To not see all DD's teachers at parents night?

[strictlymomdancing]

DD has her first high school parents night coming up and appointments are available to book online.

I'm not sure whether to see all her teachers, or just what I consider to be important ones. I don't remember my parents going to see my eg PE teacher or RE teacher because not only did I dislike the subjects, I also had no intention of using these subjects or carrying them on.

I intend to speak to her maths, english, language, social subjects, business and science teachers. Also music as she's really good at that. Not so sure about Art - she likes it but probably will never use it. Same with home economics and technical studies.

Do any other parents avoid seeing particular teachers?

But thejollyroger not seeing a teacher at parents evening doesn't necessarily mean that you don't expect your child to try or to behave in those classes, merely that you are prioritising limited time. Surely that is also a valuable skill and life lesson?

I agree, IF you don’t have time. If you do and you just can’t be arsed, it’s the opposite.

And once they are doing GCSEs it’s different. They have a limited amount of time to spend and they have to plan it out for themselves. In Year 7 when their time is allocated for them, they should be trying in every subject.

If it's anything like my Sons Secondary School, it's not possible to see all teachers. You get a 5-10 min slot and the pupils have to book them. If you want to book a slot with a teacher but the particular one is taken and you can't make any other they have available (if any), you don't get to see them.

"Slot clashes" are an inevitable thing, so you have to prioritise what between you and your son/daughter you think is more important.

In the 7 years we've been doing it (two children), slot clashes have always happened as they have the demand of multiple tutor Groups on their hands.

Don't give your child rhe message that some subjects aren't important. A 5 min check in that they are behaving and keeping up is polite.

Don't give your child rhe message that some subjects aren't important.

In the grand scheme of things, some really aren't important if the child isn't going to continue it.

My son hates drama, he isn't going to continue it, so we don't go. That doesn't mean to say that if he was a pain in the arse in the lesson he wouldn't get a bollocking and we would know as the school would be in touch.

My ds is year 9 so I saw them all this year as he is about to pick his gcse’s and I wanted to get a good understanding of how he was performing in each one to help him decide what subjects to pick. Previous years I have just seen the core subjects plus maybe any he had a keen interest in

PhilCornwall1

But with some children that turns out to be a short-sighted strategy. For example, the subject itself may not be important but the skills they might have learnt or the relationship they might have developed with a future tutor might have proved valuable later. But because they don’t try, they don’t get those things. Or the child decides French isn’t important so doesn’t concentrate, and begins to make friends who don’t concentrate, and before you know it their friends are the badly behaved kids in the year group and nobody is concentrating in anything.

There are unintended consequences to telling your child that a subject isn’t important, and when they are 11, why would you?

@thejollyroger

Well, we've done ok with ours, so I'm happy.

Never once say a PE teacher, Art or Drama teacher for my two! Not once. And for DS I can add Music to that list
Tho I hasten to add that both DC did plenty of music outside of school so please don't pillory me as a bad parent! They also led active, tho not organised-sporty lives

Yr7-9 core subjects plus any we were concerned about, and any DD wanted us to see (plus geography one year as the teacher insisted on seeing everyone, for no apparent reason).
Yr10-11 everything (bar PE, which she’s not taking at GCSE)

Five minute appointments, except yr7 English when the poor woman had two classes in the year and offered everyone TWO minutes or an email - we opted for the email, which was far more useful and must have taken her considerably longer.

I’ve never given her the impression she doesn’t have to behave and try her best in any subject (even bloody geography), having assumed if she was slacking off she’d get a poor effort grade, and if she was misbehaving the school would tell us. Sadly the first of those at least hasn’t been consistently true.

Don't go and see all teachers "just to be polite" like one person has suggested. Parent's evenings are hugely busy and the teachers are usually overstretched or overbooked (my husband is always around an hour late home from parents evenings). Prioritise who you want and need to see based on how your child is doing and if there is anything they are concerned about and go see them. Unfortunately, good students often have the more organised parents and they fill up the slots being polite and my husband doesn't actually get to see who he feels would be beneficial.

Our school considered online booking but decided against it.
They felt the paper based system gave responsibility to the kids but also the teachers could grab the planner and mark themselves in if they particularly wanted to see a particular set of parents.

If you're doing the online booking and there aren't always enough slots to go round, it's worth a bit of strategy in the order you book them. There are usually enough slots for one class-worth of kids, so any subject where the teacher only has one group should be fine. Our school only does half a year group at a time, so that means most subjects will have enough slots. The exceptions tend to be subjects they only have once a week - like drama, art, music, RE (also form tutors if they see their form as well as teaching group). So start by booking any of those subjects you want to see. Your child may well know which teachers have more than one group, if you ask them. Then go for the other subjects you're anxious to see.

The other thing to be aware of is that in many schools, the appointments system really functions mainly to spread out when parents arrive, and the exact times are not rigidly enforced. There often end up being bottlenecks with some teachers, and other teachers sitting there with nobody to speak to. So anyone you haven't managed to book, or your later appointments, try and identify where they are, and keep an eye out for them sitting waiting - usually if you go and say "I didn't manage to get an appointment/my appointment isn't until 8pm, but can we grab a minute while you're free", that will be fine.

I'm with you PhilCornwall
I expect my children to put in a good effort with everything but it is daft to pretend that every subject is equally important to them. It has been fairly obvious by year 7 what each of my children's general direction of travel was going to be. And I would consider that both I and the school had failed if I had to see any teacher face to face at parents' evening to discover that there was a significant problem in any subject.
I imagine that most people's parents' evening experience is similar to mine. I sit down, say hello. They ask the child how they think things are going and then tell me that everything is great, no concerns about attainment or behaviour. I ask if there is anything more we should be doing to support them. They say no, carry on as you are and I say thanks and move on. If only hearing that from 8 or 9 teachers in an evening instead of 14 or so is setting my children a bad example, then that's a risk I'm prepared to take.

We used to avoid the wanky flowery subjects.

We used to avoid the wanky flowery subjects.

You said what I've been thinking!! And there are plenty of em.

I expect my children to put in a good effort with everything but it is daft to pretend that every subject is equally important to them.

I don’t think anybody is saying that we should do that... They’re all important when your child is studying them because they all contribute to the overall quality of education received and attitude developed. But of course some subjects will be more important to your child’s plans than others.