To be disappointed about UK school reports

[Itisaniceday]

Posting for traffic and advice.

DD is in year 9 and has an EHCP. I honestly can’t tell how she is doing at school. The reports are so general and the meetings with the teachers once a year are only 5min. Once a year meetings with SENCO to tick a box for the LA report and them to get the additional 10k they get for her.

Growing up in a different country we had reports every 3 months: 1 to 10 you were scored; also the place you were in in relation to your peers was given. If you didn’t pass the year you will repeat it.

Please explain the UK system to me. My concern is she will get to GCSE and they will tell me, sorry she didn’t pass; not place on the sixth form for her, etc.

I am happy she is ok to go to school everyday but I would like to know more reg her progress.

The UK education system is set up to get most kids sort of educated. Eighty percent of children will do okay. Not badly. Not spectacularly. They’ll be fine. And five minutes every year is ample time to reassure the parents of that.

But if your kid presents a problem for any reason - neurodivergence or dyslexia or being noticeably above average or having talents that don’t align with the curriculum or an SEN or a physical disability - the chances are that UK education won’t serve them very well. Those kids are time-consuming and expensive. The capability for addressing them will be the first to be cut when money’s tight.

There’s not much an individual school can do about it. The whole system is designed to deliver an acceptable outcome to the largest number for the least cost.

In UK schools, your best bet as a student is to be solidly average. And the reports make that pretty clear.

You're not being unreasonable at all.

All my emails to the school requesting to see my child's test results in relation to the class average went ignored.

Thank you. This is useful. I guess we will have to invest in tutors as the school is not going to do much; they have plenty of problems and not enough resources as it is.

Also lower expectations reg school. They are doing what they can I guess.

yes, I realise it is a waste of time chasing schools.

No state school will tell you were your child is in relation to others. It doesn’t reall matter because one class, in one school in one area is not representative of the rest of the country.

School reports aren’t standard but I would expect to see some kind of target for him for the end of the year and where he is in relation to this. I would also expect to see how his effort is in each class.

Can you post a copy of the report or feel free to PM me with it and I will see if I can help (I’m an ex teacher).

At primary school most reports tell you whether a child is "expected", "greater depth" (sometimes called deeper or exceeding) or "developing" sometimes called emerging

If they are at expected then they are on track.

If they are on greater depth or exceeding they are ahead/advanced

If they are developing or emerging they are behind where they should be.

Primaries in most years (obviosuly not Covid years) do the phonics test in year 1 ( this is pass/fail and must be reported to parents), ks1 sats at the end of year 2 which also must be reported to parents and your daughter also probably did the times tables test on year 4 which also should have been reported to you.

They also have ks2 sats at the end of primary. 100 is expected so anything below 100 shows your child is behind. Above 110 or so is exceeding and ahead.

If your daughter has an EHCP there will be targets on the EHCP which the school are supposed to report on at the annual review meeting. Her EHCP should also detail the areas she has difficulty with and the suppport she is being given.

As a teacher I have filled in hundreds if not thousands of EHCP updates forms on students I have taught.

Do you have the paperwork from
Her last review meeting? What are her targets?

No state school will tell you were your child is in relation to others. It doesn’t reall matter because one class, in one school in one area is not representative of the rest of the country.

In Wales we get a report telling us our child’s position in relation to all children in that year based on national tests.

I HATE IT.

They also have ks2 sats at the end of primary. 100 is expected so anything below 100 shows your child is behind. Above 110 or so is exceeding and ahead.

Hideous.

Have you tried though? Not every school would ignore you asking to talk to the teacher in more depth. Yes, the 5 minute conversations (which we have twice a year) are usually enough for a child that has no problems. At our school parents with children with SEN are offered an additional appointment with the SEN teacher, and also the opportunity to have longer appointments with their teacher if needed. At our school, if the teacher had concerns about a child's progress, they would contact the parents well before parents evening to discuss. So if we don't hear from them, its generally because there are no concerns.

