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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

School displaying DD's attainment levels on the wall

248 replies

Erinsboroughrocks · 05/01/2018 12:02

DD is in y6 and working towards her SATs. The teacher has a chart on the wall with each child's name listed. Next to each name is a colour for each subject. Green is working above, orange is working at and red is working below. All the children know what the colours mean. DD doesn't like having this up and I feel a bit uneasy about it. WIBU to ask them to take it down (or instead put up a board of colour coded teacher observations in the staffroom 😉)?

OP posts:

DullAndOld · 05/01/2018 16:39

right Gilly stand up and walk to the door, that's right. Now, stand against that wall. good. Now close your eyes and put your hands on your head. good.

ahhh that's better ..

x2boys · 05/01/2018 16:40

Gilly my son knows full well hes well behind his peers because his school make it blatantly obvious by putting him on the bottom table I'm not sure how publicly humilliliating him by letting his whole class see is results would help him in anyway tbh

shushpenfold · 05/01/2018 16:41

Good job too (that they took it down) This goes directly against the new data protection regs which go live in a few months (look up GDPR) Large fines are handed out....

BashStreetKid · 05/01/2018 16:44

Gawd, not the old "snowflake" thing again, Gilly. It's like holding a sign above your head telling everyone that you're incapable of original thought.

Perhaps you could explain how refusing to display results on the wall equates to telling children they're amazing?

yorkshireyummymummy · 05/01/2018 16:45

It’s bugger all to do with anybody else.
Snowflake my arse. I wonder if forty will feel the same in five years if her child is towards the bottom of the class and every body else knows he is ‘ stupid’ - And I’m not saying that but the kids in his class will. Trust me on that. When her kid is weeping after the other kids take the piss out of him none stop...........
No, you are absolutely NOT BU to ask for this to be taken down.
I would be asking too. Because there’s nothing more cruel than a pack of kids and frankly the teacher is giving them ammunition to shoot the less able children with. This is tantamount to bullying. Go and sort it Mummy!!

horatioisabrick · 05/01/2018 16:45

BitOut

I was. But I wasn’t sure whether it was obvious...

Most people try to see the good parts. Or hide the true awfulness (by pretending it never existed, joking about it etc...)

DullAndOld · 05/01/2018 16:46

in fact it's like holding a sign above your head saying 'I am thick as pigshit'.

BashStreetKid · 05/01/2018 16:47

But how do you feel about sports day then?
Is it only acceptable to rank sporting achievement but not academic?

Not that keen on sports day either, to be honest. If it's not acceptable to show children up when they struggle with maths, it's equally unacceptable to show them up for not being able to run fast.

Bekabeech · 05/01/2018 16:49

There is research that this kind of thing is demotivating for just about all pupils. Even high achievers can think they don't need to work anymore now.

notfairscared · 05/01/2018 16:51

I nearly posted something similar recently, Ds1(9) teacher read out their levels to the class and this week read out their maths test results. Ds struggles with maths so only got 8/30, others laughed (I appreciate I only have his word for this)... Result was my school resistant Sen child wanted to go even less.

GirlInterruptedOftenByKids · 05/01/2018 16:54

Loling at "quite literally breeding snowflakes"....I would have no idea how to breed a snowflake literally!

Well done on getting it removed OP. ...no need for children to know each other's levels (and mine are both top stream but still I wouldn't want it advertised )

Mumoftwoyoungkids · 05/01/2018 16:54

teentimestwo Pretty sure I know where you went and what you studied..... Did you go? I didn’t. I had an End of Alphabet surname and really couldn’t face the stress of waiting. I turned up 10 mins later to check the results on the board.

PocketCoffeeEspresso · 05/01/2018 16:55

YABU. Children in Year 6 need to know exactly how they are performing compared to their peers. Too many chidren are wrapped in cotton wool and believe that they’re amazing when they’re barely average ! This comes as a hard shock for them at the start of secondary school. If parents treat their children like snowflakes they will never succeed.

What? DS knows his strengths and weaknesses - how is pointing out that he's 3 pages ahead in maths than little Bobby, but his spelling score is 7 down from Millie going to do anything at all? Better for the teacher to look at how he's doing and talk to him about his work, and what he needs to do more in, and what he can do very well than play them off against each other - when has doing that ever lead to anything good!

Gilly22 · 05/01/2018 16:55

Perhaps primary schools should stop choosing football & netball teams ? My DS knows he will never be good enough for the school football team (or choir !) but he accepts this and still tries his best. It’s called being realistic in life.
One of the biggest disappointments for children going into secondary school is when they realise that they’re average, ( of below) when their parents have made them believe that they’re amazing.

DullAndOld · 05/01/2018 16:56

"quite literally breeding snowflakes' - wouldn't the warmth of the vaginal passage make them melt?

