Weird school report?

[sambaba]

DD, just turned 5, has been able to read since 2. She can now read for example Harry Potter. She will ask about and respond to punctuation in text. Comprehension is amazing.
She started school this Sep and her first school report says underachieving for language and communication.
Both her nurseries identified her language was very advanced.
For context DH and I are both teachers and were also both GAT at literacy.
Is this a bit odd? I don't really plan on saying anything but I'm just a bit baffled.
It's two form entry and there are a lot of challenging kids I think including one whose been a bit violent at time, I suspect she's a gentle soul and doesn't say much.

If course you raise it. You're seeing a big discrepancy between what you see at home and what the report says. You need to find out if something is wrong for her in the school environment, or if the teachers have made a mistake.

I also had an early reader DD - though in her case while she 'could' read Harry Potter, she didn't want to at that stage. The first reception report said her target was to read a sentence. We pointed out that she was reading hundreds of the things daily for fun, they re-assessed and came up with something more realistic.

They were also weird about end of year R assessments at that school. DD was more advanced across the board at start of reception than DS was at the end. Yet he got more of the greater depth or exceeding marks or whatever it's called for reception at old school than DD did at this one. Either they were rubbish at recording evidence or fiddling the value added.

I find your post unusual. You ask for advice, reel off how experienced you and your husband are and why none of what many other responders say is correct because you’re very experienced and know better. Surely in that case you’d know that simply discussing it with the teacher to see whether it’s an error or she feels there’s something you need to do to address the issue is probably the best way forward. The poor teacher you have quoted as being young and inexperienced- I wonder if you were so right and perfect when you were young and inexperienced maybe don’t tell her how experienced and G+T you and your husband were/are though. Your issue is the mark your child has been given in a report - address it with the person who wrote the report but in a nice way. Sorry if this sounds overly harsh but when two experienced apparently knowledgeable teachers can’t work out what to do it’s a worry - and I’m not a teacher btw

I’m just here for the grammar lovers. You dont have to be gifted and talented in literacy to know when to say my DH and me, versus I.

FWIW my kid was and is brilliant at maths (and languages). He now goes to a private academic secondary (top 3 in the country) where he is properly stretched.

His lovely state primary school could not support him. They are there to teach all kids, not pick out my child as special. They attempted to give him some stretch work and I supported him at home as best I could. I spoke to the teachers when he was maybe 7 or 8. But op I do understand how it goes when you have an advanced child, in whatever area. Doesn’t need to mean autism or anything else. Simply a skill in that area. Brainy, in old money. Support her, maybe give the teachers a chance to get to know her, certainly raise it with the teacher.

What are you looking to get from this thread? People have given suggestions, you've told them you know best. Ok, fine. You're professionally qualified and the parents, so what can MN add to that anyway??

I’m afraid, OP, that you do sound very much like THAT parent.

But is it possible that your DD is downplaying her abilities to ‘fit in’? It’s awful even at that age to stand out.

Or is she simply not participating as expected in the group work? Concerns were raised about my DH’s reading at that age. He could read perfectly well but experimented with reading upside down at group time.

Probably because everyone is slagging her of and suggesting she gives inappropriate books to her child and has no idea what she is talking about.....

OP, if you come on here and say your child is above average for anything you are basically inviting a bit of a pasting. It's silly really. What does it matter to these people - it's not like your child is in direct competition to theirs. (If they even have a child). I have never really understood it.

Anyway, I would just assume it is an error, as your daughter is clearly strong in this area. Is their a written report to accompany it?

I would definitely raise it with the school and ask them to explain it. What's the harm?

But given you and your husband have so much experience, it seems implausible in the extreme that they is some aspect of your daughter's learning she is behind in, that you have somehow missed......

@Herewegoagain84

Why is it rude and arrogant to say that you have qualifications and experience that gives you expertise in an area?

No matter what her experience, she’s entitled to come on mumsnet and ask if other people find the discrepancy between her child’s school report and her own experience of her child strange. It is strange, and plenty of people have given possible reasons for it, which the OP is entitled to weigh up and agree or disagree with, based on her knowledge and experience of the situation in general, and of education.

The fact that she thinks she knows better than her daughter’s young and inexperienced teacher doesn’t make her arrogant. I know enough dim primary school teachers to know that they are far from infallible when it comes to assessing a child’s learning.

The fact that she thinks she knows better than a lot of posters on this thread also doesn’t make her arrogant. The reality is, she does know more. There are a whole load of posters on this thread who have got absolutely no idea what they’re talking about when it comes to literacy, SEN or brain development and are making all sorts of ridiculous fact free statements merely to bully the OP.

Two things.

Firstly I actually would raise this if you assume an error. The reason is that when Dd just missed her 11+ score by one point, I had to fill in a selection review. I'm not sure if they were all needed but since everyone school report she'd had since reception said exceeding in everything, I sent them all in with the review.

