Being quiet in lessons? Year 12 report

[Stugs]

Dd is in year 12. She's just had a written report which her school does once a year. She's doing PE A level and one of the teachers wrote that "Snugsdd is quiet in lessons, and one if the quieter pupils in the class, however despite this she has an excellent grasp of the topic and performed well in the recent tests".

She had a really good report with Excellent for learning for all subjects/topics apart from that one which was Good.

I'm really happy with her report and she knows I'm proud of her for getting her head down and working hard (she's been unwell). She's working at grades B mostly with the odd A. She's needled by the comment as she doesn't think she is quiet at all!

This is just a question to (genuinely!) ask if you are a teacher why is being quiet in lessons a bad thing? She says there are two very loud girls who play solitaire (!) in lessons and shout out who the teacher really likes as they do the sport that he teaches- this is just what dd has told me obviously not sure how true that is.

Respectfully, do you really think a teacher is complaining that your DD contributes but doesn’t shout over others? You’re very defensive here and seem to think any comment other than that she’s entirely perfect in every way is some kind of attack. Why would the teacher want your DD to shout over others?

Triggered? How do you figure that? Just because I think your attitude stinks?

Why don't you concern yourself with what's best for your daughter (which is, afterall why the teachers have given you the feedback) rather than looking down on other children to get her to compare favourably?

So, your perfect DD is pissed off at her teacher because she didn’t perform well enough to get a prize and it’s the teacher’s fault for not saying she’s better than she actually is rather than her fault for not doing enough?

She’s so perfect that she’s taking three subjects that aren’t particularly academic but you look down on the other students in her class because they aren’t particularly academic?

She’s so perfect and so surrounded by people beneath her yet she’s not working at her target grade?

And you believe the teacher has lowered her effort grade and given negative feedback on her report because she’s actually doing everything she’s supposed to do perfectly but the teacher wants her to piss about and not pay attention instead?

Does that sound reasonable and logical to you?

So true, why has the teacher not focused on trying to involve her more.
I was a very quiet child from a troubled background and always remember a school report saying I was quiet but not always good.This was from a teacher who assaulted several pupils in our class.

"being quiet in lessons" can translate as " Rarely asks questions, or puts her hand up to answer them". Or it could just mean she's a grafter who gets her head down and works well, undistracted by daft loud girls.

She's doing well. that's all that matters

I'd personally look at it like this and if offering feedback to my daughter I'd attempt to phrase it in this way.

There's nothing inherently wrong in your daughter's learning style, we all learn in different ways, but to get the best out of a group of students, all with their own personalities, and for a teacher to give their best,( again every teacher is different), sometimes a teacher may imply that students need to learn to slightly modify the behaviour that comes most naturally to them to achieve the best overall outcome.

So while in her other classes her type of intervention is fitting really well with both the teacher and the other students, in PE slightly less so.
It's not a case of right and wrong just that maybe the PE teacher would appreciate her input as it would improve the class dynamic as a whole, both in the students' ability to learn but also the teacher's ability to engage with her or possibly hear and comment on new and varied ideas.

Adaptation to your environment is a positive skill to have, and while it can seem frustrating to be told/asked different things from different people if you focus on that, rather than it being a criticism on her character, then she may feel been about the report.

This has been the refrain for my daughter's school career. Following a very gobby brother, she is very quiet. But also very academic.
It is important to participate in class, and at A level with only a few students it is all the more obvious when someone doesn't.
My daughter makes sure she expresses her understanding without actually speaking much. Nodding, looking directly at the teacher, and of course she answers if called upon. Plus she will ask to meet with a teacher if she is having a problem with an assignment.
Teachers need feedback. One of the complaints about online learning was not knowing how the kids were receiving the information, and how much they missed the back and forth interaction which was very difficult to replicate online.
Your daughter doesn't have to change her personality, and it does seem as if this teacher is happy with her progress. But in other circumstances she may have to be more forthcoming.

No you don't sound in the least bit reasonable and in fact quite unpleasant!

Pot, meet kettle. You’ve been nothing but unreasonable and unpleasant with every update.

YABU. She needs to contribute more because that’s a basic expectation. More than that, YABU to think that the teacher is asking her to misbehave when they clearly aren’t and to be nasty about other children in the class. YABU to encourage your DD to throw a strop about every small criticism she receives.

It’s good that she isn’t chatting when she’s supposed to be working but it sounds like she isn’t really contributing to class discussions. These discussions become a lot more relevant to the way of learning in sixth form compared to previous years. At university and in the workplace these discussions will be very important and could form part of her assessment so it is something that is good for her to get used to doing now.

