So upset about school report. feeling like a shitty mother

[Harriet220909]

Had my son's school report back yesterday and I'm really upset
He hasn't met any of the targets for he's year. Not one.
I know I should have done more with him at home but I have an extremely demanding toddler, I'm stuck in a one bed flat so there's nowhere for him to go to do he's homework and I feel so shit.
He's such a bright child bit completly lacks confidence due to him being behind. He's writing is unreadable and when he asks me to read he's writing I try so hard to and he's little faces just crushes when I get it wrong

I feel awful and like I am failing him. He's got an awful father who never helps there's just little old me trying to do everything

And now he's behind and he knows it. Today he told me he feels stupid after attempting he's homework. I can't afford a tutor, how can I help him?

I just wish the school had told me he was behind instead of me having to read it on the report at the end of the year. I would have pushed him harder and tried to do more

Have also researched some ways to build he's confidence in all areas. He's quite an anxious child so I feel that is the biggest thing to work on over the summer

Lego is excellent!
Also look up the opposite of worry by Laurence Cohen

I will do sock master. It's just so hard to know if u are doing it right, and as I am the type to overthink things and so is ds I worry about he's worries and work myself up

He's doing ok though after talking to the teacher I've chilled a little Will definatly do some activities over the summer but will try not to stress

I know this is a bit "me me me" but it might help you stop worrying -

DS did badly in KS1, and years 3 & 4 he struggled. He's got Level 5 in all his SATs this year. I guess it just "clicks" sooner or later?

You can use Lego for maths skills.

game

Lego games

Lego listening game

You could easily make this yourself

Art dice and a link to pattern block cards that are free to download (on other good sites). Plus some nice art ideas using shaving cream.

Fine motor plus number recognition

Fine motor plus spelling

math and mrz, US education varies greatly, not only by state but by city or town (which are the education authorities in the US)

Two of my DGC live in a major city, parents currently researching schools.

The top private schools all offer a stimulating, child-centric play-based for the first two years. Lots of art, music, creativity - as math described above. This is what my own children benefitted from in the UK many moons ago,

Same goes in the upper-middle-class, top-achieving suburbs that surround the inner city.

In contrast, the state schools buckle down to formal academics - phonics, reading, maths, at a tender age. Four-year-olds get worksheets for homework. Similar to the UK nowadays. There's not a lot of difference, to a small child, between Common Core and the National Curriculum.

math, your children were lucky in where you live and the schools they attended.

Interesting how the most privileged children, in schools that annually send respectable numbers of their graduates to Harvard, Yale, and the other Ivies - enjoy this excellent early foundation.

Whereas the predominantly under-privileged kids entering inner-city state schools miss that age-appropriate developmental foundation and buckle straight down to long hours of formal academics.

Sigh.

So two years of child centred play based education ... Could be talking about the EYFS

Harriet some fun maths ideas www.notimeforflashcards.com/2015/01/fun-math-activities.html#_a5y_p=3154065 it's American so nit linked to UK curriculum but good basic stuff

mrz spelling tests and weekly lists to memorise are not 'child centred play based education'.

Nor is expecting 5-year-olds to learn to read.

Some might pick it up, but kids develop very differently, and a year's age difference is huge at age 4 (one-quarter of their life) or 5.

Children don't get stressed, feel they're more stupid than their classmates. Early Years, their energy is devoted to enrichment and understanding, not narrow academics.

A quick example: Sidwell School (where the Obama girls go) says 'second graders begin to be accountable for standard spellings.' That's Year 2.

It's worlds away from the rigidity of weekly spelling tests in reception and Year 1.

I just don't see how EYFS offers 'two years of child-centred, play-based education.' There may be some residual elements but it's not the focus any more, at least at none of the UK primaries I know.

And they certainly aren't a feature in our Foundation Stage or in any good early years setting

Perhaps there are very few 'good early years settings' left in the UK.

My information comes from friends' children in various good but not great London primary schools. The kind of schools that are only oversubscribed because any decent school is oversubscribed. And this is what happens.

