KS3 - KS4 Flight Paths

Will try more direct approach teen, as I said my experience with DD was teachers selling their own subject... Most of them didn't know DD from another pupil....

Will teachers know though when new style GCSEs won't have been sat when we have options evening

Maths and Science are their strongest subjects,

hippo I found I had to ask the teachers directly. If DD takes history, do you expect her to get at least a C for her GCSE? They were incredibly reluctant to offer opinions on suitability unless asked direct. Even the science teacher when DD mooted doing triple science (which would have been a disaster) didn't clearly say 'bad plan' but couched it in waffle words.

(Are your DSs good at maths? There is a strong link between maths and CS).

all I want to know is should (based on their individual attainment) DS's take geography, computer science (both want to take options) and which other options should they take as I can't fathom their report....

Need to choose after Christmas. Will have an options evening, but tbh didn't find it particularly useful when I went with DD a couple of years ago as each teacher was trying to "sell" their own subject regardless of DD's natural ability, attainment etc...

Noble - Side note, why don't parents generally get CATs results? I found out after their CATs, one of my DS was 2 years below reading age, (I never knew this at primary school). I only found out CATs results with DS as SENCO got in touch with me with a reading strategy.

Their reading (and writing) ability is a concern of mine moving forward choosing their option.....

Noble I do see your point re grading effort. You can only look at outward indicators, not what is going on in their head.

However for parents it is better than nothing I think; and if DD were being graded on being neat her grades would be much lower than they are. Also it is good to know that despite DD being massively behind in PE she isn't opting out or being disruptive in the lessons.

Effort grades 1-4 so you can see if they are trying.

You really can't tell how much effort a kid is putting in. We grade proxies for effort, like if you have to prompt a kid to get on with their work, whether it's neat, whether they put their hand up to answer questions.

This means that students who struggle to be in the classroom, or struggle to be neat, or have social anxiety so don't put their hand up get downgraded even though they might be trying really hard at their level.

I think broad bands for GCSE targets, 1-3, 4-6, 7-9 might be the way forward. Fail, pass, A-level potential.

I used to work in a primary school office and saw how long it took teachers to write reports

A lot of parents either didn't read them or didn't understand them (this was when levels were "in") parents with cba, English not first language, illiterate or low education.

I quite like what my DD's school is doing.
Effort grades 1-4 so you can see if they are trying.
Then
'working well above' (1.5 years or more ahead of national expected)
'working above'
'working at' (where working at in y11 would be 4/5 tbd at the moment)
'working below'
'working well below' (1 year or more behind expected)

I can see at a glance whether DD is trying and broadly where she is at. By comparing reports I will be able to see whether she is making expected progress, or not.
It is very clear, and not trying to be over-precise.

Ooh... okay noble. I was just going on my experience with my DS. We were told at end of first term of yr7 what they'd aim for him to get at GCSE. It was based on SATs, CATs and them getting to know them that term. I just assumed alls schools doing the flight path did the same thing. You're right, it is utterly pointless if you don't know what the target is.

Bumps, it's something a lot of secondary schools seem to be doing. So each report tells you if your child is 'on track' for whatever target the school deems them to be capable of. Judging by what noble's just said, there's a huge variety in how schools apply it!

Mines only KS1 - what's a flight path please?

the parents must have known whether she was seen as a potential A, B or C, etc GCSE student.

No. Who tells them what KS2 results mean for GCSEs? Or KS3 levels? I've seen enough posts on here asking 'is this good?' to know that plenty of parents don't know.

Posters were saying upthread that they were being told if their child was on target, but not what the target is. How useless is that?

I agree, noble if the parents don't understand it's utterly pointless, but surely... (and I may be wrong here) with the lovely girl, the parents must have known whether she was seen as a potential A, B or C, etc GCSE student. Each term the progress tracker simply says whether they're perceived to be broadly on track for that target still, or really nowhere near/ slipping, etc. It's easy for parents to get that I'd have thought. Most do.

