No progress in 3 years? WWYD

[HattiFattner]

My son is a bright kids Y6 - level 5 in reading and comp, level 5 in science and math.

He entered his current school at level 3 in writing. This weekend he tells me that his writing was assessed at level 3a.

This means he has not even acquired the national average for Y6. Im really cheesed off as I highlighted this to the school and OFSTED last year, and yet still no progress.

They have put it down to himbeing lazy/impatient/in too much of a rush to finish etc.

But I cannot see how he could have made so little progress over 3.5 years,and why no interventions have been made to establish why he is unable to write fluently.

Imconcerened that writing is a skill he will need in Seniors, in all lessons, and if he doesnt have the basics down yet, what hope for ever achieving good grades at Seniors?

Parents evening on Wednesday, how do I approach this?

I would ask if it was true. Hopefully he's wrong and it's not 3a.

I would talk to your son about writing. Would he agree with the school's excuses reasons? I would be trying to find out if there was a physical reason or there are distractions at school. My experience of being at a state school is that if you are worried that your child may have SEN then you have to push for help and keep on top of the teachers to ensure that help is being given out.

I'd ask the teacher the how the work that was assessed as 3a could become a 4c. I'd also ask if you can read it for yourself.

Just ask like you did here, any parent would be in their right mind to be concerned if what your son said is accurate (although I doubt it is).

My DSS had dreadful writing at the start of Y6. He was sitting the grammar school exams and so did a lot of practice papers. His handwriting massively improved during the process, and is fine now. I think you just have to take this on board and make him write every day.

Also worth asking if it was one piece or writing that was assessed at 3a or his writing in general, as teachers may do one-off assessments of a piece of writing as well as ongoing. If so may just have been a task/genre that particularly didn't suit him. There will be specific things to do to achieve the next level, ask what those are and have a really good look at all of his writing if you can.

Thanks for the responses.

Last year's parents evening, we were told he was level 3b but that was because he was missing the basics - like full stops and capital letters, poor spelling,punctuation, plus sentence structure not great - ie writing in phrases, rather than full sentences.

we were told he has great imagination, always willing to contribute interesting ideas in class discussions, but just cannot seem to translate those ideas onto paper. - Very disorganised in thinking.

We have tried to encourage more descriptive writing at home- we play a game "three words to describe....eg a cloud, without using white or fluffy" - and have expanded that to be "three metaphors" and "three adjectives" but while he can do it verbally when prompted, he cannot do it on paper.

He was in Scool Action for handwriting in Y2 and Y3, and can write OK now, but somehow the content is lacking.

If he doesn't do basic punctuation they won't be able to give him up a level 4 no matter how brilliant the content.

This isn't directly related to his handwriting - in that you can get any level with scruffy handwriting. But not liking the physical act of writing might be stopping him from writing good content.

If you think he really hates physically handwriting, maybe try him on the computer at home. If his content improves dramatically then you can decide what your next steps are.

My DS really struggled with punctuation, and made very little progress in the juniors. But then this term he has suddenly made vast improvements and now quite often uses full stops correctly and sometimes uses commas correctly. I've no idea why...

Not really got any other advice - but know exactly how you feel. I think you should ask for him to be in a writing intervention. And just be very clear that you're not happy with his progress and you expect the school to be addressing it.

I second Indigo's idea of using a keyboard, and also that I know how frustrating it is when a bright child is struggling with something.

I'd be tempted to look at whether he has dyspraxia - especially if he struggles to organise his thoughts. You don't need to go through the school for an assessment. Your GP should be able to refer you to a paediatric occupational therapist for assessment. I have also once known a bright boy suffer with this type of thing. He wasn't showing much problem with reading, but he was dyslexic- his above average abilities meant he had taught himself a lot of coping strategies, but it was still showing with writing and spelling.

PS - the occupational therapist should then be able to advise you and the school on the best way to help him if he does have dyspraxia.

Do you know what his KS1 writing level was? If it was 2c then he is roughly on target (poss 4c then in SATs).

ks1 was level 3 hocus. hence my worry!

Hi
I was a KS1 Teaching Assistant for ten years; now a voluntary helper in a small Primary school two days a week.

