Primary prize day - small number left out

[Resiliencerequired]

I’d like to gauge whether or not I’m being over sensitive over this topic or not, I’m generally fairly resilient about these things.

I attended my son’s leavers assembly prize giving on Thursday - he’s at a small prep school with a class size of 21. For background he’s had a brilliant time during his prep school years, he has lots of friends and brilliant teachers in years 3-5. This year has been more of a challenge - my ds is quite capable, but can be distracted and can be a bit of a clown - it wins him friends, but not marks in tests…… His teacher this year has been rather unpredictable, he encourages banter amongst the children and shares jokes, but then tells them off and gets cross without warning. My son has struggled to understand what’s a joke and what’s not. He has found the learning environment uncomfortable at times and this was reflected in his end of term report where his attainment/effort had slipped - it came as a surprise.

Anyway, when we arrived at prizegiving there was a table full of cups and trophies and I honestly thought there was enough for one each. As they awarded them (some children received two), I had this sinking realisation that a small number of children weren’t going to get anything and sure enough, ds was one of them. Of the class of 21, I think about 16 received either one, or two cups/shields and five got nothing.

My view is that either prize giving should be for the really deserving children, or everybody. It wouldn’t have taken much to get a few extra awards and made sure everybody’s talents were recognised (there were no sports awards, for example - even though I know the school has them from previous years).

My son was initially quite dejected as he too thought there was something for everybody. Ultimately he was really mature and said ‘I don’t mind not being good enough for a trophy, friends are better than trophies’. He hasn’t mentioned it since. I should add that the school gave each child a small gift and one of the mum’s had organised a fabulous year book which was also distributed, so he didn’t leave completely empty handed.

I however, I feel that being excluded in this way has tarnished the end of his time there. Regardless of how my son felt, I felt really rubbish - like my son had under achieved and was worthless (he’s quite sporty and is really thoughtful - it would’ve been easy to think of something for him). I have a few children, and therefore many, many years of primary school experience lol, so I’m not too precious, but it ranks as my lowest moment ! Am I overreacting ?!

YANBU: It’s sad to exclude a such a small number of children and prize giving should be either for a small number, or everybody.

YABU: Get over yourself - resilience is the greatest contributor to success !

I'm slightly worried that the very disorganised Y6 team will do this, this year. In previous years the team have found something to acknowledge about every child as it's a celebration.

His effort has slipped, unfortunately there are no prizes for being a class clown.
Harsh i know, but if he would have deserved a prize, he would have got one.

I think that's very unkind. I'm not surprised you feel rubbish and hurt for your son.

And I'm really not an 'everyone should be a winner' person either! But you can't just leave out a handful of kids and every child in that class would have done something to be proud of and acknowledged for.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to feel upset. It’s thoughtless of the school to treat young students in that way.

My kids are in high school now and honestly I feel like primary schools should just abandon awards. They are so rarely awarded fairly, and usually it’s the same kids every year receiving them or they just reflect the bias of a teacher towards a particular type of child. When DD was in yr 6 one of her classmates was expecting the academic award but someone else got it and she was given the citizenship award instead. Seeing her standing on stage with a face like absolute thunder was such a slap in the face to the many kids who were genuinely good school citizens and would have treasured that award instead of seeing it as second class. Then the ‘performance’ award was given to the teacher’s pet who was neither interested or talented in performance. I love high school - first in every subject and top 3 in the form entirely based on marks. No favouritism or consolation prizes.

On the face of it this does seem a bit unkind. However some parents have no idea just how badly behaved their children are. What is told to you as "class clown" is probably a lot of incredibly annoying low level behaviour. It's better he learns now and not halfway through his GCSE years. Being class clown may give you friends for now, but other students will get frustrated in the end and back away from your ds.

He has had a stark lesson that if he messes and performance has declined, he won't get prizes. I would move on but be clear that senior school will not tolerate the class clown either. If he is going to a independent you may find them managing him out.
It's not nice but if he learns now from this it will save you a whole heap of grief later.

Well yes, but in some ways he’s been more like this this year, because his teacher seems to encourage banter somewhat.
The opening line of his report was that ‘xx is a nervy boy’, which I found somewhat contradictory, but kind of underlines that my son has been worried at times about his teachers unpredictability.
But he can’t be that nervy, because he’s been described as talkative too !

At the end of the day his previous teachers were really excellent and he’s always had good reports - I’m just sad that the year has ended this way and whilst my son may not have deserved an award, the other four children certainly did ! They are lovely children.

Our previous primary school (older children, state), managed prize day well, all the children were grouped by their talent and all received a small trophy, with one main shield for the best in the group. So all sixty children received an award, with about 10 receiving a main trophy.

Totally understand the disappointment, but as a previous response has said, these lessons are best learned sooner rather than later!

A few years ago my DS was also left out. Mixed age village school class, about 10 year 6 children. My DS was the only one left out. As a truly hardworking and dedicated student who loved everything about school and leaning, was tremendously helpful and sensible and never said an unkind word. this omission could only be a reflection of staff bias and unkindness. As a very high achieving mathematician, I asked his teacher if they had considered him for the maths prize... They awarded it to another child "who had made good progress". A child whose wealthy parents proceeded to send him to a private school after, despite extensive tutoring, he didn't pass the 11+ for the grammar school my son attended. My son was never going to win prizes for sport etc, apart from effort, but to fail to recognise any achievement in what he was good at was heartbreaking. I asked the headteacher to please avoid this sort of exclusion in the future. He said that my son would win accolades in the future...looking back, DS went through secondary school with decreasing confidence and exam anxiety and took 3 goes to finish year 3 (huge additional debt plus support from us). I wonder how his life might have been if his y6 prize-giving hadn't been so unfair, just rewarding favourites and ignoring hard work. Especially as they had way more prizes than children. On the plus side, this sad experience informed my attitude as a teacher - I did it better than them.

