Shout and scream or Coffee and Tea??

Did she score 100 or above in the KS2 Reading and Maths tests?

I don’t want to be in a position where the school is piling on pressure on my kid in three or four years time because they didn’t do enough earlier to make her ready for KS4 and GCSEs
Why would you think that's the case?
Did she reach National Standard?(100)

OP it's great to see how you're taking on board all these ideas from this thread. Really refreshing and I'm sure your daughter will feel the benefits.

I just wanted to share about one young lady I taught for science for three years. She was always in bottom but one set as she was very anxious about tests and underperformed despite having lots of TLC and access arrangements etc. She was a very nervous girl anyway. However when relaxed she clearly had the same ability as a middle set child, but if we'd put her in that class she'd have felt so overwhelmed, and had maybe 10 more students in the class, she'd have got lost. Staying with me in the lower set (who I adored and chose to keep each year rather than re-timetabling them onto someone else, even though they drove me mad at times) meant I had time to work with her, she lost some of her anxieties and started to believe in her own ability. It helped that she, being brighter than a lot of the others, picked stuff up a bit quicker so had extra time to practice-big fish in a small pond, I guess. In the end she got a C in her GCSE and outperformed kids two sets higher than her. So being in a lower group isn't always a negative thing. This girl had supportive parents like yourself and we would exchange emails or phone calls maybe once a month to keep up and so I could tell them what topics were coming up next, so there is a lot to be said for the collaborative/softly softly approach to building a partnership with the school as you'll find staff will be happy to keep in touch with you.

Again, id like to say it's refreshing to see an Op willing to take on board suggestions.

Loads of good suggestions here. I'm of the view that it can be good to make contact with school and communicate about concerns, as long as you are careful not to do it too much. It's always best to approach with a query and seeking advice rather than a complaint, especially when you're not in receipt of full information.

The issue here partly seems to me that you simply don't really know what your DD is capable of and how she can be stretched further. So I would ask. I wouldn't start from the point of school is failing and she is in the wrong set, because actually you don't know this. What you want to know is what they think her ability level and potential are (and what evidence there is of that) and if she is meeting her potential at the moment - is she working hard and what are the school doing to push her to achieve her potential? And you can ask what you can do and what more can the school do. And I'd look to make a plan in collaboration with them so you're going in the same direction and you know what they're doing and they know what you're doing, including the tutor. If you approach it from an angle of a fact finding mission and having the goal of making a plan not a complaint you should find you can work with them.

I'd probably email the Head of Year, and copy in the maths teacher and form teacher and probably Head of Maths too, asking if you can come in for a chat to discuss her progress in maths. You can lay out in the email the things you're interested to chat about and make clear you want to work with them to achieve the best for your DD. At any meeting, ask if they can confirm what has been agreed and ask too if you can have an update in perhaps a terms time. Al of this will involve time and effort from the teachers, but I think it's a reasonable request and if you approach it in the right way, it could make her time at school more productive - she will be more on the radar of the teachers and you will know more about her ability, her work ethic and what is going on and feel steps are being made to move forward.

Best of luck in finding out more what is going on and developing that plants move forward.

Parents Evening: You have to plan to get the most out of your 5 minutes. My view is 3 points/questions at most per subject.
e.g.

1. DD tells me she finds it hard to concentrate due to some of the behaviour of the boys.
2. What is her next target
3. How can I best support at home if we wanted to do a bit extra

Otherwise you risk spending the 5 minutes like this:

Teacher to your DD: 'How do you think you are getting on?'
DD: Silence. Then eventually mumbles 'OK I suppose'
Teacher: Well, you have made a good start. We have been covering maths core basics this term and in her recent test she did fine. We use a spiral model which is why some work will appear to be repeated ….

Definitely one data drop a term is fine. ‘weighing the pig does not make it any fatter’. Your child needs time to learn new skills.

