Do examples of you DC's classwork get sent home?

[PastSellByDate]

Hello Mumsnet Primary Talk:

I'm a very old thing (40 was a while ago) but in my day (when dinosaur's walked the land) worksheets and marked tests used to make their way home constantly. Although we have homework - it's rather a one-way process - as we don't see our DCs' work actually marked - we just get stickers in the homework log and the usual Well Done! or Teacher's initials. We do see spelling test results (which are in the back of the spelling book) but that's it in terms of seeing how our DCs' are doing on tests.

I've been talking with friends here and we're all wondering what happens elsewhere. Do examples of the things your children are working on during the week make it home? (for example do you get science or language worksheets, English comrpehension/ grammar worksheets, History worksheets, examples of writing or a poem, maths problems, etc...)

We've been told this kind of thing can't be sent home because it's needed for Ofsted. Is that true?

I'd personally love to see my of my children's work - I think it would give me a better sense that things are happening (learning is going on).

At our school, work usually only gets sent home at the end of the school year. Parents are given their child's books to look at on parents' evenings but these are not taken home.

Same as Coppertop. And nothing is "marked" in terms of marks out of 10 etc. It's all comments, "well done" stickers and suggestions of things they could do better next time.

We have three parents' evenings per year, where all their books are available to look at. Also three reports, which have quite a lot of detail about what level they are working at, progress since last report etc.

Thanks coppertop & AChickenCalledKorma:

That's pretty much what we get.

However I'm left wondering why only 4-6 pieces of work per topic (math, science, Writing, History or Geography topic for term - usually a display with examples of work) was in 'topic workbooks' for parents to see at our school for the late October parent/ teacher meetings. (We started beginning Sept. - so after 7 1/2 weeks of school)

That works out to about 3 pieces of pretty small examples of written work per week achieved (even allowing for nothing week 1 and nothing week of meetings) for the workbooks + 1 example (if selected) for class display board.

I know that the kids do a lot of work sheets & 'working out' sheets, as well as writing exercises, but we seem to only be shown a selection (also the selection is different between children - even if in the same group - almost as if they're trying to show best work to reassure us they're doing well - rather than many examples of work (some of which may be dreadful) to demonstrate progression).

For example, they've done a book about facts related to their history topic on the computer but a copy was not sent home (or e-mailed if printing cost is an issue) to parents. Why not?

If you're a teacher and know what is done with this type of work, I'd love to know. Is it kept as evidence of progress or something? How do you select what to show parents?

What year group/s are you interested in? The reasoning (or lack of) behind the answers to your question will vary greatly between years 1 & 6.

My parents see everything at parents evenings and if they want to look at other times then we can arrange a mutually convenient time. Have you asked the classteacher these questions?
As for why those pieces of work were not sent home, I'm guessing that time was probably the major factor.

My DCs' school invites parents to a 'Mummy & Daddy Come and see what I have done" event at least once a year (sorry, the name is a bit twee!).

It's usually held in the last 45 minutes of the school day. The children have a selection of their books on their tables and have put stickers on their best work to show you. Then they take you on a tour of the classroom, the playground, the toilets...This is in addition to target-setting and parents evenings.

My DD is at a French school and a selection of exercise books come home every Friday, including the "cahier du jour" in which the children do a test every single day in either literacy or numeracy eg dictation, spelling test, arithmetic. Everything is marked - only work that is 100% perfect gets an A; one mistake and you get a B.

I like getting her books home as it is the only way we have of knowing what she is being taught in class, and on occasion it is useful to revisit a topic with her that she hasn't fully grasped.

We get to see the work every half term and (most of) it gets sent home at the end of each term (I assume some is retained for files, or perhaps some is just copied).