Just to give a counter example. One of DS's friends got a report which showed her on track for academic targets and above track for lots too (so lots of green and blue), but her effort and homework marks were ambers at best and largely red. Just that alone showed her parents what their daughter was like in the classroom. Every detention, she'd managed to convince her mum that she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, was blamed wrongly etc. Seeing it so baldly on the page her parents realised that not all the teachers could be wrong and that their daughter's behaviour and attitude clearly wasn't the best.

I can totally see how whole report thing must be maddening as a teacher, but as a parent I do want to know something. I am honestly not too sure what the answer is! I hope you've broken up and can just enjoy the festivities, with no report in sight.

Would you just not have reports at all?

There's a workload issue relating to reports which means that schools have binned written comments. However this means numbered boxes which, as I've said, are relatively meaningless. My school used to have one box for each child, then they realised that wasn't helpful, so they added more boxes.
But we are also supposed to log house points, behaviour points, detentions and so on electronically which parents can see anyway. What does a tick box report add?

If you're seeing lots of amber flags, then as a parent you start to realise that your child might be struggling

That's true, but your child could have a shining report, outstandings all over the place, and the parent be completely oblivious to the fact that their child is doing really badly in a subject.

I found this out at one parents' evening when talking to the parents of the loveliest girl in one of my classes. She was well-behaved, hardworking, homework always in on time. Her parents had no idea she was bottom of the bottom set until I told them, because her effort grades and so on were always outstanding. If we'd graded progress at that time, she'd have been graded as making good progress. Unfortunately, this meant good progress towards a fail. Her parents didn't understand national curriculum levels.

Once her parents knew, they pulled out all the stops with her and she moved up the sets and passed her GCSE 5 years later.

These flight paths are pointless if parents don't know what flight path their child is supposed to be on.

I do get all of that, noble but coming from the other side, it's all I have and as a basic guide it's helpful. If my kid's progress or effort marks all come in as shaded red, I'm going to know there's a problem. If he has one subject which shows he's red, but the rest are green, so deemed on track, then I'm going to maybe start to keep a closer eye on helping him for that one subject, or ask why that teacher thinks he's a pita! I actually think it's a bit more useful for the middle range. If you're seeing lots of amber flags, then as a parent you start to realise that your child might be struggling/ slipping. That might help you to help them earlier, etc, rather than wait for them to slip even further.

Yes you're right, of course you are, on variables. Some teachers will be harder in terms of how they grade. Others over generous. Parents will mostly get that and understand that it's an average snapshot for the term. They'd appreciate that one amazing piece of homework wouldn't counter out all the late/ forgotten/ not completed bits.

Also after a term though, you know pretty much in each class who's struggling or has a problem surely? I mean that both academically and behaviourally. So yes you take seconds to tick the relevant boxes to generate the report, but I'd hope that mostly they're relevant to that child and not just about the last test result or one particular lesson or piece of homework.

There is no exact science is there? Would you just not have reports at all? I'm genuinely interested.

Unless the teachers just lie.

We don't lie. We just make it up. If I wrote reports just after a crap P5 lesson with a class when there had been a fight at lunchtime and they were bouncing off the walls, they would get a different set of numbers than if I wrote the report after a P1 lesson when they were still sleepy enough to be angelic. Yet the report is supposed to be a reflection of their work since the last report. Some teachers set the default as 'outstanding' and downgrade kids who aren't quite up to scratch. Some teachers set the default as 'good' and only upgrade kids who are really good.

The progress stuff is all made up too. Progress can't be quantified into neat little boxes. If a kid does well in a test, have they made progress or was the test too easy for them?

Homework - does 'good' mean the homework is good or the student is good at handing it in? If a kid hands in homework that is usually perfect, but one or two pieces are late, what grade should they get?

Teachers spend mere seconds deciding this stuff.

noblegiraffe, you're right it's not accurate and it definitely isn't scientific, but getting a sheet with clearly coded flags for progress/ effort and homework each term is helpful to me as a parent. It's an indication as to whether my child's behaving, paying attention, learning, etc in each subject. Unless the teachers just lie.... We ignore the GCSE predictions. Especially now it's all changed, who knows what they'll get.

reasonably reliable

The problem is that it's not reasonably reliable. It's not even slightly reliable. It's giving the illusion of science where it's nothing scientific about it.