I have heard great things about this magazine
www.aquila.co.uk

Another tip. Make sure her phone is not in her bedroom overnight or she will be on it through the night. She needs a good nights sleep to learn well.

sounds good.
imo it is all about How you can help, ask the school, how can you help? which websites are useful.
show involvement.
but remember fun
there is bbc bitesize

My three attended a very very poor secondary in a remote location. Since dh and I had good jobs there moving wasn’t feasible. Instead we focused on sports, various trips and experiences and the best colleges possible.
Both colleges attended by my boys, tested and topped up their secondary studies.
My youngest attended a full time 13 month in-depth program that in that timeframe redid grades 9-12. Those grades were subsequently used for further education.
I had never heard of such programs. Hidden gems (although located in Canada), I’d be researching similar options in the UK just in case.

Some fun maths stuff which isn't a workbook:

www.rigb.org/christmas-lectures/watch?video-topics=Maths&video-lecturer=&video-year=&video-type=series&search_text=&p=1

Lots of other topics there, as well. The RI used to run family days quite regularly as well. (No help if you are nowhere near London, of course).

• seems they still do:

One set of data per term is sort of plenty. The teachers need time to teach in-between assessing!

I have only had limited success with asking for exercise books to come home occasionally (I tend to stick a post-it inside DD's planner).
I have had more success with occasionally emailing specific teachers with specific questions (we have a good 'contact teacher' system).

She's only been there a term, some children take longer to settle into a new school than others. Try not to get annoyed about her lack of progress, and please don't let it be a source of friction at home. She will definitely pick up on that, even if you don't argue in front of her. There's no point in getting angry with her teachers either.

Anyway, some kids do plateau for a year, mine did.

Behaviour issues can be an issue and that would be an issue for school to manage effectively. They have a responsibility to help all students learn.

Re the 4 data drops, I think we’ll have to agree to disagree. If the teacher can’t demonstrate how the child is performing at least week to week, then how can they find key their delivery of their material to the kids?
Progress and data drops are different things.

I can tell you the strengths and weaknesses of every child I teach and tell you what I'm doing to help thrm improve. That doesn't translate to a data drop for parents.

Anyone expecting to see week to week improvements in terms of grades doesn't understand how learning works. E.g. I might be working on sentence variation one week and next week look at context of poems. Both involve making progress, neither would be enough to move a child up a grade.
Parents/senior leaders wanting everything micromanage and every ounce of learning quantified do teachers and students a huge disservice.

I don't recommend you bringing it up with the school, yet...
Focus on your routine of revision at home. Push her at home and make sure she is making progress as a result of the work you're doing with her at home. She will eventually do better in her topic tests and this, eventually, will result in her being put into a different band.

There will be lots of change between year 7 and 9. Save the hard core attack on the school till year 9, they'll take you more seriously when there are GCSE grades at stake.

Im a teacher (middle leader). I get this countless times and I think you should play the long game.

Good luck.

I think it is great if you start taking your DD to the library - most will have a teen fiction section, but don't forget poetry, graphic novels (very popular with reluctant readers) and also non fiction books on a subject of her choice. Some libraries have a café, which might help! My library runs a manga club for tweens, so might be worth enquiring if yours runs anything similar - might appeal to her artistic tendencies.

Also see if you can support her learning by going on relevant day trips - eg visit a castle if they are studying castles in history, Hampton Court if they are doing the Tudors, a bow lake for geography etc. If you find out what she is doing, there are lots of fun things you can do to support the curriculum.

If you want suggestions of potential books to read, I'm sure posters would be happy to share what was popular with their DC. Might help if you could give an indication of books she has actually enjoyed.

There is absolutely no point in agitating for her to move up a band if she cannot manage the work- it will knock her confidence hugely, and likely turn her off school completely.
Kumon is dire, don't do that.
Khan Academy maths is good (online, not physical).
What did she achieve in End of KS2 tests? Is she bottom band in a higj-performing comp, or bog-standard comp?
Don't make learning "fun"! Learning is hard work, and you will do your child more favours if she learns to.work hard, and gets satisfaction from her achievements.
She needs to read every day- aloud to you, and privately in her head. Cut back the phone/social media use. Does she do a sport?

