B for effort

[Feenie]

Anyone care to offer an explanation as to why ds's report, full of praise about what a lovely little boy he is, kind and thoughtful, always does his best work and tries his hardest, then cites B for effort for everything?

But...you just said he always does his best....

Erm, erm, erm

Admittedly, I've had a heck of a day (which is why I'm still up) but, even I can see that is contrary.

So he tries his best, but attains a B for effort ... What does an A require? Blood, sweat and tears?

Well done to your DS (and a D- in report writing for his teacher )

Perhaps he does his best with encouragement and a bit of support rather than independently?

Because effort grades are a load of old bollocks.

Seriously, they are arbitrarily arrived at and meaningless at best. One person cannot accurately gauge the amount of effort another is making, it's absurd.

Think of the poor kid with low attainment grades and high effort grades- they are effectively being told that no matter how hard they try, they will never achieve more than this (low) grade.

Because some teachers reserve A for effort for the girl, it's always a girl. Who writes far more than necessary in immaculate handwriting.

Also as the previous poster said they are totally arbitrary.

Because I got As I often got B for effort when in fact I deserved a C or a D.

I was just good at last minute cramming.

Star that maybe true, but at my DCs school girls have to get 95% effort or more to get a prize, boys only need about 90%. Although how you can give a percentage for effort is pretty rubbish too, even more of a guess than A to E. so for a girl she just needs any teacher to "not like her" or mark her down and she falls out of the golden zone.

DS has a report for Spanish (secondary) that reads: Effort: Poor. Behaviour: Poor. Homework: Poor. Progress: Satisfactory...
then the personal note from the teacher underneath says 'DS has worked well this year'

Huh?

My DS got As and Bs but then the comments basically tore him apart, his work was poor, he never concentrated and my personal favourite he had a speech impediment (which he doesn't) (hmm)

I agree with tethers.

There is no way to measure effort.

Do you have to report on effort in your school report?

Anyway. As you know. it doesn't matter what he gets in his school report.

I know, I know, you are right. It just irked me. And don't get me started on the ridiculously defensive letter that was sent to justify the phonics screening result.....

We do report effort, but if I said someone always tries hard and always does their best work, I would give an A!

How badly did they do in the phonics test? :)

Let's really hope that the schools which have been dragging their heels all teach their kids better next year.....

I am guessing very badly, given the defensive letter, the last sentence of which said 'Only 32% of children passed the pilot last year'.

If you put the letter I sent out next to it you would think we were from different planets.

I hope they are panicking big time.

Don't need a daily phonics session, my foot!

Interesting. We are reporting 'attitude to learning' (on a 4 point scale) for the first time this year - and the head has been forensic in pointing out where the text in our reports doesn't match those grades and demanding that one or the other be changed.

I'm also thinking 'crikey' about your letter, Feenie. Even we got more than twice the level in the pilot, and that class has about 30% SEN and 25%+ who hadn't set foot in any childcare or educational setting until the beginning (or in a couple of cases, the middle) of Reception. And we're worried that our score is rather low.....

My ds exceptions report except his science mark which was very average
But
He won the years science prize
Go figure

That is not what I typed

My ds's report was good except...

"What's the point in working harder if you get an A grade anyway?"

Well, he may just have scraped into the A band but be capable of more. IMO doing the bare minimum in order to get a grade is not a good attitude. And I say that as someone with a child who is often doing the bare minimum to get a grade :o

I used to like it when my DS got an A for achievement but only a C for effort. He decided it was better than an AA, because he had achieved an A grade without trying too hard!

DS1 enjoys recounting the tale of his friend who got an A*(attainment) E (effort) for some language or other. The child is bilingual.

I would have thought effort marks measure how attentive & focused the child is about their work. Pretty easy to tell whether child is paying attention or not.

Nope, have got : 'Always does his best work', 'listens well', 'contributes to class discussions with careful thought'.

Fallen Caryatid, sorry I missed yours before, which sounded plausible, but have reread report and it says 'works well independently and cooperatively with a partner or with a group'.

Still !

I'm struggling to think of a reason for you too and the best that I can come up with is that he does all the things you say but sometimes he does something else which isn't so good likes talks too much or day dreams, not at important moments when obviously he is paying attention but more in the free time when they are just left to get on. Or maybe it is just because doing things well doesn't mean you couldn't do them better with a bit of effort but that still doesn't make sense with the 'he always does his best work' comment.

However I am clutching at straws and my DS2 (yr3) got almost identitical comments to your DS and got straight '1's (the highest in his report) for effort in everything so I can't see why your DS got the grades he did either. Tbh, not getting the top grade for effort after comments like that would upset me more than mistakes in attainment grades because all you can ask is that your child do their best and if that isn't being recognised that is a real shame. I can see why it bothers you and I would award the teacher a C- for effort on this one and not checking for consistency.

DontEatTheVolesKids, if you are marking how attentive and focused a child is, then all you are measuring is their on-task behaviour; this is not an accurate indicator of effort. For example, for some children the task could be very interesting and they are absorbed by it; they are actually making very little effort, yet are focused and attentive.

For some children, getting to school at all requires more effort than may be apparent; they and others may display more off-task behaviour, but are making more effort IYSWIM.

I think dd2's teacher looked at effort and attainment separately. Dd2 looked and saw she had 2 for effort and 1 for attainment. She then said smugly she obviously didn't need to work hard. I don't think that's what the teacher meant. She may be a bright little girl who can coast at the top end, but she's not producing her best work.

Her report also said that she was very academic, particularly in one subject-that she didn't get the highest level for Actually I think she is better on the one she got the highest level for, but I did wonder what the teacher thought by writing that, and then giving a lower level.

Also different teachers may have different ways of assessing them. When we had effort/attainment at secondary school, I remember one teacher almost never gave above a B for either. My dsis who'd got about 98% still got a B for attaintment