His effort has slipped this year, and his attainment hasn't been as good. I'm not very surprised that the school didn't feel like rewarding "the class clown who hasn't tried very hard" this year. It's probably not a behaviour they felt like condoning via an award.
Probably best your son learns the lesson now, when it doesn't really matter.

You’re trying to blame this on the teachers teaching style and you shouldn’t.

Acting the clown students are a complete nightmare in a class and it’s exhausting having to constantly manage their behaviour. He didn’t deserve an award and he didn’t get one.

My son was at a fee paying school and thankfully badly behaved pupils were ‘asked’ to leave.

Thanks for all the responses so far - helpful to get an outside perspective.

My ds isn’t a naughty boy (honest !), he got lovely reports from his rotational teachers (french, sport, music etc), his teacher didn’t tell me he was the class clown, it’s just the impression I got from him being given the comedy part in the school play - his teacher didn’t say this explicitly.

His attainment has slipped though it seems, (but hard to tell as they don’t do sats) and I guess I wish I’d been told about it during the year. His teacher did also note his lack of confidence in class, which alongside his ‘nervy’ comment makes me really confused, I’m not sure if I have a nervous child lacking in confidence or a disruptive child who is quite the opposite. My husband is a teacher - I’m well aware that some parents have their head in the sand regarding the behaviour of their offspring !

Anyway, the upshot is that the end of the year has been a disappointing surprise, but as you say, he has a fresh start in September (state), and I don’t really want the end of term to taint the very solid last few years.

I think his school was unreasonable both for ds, and the small number of other excluded children, but I genuinely appreciate the comments, definitely food for thought.

Best to teach them early about the fact that not everyone is a winner.

It's harsh but such is life!

16 trophies in a class of 21 is a bit shit

My ds is nervy, talkative and can be very funny, fortunately he knows how to judge the room and generally avoids the class clown label. It does sound unfortunate that there were 16/21 awarded but I would try to see it as a lesson for ds that secondary will be different. As you know if you have older children there will be teachers there who engage in banter but then have to stamp quite hard when they see the class begin to spiral and your ds needs to learn to make sure that he isn't the one with his back to the door being a clown when the Head walks in. We had a lot of discussions with ds before about the need in secondary to moderate the chatting. I think particularly with the youngest it can be tempting to let standards slip a little and be more tollerant. Hope he has a great time at secondary.

Many comedians are actually quite anxious and the comedy is an attempt to hide their real feelings and discomfort with their anxiety.

Maybe if you had been given heads up on your son's behaviour/grade changes earlier than the final year report - you could have worked more with the school to improve on this - and also, you would have had more warning (indirectly) that he wasn't going to get a prize. It leaves a bad taste after so many years.

I think not all teachers like all kids and not all kids like all teachers. No doubt a good relationship I think gets better results- but not always going to be like that.

I tell my child (who does not like her music teacher...) that she is there to learn music and not to be her friend....

Favouritism sucks when it happens- but doesn't sound like this is the case here? Sounds like teacher / pupil had trouble 'reading ' each other.

It is a bit harsh but at the same time I think it’s a good learning lesson for your son in dealing with disappointment and an incentive to do better next year. If he wins a prize next year it’ll mean more because he’s had to work for it, rather than just being a token reward.

Thank you, I think this is good advice x

I think I’d probably have a word with his teacher for next year and say that you weren’t aware of the issue until the end of term but he’s working on it now and could he/she keep you informed as to how he’s getting on.

Unfortunately some DCs are just not well liked by teachers.

I was such a one. I came first twice in primary school exams but the only trophy I ever received was to share the "Most improved in English " on the year I'd come first overall.
DS is the same - likely to leave senior school without a single prize from junior or senior school to his name.

I haven’t read all of the replies but what does eh say about his behaviour? I have ADHD and autism and I could relate to not knowing what was a joking and also being desperate to be liked. Of course he could just be being a bit naughty and this will be a good lesson for him.

I don't think everyone should get a prize but I agree 16 out 21 is too many. If it's specifically achievement I'd say less than half or something for everyone. Otherwise it feels like a personal attack. And is not good for any child's confidence

@Pigsears, thanks, yes I think it would’ve been a bit easier if I’d have been involved in discussions throughout the year. I agree it leaves a bad taste.

I don’t think there was any favouritism involved to be honest. The class does have one difficult child in it, and they did get an award but they are quite talented in that area - fair enough.

When I wrote the thread I didn’t actually consider that my son had been deliberately excluded - I thought the teacher had given out the awards fairly but hadn’t considered the fact that there were four or five children who hadn’t got anything. Thoughtless, rather than deliberate. I still think this is the case based on the other children involved too, but I think it opens the door to having constructive discussions with my son about expectations at secondary - so perhaps a useful learning experience after all which is helpful.

He hasn't worked hard, hasn't got good grades and has played the clown and been disruptive in class.
Why do you think he deserved a prize?