oK- another sschool report for interpretation..

[seeker]

ds has just had his first year 7 report. It has target levels and the level he's currently at in all subjects. It doesn'r say when the targets are for.

So. Which is more likely? The target levels are for the end of the year, and he has already met 3 of them, but has to make 11 sub levels of progress in Spanish, 7 in Art and 5 in music in the next 6 months, or....
The target levels are for the end of KS3- and he has already met them in 3 subjects or....
Something completely different which makes sense, because neither of the first two options do?

End of key stage I think

He hasn't met them per se just this term he has been working at that level, these can fluctuate dependent on the type of work covered eg in science a student can be great at biology but the following term doing physics in science and their level could drop. I only say this so you don't feel too worried

Spanish, art and music are all new subjects to him I would imagine so his level will start low but rate of progression will be faster

Hope that helps

DH says that his targets will most likely be for the end of the academic year. Expected progress over one year is two sub levels. His targets will be based on his ks2 English and maths sats results. Spanish music and art may be at a lower level than English and maths because he hasn't done them before, so to reach targets he'd have to make drastic progress.

Also targets will be reassessed probably at the end of the year

Targets more likely for end of KS3. He'll have started at base level for Spanish and other subjects not assessed in Primary so will of course have more to cover.

So they are expecting to make 11 sub levels of progress in Spanish in 6 months! He'd better get his act together then!

It means that the school don't know how to sensibly set targets for their students.

Lots of schools are using ks2 results to set targets for new subjects. It's bonkers - a kid that is great at English/Maths won't necessarily be as good at Art or Spanish. DH is a progress tracker and he spends a lot of his time interpreting reports for parents!!

End of KS3 is at the end of Yr9 so plenty of time to do that.
At dd's grammar all children start two languages at the start of Yr7, by the first term in Yr8 best they are given is 4a/5c because of what they have covered in the curriculum. Progress in languages can be very quick once they get to grips with it.

What's a progress tracker?

Presumably they'll give him new targets next term for the ones he's met? Well, they will after I've been in to talk to them in the new year anyway!

Have they said if he's working to/above/below expectations?

He's a teacher, but also responsible for making sure that the kids are on track to achieve their targets - so many spreadsheets and data, and elaborate traffic light systems.

No, but he's got 1s and 2s for attitude to work.

I presume they use Fischer Family Trust. It just annoys me that they don't explain it properly- grr. I will be Having Words in the new year!

Well, the only targets DD got recently were end of year targets, nothing about end of KS3 targets. She is also Yr7 and I think this is very sensible - you need to give children time to settle into secondary before you can predict what they're capable of.

DD has already met her end of year targets for science, English and maths and her teachers have made it very plain that these will be reviewed and adjusted upwards - couldn't ask for more, really, it seems sensible and flexible.

It is more usual to give end of year targets than end of KS3 targets on a mid-Y7 report.
Subjects he hasn't studied before should still have an achievable target for the end of the year. The MFL targets seem a bit different from other subjects. DS1 started German at the beginning of Y7, 4A was his target for the end of Y7.

We haven't seen FFT data for our y7 and were supposed to set them targets just after half-term - well, our assessments are half-termly and they'd barely finished them so in English at least their targets were basically set off the back of their KS2 results which are not very useful to us anyway. So they're largely fictitious. Do I think this is helpful to anyone? No. But I simply didn't know them well enough or have enough data on them six weeks into their secondary school career to set a proper target. I didn't even have their CATs results.

The next set should be much better.

Anyone remember what their year 7 actually got for a new MFL at this stage in the year?

We don't use FFT now, just levels of progress, as that's what OFSTED care about apparently.

Anyway, you need to be taking levels, and especially sublevels with a pinch of salt at this time if the year. I teach Science. My year 7s have done two topics this term. I have assessed them using APP (to follow on from primary) and using SATs questions. Different levels. One topic was chemistry based, and one was Biology based. Different levels. My reported level to parents takes into account all these different assessments.

I genuinely think that more qualitative reporting would be better mid year.

However, to answer your question about MFL, my own DS's French report said 4c, and his teacher was happy with that.

Schools have pretty much no choice about 'getting to know pupils before setting targets'. The government expects a minimum of 2 levels progress through ks3 so that's how they're set. As you get to know a pupil they can be put up but not down. Government GCSE targets are set against ks2 data. It's a nightmare because pupils are hot house for ks2 sats then have totally unrealistic targets which schools are judged on 5 yrs later. I've been in the position of having a pupil come up with a level 5 who in my opinion was barely scraping a level 3. I had to set his yr7 targets as 6c when he couldn't read, write or understand even basic concepts- poor kid.

You can adjust down, the national expectation does not fit all, although we are measured for all. I think thats school policy.

That's interesting. One of ds's targets is actually lower than his than his KS2 SAts results- I wonder how that happened!

I am not at all worried about his progress- settling in is all i ask for in term 1. i'm just interested in the process.

For languages, parents often worry. Even if they have done some MFL in primary they will start on a level 1. End of KS3 you are looking at level 3(v weak) to 5/6/7 (top). For an average/bright pupil, MFL levels are likely to go something like this:

y7 term1 - level 1, term 2 - l2/3, term 3 - l3/4
y8 t1 - l4, term 2 l4/5, term 3 l4/5
y9 l4/5 t2 l5, t3 l5/6/7

Levels aren't like in other subjects, they are about the skills learned rather than the ability in those skills. A very basic explanation would be:

l1 - uses words
2 - sentences
3 - sentences with opinion, basic connectives
4 - paragraphs with opinions, connectives
5 - one other tense
6 - 2 other tenses
7 - all of above and some degree of fluency

Typo? In my school we are endlessly copying data and targets from one system to another, (mainly Excel to SIMs), I'm sure mistakes are made all the time.

And once the report software was accidentally programmed to print MFL targets in the maths column, that was confusing.