teacher. Also don't these pupils have homework that is marked and recorded? Surely all that is required is for teachers to check their records to see what little Johnny has done this term even if they can't remember who he is?

Alison, it depends on whether you want to make an official complaint, or just flag up the problem.

If you do want to make an official complaint, as you have already raised the issue with the HoY without a resolution to the problem, you would usually now escalate it to the next level - in most, but not all, cases that would be the Head of School.

The school should have a complaints procedure/policy which are sometimes on the school website, but more often than not you will need to request a copy from the office.

The usual system goes, Teacher, HoY or HoD, Head of School, relevant Governor, LEA.

That said, as Eviltwin said, it most likely will get bumped back to the HoY to be dealt with, but I wouldn't let that put you off writing directly to the Head, who then has a responsibility to write back addressing the complaint.

I would write to the Head of Year, and copy it to the Head. The governors would pass it back to the relevent member of staff, I expect. If you go straight to the Head, he/she would be likely to pass it to the Head of Year to deal with.

I too can see how this will have happened. Many schools use a computer system for reports - comment banks which you simply click on (the comment banks are written by the HoD in my school - they're not completely generic) to create the report. I teach a total of 12 classes in KS3 alone, and by Christmas, was still not 100% secure with who all the children were - I knew their names and could talk about them if they were in front of me, but couldn't be completely sure that I had the right Charlie, Chloe or Jack if I was given a Year Group list. Like coastgirl, our reports are sent back to us if one is blank (although unlike OP's DD's teachers, I would then call the relevent person and point out that I do not teach that child)

It's not an ideal system. I am embarrassed to say that I happily went along with it for KS3 classes (never KS4 or KS5) until I got reports from school for my DTDs (in reception) which were clearly comment bank reports, and said exactly the same as each other. I really felt that this rendered them pretty much meaningless, and am now far more careful with my own reports, however long it takes.

OP, I would be very straight with the school - write or phone, and point out that your DD does not do these subjects. It will not "blow the system open", as TalkinPeace2 suggests, as I bet you won't be telling the school something it doesn't already know - it will be individual teachers who need to be corrected, not the "system".

Our reports are done on computer and when I do get a student on my list who I have never taught, or who on one occasion had newly transferred to the school and who I had done little more that given an exercise book to, I naturally leave it blank. To which I receive a snotty email from the "Information Services Team" telling me my reports are not complete.

FWIW I write personal reports, as do all the English staff at our school. I have heard teachers from more than one department say that we're mugs for not using comment banks though...

I took it furher when my DS had reports for two subjects he didn't do, taught by the same teacher.
She thought he was Matthew apparently. Despite not having taught him at all that year, and the report being in April.
The other reports from the teachers that knew himwere spot on, personalised and helpful. I just assumed it was her being muddled.

I'm not particularly surprised. I'm a twin, and several times lower in the school, my bro and I's reports had the exact same sentences copy&pasted in. I remember once, my brother, several of my friends and I all had the same music report about how we could "sing confidently in the choir" despite never having sung in any choir or group.

Your situation is a lot worse though, and quite frankly ridiculous. Complain!

Ahem - 'paper record that you have raised the issue' not paper record of that you have raised the issue' - oops!

I'm really shocked by this, even taking into account possible problems with the system, rather than individual teachers, its still nowhere near good enough. How on earth can not even one of those teachers concerned have noticed your dd isn't in their class?

As you said, its bad enough that it happened once, but for you to raise it with the school, only for it to happen again is frankly disgraceful.

I would write to the Head asking for reassurance that the system has looked at and changed to avoid it ever happening again. As you have already raised it with the Head of Year - without a successful outcome, you are within your rights to move up a rung in seeking a solution to the problem. There definitely needs to be a paper record of that you have raised the issue with them, even if you'd rather not term it a complaint.

I do understand that there are a lot of pupils in some of these very large schools, but imo there's no excuse for a teacher not having enough documented evidence of a child's achievement or otherwise to be able to write a meaningful report on them. What about all their classwork and homework fgs? Fair enough, I perhaps wouldn't expect them to actually 'know' every child personally, but surely they should at the very least have a paper trail that can inform their report writing. How on earth can you write a report for a child that has never completed one piece of classwork or ever handed in a homework assignment set by you for a certain subject?

It makes a complete mockery of report writing, they might as well put the time to better use if they are just churning out generic reports. In some ways I do actually feel sorry for the teachers, as if the system is this unfit for purpose, they must be very frustrated at having to carry out what is essentially a monumental waste of their time.

Out of interest, what happens at parents' evening? Do the teachers never notice that child X's parents have never attended a single appointment with them?

Whatever happened to Every Child Matters!

"Dear HT I am concerned with DCs report as I would have expected far higher grades in subjects X Y and Z, could the teachers confirm which homework and lesson modules they were not happy with"
Blow the monitoring system wide open.
Go for it.

This is dreadful. what happens at A level and predicted grades. Un iversity offers can stand or fall on this and it would be unforgiveable of there's an error to the child's detriment

i agree with mnistooaddictive i gather majority of schools do this its very bad it happened at all let alone twice if your really bothered (and i would be too) id email head of year , the HT and even possibly the govenors but at the end of the day id mainly see what yr DC's reports/ levels are for the subject they do do as thats more important but ill never look ata school report quite the same now ive read what happened to you

Mummytime, that predicted grade might be based on projected data - they take data from, for example, key stage 2 tests and CAT tests and use that to extrapolate what a student could achieve in other subjects, even those not previously studied. So a student with a decent degree of literacy and logic skills, say, might have the ability to get an A in GCSE Latin - but obviously this is only relevant if they actually end up studying it!