You must teach at an exceptional school. It just doesn't sound typical of what most children get.

How many have you actually visited to make that judgement?

My school is a bog-standard primary school typical of schools in my area

For the record we don't send home spelling lists in Y1 or Y2 either

No early years spelling lists here either.
Iirc, DS got books with words around Christmas, so 1\4 were over 5.

Our children climb trees, build dens, make rose petal perfume and work in the mud kitchen. They sing, dance, defeat dragons and turn their teacher into a frog with the magic wand they keep in their shoe. They toast marshmallows on an open fire, grow vegetables to make soup, paint rainbows in puddles and make snow angels. They design traps for trolls, make wanted posters for wicked wolves and count magic beans ... Yes reception in the UK is far from child centred ????

OP

Your little boy is likely to be almost a whole year younger than many of his class mates. He is so little, just five!!! Had he been born a few weeks later he would only just he starting school!!

My eldest DS spent the best part of a year writing many letter back to front, unable to form letters etc. Now however he is in the high a ability reading group and within normal range for handwriting etc.

The biggest issue I have taken is your little lads lack of enjoyment of and confidence in his ability at school. This will hold him back much more than being in the lower ranges of ability at age 5.

Can you arrange a slightly longer meeting with his current ( and maybe prospective teachers for next term) to discuss thoroughly what they plan to do to support an encourage him? It's really not all down to you!!

My daughter's in Y3 and has never yet had a spelling list (leafy bit of London, school with good ofsted, not oversubscribed).

My DCs went to a bog standard parochial school, not 'top private' by any means, and the local public (state) schools offered exactly the same approach minus weekly trips to the church, and starting in Kindergarten since the district did not offer preschool. The other local schools (three Montessoris and a Christian school plus the YMCA preschool offerings and some Lutheran and Jewish preschools offered preschool and all were similar in their play-centered approach). My DCs were definitely lucky not to live in the neighbouring large city.

Ljny:
'Interesting how the most privileged children, in schools that annually send respectable numbers of their graduates to Harvard, Yale, and the other Ivies - enjoy this excellent early foundation.

Whereas the predominantly under-privileged kids entering inner-city state schools miss that age-appropriate developmental foundation and buckle straight down to long hours of formal academics.'

I agree with this -- I believe there are studies showing that 'inner city' children who were allowed a truly play-centered early years foundation that sought to build up vocabulary, self expression via art and music, and self confidence ended up far more likely to avoid crime and prison, while one third of those placed in the high stress academic environment that told them they were failures by age 5 or 6 ended up in jail. The neighbouring city does not have art or music, and there wasn't even recess until a few years ago, having been dumped for a few decades.

The more I read of your posts, Mrz, the more I think you do indeed teach at a school that differs markedly from anything my relatives and British friends have experienced. It sounds more like a Steiner school, to be honest, than anything that could be considered mainstream. Do many of the children in your classroom suffer from bedwetting or fake sickness to avoid going to school? The OP saw samples of the writing of the other children. Would you say it is unusual to see that children have been writing in a classroom of 5 year olds?

I could walk into most schools within a hundred mile radius of here and would see a very similar picture to my own (maybe not the tree climbing). The schools I see that focus on reading and writing do so because of parental pressure.

No I don't think it's unusual for children to be reading and writing at age five (I certainly was reading and writing before I ever started school {as were most people I know} without anyone sitting me down and forcing me to learn )

www.abcdoes.com/abc-does-a-blog/2015/01/brilliant-idea-for-your-writing-area/ perhaps you need to revise your image of writing in the early years - these pictures are from schools all round the UK.

On the U.S. front forty -three states, the District of Columbia, four territories, and the Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) have adopted the Common Core State Standards.
www.allianceforchildhood.org/standards

Don't concentrate too much on writing. The most important thing is establishing a proper love of books and reading. This means finding/using library books that utterly enjoyable and extremely interesting to him. Read together taking turns for 45 mins a day. Maths can be engrained as you go through your normal day spending money, making recipes, looking at clocks.