We then get an end of year report that isn't general - it tells us for each subject where our child is in relation to what is expected for their year group. But its the end of the year, so by that time you should know if your child is falling behind or not.

I think if you feel you're not getting that information, you should at least try and ask!

I’ve always got an average score for the cohort in each subject and a mark for my child. This is a report 3x a year. State secondary. Sometimes the average is given per set even.

A report stating how your child is progressing relative to their cohort is of limited usefulness. It's more useful, particularly where SEN is involved, to compare them to their own starting point.

For example, it would be unhelpful to tell me that DS2 is still performing in the bottom of the bottom centile for his age group as in teh comment about Wales. It's also unhelpful to compare him to the other 5 kids in his class who are all in vastly different places academically and socially.

Completely unreasonable to ask for results in relation to other class members, their results are confidential and no other parents cannot access them. One of the most ridiculous requests I've read. Let teachers teach, they will contact you if there is a problem.

I would expect that this year you will start to get more of a steer on progress and targets as your DD will need to select her GCSE options.

FWIW, my DCs' school includes end-of-year test results and class averages in its reports, so this obviously varies school to school

My dc had written reports 3 x a year at secondary or you could just check their results online for individual tests

Completely agree. I am only interested in my DD’s progress against her capabilities.

They didn’t set in years 7 or 8 so the differentiation in her class was quite extreme and she came out many levels above the expected target for those years. Which meant they thought she was doing fine but she was bored and unengaged and her ND needs got ignored making her very resistant to talk about anything school related.

Hopefully year 9, with sets will support her better. 🤞

I don't know what a score of 1 to 10 would mean, how is that scale being determined and how does it relate to expected performance? Also agree with PP that position within the class is fairly meaningless.

Do you get reports with data, or just a comment? You should be getting at least a "below expected level, at expected level, higher than expected level" for each subject. The secondary school my child attends also has specific codes for the "below" level that indicates why and what they can do to improve. The explanation of that comes with the report.

If you really aren't getting that info from the school then I would ask for an after school meeting with the head of year and ask for an explanation as to what their report shows and how it's meant to inform you of progress.

Why hideous? Do you also think GCSEs A levels etc are hideous?

There is no point knowing your child's progress vs others, but there is a point in understanding her progress.
My daughter took a similar (same level different questions) maths test every term to evaluate her progress. Her scores were 36%, 45% and 92%, so we could see clear progress through the year, and that the extra support the school gave her after test 2 was really worthwhile. Does your school do anything similar?

Why do you hate it? Unless your kid is one of the bottom ones. I had class placements at peep school for every subject. Was most perturbed not being told where my own kids were in relation to the others.

My DDs reports give their current level, and what that would translate to on their current trajectory at the end of Yr11.
I have no interest in how their friends are doing. Obviously I hope they are doing well, but thats of no relevance to how shes doing. I need to know shes doing well in Maths,but struggling in English, so I can get her extra help if she needs it.

We also get effort grades. They tell me shes trying her best.

Incidentally, her KS2 Sats showed she was "below expectations" in some areas. But I knew this already... and was amazed how much progress she made.

Our secondary does give grades 1-9.

Yet it's a method still used in a majority of countries in the world and has been for decades if not centuries. Not ridiculous at all.

You get you child's score for a subject, the class high and the class low. It's very useful particularly for parents not familiar with the curriculum for example those who come from abroad.

So yes, schools and classes are different but people know that. You know that top of the class from x school is going to be class average from y school. But it's still a helpful benchmark.

And yes, it's more useful for the high performers who deserve a good education too. It helps to know that they're maybe getting good results but that those could be better, v they're top of the class in every subject and maybe there's merit to what they say when they complain of boredom.

I would not hate it; if my child is bottom of the year I would like to know

The report is like this:

end of year assessment: 54

class averages: 47

or whatever the percentage that is

per subject plus a comment

This is a good idea. I will ask for a meeting with the head of year