Do you see your child's school work?

[LifeIsBetterInFlipFlops]

Interested to see if this is normal, I never see my child's work.

I understand that school work books can't be sent home, as many may not make it back to school. But I would love to know what DS does, how his work is presented and what sort of marks or corrections have been made.

I'm not talking about a big showcase event, but just an opportunity to regularly see his work. I'm not looking for teacher assessment or feedback, just a chance to see with my own eyes, how he is doing.

We do have half termly newsletters covering topics. We have homework projects and parental involvement sessions once a year, where we go and help the children with a specific workshop. But non of this shows day to day working.

I'm interested in both teaching and parental points of view.

We have work sharing afternoon once per term plus we see the books at Parents. Eve and at other times on request. We get given all the work at the end of the year.

Thank you for all your responses.

I haven't been concerned in the past, when I could see progress through the levels and sub-levels; but the school have stopped using them and are now saying he is 'secure', but I find this too general, and can't see if progress is made or not, hence the reason for wanting to see his work.

We sometimes see odd bits at pickup time, and then all the books are in pile for us to see at parents' evening, and then at the end of the year they mostly come up except for the odd thing they hold back for continuity, and then we get that later.

If your school don't give you a chance once a term as a matter of course, I'd ask for a time slot to go in and look.
The things I am interested in are the work itself, including the frequency of extended writing, but particularly the quality of marking and if there is follow-up from the child to address ideas for improvement.
When I have looked round potential schools for my DC I have always asked to see marked work, for the same reasons.

Hi Lifeisbetterinflipflops:

First of love your username! and totally agree! Bring on summer.

This has been my experience as well - however your school should let you see workbooks at parent/ teacher evenings.

At our schools (DD2 moved primaries - so I have experience of 2 now) - the workbooks are set out for parents to thumb through whilst they wait and you can continue to look through them after the meeting.

If your school doesn't do something like this - I'd just contact them, explain that you feel 'out of the loop' in terms of what work your child is doing and that you'd like to come in a bit early (one morning/ afternoon) and look through his workbooks.

I also think that if they don't regularly share work with parents - you could contact HT and suggest that at parent/ teacher meetings the school could consider making work available for waiting parents to look through. It certainly means that we aren't too bothered if meetings are running late - which seems to be the norm.

HTH

Can you make an appointment to talk to the class teacher. Personally I'm happy for parents to pop in anytime after school to look at books and have a chat

Lifeisbetterinflipflops consider secure as you would level*B

We can go into the classroom before school everyday and so once or twice a fortnight I ask DD to show me her work. If her teacher is there she often suggests something. But this is Y3, don't know if less opportunities as they get older.

Still more responses...thank you!

PastSellByDate - well right back at you...love your username too - and thanks for telling of your experience.

mrz - his teacher isn't the most approachable, but yes - I will ask her. Thanks for comment re levels; I have a further question...he is currently 'secure' but how do I know if he has made progress, he could be bumping along the bottom of this level or steaming ahead at the top, or indeed dropped from top to bottom iyswim?

The teacher should be able yo tell you what he was assessed at in September

He was 4c in September at start of year 4 (maths), predicted 'secure' in July. But he's already secure, so I won't know if he's slipped or gained.