Any primary school teachers willing to give some feedback on DC school report

[Sheyllablum]

Hello,

We've just received our DD's (Y2) half year school report (she's in a private prep). I'm a bit underwhelmed by it considering that the teacher always says she's doing amazing and does not need to work on anything, just carry on doing great work.

I grew up in a different country and our schooling system is very different. Would someone with teaching experience be willing to read the report (it's not long) and give some feedback on whether this is standard/good and how to address different things on parents meeting. Nothing will be outed, but I'd like to send it in private.

Please?

Nope sorry - I put in enough hours to be doing free consultations

It might be tricky without the context of other reports. What are lines form it you find clncerning? Are there actual scores on there? Saying she never has anything tinwork on isnt reassuring. Sounds like the teacher doesn't know tge student well enough.

Ok, no need to reply then. Thanks.

Why don’t you add some please into your message :)

what’s up with the politeness police on MN today?! No one ever says “please” - it’s a forum, if you don’t want to comment just move on to the next thread.

OP I’m not a teacher.

The scores are 1 to 5, she got 4 for Collaboration and 4 for Concentration. Never knew these were a slight issue. Also she got Satisfactory/Developing for spelling. Again, we weren't aware of that, although I did see some work books being corrected quite heavily last term but a bit better lately. Excelling at Maths which we sort of expected. But the comments are just luke warm...she's made pleasing progress, good understanding etc...Is this standard? We thought she did better than that based on our last parents meeting and also how she's doing at home.

I should mention she's suspected ASD and finds the class a bit loud.

Yeah it’s standard and pretty British response. Her scores are good and she is 6/7. You are massively overthinking this.

Maybe some teachers never give 5 or wouldn’t even give Einstein glowing praise ? 4 is fine if 5 is highest.

That reads as good age appropriate feedback. I hope your child doesn’t pick up on your dissatisfaction.

I'm a primary school teacher. A please costs nothing.

That being said, the scores your child has got sound fine. I'd say a 4 out of 5 means perfectly good, tries hard etc. But perhaps not outstanding? There's nothing wrong with being slightly less than perfect.

Are you Eastern European by any chance? In my own parents evening meetings, it's very often those parents who drill me as to why their child only got a "good" as opposed to an "outstanding". There's literally no reason. They're fine and doing everything I expect. There's no concerns whatsoever.

I'd kindly suggest that if you're reading this much into a Yr2 mid-year report, you might be in for some rude awakenings further down the line.

Then you are no more helpful than the manners police 😂

Thank you, I'm glad to hear I'm overthinking 😀.

The issue is that with her being suspected as ND, we have lots of worries going into Y3 when things are massively ramping up and becoming more formal. Hence the overthinking.

But thank you to all who gave some constructive feedback, very much appreciated.

Id focus on reading and spelling at home as she is below expectations there.

And ...DD has got nothing but praise from us!

Would you not be better off speaking to your daughter's teacher directly if you want further detail? After all, she knows her.

Going against grain here. I would expect specific guidance on what needs to be in place for her to gain the next level . Also satisfactory progress is defined as reasonable progress from the last assessment. So if the child was behind then she may have made the expected progress but still be behind now. If you are concerned get a copy of the national curriculum . It will show you what is taught at each year group in the core subjects . You can then get a feel for how she is progressing.

Agreed with this - interesting that the first few messages are all about the omission of 'please' yet the OP chose to ignore... I can't stand rudeness.

Some of you people really dont have any real problems. A 4/5 is a good score, thats like 80%

Thank you. The thing is DD has never had a Satisfactory before. Her spelling was 'Good' last year so this is a regression. The girls who struggled a bit in Y1 were given extra work. DD was never given anything besides her weekely homework and this has never been addressed.

I think maybe you just don't quite understand how the scoring works?

Getting less than 5 doesn't mean there is a problem? 5 isn't the baseline, it is what the very best students in the class will get. Getting 4 means better than average and doesn't warrant any particular commentary

Thank you. She got 5 in many areas, apart from Concentration and Collaboration which makes sense in the context of her being ND.

I'm more concerned about Satisfactory for spelling which has never been mentioned or addressed. It was Good last year so I would have expected some sort of strategies for improvement. She won't do much at home, it needs to come from school otherwise she's not keen on doing any extra work initiated by us.

I think this too is a bit OTT

She got satisfactory. Which is satisfactory? It's not under the level they are looking for, just makes her average at one thing.

If she is above average at everything else, that's great

Some children do struggle with spelling when they move from Year 1 to Year 2.

In Year 1, most spellings are directly linked to the phonics phase that the children are studying at the time. By this point in Year 2, however, they should have learnt all the alternative sounds so the choice of grapheme to use when it comes to spelling a word is much wider, with many more opportunities to get it wrong.

Useful practice at home might be to ask your child to think of all the different ways they can make the 'a' sound, for example (a, ai, ay, a_e ...), and then to come up with a word for each spelling.

Thank you very much x

The National Curriculum in England - Appendix 1: Spelling has all the spelling rules children are expected to know by the end of each key stage.