Probably all children find writing much more difficult than reading, and I guess there just isn't time in the curriculum to develop and extend writing properly. There is not enough time to go over pieces of writing in depth and detail so that a child understands where they are going wrong, or how their style or ideas could be improved or extended.

And there are so many different sorts of writing required by Yr6: story telling; descriptive writing; report writing; recounts; writing-up experiments, investigations, data collection etc; poetry, and more. I am a trained touch-typist, and with reluctant Yr2 writers years ago I sometimes used to type to the child's dictation; boys who seemed to have no ideas and wouldn't hand-write much, could dream up brilliant stories when I typed it for them!

I have never been a much of a 'creative' writer myself, but am OK on factual or report writing. Even now, working with KS2 children I have little to contribute to help them with the descriptive or imaginative material, but I am fine with the 'technical' aspects - punctuation, etc.

As your son reads well, maybe look at his favourite book with him, and talk about the style of text, how could it have been put differently; why is it punctuated the way it is; re-write it keeping a similar meaning, but in a different style: journalistic, scientific etc; write it as a celebrity, pop star or teenager might write it.

Modern children's literature embraces a vast range of styles, so see how many he (or you) can find. Depending on your relationship with school, ask his teacher/Lit Coordinator to suggest books for different genres and writing styles; or ask your local Library for ideas.

Again, if DS is amenable, suggest he writes something every day - even if only a line or two - like a diary, but putting down anything he wants, news, ideas, worries, hopes, friends and relationships. Obviously, you can only do this if he is happy about it, and maybe focussing too much on his (lack of) writing might make him worry about it more, and be counter-productive.

A brilliant book I read recently is "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" by Lynne Truss, about using punctuation; it is for adults, but she has also done similar ones for children. I'll try and give you the link, but I've never done one on here before so it may not work!

www.lynnetruss.com/pages/content/index.asp?PageID=8

Cheers, and good luck.

The KS1 assessment must have been too high - you need almost accurate fullstops and capital letters and good sentence structure for a level 3.

Unless he did that in KS1, and doesn't now?

I could have written Hattifattner's post. I have the same issues.

I have had lots of discussions re punctuation etc but the teachers have never focussed on this so as time has passed, DC has decided its not important. Because my DC are "above average" in most areas they have deemed it not important and "it will come".

Various teachers have probably considered me a PITA (based on Mumsnet posters comments) because I have kept raising concerns about punctuation and grammar - lack of, and yet they have still not focussed on it with my child. I realise there are 30+ other kids that are a priority but I am concerned that we are almost at the end of primary and DC still cant be bothered to write anything down properly.

I have tried all the suggestions from Ferguson without success and I am very worried.

I do think some extra work on grammar might be the key.If he reads well and can do the verbal description then there is a reason he is struggling to get this onto a page of writing (unless he struggles with the mechanics of actually writing).

If you can get the full stops,capital letters and commas sorted then he should able to achieve level 4 rather than 3.

I did this with my ds for commas and am trying to clarify grammar for him as he is a bit hit and miss. I'd also get a Lynne Truss book.

These are both good for structuring specific types of writing he may have to do.

I'd probably be asking for him to be put back on 'school action' too so you know how the school is addressing his difficulties with writing.

Hi again -

as I suspected, 'link' didn't work so I'll try again in min.

'RoadArt'- I seen you before a few times!

I can't remember how or when I learnt the 'mechanics' of writing, but I passed the 11+ and went to grammar sch, but then didn't make the most of it, failing 'O' levels except for three!

If kids can accept it, it rather looks as if parents will have to do the job themselves. (Maybe my parents 'pushed' me more than I remember.) I don't know where quote came from, but I heard once children learn to read IN-SPITE of school, not because of it. Depends on the home, obviously, but the same can probably be said of writing.

Do give Lynne Truss a try, especially her kids' books.

www.lynnetruss.com/pages/content/index.asp?PageID=8

Ha! got it.

Thanks Ferguson.

thanks ferguson, thats helpful. ALso AgeofInnocence, thank you for your links.

I shall go in fully informed tomorrow.