Aibu to wonder about primary school reports?

[Thingsthatgo]

This isn’t a stealth brag. Both of my DCs can be a right PITA, and I know that they both have their strengths and weaknesses.
Their primary school reports always make them out to be perfect angels, who are borderline geniuses, and I am fairly sure this isn’t the case. Aibu to expect reports to have some resemblance to reality? Otherwise what is the point? I have asked around parents from other primary schools, and it seems it’s standard nowadays.

Beingatwat
I like the sound of yours..surely most parents would rather read an honest, accurate report?

I'm a primary teacher. At the schools I've worked in we're told to write positive reports which focus on the strengths rather than weaknesses. They want a positive spin put on everything. There are ways of making "doesn't listen to a single instruction" sound better 😂.

They do seem a bit pointless.

I would really like actual grades from her end of term assesments they do. But they dont tell us or the kids...

@NoIDontWatchLoveIsland

Beingatwat I like the sound of yours..surely most parents would rather read an honest, accurate report?

I know I would want honesty rather than excessively positive drivel.

School reports aren’t necessity glowing here. They tend to be a combination of positive and negative, but also fairly honest.

One of my dc’s report described them throughout as the opposite gender.

Could the school have transitioned them without telling you?

As a teacher who spends hours and hours writing reports this is really depressing reading.

All my reports are really personalised to the individual children. They’re not written in a secret code. They are what I’ve seen of the children I teach through the year. They shouldn’t come as a surprise at all as I will have had lots of conversations with parents through the year, especially if there have been specific issues.

They are also a celebration of everything your children have achieved. We spend 25+ hours together each week. They’ve grown and learnt huge amounts. I’m not going to focus on the 3 times they’ve had an almighty tantrum over the incredibly thoughtful contributions they’ve made to class discussions all year.

Consider they are positive because teachers actually like your children.

I only have 10 in my class ( independent school). I spend ages writing my reports in the May half term. They are fully written from scratch and not stock phrases.

I do genuinely like 'my' children and so write my reports accordingly.

Only one child gets ' truly a pleasure to teach'. My own bizarre rule!

Colour me cynical. Many are going to accentuate the positive but even more so this year (and sent out with 24 hours to go) to
*minimise parents being that parent
*so that the school can maintain they are managing all the children's needs on bugger all budget
*to downplay the Covid effect - but this will rear its ugly head later when they do poorly in the next set of official exams and will be given as the reason
Don't get me started on comment banks.

@chickenyhead

A pleasure to teach - no idea who your child is

My son's teacher told me outright that he had no idea who the child was, or what to say about him! He was teaching him Higher Physics in a class of 12, but apparently had never noticed him.

The first reply on this thread mentioned complaining about a negative report. And there is your answer.

SIL is a primary school teacher and writing reports is a nightmare - they have to mention specific targets the children have achieved (or not) and put it all in Ofsted-friendly language. There is a bit of c&p but really, how many ways are there to say that a seven year old can get changed for PE without help? Equally it depends on the teacher. DS1's report is absolutely him, but his teacher really gets him and has been saying the same things all year. DS2 was really disappointed in his because it was more matter-of-fact but his teacher is quite low key and sparing with praise.

I’m a primary teacher and my reports always focus on the positive. If I had any major behaviour concerns then I’d have told the parent in person long before I write a report

I would love to tell the truth in reports but often the negative things are connected to parenting and parents don’t want to hear it! Makes them defensive.

If I write pleasure to teach then that is the truth. I won’t lie about that.

With my younger children, I tend to delegate parents evening and skim read reports. They have a sort of grade/star chart thing for behaviour, attendance and so on at the top, and if the grade for those is fine then I skip to the next box (there are lots of boxes!) without reading the comments.
Experience tells me that limiting direct contact with the school is the only way to get through it (there is no alternative school, it's really this or nothing).
Once they go to secondary, I do the parents evenings and read the reports more thoroughly. My husband tends to skip parents evenings for the older ones, because English isn't his first language (primary school tend to insist on speaking only his first language, which I can't follow at any speed).

