Yr1 phonics check

[shoelaces]

How does your school tell you the results?

I know/hope they would contact me if they had concerns. But is that it? Is it normal to not know anything at all?

Not even a note saying well done/brag/boast our school/class average was x

I tried to get DD to do it again. She raised through 1st page but then refused to do anymore. Why was I getting her to do it again when she did it in school!!
I never mentioned anythinn about that being the test so I guess it’s good she remembers it!!

Yes, reporting the score has been statutory since 2013 (it wasn’t in 2012).

Oh that's interesting Feenie. DS would have done it in 2015 so they broke the rules. Will be interesting to see if they're still breaking them now. Not that I'm going to ask for it - though would probably raise a laugh if I did. I did ask for DS's Yr 2 SATs just out of nosiness.

Not hearing is not a good news. Got results in today's report, 18 out of 40.
What's more disappointing, we had an individual meeting with the teacher the same day the test was done, I asked explicitly what are chances, and got the answer that "test is this week". The teacher was thinking that 18 is might be enough? Hm

Oh no that's rubbish! We still don't have the scores and teacher has booked a meeting with me for next week, with SENCO as well. Not sure how this is going down now.

Oh dear! We just got a tick on DS report, no mark.

@karolinaNik we aren’t allowed to say how we think a child has done until the pass mark is released. The DFE do stringent spot checks.

The pass mark has always been around 32

Our reports are out next week. Tbh our school has an after school phonics group for children they are worried about that is invite only and I think these children were the ones they were worried about

Teachers have to tell parents whether or not children have passed the check but they don't have to report the individual scores.

A previous poster (can't remember who - sorry - and it was on a different page) said that their dd had told them that they got all ticks. She probably has done well, but the ticks don't necessarily mean that. Teachers carrying out the check are often advised not to use crosses as it could dent children's confidence to see lots of crosses.

Instead teachers put a tick in one column for correct responses and a tick in the other column for incorrect responses. I tend to find that my children who really struggle with phonics tend to be very pleased by my reassuring smile and all my ticks (even though they haven't actually managed to read many words correctly) whereas some of the other children will notice that a few ticks are in a different column from the other ticks and will work out that those must have been their wrong answers.

That’s interesting with regards to ticks and it does make perfect sense.

It was me who mentioned that and it was completely unprompted by my girl.
She is very eager to do well but the school have done it in a very relaxed way which I am pleased about.

We’ve not actually had report cards yet so I don’t actually know how she’s done yet. We will find out soon but it really doesn’t matter either way. She is happy and progressing in school. She tries hard and that’s all that I can ask for. And if she has not passed then she will get the extra support she requires which can only be a good thing.

About ticks during the test - explainable, as the little ones may not cope with the feeling they are not doing good.
But the whole picture of: teacher smiling and encouraging, telling to skip whatever word is difficult, saying 'well done!' and putting a sticker,
and me saying 'sorry, you didn't pass, you will have to repeat it next year' in a month after the test. This put me as a parent in a position of a 'bad guy', not mentioning that the poor kid was sure he did ok, so he started crying and telling that the teacher lied.

Cariadlet, looks like feenie's right, schools do now have to report scores to parents. Section 9.2.
www.gov.uk/government/publications/key-stage-1-phonics-screening-check-administration-guidance

Karolina, remember it doesn't make DC's reading any better or worse, it just means they should get more support next year.

Karolina, the problem here is that they've told the kids they were taking a test in the first place. DD's class didn't know they were taking a test this year let alone care whether they have to do it again. It was just another bit of reading practice with a teacher.

Schools have to inform parents of their child's score and whether they met the expected standard (Wa) or working towards the expected standard (Wt). They should also provide information about what will happen if your child is Wt.
The school and national results aren't published by the DfE.

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catkind - thanks for pointing out the paragraph.

We always reread the sections about storing the papers and administering the check in case anything has changed and to be sure we're doing everything absolutely right in case we're moderated. Other sections we just skim read and that bit had totally passed us by.

We've always told parents whether or not their child has passed the screening, but not given out the exact score (although we'll tell any parents who ask and will have a conversation with parents whose children haven't passed). We'll need to talk about that in school on Monday and have a hasty rewrite of the sheets that go out with the reports.

and me saying 'sorry, you didn't pass, you will have to repeat it next year' in a month after the test. This put me as a parent in a position of a 'bad guy', not mentioning that the poor kid was sure he did ok, so he started crying and telling that the teacher lied.

You don't need to tell them they didn't pass though.
Say "Wow you got loads right. Teacher's says you tried so hard. I'm really proud of you. Teacher says that next term you're going to do some more and do another test. Won't that be fun?"

At 6yo that's the appropriate response. Yes, at older they do need to know, but at that age all they need to know is that they're going to be doing some more (fun!) work on phonics and do the test again.

Sorry bad timing cariadlet! I expect my kids' school have been doing the same as yours. Of course if we get a hastily redesigned sheet perhaps you are our school

That paragraph has been passing you by since 2013, cariadlet! Had to tell my ds's school then, when he retook in Y2. They also failed to report school data and comparative data for the end of Y2 - you might want to check that too.

When I told the head (and knew exactly what was to be reported since I had a)read the documents and b)was responsible for reporting it all in my own school) she said I was wrong and the documents were wrong. Then she said the LEA had told her not to and so they couldn't tell me (I forwarded that to the person at the LEA who most certainly would not have told her anything of the sort) and finally, when I involved the dfe, she reported the phonics score for my child only when he started Y3.

He's in Y7 and I still don't know what his reported Science TA was. I gave up. Why can't people read documents? It's not difficult.

Also, as mrz says, you have to report to WTS parents what you're actually going to do about that. A 'conversation' isn't enough.

Reported Science in Y6, I meant. And even though Y6 teachers are required to report Science, the Science target for GCSE set for schools by the dfe actually comes from the Maths and Reading tests. What a load of bollocks! It's a mess.

You don't need to tell them they didn't pass though.
Say "Wow you got loads right. Teacher's says you tried so hard. I'm really proud of you. Teacher says that next term you're going to do some more and do another test. Won't that be fun?"

You obviously have a completely different idea of a 6yr old to me, although obviously a 6 year old who's passing the phonics check and one that's not are possibly different. I would expect the child to be interested in their score, I'd expect them to know they were doing a phonics check, I would expect them to know why they were doing it - ie care about their own teaching. To me that's how you avoid anxiety not by pretence as to what it is.

Our school told the students before parents - maybe they only did that with kids who passed but I don't see why, isn't it simply part of the child understanding their own learning goals?

One thing I really can't imagine about the above conversation though - and I can recognise why many people don't like the idea of tests etc. - is the enforced jollity of "won't that be fun" - it's very likely that any kid failing the phonics check doesn't find phonics fun at all, all of them will see through that fakeness I'd say.

I don't think any of DS Y1 classmates know what they did. That is the point really

I don't think the child anxiety that goes on in year 6 about SATs is a positive aspect of learning at all sirfred. So 100% applaud our school for protecting the children from that in Y1 and Y2. I want the kids to be excited about actual learning - the kids I read with who couldn't decode CVC words at the beginning of the year and now can are super proud of their progress and so they should be. And yes they have fun reading with me and I'm sure the same with their teachers. Even when they were needing help to decode every word we made it positive for them. I'd be really fed up on their behalf if their teachers or parents told them they'd failed at phonics. They're making good progress, if it's not enough that's much more the teachers and parent's responsibility at 6 than the child's. (Even as a volunteer I can tell which kids read at home. And which memorise because school don't provide an adequate supply of books to practice decoding.)