I have an inherently naughty and an inherently good child. At least sometimes it seems that way. At school they had different things to learn.
For dd, who loves school, socialises easily, loves to do whatever the teacher tells her, concentrates easily and naturally sits still it was about learning to say to the teacher, on occasion that she was unhappy about something (like sitting next to the naughtiest boy for too long).
For ds who finds it very hard to sit still, marches to his own drum, is impulsive and doesn't understand consequences, gets angry and can't control himself, finds it difficult to make friends and is dyslexic, it was pretty much everything. He is also not SN, although he has had a lot of assessments in the past.
He still at 10 has a reward chart, because for him it works. It means that instead of being called in all the time to discuss how to manage his behavior, his behaviour is managed and he is doing well. It makes him less disruptive because of that, and the other children now feel OK around him and he is making friends.
We are lucky in that they have always been to good schools where both of them have been obviously loved. But I don't feel that dd has lost out because she has had to be more self directed at times when her teacher has been looking after more needy kids, because she has the ability to self direct, and it is a good skill to learn. She has also learnt from seeing ds in bits when her school report has come back glowing and his has come back with lots of "could do betters". She understands that he genuinely finds it very hard to be "good".
So OP, could be bad class management, or could be that your ds needs more understanding of others (again a life skills that grows over time), or that he is seeing things from just his point of view, and forgets the verbal praise and focuses on the big things (my dd was inclined to do this - often when we spoke to the teacher we'd get a different picture).