Dear all:
Very interesting discussion here.
First kezza1230987 - I'm not sure by levels whether you mean book bands (the colour bands on the back of books either issued by school or by reading book company - like Oxford Reading Tree) or whether you mean that the teacher has told you your DD is 2 National Curriculum levels behind the rest of her class (info on NC Levels here: www.mumsnet.com/learning/assessment/national-curriculum-levels & then follow links to further discussion of NC Levels.
Now several but mainly learnandsay have been discussion whether the issue isn't that parents know too much. I think you do have a point, but I'd like to be the devil's advocate here and say that information is power.
Our school studiously avoided telling parents how their children were doing, what they would be working on or even sending home homework. The culture at our school was do as little as possible, it was obvious in everything that occurred. Things only started improving once OFSTED contacted the school to say they'd be inspecting sometime after Sept 2011.
Suddenly there was homework.
Suddenly parents were informed about progression against NC Levels
Suddenly there were e-mails to parents with information on school issues/
activities/ special events/ etc...
Suddenly there were interventions for pupils with poor reading/ writing/ maths
Suddenly there was on-line maths homework
Suddenly there were policy documents for pretty well everything
Suddenly there were parent surveys
Suddenly there were curriculum meetings
Suddenly there was a move to improve standards & attainment
Suddenly there was moodle - so each class could have additional on-line
resources to support learning
Suddenly the school started doing its job...
I know there are fabulous teachers out there - many of our friends and family are such teachers so don't get me wrong - but...
there is something wrong with a school that the solution to children performing badly isn't to help them but move them down a group.
there is something seriously wrong when your child is going to a school that is content to move a child down a reading group because of an outburst and then force that child to read books she'd read before and could read with ease for the next 12 weeks.
there is something wrong with a school that when they have able students they have those students spend their time in school teaching other students
there is something wrong with a school when parents ask for help or advice about supporting their child's learning that they're usually always told 'Oh we don't do that/ don't recommend that at XXXXX primary school'.
there's something wrong with a school when parents raise a complaint (no matter how gently) and are always told 'Nobody has every had a problem with this before, we find people from.... or professionals.... or _ fill in the blank often have expectations that our out of line with what we provide under the national curriculum.
there is something wrong with a school that refuses to teach column addition/ subtraction until Year 5 - that refuses to teach simple division (division with remainders) until Year 6 - that refuses to teach beyond x2, x5 and x10 in KS1...
I could go on but I think you get the idea.
Trust me the availability of on-line information, Campaign for Real Education documentation, OFSTED videos/ policy documents, the Vorderman report on word-class mathematical education for all, etc... have been a huge help in ensuring my expectations, concerns and ideas for solutions were in fact valid and most importantly, reasonable and in some cases best practice.
The fact that I've had to go away and research maths curriculum and what should be taught when and how is quite simply ridiculous. However, it has been worth it to have OFSTED agree with me that the provision of mathematics at our school has to improve. I am gratified for my DDs, but genuinely pleased for all of the pupils at the school. They're lovely, bright and lively kids that all deserve a good start in life, which includes basic numeracy skills.