To be worried about ds year 7 English level?

[House4]

My ds has finished year 7 with an English level of 4a. This is what he started the year on. He has officially made no progress throughout the year. His end of year target was 5c.

The reports were given out on the day before the last school day so not enough time to digest and ask the teacher. It's playing on my mind now.

He has either met or exceeded levels in all other subjects. He has achieved a 6c in Maths (and has always been in the top set).

In year 6 SAT's his Writing level was 'working towards' so I had asked the Year 7 English teacher earlier in the year if he needed extra help and she said no. He doesn't particularly dislike teacher or lesson and was given 'good' for effort, behaviour and homework.

I will obviously speak to the school as soon as they start again in September but should I do anything now? I.e. Have him assessed independently or start to look at private tutoring? I do not want it to be 'too late' to get help by the time he is sitting his GCSE's.
Any advice appreciated.

How could he get a 4a in last years SATs? they got scores like 112 or 99 or whatever?

A forecast 4a in the new levels is a middling C. I wouldn't worry about it at all.

Pengywwn. I know. I'm an English teacher. The grades are a nonsense esp at GCSE. What the school is doing even attempting to project in this way is wrong and inevitably confuses parents.

The headline is this: he is probably doing fine. Rather than add to a non teacher's confusion by getting technical, let's reassure. Especially in a case where we don't know the school or the child and what he is capable of.

Another teacher here saying it's probably fine and nothing to worry about. They shouldn't be using these levels and his primary school shouldn't have used them either. It would be so much easier if schools just reported on whether they have made expected progress this year or not!

Send an email to the school, the teacher will possibly not see it until September but then you can put it out of your mind until then.

In the old days we used to use an end of year test with levelling and it may just be that he didn't have a great test but they should have contacted you earlier in the year if they had significant concerns so it's probably fine.

Agree with other posters this would be a GcSE low grade 'C' which he can't really have achieved by now and you have said he is 5 or 6 in other areas which is even more unlikely so think the school sound a bit behind the times still reporting NC levels which don't exist!

I think levels aside his writing doesn't appear great to my untrained eye. He doesn't use capitals all the time for example. Unless he is really trying hard and concentrating. I think at twelve I would expect a child to use these basic skills but they don't come naturally to him. He has bought his books home so I am going to look through them properly when we are home later. He doesn't interpret text at the level I would expect for his age either. In infants and early juniors he was above average for this but I do feel since year 4 he hasn't improved much in Wnglish overall. Outside of school he does very funny you tube videos and has great ideas for these which is great and very he is very verbal in his sports teams.

*English!!

4a & 5c sound more like old NC levels than predicted new GCSE grades 'flightpath' to me, especially from last years SATs. Unless clearly stated otherwise?

My DD is also finishing y7 and struggles with English (current 'flightpath GCSE grades 2-3). We will (yet again) be doing some English over the summer. She has matured quite a bit this year, so I am hoping that maybe this time she will finally 'get' how to break things into sentences ...

Our school are using GCSE grades to grade work from yr7 which means that in some subjects 1s and 2s are quite normal. A 4a would be very good. They don't award more than a 5 in yr7. Lots of yr 7 seemed to be revision and making sure they are all at the same stage so I guess they might not make lots of progress if they were already fairly confident.

A 5 in yr7 would be expected to be an 8/9 by yr11. This is a selective school so might be some 9s.

This thread about how giving GCSE grades in Y7 is nonsense and how any grade given in KS3 is subjective might be instructive: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/secondary/2979988-School-reports-which-give-your-kids-GCSE-grades-or-flightpaths-are-bollocks

There's bog all difference between a 4A and a 5C, assuming they are using the old A the highest, C the lowest. No science behind it at all. God knows why they would give an end of year target of 5C to someone starting on a 4A, or where the 4A came from given the new SATs.

However, despite the levels being subjective nonsense, the teacher may be trying to tell you something by not having raised his level all year. Or they may not, but the only way you'd find out is by actually asking them.

Yes I will definitely be asking again when they are back. I did email earlier in the school year so will be a bit disappointed if they were trying to tell me something through this strange level grading when I obviously care.
He can use capitals and write neatly etc just doesn't do it automatically all the time which I think he should at this age.
There is no written description for any of the subjects - I doubt I will be the only one emailing the school! Wonder why they send the reports out at the very last minute

OP is this helpful?

www.gumley.hounslow.sch.uk/_files/472B6B4B919342CD8F3CC96B1E8F1FE2.pdf

I'm trying to get my head round the yr 7 report that we have here.

