Parents Evening YR and Y1.. am I too laid back?

[anonymousbrainsnatcher]

.. I never ask particularly detailed questions at parents' evenings. I figure that as long as they are happy and settled (thank the lord) and generally progressing with the range of subjects/activities, then really, do I need to delve much deeper than that?? I am not a pushy parent and give not two hoots whether my DC are at the same/worse/better reading level, maths level or whatever as their class mates. As long as they are making good progress for them that is my main concern. However, should I be more worried about getting more details? I was a bit to hear from a Y2 parent that one of the Y1 teachers (not ours!) actually lets you know exactly where they are in the class order of things... isn't that a bit much at this age?! Do parents really care whether their child is at the top, middle or whatever. Only if they are actually struggling and need maybe extra help would I expect a teacher to divulge this level of detail??

I absolutely take my children's education seriously, and maybe I am too laid back about it all.

That said, so that I don't just waft in and waft out again I feel that I need to have at least one or two "proper" questions to ask.. what do people actually ask at parents evenings?!?!?!?!?

Any ideas?!!?

I'm a bit like you, I think

My main concerns are whether they seem happy and settled in school, and whether they play nicely with people and socialise well

Anything else is a bonus (for instance, I know that dd1 is doing ok academically - I can tell by her reading and ability to add up etc - I don't need the teacher to tell me that at this stage IYKWIM)

I like looking at their work though - could you ask to see their literacy book or something? The little stories they write and their drawings are sweet!

Oh yes, will definitely ask to see workbooks. And yes, ensuring that socially they are operating in an appropriate fashion, manners, and general behaviour are key. Our school are unbelievably hot on that and if there are problems are not slow at coming forward.

The workbooks are precisely the kind of thing I would have forgotten to ask about, though suspect teacher will have them available for us to see whilst we wait for our appointment... but brilliantly reminded. Thanks.

Phew, glad it's not just me. I know DS is doing absolutely fine (maybe, even, he is doing really well relatively - I don't know and frankly I don't care). But I don't feel the need to have him directly compared with his 5 and 6 year old peers... I don't think our teacher will do that. Was just that other Y1 class teacher does.

I have dd1 in Y2 and I've never had a teacher comparing her to her peers

That is truly shocking I agree!

TOTALLY with you on this one! :)

We had this in Reception a few years back. The teacher was giving out the average point score from the base line assessment and the individual score of some children (she gave this info to some parents and not others, os it may have gone to those who asked).

However, some mums where told more or less where their children were in a moderated ranking.

I think this has now been stopped as there were complaints.

I teach Reception and Year 1 and usually we are asked are they happy at school, do they have friends? is there anything we can help with at home? do they eat their lunch? do they behave well ? They are so little at this age so very sensible questions, as a mum thats what I want to know, not scores and levels !

I was like you in R and Yr 1. I have turned into the pushy parent from hell now ds is in Yr 2. I accepted in R that ds was making 'progress' even though he had gone from knowing his alphabet and reading simple words in nursery to only knowing a few letters of the alphabet. I figured that the change in school might be the reason.

In Yr 1 I was told he was badly behaved in class but making progress. I left it and eventually ds was tested by the school and had mild learning difficulties. I agreed to pay for extra support (private school).

Now in Yr 2 ds is making indiscernible progress (well I can't see it - I see his reading, spelling and maths deteriorating). I'm fed up with the attitude of doing nothing so long as some progress is made. I'm also fed up that this is deemed acceptable because ds is viewed as average in his age group. I am very fed up indeed that ds refuses to do home or school work and his teacher's answer is to keep him in at break time to complete it (pretty much daily).

I've now said that this is not acceptable and I want to know why ds is so reluctant to do anything at school. I've had to push and push for them to do something and frankly I wish I'd pushed harder in yr 1 and questioned his teacher more closely when she said at every parents' evening that she had never taught a child like ds.

I think you want to know if your child is happy, behaving fairly well and progressing. When one of these areas seems not to be happening you start getting pushy - or at least asking more specific questions.

Dh went to see dd's teacher this week - the first time he's done a parents' eve, rather than me. He came home, told me what the teacher said. Some of it sounded a little odd - like that dd was quite quiet in class, or that she really liked sport. We're about to shrug this off when we get a phonecall from school. Its a very embarassed and hugely apologetic teacher to say that she's just told dh all about the other child in the class with the same first name as dd . So clearly the important thing for us is, not what questions to ask, but to remember to listen to the answers

I like to know how well he's doing not compared to others but on a personal basis.

However if a teacher wanted to impart to me DS was top of the class I wouldn't complain [hgrin]

I have parents evening on Wednesday. DS1 is in Yr1. Whereas in reception I was only really interested in him being happy I do want to know more about is academic acheivements this time round as well. He is so uninformative about school ( usually choosing the preferred response of "I can't remember" when asked what he did that day) that I have no idea whether or not his achieving is full potential. Like a pp said I don't care about rankings etc. Just want to know that he is doing the best he can do and make sure that we are doing everything we can at home to support him in areas he finds difficult :)

Bek x