not to want to continue to sign a homework diary in year 8

[glitterfairy]

I wrote a message in my sons homework diary this week which was a little tongue in cheek but I am sick of signing it in the shower every week.

I think when he is 13 her really ought to take responsibility for his homework and I should not have to sign a boring book every week which I dont look at and often there is nothing in it anyway.

I can understand in primary school but really in year 8 it shoudlnt be needed surely?

This is the usual pointless MN argument

MN-parent: my DC's school is crap
MN-teacher: I'm perfect, I am, and therefore the whole education system is perfect
MN-parent: oh no it isn't
MN-teacher: oh yes it is
repeat ad nauseum ...

oooh. Do you think that Purits is fed up of
a) being ignored
b) being told how wonderful everyone else's school is

grrrr

I think the use of diary/planner must differ from school to school. I don't recognise the description of how valuable a communication tool the diary is or how it is overseen within school as given by scaryteacher. Use of diaries/planners isn't mentioned in our home/school agreement, either.

At our secondary school communication between parents and school seems a bit hit and miss. As with other methods of communication the diary isn't to be relied on at all and the overall impression I had was that it was for the student own use.

Scaryteacher "I fail to see why I should get a bollocking because a parent won't sign a a planner despite my best efforts."
I don't see why some students should get detentions because a parent won't sign despite student's best efforts.
Also, the conforming to parenting style was a comment from glitterfairy, not me. Although I do agree with gf.
I do feel at times that although it is said that school, child and parent are supposed to be working together to one aim, it feels as though as a parent are being told how and what to do without any input from the parent. Which is sad as it would probably be more beneficial all round if everyone involved could truly work together. But as you have said that's probably not really possible given the numbers of children passing through the schools.

Can't see I claimed I was perfect anywhere Purits, or that the system is perfect, far from it; however, this bit of the system ime works when used properly. I am as entitled to my opinion on it as anyone else.

I'm sure that "this bit of the system ime works when used properly". I just wished DD's school had used it! The school didn't fulfil their part of the home-school agreement - it was just something that they said they did so Ofsted could tick a box when they inspected.
It was yet another example of how DD's school didn't communicate with parents. I think they would be quite glad if they never had any contact with us ever.

Me too Riven.

I would also like a change in manners towards kids as well from some teachers. Many teachers speak to children in a way I find reprehensible and which teaches them extremely poor manners and a great lack of respect.

For the record I chose my dds primary school because it did not set homework and the head told me that if a school needed to at primary level it was a failure of education as everything they needed should be contained within the school day!

When my two others were little I signed my eldest dds reading diary for a year as it was completely pointless and I couldnt keep up with her reading. She read under the covers from about 6 and was gobbling up books at a rate of four or five a week.

Each child is different but I still think if you treat them with respect and belief rather than suspicion and fear the results will be better.

I'd like a change in manners from many kids towards teachers. I get sick of being told to 'f off' when all I've done is wished them 'good morning 'and smiled. I get sick of having kids standing the other side of a shut door and watch me struggle with armfuls of books and a laptop and not bother to open it, when I will stand and hold doors open for them, and not get thanked for it.

Many children speak to teachers without respect and with poor manners that haven't been modelled in school. I would point out that parents have their kids for longer per day than the teachers do, plus all through the holidays and at weekends, so the poor manners come from home, not school. I'm there to educate the child in academic subjects, not teach the rudiments of how to exist in polite society. I teach that to my ds; I do not expect to have to do it for 600+ other children, who have parents to do it for them. If that is what parents want, then send your kids to boarding school, where manners or lack of, will be addressed. There is not time to achieve this in the 5 hours per day that a child is in the classroom.

I would also like parents to stop seeing teachers as the enemy, as many of us are parents too, and I would love some of the parents who believe their children are perfect to come into school and see how their little cherubs behave, as they may just have a shock; especially the parents of the ones who turn up stoned to lessons and then disrupt the hour a week with that group by having to call the nurse and the senior management team to remove said child. I can't teach with a stoned and disruptive 16 year old in my room, nor should I have to.

Respect is a two way street, start treating teachers with some and you may see improvements - teachers are told they have to 'earn' the respect of their pupils, well, they have to earn mine. 'Each child is different', yeah, so is each teacher, we are individuals too, and we don't just trundle back into the cupboard at the end of the day. You want to change the system, train to be a teacher and come and fight it from the inside then.

Message withdrawn

I understand the point of the planners. But if a parent takes the time to write a letter saying that for reasons that are important to them, they no longer wish to sign the planner and their child is doing well in school, then why on earth wouldn't a teacher respect that wish? Scaryteacher, it sounds to me like you need a sabbatical. I'm sorry you are so down on your students, parents and job, but it's not really fair to paste the crimes of a few (or even a majority) on the ones who are not badly behaved.

I spoke to the respective teachers of my ds and dd when they were in kindergarten (usa) about my not wishing to continue to complete the daily Reading Log (record of what I read to them each day) as it was taking time away from our precious little reading time that we had. I assured the teacher that I read to my children on a daily basis and would continue to do so. In both cases the teachers were happy to waive the necessity for the log, as they understood that it wasn't necessary in our household as a means of encouraging reading to the children (as evidenced by the academic abilities of my children).