Levels don't exist anymore, but schools still need to judge the teachers, sorry, students, so many have done what we did-made their own systems up. Makes it a joy when kids transfer to us from other local schools. "Right, you're on ....., you'll be in set 5." "But I was in set 2 in my last school!"

At dd's school the 4a is quite different to a SATs 4a - it means something like advanced and is the last one before they go up to 5f which I think is foundation. They map on to what the school think the GCSEs might look like - though they have said they don't know. I guess that a child in yr 11 producing that level of work in a GCSE exam they would expect to get a good pass 4. They are just indications of current level, as are any reports at this stage. It is just the way their school do it but at least they had a meeting where they explained it all. How they determine target grades though remains shrouded in mystery.

My DA is in the same boat - his twin sister for a 6A - so huge difference in skills - he knows his stuff - just won't produce anything decent the teachers can mark

I've brought grammar and literacy workbooks - plus a writing skills book

He has to complete a excersie before he can play out - everyday -

I've also brought a word search book and I read to him every night - he doesn't want to read but happily listens and it's better than nothing

Find some short stories with good middle beginning and end - with a twist etc so he hears what a good one might look like

Work in his confidence - something is better than nothing!!!!

So boys just look at a blank page and go 'OH No'

His report was rubbish - shame his teacher didn't approach me earlier !!

Sounds like the school has got targets set too high to be honest. My DS has just finished year 7 at secondary school as well and his targets as well as other year 7s were 2+ and my DD who just finished year 9 had expected end of year targets for 4+ for her year.
So sounds like for year 7 they've got end of year targets too high

Also bear in mind that he has achieved a huge amount in the past year. He has (presumably) learnt to get to a new school, found his way around the school, made new friends, met new teachers, managed his school timetable, his homework timetable, adjusted to new rules and discipline standards, etc. That's before you consider that he has made progress in all other areas. His new English teacher might even feel that he was slightly optimistically assessed at the beginning of the year or maybe was a very low 4a at the beginning and is now a high 4a but still a few gaps. Not to say you shouldn't do a few bits over the summer but I don't think you need to worry too much before discussing with his teachers in Sept.

You can't say he started on a level 4a because a level 4 at primary doesn't exist. You've said yourself that he was working towards the expected standards at y6.

There are massive issues with trying to take gcse grades down through ks3 and the a/b/c sub levels are a figment of the school's assessment policy.

Not only that, but getting the top end of a gcse grade 4 is like a C- at gcse but on a spec that is more difficult and can't accurately be given unless he has sat full gcse papers. Add to that the fact that grade boundaries don't even exist yet.

Honestly, I'd just hang fire. Read with him out of school and keep an eye on his exercise book next year.

Should add that a child going from working towards to a gcse grade 4 in 1 year is a huge amount of progress (almost unlikely).

It may well be that 4 is actually a school devised assessment level so nothing to do with gcse or old national curriculum.

The new gcse grades are very confusing bue to each schools interpretation The way they compare to old grades, according to my school, are as follows:
9 - A** (doesn't currently exist - only the exceptional will achieve this)
8 - A*
7 - A
6 - B
5 - C
4 - D
3 - E
2 - F
1 - E

There is, obviously, some debate as to the interpretation. Some schools group 4 and 5 and equate them to a high C or low C. My school are following the above and insist only a 5 or higher is a passing grade. How they are used at ks3 and flightpath vary from school to school. Some schools have insisted they are used at ks3. We just say 'working below, toward, at, above, well above' the expected. It's frustrating and pointless. There was no need to change the system- it's just another stick to beat teachers with. 'Pupils achieving top grades has fallen dramatically this year'. That will be the headline in the summer. That's because the top grade didn't exist before now. Plus, the grade boundaries have been pushed higher making exams harder. I grade my pupils 'coursework' type element using a scale that goes: outstanding, excellent, good, adequate, limited. 3 years ago, a grade C was achieved if a pupil fell into the 'good' category in all 4 elements. Now, they need to achieve in the 'excellent' category because the boundaries have been pushed higher. Mathmatically imposdible for them to get a C if they arent excellent. It's actually quite soul destroying as a teacher.

The above mapping is incorrect and has been split that way for convenience rather than accuracy. There is no debate, a 4 is equivalent to a C, that's how the grade boundaries are being set. It's frustrating that schools are trying to force new onto old when it's not going to work like that. Telling parents a 4 is a D is massively wrong, a D was a fail requiring resits, a 4 is a standard pass and doesn't.

Here is Ofqual's mapping based on how the new GCSE will be marked.

Whatsername17

Thank you - that actually gives me a bit of hope my DS has a chance of passing his English exams (4 years away) but at the moment he finds it incredibly difficult to write anything that's deemed good enough - and his confidence is shattered