I might be wrong, but I think the whole flight path idea stems from Michael Wilshaw (Ofsted chief). It's the system he set up at his old much lauded school and it's radiated out from there. I agree that it's daft to announce GCSE grade targets when they've just started in yr7, but it is useful in giving you as a parent a reasonably reliable idea of whether your child is sliding or not. Obviously a good school should tell you that regardless in reports, but lots don't. For DS we get a simple report each term with progress/ effort/ homework marks on for each subject. Each is graded by colour, so blue (above track)/ green (on track)/ orange (below) / red (oh dear!). It's easy to read and just quickly check if they're sort of okay. Not fool proof at all, but still a system everyone can understand and it's blindingly obvious if they're falling behind, so helpful that way.

We had a y7 report earlier this term. No flight paths. The levels are based on the 9-1 system but with a chart showing where the average is for each year up to and including year 9. The target grades are for end of year 9 not GCSE. They are obviously based on SATS and CATS results. This seems more logical but still quite bonkers because in some subjects not enough work had been done to be able to assess it and the targets will get tweaked anyway! DS1 in Y10 said ignore the levels till the end of the year report as it's much more realistic!
We don't choose options until end of Y9 although the maths and science GCSE syllabus begins in Y8.

Why not actually wait until the child is in Y 11 to do a predicted grade?

To be fair, that would be a bit late for most kids, especially to tell them they're going to fail. A ballpark figure in Y9 for options would be a reasonable expectation, except a lot of schools have moved options to Y8 and some students are having to make those choices now.

Parents do need a way of knowing whether their kid is strong, OK or weak in a subject, but this isn't it, because if they're not told the targets then how can they decide whether their kid being on course for the target is acceptable or not? If they knew their kid was on target to fail, then they could buy workbooks, hire a tutor, other interventions.

The 1 is being pegged to a G isn't it? So only the same proportion of kids who failed last year can fail this year?

How that's actually going to work when our weakest kids can't answer the easiest questions because the papers (even maths foundation) start harder than the old papers, is beyond me.

The worry here, in English, is not about grammar schools showing progress but more about how the new GCSE exam blatantly discriminates against SEN/less able pupils. No tiers means that our weak students who would once have got D/E/F will now get Ungraded and I work in one of the top 5% performing schools in the country. Marking Mock papers was heartbreaking. These children have been well taught, are essentially literate yet will fail because they cannot analyse a literary extract. How does that equate to the needs of modern life? Yes, maybe for higher grades, going on to university, but to allow people access to being a plumber/ hairdresser/train driver? All essential jobs but you cannot get on the course unless you can comment on the structure of Daphne du Maurier's writing. The impact of these changes will cause untold misery.

What a load of shit. Why not actually wait until the child is in Y 11 to do a predicted grade? You cannot possibly say how well they will do in four years time. When will we give up all this crap? How about setting an exam at the end of each year based on what has been covered and giving kids a percentage score? Why do we persist in dreaming up more and more complex meaningless assessnent systems? If we look at the countries that are doing well educationally they probably have v simple things like exams and termly tests whivh show whether child is doing well or struggling.

I don't know, I just got called in as a parent and was told about the new GCSE structure and that they give them a predicted level based on their SATs results and how they'd been working in class and another few factors. It is a computer generated system and seems to have given individual targets as (my daughter is very very bright) amd was predicted 8s and 9s but from her friends 7s and 8s

Flight paths are the new band wagon to jump on since the government scrapped levels, didn't replace them but still expect us to show progress. Not sure where it has come from, google turns up some blogs, the DfE gave a grant for their development apparently.

The GCSE predicted grades are FFT targets. The utter insanity of using these as a benchmark for Y7 just proves how desperate schools are for a data-based system at the moment.