A lot of schools I've worked in have a programme for reports where they choose an appropriate comment from a drop-down menu for each subject and then wrote around them to join them up into meaningful paragraphs.

The last time I wrote a report, over 10 years ago now, we weren't allowed to be negative at all. This was easy for most children but it was difficult for some of the more challenging children!

I appreciate you Floobydo. I like to read a positive report about my dc. Because it's a summary of several weeks/months, I want to get the sense that the teacher focuses on the positives. All children have their negative moments, and it's important for the teacher not to dwell on that. That would make it feel too personal, and unprofessional. I do like them to be specific enough that I feel like the teacher knows and 'gets' my child, and can identify areas where they are excelling or needing extra support. But no negative comments needed! It makes me feel quite sad to read a report and think a teacher doesn't like my child, when they spend so much time together.

My DD (5) just got her reception report in which her teacher described her as having "a calm and quiet nature."

DP and I were and thinking she can't possibly have been writing about our child!

My DD is now year 10. Her reports have been the same since reception as has parents evening. She is one of those in a high achieving cohort who is doing perfectly well but could probably push herself a bit further. Yes she probably could but she is neither a genius or a trouble maker.
Even when her dad died in year 4 she did not get any recognition for still turning up and doing her work in the end of year awards. She was very upset not to get 100% award for the first time though, she took a day off for the funeral.

Yeah my daughter gets glowing reports, especially about her behaviour. At home she's a strong willed, often rude and incredibly messy PITA most of the time!! But I do know shes absolutely only like this with us, thank god! I would be mortified if she behaved like she does at home with anyone outside my immediate family! I just know she's comfortable at home and often letting of steam from being so bloody good all day!!

This until my experience at all. Dc1 goes to a very small primary though, maybe that makes a difference. The reports came out last week, I saw a couple of others and they were all very different.

@willstarttomorrow

My DD is now year 10. Her reports have been the same since reception as has parents evening. She is one of those in a high achieving cohort who is doing perfectly well but could probably push herself a bit further. Yes she probably could but she is neither a genius or a trouble maker. Even when her dad died in year 4 she did not get any recognition for still turning up and doing her work in the end of year awards. She was very upset not to get 100% award for the first time though, she took a day off for the funeral.

That's so sad that she still felt so committed to school after going through something as awful as loosing your dad. It's does make you wonder with some schools, do they ever look at more than the stats?

As a science teacher "works nicely during practicals" translates to "I don't know your child well" and "enjoys practicals" means they are a bit dim.

@whatarewetalkingabout

I appreciate you Floobydo. I like to read a positive report about my dc. Because it's a summary of several weeks/months, I want to get the sense that the teacher focuses on the positives. All children have their negative moments, and it's important for the teacher not to dwell on that. That would make it feel too personal, and unprofessional. I do like them to be specific enough that I feel like the teacher knows and 'gets' my child, and can identify areas where they are excelling or needing extra support. But no negative comments needed! It makes me feel quite sad to read a report and think a teacher doesn't like my child, when they spend so much time together.

Some of my favourite children to teach and have in my class have been some of my most challenging. Their reports wouldn’t have been entirely positive because their behaviour wasn’t always (or even all that often) great but I didn’t write those things because I didn’t like them. I had a really good relationship with a child who regularly used violence against other children if they upset her. This always happened during break and lunch. In my classroom though, she was fantastically hard working for me and regularly asked me for extra challenges to solve. They were our little thing we did together. Should I have never mentioned her issues with the other children because I enjoyed teaching her?

I see what you mean BeingATwatItsABingThing. For me it's important that the report doesn't come off as the teacher being negative about the child, sounding annoyed or frustrated by the child. But yes of course any issues should be reported, but in a professional way and in the spirit of the teacher wanting to work with the child and help the child.