School report is so vague it feels pointless

[Whatdoyouthinkof]

My son has brought home his spring term report and for every subject he is working towards..school has sent a separate guide that every child at this stage of the year will be working towards as not completed school year and a few exceptional children will be working at. Am I being unreasonable to wonder if nearly child is working towards what’s the point of sending home the report?
If my child is struggling I would genuinely like to help him but I feel there is such a vague approach to reports these days I can’t work out if he’s doing well or not. Is it normal to receive a school report and feel none the wiser?

Out of curiosity, what would you like to have read, a detailed report of every second in the classroom?

I would LOVE to be able t owrite that for each student, but sadly I already work 60 hours a week and do reports after 9pm when kids ar ein bed, and the fact the reports are short are because I can barely keep my eyes open from exhaustion, not because I am incompetent.

school has sent a separate guide that every child at this stage of the year will be working towards as not completed school year

YABU

You say yourself that the students are working towards because they haven’t finished the school year and so there’s nothing else to say if he’s coping fine.

The students who are working below will probably have a bit more information about how they can improve their score eg by increasing their attendance.

Most pupils who are working significantly below would have been spoken to regardless of the report anyway and the reports are just to keep parents in the loop about their progress.

What else do you want the teacher to say?

They’ve said what she’s doing well and what she can improve on.

Sounds like you’re just annoyed that the teacher wasn’t gushing over your child and saying how perfect they are.

YANBU.

DD1 was at primary school when there were national curriculum levels. It was so much easier to see where they are up to. I knew early on that grammar school would be an idea as she always was working a year or two ahead of the average attainment. DD2 was under the new system - working towards, meeting, strongly meeting etc. No idea, such woolly nonsense. Much prefer the secondary school system of giving grades for effort/application only then attainment only at the end of the school year.

A decent parents' evening via whatever means where the teacher can say to the parents "Your child needs to work on x right now" is much more valuable.

Yes it is. I'd rather have an informative report saying that than have to bother with parents' evening.

It’s not about being shit or incompetent or doing the bare minimum. There are assessment standards; you can’t assess them til they have covered the content; and you can’t say they have achieved something til you have evidence they have achieved it.

Well I know she likes science and is a lovely girl. It would be nice to get insight of what she is like in school and how/what I can support her with at home. I really am baffled as to why a few sentences on that is apparently so impossible

The reports are vague and generic for most parents, a lot of paperwork for no real information..are you not just agreeing with that?

Our reports were meaningless. Even had the wrong subject updated. DC doesn't even do the subject the comments related to

Exactly.

We are specifically told we aren’t allowed to do that.

We also aren’t allowed to give an overly negative report.

It’s all about a shit sandwich in the world of reporting. And absolutely no kid has nothing to work on!

But they've told you what she's like - lovely but shy/lacking in confidence - and what you can work on at home.

I had to write reports when I taught English abroad. Free text, no restrictions. Easy enough for outstandingly bright or struggling students, surprisingly hard for the average ones. Remember in a large group you are going to have a fair amount of students who are bluntly mediocre and quite unmemorable. This isn't necessarily a negative, society needs all sorts.

This is what ours does. Just had our second parent meeting this year and will have the report at the end of summer term.

Im not entirely sure why schools share the mid year data to be honest. I think its because they have the data for internal purposes and its quick to share so it feels helpful, but i dont think its very meaningful without the teacher talking through it. Parents are entitled to know how thier child is doing and the end of year report is the one that is a requirement and normally has more info and comments. Most schools do one or two parents evenings to discuss progress as well and would contact parents if interventions were needed.
I agree id always ask questions if i wanted to understand more.

Because a teacher has to produce sometimes up to 90 of these within a week. So sadly while we would love to write something deeply personal about each student, it's virtually impossible. The report needs to highlight something about the student, so the teaher writes aomething about behaviour and enthusiasm, if you would like more, drop them an email or ask for a phonecall.

The report you copied seems like bein d done by her form tutor wh opropbably sees her for 10 minutes once a day, who has no clue how 30 of their form students are doing in each of their 10 subjects and how can they know what your daugher needs to do in Maths to improve?

I don't see what's wrong with that report - as a parent I would be quite happy with that as a mid year catch up.

I want to know if my child is applying themselves and if there are any areas of concern.

It's also good to hear the teacher say something that shows they know the child and what they are interested in etc.

School is a long-term game and parents have to trust the teachers.

We played school report top trumps in the park one end of term and discovering that all 6 of our kids pretty much had the same report, except the really naughty one who apparently lacked more focus than even the lacking in focus other boys!
Deffo cut and paste… though naughty kids parents had been called in endlessly, brainy kid had been told in person how brainy kid was repeatedly, and the rest were okay. Shaved and middling in subjects so we didn’t hear much from teachers…

I would like to know is where exactly my child ranks in relation to their class/cohort.

What the fuck? Why should that matter?

Quite. There was a thread on here yesterday in which the parent was complaining that their Y12 child 's report had said the child didn't contribute enough in lessons.

I've just seen someone saying they want to know how their child ranks against the class/year - I can only imagine the furore if schools went back to doing that.

You as a teacher may see if like that but clearly parents don’t - I get nothing at all from a report like that.

Yeah that's a) weird b) nosey

This is not a ridiculous question - parents want to know how their child is performing in relation to their peers. We can't answer, for very good reasons - but now that grading has moved over to Above/Expected/Working Towards, you get a broad idea. Still, these are 3 very broad categories, and it's not odd to wonder more specifically what it meant by 'at expected' (barely at expected? nearly at above?).

Of course it matters. They're not awarded GCSE grades and university entrance based on anything else!

A teacher told me I was unlikely to get an O level in a subject, which I was picking as an option. No idea why but guess what I majored in my degree?!

I would have liked to see teachers given more honest end of year reports at dd’s state schools.

I honestly don’t understand how what the teacher said isn’t as clear as day.

Remember, many parents have a very poor grasp of literacy skills. Teachers need to write a report that is easily understood by someone with basic literacy skills.