In fact one of the main reasons I moved back to the USA when my children were school age was that I was concerned that the English system seemed to be very rigid with a high level of conformity expected. Students all appeared to be treated as if they had the same educational needs and were quickly judged (and tracked) if they didn't perform at a predetermined speed and level. And it seemed that a child who didn't quite fit the system (like my ds) would have constant troubles and complaints from the teachers (as my ds did in our state school nursery in London!!!!). They complained that he couldn't write his name (he was 3 and frankly just preferred to write his sister's name which was shorter) and complained that instead of lining up the numbers from 1-10 forwards, he started doing them backwards (surely they might have twigged that he needed extra stimulation and even if they didn't have the time to give it to him, couldn't they have just let him do his thing).

And this client thing is just odd...I'm not a client of the school....my child is. So why would they judge a child based on the parents' performance!!??

"so the poor manners come from home, not school"

While that may be true for some children, it's not true for all. Our problems with manners/attitude with our children almost always stemmed from school and the things they picked up there. Not from teachers I would add, although there have been some occassional eye-raising moments there too.

Sofia what an exceleent post.

Bloss I am sorry if my posts appear hostile to teachers. i come from a family of them.

As a nurse I am expected to treat patients as individuals no matter what the constraints are in terms of time and energy. I am expected to put up with verbal and sometimes physical abuse and understand that it is because people are often in pain or are anxious or scared.

The relationship between school and home is critical and I understand some of what you and st have been saying and recognise it as well. I have tried to support the childrens schools by being a governor or working for the PTFA.

I think we have a problem often with our attitude to kids here (seen and not hear etc) which I never feel is shared on the continent. I also think there is a problem in this country with the view of education (its all about jobs rather than education for its own sake) and the respect given to the teaching profession. BUT and it is a big but they do not always help themselves.

Many teachers talk to the children in a very aggressive manner. In my Dds primary school they have really changed this and no teacher is allowed to shout! Children are all treated as one lump and again in my Dds primary they now have learning at the childs pace so she is year 4 and is learning at year 6 level.

This shows it is possible to do things differently but there is often a heads down and get through attitude and an adherence to ways of thinking which require new ways of doing things. I recognise this in health as well and think consecutive government changes, pressures and targets do not help the process at all.

But over a homework diary I really do think that if a parent writes a note saying they cannot see the reason either the response should be that they would like to talk it through with me or they should accept that it may be great for some but not good for all. My ds is in the top sets for everything and a very committed, well behaved and talented child doing well.

I woudl like to see him making more use of the diary himself and will work on this over the summer with him as I think it would help him as he likes a schedule but I want him to do this himself.

Message withdrawn

"The relationship between school and home is critical and I understand some of what you have been saying and recognise it as well. I have tried to support the children?s schools by being a governor or working for the PTFA."

I am on the Parents' Forum (in our new school, the old one wouldn't have such things) and am/have been active in the PTA. It may be that GF and I are the exception that proves the rule, but it seems strange that we have two examples of supportive parents with above-average DC who feel that the school system goes against them.
Perhaps if teachers spent less time being understanding of the badly-behaved and spent more time appreciating the better-behaved then we might get somewhere. It feels that there is a attitude of 'I need to spend effort on the poor pupils so they scrape a C-grade but I don't need to worry about fulfilling the more able students' potential because they will get above-D anyway.'
As a parent I was taught to reward good behaviour and not to reward attention-seeking bad behaviour. Why don't schools do the same? It seems that the more they excuse poor behaviour (homelife, poverty, ADHD etc) the worse behaviour gets!

you did not just catagorise ADHD as an excuse, did you?

Tell me you didn't ... I have seen ADHD firsthand, it is devastating and it is a neurological condition!

I think (I hope) that what she meant was that often it's given as the "diagnosis" by the teacher for a child who is not conforming. I have been told over and over by teachers that perhaps my ds is ADHD and should be medicated to improve his focus. He is absolutely not ADHD and no professional in the medical field would diagnosis him as such. He is just a daydreamer. He focuses just fine on the things that interest him. And by teachers trying to get him on the ADHD path, they are not serving him well and taking resources away from the kids who do need the extra help. I think what purits is trying to say is that you have to get your child categorized as something negative to get extra help instead of just getting it because you are one of a bunch who need it.

Close, Sofia. I am pissed off at 'needy' kids getting a disproportionate amount of the budget.
Those who mess about and disrupt others' learning get all sorts of targetted attention, base units, one-to-one helpers etc etc etc. By definition, this is taking resources from those who are not misbehaving, who are expected to put up with being treated as merely one of the herd (see GF's posts).
I'm surprised that there are any well-behaved kids left - they get a raw deal.
Actually, I don't think that it does the badly-behaved any favours either - it doesn't really prepare them for the world of work. If they engaged in that sort of behaviour at work they would be out of there so fast their feet wouldn't touch the ground.

A very good post scaryteacher. Home and school should work together and back each other up. If the school wants to communicate through a homework diary I think that the least the parent can do is sign it, it isn't exactly an arduous task - and not worth arguing about.

By purits on Sun 20-Jul-08 17:26:21
Close, Sofia. I am pissed off at 'needy' kids getting a disproportionate amount of the budget

nice!
As a parent of a "needy" child I find that post a bit
I am sure my dd would have been hapier not to have been severely disabled. she will happliy swop with your kids.

in answer to the op
yabu 13 is still young and they do need your imput.

Get off your soapboxes. If you read it properly I'm talking about the time wasters: the perfectly-capable-but-can't-be-ar*ed.

Well he'll have another in Y9 and Y10 and... so get used to it!

If the school asks you to look at it and sign it, that's what you should do. They've worked out that this is the best thing for the majority of the students and shouldn't be expected to make an exception for your son, however conscientious he is.