Secondly, you haven't come across very pleasantly on this thread, simply arrogant, dismissive and rude. So, crossing fingers that your husband is more humble, I would send him in rather to raise it. If he's worse, and the two of you can't even pretend to be humble when you raise it, you will definitely be labelled those parents. It isn't about the question itself, which is fine, it's the attitude.

@EnidSpyton re: "I know enough dim primary school teachers to know that they are far from infallible when it comes to assessing a child’s learning."

This has also been my experience. Mark Twain's advice was "Never argue with an idiot. They'll drag you down to their level and beat you with experience".

A lot of posters are commenting on OP's attitude but they don't seem to have acknowledged that OP faced a wall of disbelief, accusations that she doesn't know what she's talking about, suggestions that her child is ND and accusations of letting her daughter read unsuitable books to list just a few response types. I'm not surprised OP comes across as defensive against all that

Teachers can absolutely be that parent, and often are. HP for a just 5 year is completely inappropriate and you should know that.

I'd say it's an error- the teacher may have confused her with another student?

Just a thought, Is your child reading on a kindle? I think the flexibility of the font size, background colour etc makes it a very different experience from reading words on paper where the font cannot be changed.

From what I remember of the Biff books, the batters had lists of further tasks, and it wasn’t just a case of being able to say each word.

I had an online parents evening once where it was a minute into the teacher talking at me when I managed to interject that I had a son and the teacher was talking non stop about 'she'. Wrong child. Despite only 12 in the class and the other child having a completely different skin colour to me.
I would ask. Mistakes do happen.

To be fair, it might be more common than you think. My Mum, a secondary English teacher, was made Senco with absolutely no training and very little experience of SEND in the classroom.

Hi OP, I have a similar dc. I see you say she’s likely to present at school as “a gentle soul and doesn’t say much”. I am wondering if they will say that they are not seeing her interact age appropriately in terms of communication as a result, if she’s not very communicative in the school setting with adults and peers?

My similar dc was reading at 3 and I was posting on this board a lot. Still gifted and talented at secondary age, in line for a bright future and has good friendships. Also now has an autism diagnosis as well. It wasn’t easy to see at the time where the little social differences were at that age, but as they became older it became much clearer.

It would be worth approaching this comment on the report with an open mind when discussing with the teacher - I think these things are much harder to see in our own dc because we know them so well that we just see them for the wonderful whole people that we are. For example, a family member is an experienced psychologist and didn’t recognise his child was ND until that dc was 9. The dc is wonderful, bright and now has a diagnosis.

Both you and your DH are teachers so you know if you have questions you should talk to the school. You are saying that the young teacher has recorded a wrong assessment for your daughter. Well…if you think that then book an appointment. But be prepared to be told they have a different view than you do. If you’re not going to listen to the teacher then don’t waste her time.

So many posters like you are declaring this as if it’s an indisputable fact.

It’s not. The first Harry Potter book is perfectly accessible, linguistically and thematically, to children of high intelligence and reading ability, from the age of 5. They might not grasp all of it, but there are plenty of elements they will grasp and enjoy.

Some 5 year olds might find it a bit scary, others won’t. All children are different. Declaring that a book written for children is universally inappropriate for children of a specific age is utter nonsense.

I had a relatively similar experience. We moved area and I was concerned that DS reading words were on the easy side at his new school. He read before school, I never taught him he picked it up and he reads and reads all day. I have to take his lamp out of the room at bedtime or he would read until 10pm. I brought it up with his teacher who was shocked and hadn't seen any evidence that he was a reader in class, she showed me his workbooks and he had done very little work in 1.5 months. I didn't disagree with her assessment. She reassessed him and he went form the bottom literacy group to the top.

This is no longer allowed.

SENCos now have to have a specific qualification or be working towards one (in state schools) in order to be employed in the role.

I don’t have 30 years of experience but I do know that the plot lines of Harry Potter are inappropriate for a 5 year old. What’s next up on the reading list for your little darling OP? 50 Shades of Grey?

I am not sure why OP posted here as they know everything already.

Gifted and talented

I was going to say exactly this!

The themes get darker as the series goes in, the books were originally released one a year and are designed to be for increasingly older readers as their readership aged.

Also, you don't need to understand all the themes to enjoy a book necessarily. And Harry Potter can be ready on a surface level with a lot of enjoyment without understanding any underlying themes.

My DC both started reading Harry Potter young - my eldest at 5 or 6, and they've gone back to then and re-read as they got older.

The posters having a go at the OP for this are pretty narrow minded IMO. All DC are different and besides being a teacher I expect she knows her own child!

Why don't you plan on saying anything? If there is an issue surely you want to know, and if its a mistake surely as a teacher you would want a parent to bring it up so you could correct it ?