When to go and see the teacher about work being 'too easy' without looking like an awful Tiger Mother?!

[harrietlichman]

My ds2 is in year one and though by no means a 'G&T' candidate, he is pretty advanced at spelling and reading - he can easily spell the words that dd1 brings home (Year 4) for her spelling work, for example.
This week he bought home the class newsletter which asks parents to help children with their spellings for a weekly test, along with a list of new words. They were all two letter words (on, at, etc) and absolutely no challenge to him whatsover.
I am reluctant to go in to school in a way, because I don't want to come across as a pushy parent who thinks her son is some sort of genius (!) but at the same time I am slightly concerned about what appears to be a lack of differentiation in the class.
So my question is WWYD? My dh thinks I should leave it as that is obviously what everyone in the class is doing at the moment, but my gut feeling is that he is just wasting time on this and should be being challenged a bit more.

[SummerRainIsADistantMemory]

We glanced at the spellings and tables for the first time at 8:45 this morning. Both my children got all of them right. Ds1 says no-one else in his class got any of their Irish spellings right at all and those children probably did learn them all week long.

So much as it can be frustrating when he's bored, I'm very grateful that at least he isn't working his arse off and still struggling like some of his peers.

[cece]

Just before the Christmas holidays DS1 came home with a certificate for getting 100% in spellings tests for the whole of the Autumn term. I was a little surprised as I didn't know he had been doing them. Apparently he had been given lists every week but hadn't brought them home as he knew the words already!

[SummerRainIsADistantMemory]

Cece

The only reason I even bother on a Friday morning is because of the Irish spellings, they don't even look up from their breakfast the little sods.

They certainly don't get it from me, my spelling is tragic

[ipadquietly]

I think certificates for spelling tests are ridiculous. Some children (as we've heard) don't have to look at the spellings to get them all right, and some children learn them night after night after night, and still get some wrong. IMHE it's grossly unfair to reward for something that has taken no effort whatsoever.

[madwomanintheattic]

Quite.

But then if you are rewarding effort, it would be mostly impossible for bright kids to get anything, as school don't bother to challenge them.

[musicalfamily]

Yes that's another bugbear of mine - ie no rewards for bright, well behaved children - and it does affect their confidence. Every child likes to be recognised for achievement and effort.

[learnandsay]

Parents can give rewards and make them as "school inspired" as they want. I once wrote in my daughter's reading diary praise for her written stories because the teacher seemed to have ignored them. My daughter was made up and I took her to a cafe, her favourite thing to do at the moment, as a treat.

[mrz]

I find the idea that bright, well behaved children aren't rewarded very odd and that it would be impossible to reward them for effort.

[mrz]

too early for me that doesn't make sense!

I find the idea that bright, well behaved children aren't rewarded or that it would be impossible to reward them for effort very odd.

[learnandsay]

It's a half truth, of course they're rewarded all the time. But the impossibility statement came in relation to children who have learned things effortlessly, and therefore theoretically shouldn't be rewarded for effort in those cases. And the angst about good children's rewards commonly stems from bad children being rewarded for being good, exceptional children being rewarded for being exceptional and decent children in the middle getting nothing.

[mrz]

Effort is also about the care you take with your work not just knowing the answer before the other people in the class. It's about doing the best you possibly can regardless of ability.

[learnandsay]

Sure, but isn't that pointing towards the lower end of achievement? At the higher end were starting to talk about differentiation. If it takes no effort for a child to remember her spellings, so little in fact that she never even takes them out of her bag, then should she get a certificate? Why not give her a certificate for putting all the spellings into a lovely poem (at least she read them!) and give Little Jonny a certificate for spelling five out of ten correctly at his fifty fourth attempt?

[learnandsay]

Obviously with my daughter it's too early to tell; they haven't had any spellings yet. But we all know they're coming. For some reason my daughter has memorised the whole list of tricky words. That's the list that she's going to be asked to spell. I think it's a bit unfair if she memorised the list several months before the words were set and someone else learned them as weekly spellings (the way they are supposed to be learned) that she would get a certificate. That's not the idea of weekly spellings. If there was a remember the whole list a month in advance certificate then sure, give it to her.

[mrz]

Personally I wouldn't give spelling lists to take home to memorise as all the research suggests that it's a pretty pointless exercise (and I wouldn't reward a child for behaving as they should).

[cece]

I agree about the certificate. I was quite cross when he got it as I knew how little he had to do to earn it.

I have the same problem with the times tables test each week. He does them with no effort whatsoever, whilst his friends/peers struggle to learn them every week. However, recently he's been getting one wrong every week, so I have been asking him why he's not getting them all right? LOL

[learnandsay]

Hey, well don't tease him, cece. Once or twice maybe it's funny. The chances are they're odd numbered tables and he actually has to think about a couple!

[SummerRainIsADistantMemory]

Or he's getting one wrong on purpose as he was getting comments from the other kids...

[simpson]

My DS (yr3) finds times tables effortless and spellings too (we never practise at home ) but he forgets to apply the spellings in his writing...

DD (reception) gets 10 spellings a week which she insists on doing most days and a test of Fridays.

She also knows her tricky words so one of her homework tasks is to write sentences with certain tricky words in (4 a week).

However the difference with her is that she does seem to remember her spellings and put them in her writing...

She got three (pointless IMO) certificates for knowing tricky word list 1, 2 and 3 but the school gave up after that as she knew all the other lists too....

[LivingInAPinkBauble]

Currently teach year 5 but send out 6 levels of spellings-from very simple high frequency to new vocabulary and words much harder to sound out etc. it is all on a spreadsheet, I print out the words and children stick them in their homework diaries. Takes very little time and I don't have a TA. I also differentiated spellings in year 1. I would ask.

[learnandsay]

skull, you're probably just lucky. In a lot of cases people do ask and don't get.

[mam29]

my dd nearly always got 10/10spellings test in year 1.

same happened in 1st term year 2.

She passed phonics tesr year 1 so was in top phonics group.
There were 3phonics groups within her class of 30.

they all had different spellings.

lower groups had easier and less words I gather.

dd moved schools.

shes now getting xtra help with spelling.

They recognise shes good at phonics but spelling and readings diffret whereas old school felt everything was just fine.

The problem was she could learn and memorise words

few weeks later couldent remember some of them.

her written works littered with spelling mistakes.

so now she gets something called zapper cards the teacher identifies ords within her written word that are wrong and they get sent home to to work on which seems more sensible.

[drivemenuts]

Sorry Harrietlichman, what is wrong in being a tiger mum if ur child is capable. We've had similar concerns where we felt the teachers were not pushing our DS enuf, when approached we got a lot of excuses as to how he likes being in his comfort zone & does not want to be challenged. But after a lil more encouragement from the same teacher he is now performing above his yr.

Even though his class has children in diff groups according to their capabilities, so each child can work at their own pace,we still faced this problem. I cannot understand how can teachers miss such talent.

Sadly for this very reason, we r moving our son to independent schools now, as we are afraid in a class of 30-32 kids he may not get the attention he needs & may lose all the momentum & interest he shows in his work rt now. But please speak up for ur child because it is a matter of thier education.

[Feenie]

Teachers were not pushing your ds 'enuf'?

Thier education?

Wow.

[madwomanintheattic]

Bwah ha ha.