Llangollen · 05/01/2018 16:56

If it's not acceptable to show children up when they struggle with maths, it's equally unacceptable to show them up for not being able to run fast.

OMG People actually believe that!

it's the complete opposite, children need to know where they are, they need to learn that being at the top requires work, if not from others, but from their part.

The children are not even ranked between themselves, the marks are only based on an average. Your child is not 5th, or 17th or 28th in the class, which would be fine, he's just into one of 3 categories.

I am amazed that Grammar Schools are still legal with that kind of attitude. Kids need to know that they need to work to be first, they won't be the first all the time, and if they are really crap at something they should work harder and be proud of the area where they are better.

The standards are not so high in Primary (and Secondary frankly) that all kids are not able to succeed. Some might need help, tuition, extra work at home, but there's nothing they can't do. Parents are doing them a huge disservice by pretending it's not true.

BashStreetKid · 05/01/2018 17:00

One of the biggest disappointments for children going into secondary school is when they realise that they’re average, ( of below) when their parents have made them believe that they’re amazing.

Nonsense. Children in primary schools know perfectly well where they stand. I remember only too clearly my dyslexic DS telling me he was "one of the thick ones" when he was at primary school - and it wasn''t a school that put league tables up on the wall. Fortunately with the right help he actually did very well indeed at secondary school.

DullAndOld · 05/01/2018 17:00

my daughter would never have 'succeeded' at junior school with your narrow parameter of success. That is because she was starved of oxygen at birth. Seeing her name at the bottom of a class list every day throughout junior school really wouldn't have encouraged her to 'try harder' would it?
However she is very good at being polite and getting on with a job. Not being an offensive twat, that kind of thing.

MostIneptThatEverStepped · 05/01/2018 17:03

Yep Shush is right, as of sometime in May when the new GPDR kicks in anything like that will be absolutely not allowed. At my place of work we are having a massive review of how we are storing/displaying personal data and face a huge fine if we are not compliant.

BashStreetKid · 05/01/2018 17:03

it's the complete opposite, children need to know where they are, they need to learn that being at the top requires work, if not from others, but from their part.

Does it not occur to you, Llangollen, that it helps to have the sheer luck of not having learning difficulties, having supportive parents, having a reasonable diet, living in reasonable accommodation where you have space to work and your siblings won't take your books, having easy access to IT, etc etc? Should children who don't have those privileges and struggle as a result be pilloried?

x2boys · 05/01/2018 17:11

And what about those kids who don't succeed either academically or in sports or in the choir Gilly ? MY child is one of those children i no doubt he will succeed later on on his own terms and hrs a lovely well mannered polite child but right now he struggles in all areas .

TeenTimesTwo · 05/01/2018 17:11

Mumoftwo Yes I did go.

llangollen Of course my DD knows that to succeed she has to work hard. But the bottom line is that however hard she works she is never going to come anywhere near top. She's y8 and struggles with time telling and left and right. I somehow can't see her managing cubic equations in maths by GCSEs.

Amoregentlemanlikemanner · 05/01/2018 17:11

how interesting!

I think that the self-esteem point and the ethical dilemma points are the relevant ones.

sorry to disappoint the data protection afficionados!

CertainHalfDesertedStreets · 05/01/2018 17:13

There is research that this kind of thing is demotivating for just about all pupils. Even high achievers can think they don't need toworkanymore now

Demotivating, potentially really damaging for children with attachment issues and so very unfair given that lots of stuff around attainment is NOT anything to do with how hard you work but about your social class, level of parental education and/or engagement etc etc. All well researched.

Snowflakes my fucking arse.

frogsoup · 05/01/2018 17:14

Fortywings, gilly and llangollen, I went to the kind of old-fashioned school that'd you no doubt love. Results public, stragglers publicly berated. I was always at or near the top. And do you know, not even starting on the effect on the poor sods at the bottom, it was really bad for me as well. Not only was the competitive streak toxic for friendships, I also grew up thinking marks and gold stars were the be-all and end-all of life. I had no extrinsic motivation whatsoever. It took me until my late 20s to realise that there are no gold stars at the pearly gates, and to start thinking about what i was actually interested in rather than what would please my parents and teachers.

Now I have three kids of my own at opposite ends of the academic spectrum and I'm damned if they grow up in this kind of counterproductive dog-eat-dog atmosphere. I don't even let them see their own school report, bar the comments section! They obviously know where they stand (kids don't know when they are struggling? Give me strength!), but I'm not reinforcing it by 'official seal' if I can help it. As for extra work meaning everyone can get up to standard, there speaks somebody who has not the first clue what they are talking about. How come one of my children can read to an advanced level but has zero number sense despite his best efforts, including having a dad who studied maths at postgraduate level and helps him daily. I'm sure being publicly posted as bottom of the class as well would really help. Ah, that was the sound of my sarcasm metre breaking.

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