To be clear, your DD has told you she’s better behaved and smarter than all of the other children in the class and when the teacher provides feedback to improve, you’ve decided the teacher has some kind of weird vendetta against your better behaved and smarter child and is trying to sabotage her to benefit the badly behaved and not-so-smart students?

If I were teaching a class where some students didn’t do the work, kept shouting over each other and weren’t very smart, I’m sure as hell not going to go around encouraging the smart, diligent students to be more like that.

Sounds to me like your DD isn’t capable of self-reflection and you’re not capable of critical thinking. It’s really a very small criticism and you’re acting like the teacher has said something awful and unjustified. If DD is as flawless as the two of you are making out then the teacher simply wouldn’t have said it.

It's a good point. You are super offended by relatively minor feedback, flying off the handle, protesting your daughter is perfect and blaming everyone else. Your daughter will need to learn to take on feedback in her life as she isn't perfect, none of us are, and you aren't exactly role modelling how to deal with this well.

I have a three year old who drives me absolutely potty. You do wonder how some parents reach 17 years with their kid and still think they can do no wrong.

Whilst content related discussions are most important it is also an important skill for work to be able to engage and communicate wellwith colleagues/clients etc. this often requires an element of small talk/ non content discussions so it might also be good to encourage her to engage in these non-meaningful discussions in order to get used to it as long as it isn’t disturbing the lesson

Your best bet is to just tell the school that you’d rather not receive a report in future because you and DD aren’t capable of receiving constructive criticism, especially not from people who teach subjects that are beneath her.

I grew up with a DM like this. I had to be the best, the smartest, the funniest, the most interesting, the prettiest… hell hath no fury like my DM if I’m anything below perfection. It’s really fucking stressful and I spent my life thinking I’m not good enough.

Do you think, perhaps, the fact you get so aggressive at the thought of DD not being perfect might be the reason she’s insisting to you that she’s the top performer in the class, that she’s contributing perfectly, that she’s the only one doing the work, that she’s the only one not getting distracted…? How would you react if she said “yeah, I don’t really contribute to discussions because it’s a lot of effort and I can’t be bothered”?

You having your nose this out of joint over such a minor criticism makes me feel really sorry for DD. Firstly because she’s not allowed to be anything less than perfect. And secondly because you’re teaching her than any feedback is an insult and should be immediately ignored and ridiculed. You’re stunting her.

I'm sorry that happened to you. It's dd that's annoyed not me. Dd nearly died last year so tbh I'm just happy that she's still with us. She's most definitely not perfect and I don't expect her to be. I was interested as to why being quiet was a negative and some teachers have answered that very helpfully.

Great advice, thanks 😄

If she’s not quiet, maybe the teacher mixed her up with another or maybe they just copy and paste the reports and they forgot to change a bit. Not uncommon according to a couple of teacher friends.

Yes and yet we still get teachers defending it, haven’t they learnt by now that they’re always going to get quiet kids and saying they’re quiet in their school reports achieves nothing! Perhaps a class full of gobshites is their preference but I was getting irate at my son feeling he was ‘inadequate’ by not being louder (despite his winning several school awards for academic excellence and being a popular member of the class).

Agree with PP, quiet classrooms are like a death knoll, so unproductive and boring.
You want alert sparky kids who have thoughts and opinions and voice them!
An A level English class filled with quiet students would be terrible because it’s the discussion about characters and narrative choices and context that drives the development of ideas and arguments.
Me just sitting there telling them the information while they diligently listen and write it down is definitely not a successful classroom.
Also any observation of such a silent class would be downgraded for lack of class discussion and student participation.

It’s all well and good saying your child is just quiet and teachers should shut up and let them be silent but it’s not conducive to good learning for the whole class and it’s pretty rubbish when only 4 kids talk and everyone else stares blankly at you even if they are super intelligent getting 8’s or whatever.

Why are ‘quiet people important’?
what a weird statement. No one is more important. But a quiet classroom is a poor learning environment.
what do you want teachers to do? Go back to 1950’s teaching of writing information on a board for student to copy out or stand at the front and lecture for 100min lessons?
yes your perfect darling quiet A*, special awards child might be doing great but their refusal to engage in any talk is actively making the classroom a less engaging, less productive environment. They might be very thoughtful and wise but me getting that in an essay every half term instead of at least one engaged comment every other lesson is not amazing.

I'd phrase it to her that the teacher is encouraging her to put herself forward a bit more and let her light shine.

I think it's interesting that Teacher mentioned it. I don't see it as teacher telling you to make teachers life easier, or class dynamic easier to teach. Teacher is telling you for dd's good. Many quiet introverted students don't say much. But in the workplace you have to have the strength to hold your own and not be too quiet. There a very fine line. Hopefully dd will take it on board and it will help her.