What about subscribing to something like The Week junior or First News? They're really easy to read, possibly slightly too young for her now, but they might get her reading and interested in politics and current affairs leading on to things you can discuss together or maybe read a bit more about in more adult newspapers.

Curiosity about the world is such an important thing, along with being able to read and count.

What support are the schooling giving her to ensure she achieves the minimum at least ie a grade c (whatever it is these days!) in English and maths. My son has SEN and I found the best approach to get him the support he needed was to remain calm but be insistent and always leave each meeting with a concrete plan if next steps. And keep in contact, Keep the pressure on. The children whose parents went in shouting, withdrawing their child or who didn't keep on the school's case, ime, did not get the support their child needed. With this in mind, also remember that you are the only person that will advocate for your child whereas the school have 1000+ other children to worry about. Without advocating, some children's needs do get lost in amongst the crowd.

I found I had to research and make suggestions as to what strategies they could try. This surprised me as I expected the school to be the experts but they were receptive to ideas.

The biggest thing is to remain calm. You don't need to be their mate but try to treat it like s business meeting. Calm, professional, what are we trying to achieve her/what outcomes do we want. You and the school should theoretically be on the same page as you should both want each and every child to achieve their potential.

Personally I wouldn't focus on her moving up a band. That may or may not help her. If she moves into a middle band and is not able to keep up that could destroy her confidence altogether. She should do best in the band that matches her ability.

Stepping back a little, do you have faith in this particular school and the teachers. My son was not initially getting the support he needed and as a result was doing badly. However I knew the school was good and had some amazing teachers so overall I knew it was the right school and I just needed to work with them to get the support right. If you don't have faith in the school perhaps you should be looking at a different school who might be able to give her the support she needs.

None of this is easy but if you get it right it will be worth it. My son went from being on track to expulsion to getting excellent GCSEs, then A levels and is now at university living independently. My son's difficulties were different to your daughter's in that he has always been academically very able but has difficulties with social skills, fine motor skills and executive functioning. However the principles of getting the right support are the same.

I am concerned about the effect this is having in your relationship. You should be pulling together to sort this out. It is one of the most stressful and emotional things I have done, trying to deal with this issue and trying to work with the school to get the right support in place. You have to go into battle mode but remain calm and unemotional in all discussions. I cried and shouted when I got home! Does your wife have a very different view to you about what should happen and how this should be handled? If not, what is causing the arguments?

I dont get the idea of higher bands being 'better' prepared for ks4. Students are prepares at a pace they can manage. Some will hit a higher level sooner as they're more able and ready to. That's the bell curve.

I once taught a lower group at GCSE and got loads of A/A. They needed the slower and steady approach and lots of rehearsal. They didn't need bombarding with A content from day one out of principle to give them high content. They needed a well structured route through that gave them the appropriate information when they were ready.

3 data drops a year is standard for secondaries. To be honest, much more than that and it's a pointless exercise for staff, students and parents.

If a student is responding to the guidance and feedback from the teacher then they'll be making progress. A lull at the start of y7 is common for a lot of reasons, for a start it's a bigger curriculum, new skills, different staff with different methods.

As I say, have a chat with school about strengths and weaknesses.

With maths and science if you don't get the building blocks you can't learn on top. So by spending more time on them prior to assessments (which is when DD will let me) I'm providing her with more secure foundations to go forward on. This then helps her learn better in class for the next phase.

If you don't know what an atom is, it is hard to learn about ionic bonding.

Flip learning is also helpful. Sometimes I tell her about stuff she hasn't done yet, and say I don't expect her to remember it. But then when she does it in class it isn't all new and scary, so she is more receptive to taking it in.

I would suggest spending time with her and help bring on her understanding. Conversations are a powerful learning tool. Go for a walk with her and talk about what you see around you: why/how do leaves change colour? Where does concrete come from and why is it used? What kind of transport will be used in 20 years time etc. It doesn't matter what you talk about, just chat but keep it educational.