All classes ripping out work from exercise books...

[EllenJaneisnotmyname]

...and having to rewrite them more neatly. Headteacher told the whole school in assembly that their work was too untidy. They spent 3 days rewriting literacy and maths. 'Outstanding' school hasn't had an Ofsted for ages...

School not outstanding, start looking for alternatives - this is completely destructive and shoddy behaviour.

I was extremely shocked. DS3 is in Y5, I'm not taking him out now. I've never been too happy with the attitude of the HT, he's an arse, but, heigh ho!

I'm not sure I understand? The children have been told to rip pages out and do it again more tidily? I'm not sure I see a problem with a teacher saying work is too messy and to do it again.

But if they're only doing it for an ofsted inspection and normally couldn't care less I'd be annoyed.

It's the fact that 7 classes have been doing this all in the same three days. (Just after the LA advisor had been visiting) It makes me wonder if perhaps it was the marking that wasn't up to scratch and this is the only way they change it. Smacks of cheating to me and what an example to set!

Petrean what bothers me about this is the fact that it is mass punishment - surely in those 7 classes there will have been pupils whose work was up to standard?

The timing is also pretty suspicious, and I really don't think spending 3 whole days copying out work is going to have a useful impact - not to mention wasting 3 days of teaching time.

Aaahhh I see... Have you confronted asked the Head? I really don't see why they should be ripping pages out of exercise books. A neat cross through should suffice. And maybe they need to mark properly and more consistently next time.

Hopefully when the inspectors wander around chatting to DCs they will innocently mention it.

My DS had all his homework ripped out of his hw book and it was actually quite neat for him. There seemed to be no judgement being made on whose books were targetted, which makes me think perhaps it was a marking issue. Poor marking techniques so all the books needed redoing?

I think an innocent question on the Ofsted parental questionnaire might be in order?

Even better EllenJane-you can't rely on DCs mentioning it.

Ask DS about the marking of the new work-I expect it is better than their first effort!

I think the marking has been a bit secretarial, ie correcting all the mistakes in red pen rather than just pointing out errors and getting the children to do their own corrections. Very little peer marking etc.

That was my thought EllenJane-nothing to do with DCs work-more the teachers work! Ofsted will be scrutinising top, middle, bottom and SEN work and they are very hot on marking.

A bit late for peer marking though.

True. I haven't dared mention it at the school where I work as a TA, which is just down the road from my DS3's school. Oh well, 9 1/2 years down, 18 months to go...

Eh? HT asks the pupils to do their work again and suddenly there's a conspiracy to hide "poor marking"?

Does no-one trust their childrens' schools any more?

HT asked 7 classes, reception to Y6, to rip out marked work, to rewrite it, not differentiating between children, just after an LA advisor visited, when an Ofsted is expected any day... No I'm not at all suspicious of his motives.

But Ofsted will see the books with most of the work missing in an instant. Every page you rip out causes the corresponding page in the other half of the book to fall out too, and exercise books aren't that thick! They'll have nothing in their books for, what? A couple of weeks? Half a term? Ofsted is going to want to know what they were doing...

They would have to start from scratch with brand new books, and copy out the whole lot - or is that what they're doing?

Sounds suspicious to me! Bloody OFSTED! The hoops we have to go through...I hope parents appreciate the sheer bloody stress it puts school staff under?

jam - Not sure that it's OFSTEDs fault. The HT is choosing to do this for whatever reason - but almost certainly OFSTED haven't asked them to.

Ofsted most definitely won't have asked them! Children have had to redo all the work ripped out, including the corresponding pages opposite the staples.

As a matter of interest, has anyone come across this site? parentview.ofsted.gov.uk/ It was mentioned at work today as being one of the things that would trigger an Ofsted inspection on a school, obviously factoring in malicious posts. Very interesting, schools don't seem to be publicising it.

That didn't work! parentview.ofsted.gov.uk/

He might have meant just tear the pages out so it's easier to copy them than having to refer back all the time? Was he aggressive or was that how all the children painted it?

I think all children should have a wake-up call every now and then. The teachers probably feel they are in just as much trouble!

He's very quietly spoken, but the children were all upset. It seems a very draconian measure to get children rewriting pages and pages for 3 days.