Is your child 'invisible' in the class?

[Trumpette]

Dc is at primary in Junior part of the school and something he said to me the other day got me thinking about whether he is invisible in the class.

He is well behaved, does what is asked of him and puts his hand up when he feels he has something valuable to say but I notice that routinely the more extrovert/outgoing children or children who struggle more in class seem to be the ones who are noticed and rewarded with certificates, badges, responsible roles etc.

I have seen similar threads on here and I suppose it made me feel a little sad for him. He does not even register who gets the certificate of the week any more. Which tells me he has switched off from the whole thing!

Is this others experience? How do you handle it?

I am loathe to mention it to the teacher as then he will be given the certificate of the week which then makes it meaningless tbh. Although I know other parents who do this (and proudly tell you they have!)

This was my DS all the way through Primary. So well behaved, so quiet, and always, always ignored. Only the pushy loud misbehaving kids got noticed. Yes it did bother him.

Same in the playground. DS waited his turn, and others push in and get away with it.

Made me very very

Hoping secondary school will be better overall, as surely they will want to reward the goods quiet ones and tell the loud pushy ones to shut the fuck up be a bit quieter

That's my boy too. Will not do anything that might leave his head sticking above the parapet. He won't even tell the teacher when he's finished the work, and it's a battle to get him to do things like hand in homework or change reading books unless everyone is doing it at the same time. Don't think it's the teacher's fault in his case, he wants to be invisible and they try quite hard to bring him out. Star of the week etc seems to be a strict rotation system

Yes my DD 6 is one of the forgotten too and she is by educational standards 'average' (hate that word!). It bothers her sometimes because she is working dam hard to achieve what she is, never gets in trouble yet constantly worries that she will be sent to the HT etc etc. She is so exhausted at the end of the day. I can see why she would like a tiny bit of recognition. I just make sure that I show her that her hard work is noticed when I attend parents evenings, read her termly profile, and end of year report. Making sure she doesn't lose the motivation is key.

This happens at work too you know.

Its just life, isn't it?

It happened to me at Secondary School - everyone (it seemed) was getting Bronze/Silver/Gold Science certificates. I never got one! I asked about it in the end after about two years, and asked what the criteria was to get a certificate. They reeled off what needed to be done for each, and I said "well, in that case I should get my Gold" and they said, no I couldn't get my Gold because I didn't have Silver and Bronze. I said that wasn't fair, because I had qualified for both ages ago and didn't get the certificate. So now had no chance of earning this award, as it was something you got between Y7-9, and this was about Christmas time in Y9, and they only ever gave them out at End of Term Assemblies

They then tried to award me the Bronze certificate at the end of Year 9 and I refused it - just refused to come up in Assembly to collect it on sheer principle (whatever that was!)

not that I'm bitter

Ds 12 is very well-behaved, diligent and bright, but I think his shyness holds him back. Just started high school and it's worrying me that his reluctance to initiate conversation or raise his hand in class will just see him ignored. His primary school was great, and when we went to another country for a few years, his teachers there were supportive too; we made a special effort to explain to them how shy he is and while we don't want him to change as that's just his personality, we didn't want it to be misinterpreted as lack of ability or willingness to try hard. Now he's at high school, I don't want to rush in, but I think I will mention it at the parent consultation, just so his teachers are aware and hopefully able to accommodate him and others like him in class. It's hard to see your child shrink when you know the true person they are and what they have to offer.

I think what you said potterwolfie is so true that I wonder whether people at school see the 'true person' that my son is. It must be hard with all the parents and (over) confident kids pushing him out of the way!

I worry it will be demotivating for him in the longer term as he is so intuitive about many things.

DS is in Y2 and all throughout Y1 he got one smiley award, which is great but they give out three per week so there is plenty of opportunity for the kids to get 3 or 4 throughout the year, and some of his classmates seemed to get them week after week. He never got star of the week.

He hardly mentioned it but i knew it got him down as he would say 'Oscar got another smiley award this week, and he would occasionally ask what he could do to get one. Invariably he was doing everything everyone else was doing but never got recognition.

Yes it is life but hells bells it was heartbreaking seeing his little face when the 'brainboxes' got an award week after week for farting in the right direction

Like a muppet i didnt say anything in Y1 as i didnt want him to get an award just because i mentioned it, however i read this thread yesterday and customercare said:

For several years she never got picked for star of the week until I finally mentioned it to the teacher. She got the star the following week. I never told my dd that I had spoken to the teacher about it but it made all the difference to my dd. She positively glowed with pride. I feel no guilt in speaking to the teacher and now wish I had fought her corner more.

I dont know if you are still reading the thread customercare but you inspired me. At parents evening last night i mentioned it to DS's Y2 teacher. I said i wasnt mentioning it with a view to him getting an award this week but could she please be aware that DS is motivated by and responds to reward. 'Any' kind of reward. She was lovely about it and said she had made a note of it and would make sure he gets a bit more praise when it is deserved.

I feel so much happier now i have said something. i couldnt give a shiney shite if he just gets an award right away because i have mentioned it. He doesnt know that and never will

So thank you customercare and everyone else on the thread for giving me the oomph to say something

I think it is quite possible to tell your child what you think of these awards. Not when they are 4 years old and in reception, but by the time they are in juniors, just tell them. Remind them how of course the 100% kids get awards, but also how the strugglers get them because they are struggling.

A child older than 6 does not need to be jealous of an award Jimmy got for not biting anybody. Tell them, share your insight, they won't WANT such an award. Hell, go as far as telling them "I'll mention it at teacher's evening, so you get one". Watch them get it, tell them why. They will never worry about it again, after all these are the children who work well just because.

Yep this is DS to a tee. In his year 2 class they have a daily award and 4 weekly awards, so nearly 6 weeks in there have been 48 chances for him to get something and 35 children in the class, so some must have had at least 2 awards while DS has had NOTHING. It's heartbreaking as he thinks he isn't trying hard enough and can't understand why children who have 'been in red and amber' have had the awards but not him.

Yeah, ok

That was to reni2 btw.

Who I would like to award a sticker for achievement in the "Spectacularly misses the point while simultaneously being outstandingly condescending" category.

I used to think this about my son, always did as he was told, laid back child who just got on with work. Always went under the raider. More recently I had to go in because we kept getting letters home about how wonderful the school was in terms of their class incentives and yet his teacher didn't use any of them....or he wasn't getting any! As soon as I mentioned this to his teacher she gave him 8 house points in one day! However, I also have a very extrovert confident child who doesn't get chosen because they want to give the less confident children a chance.

It is incredibly difficult when you have a class of 30 children. It's hard in a class of 24, but doable. If we had smaller classes, this wouldn't be so much of an issue.

Yes, class size doesn't seem to impact GCSE results- but there is so much more to school than results.

Why, MovingOn? I often hear people saying the happy middle isn't recognised, this can be true in some schools and I would not allow a child to suffer thinking they are not cut out for getting these awards when it is obvious how they are handed out, I think that would be cruel. Much better they concentrate on things they can achieve.

Luckily our present school isn't like that, but I've seen it previously.