Secondary Teacher Help Please

[Jammeroo]

Hello

I've had my S3's report. In the majority of subjects they say she has achieved second level and the progress between levels is first stage of progression achieved apart from English where her achievement level is third level.

First of all does your school track progress like that? I feels really wordy and hard to understand.

Second point - from my understanding for her to have the ability to get Nat 5s in S4 she should have complete level 4 by the end of S3. From your experience can someone at this stage of S3 with her levels outlined above reach that or are we looking at her doing Nat 4 in fourth year?

Thank you

School reports are useless, and have always been. I want to know percentiles. The average percentile for the school and where my child sits on it, and the average percentile in Scotland and where they sit on it. S3 and beyond I want to know their predicted grade and what grade they are capable if they worked hard.

I am not interested in hearing whether they are within a two year wide level. I’m really not. It’s worthless. Give us meaningful measurements please!

This "second level" and "third level" stuff is teacher speak and totally meaningless for parents. Fine if you're using that language in schools with colleagues who understand it all but please stop using it on reports and in face to face meetings.

I also have a child in s3. All I want to know is whether he's behaving himself in class, trying his best and whether you as a teacher think he'd cope well with Nat 5 next year. Or not.

I may be wrong and the school may be reporting their levels differently but level 2 is broadly p4-7 for many pupils I thought? Our school does level 3 and four broadly in 1-3 year for most pupils, some will obviously be working at level 2 but I think they would have told you a lot earlier if you child wasn't on track to be doing nat 5 in s4, they would have done quite a bit of the course by now I would have thought. Nat 4 can be a stepping stone though I think. They may already be working on it in class as there are no exams. The reports are not clear as despite having more than one child, I didn't realize level 4 was different from nat 4. Maybe ask for a longer parents meeting to understand what it means and that your child is progressing on the right path for them.

I'm not disagreeing re the levels, but don't think this is something decided by teachers or schools - the CFE levels they are reporting are from the Scottish government's curriculum for excellence.
OP I'd say level 2 is very unusual in S3. I would ask the school for more info.

OP - I had similar queries to you but more around the "emerging, enhancing" steps for next level. DD also in S3 and and queried it at a recent parents night, the teacher basically said that the levels and the "emerging, enhancing" progress is a tick box exercise that they don't even understand clearly. Although the process is set by the Scottish Government it is up to each school (teacher even) to decide, there is no science in it and it depends what teaching point they are at in the curriculum with regard to what level is achieved. They will tend to mark a whole class as having achieved a certain level.

Parents night gave me a chance to ask if they thought she would be fine at Nat5 level - all but one did think that she would be fine. The subject that didn't think she would be fine had on the recent report as having achieved the same levels as all the other subjects (who did think she would be fine) so it shows that if you get a chance speak to the teachers you will get a clearer idea.

I very much agree with this, @StrictlyPrue . And it's great that we are back to face to face parents' evenings to get that sort of information face to face. Look, I'm not stupid. DH and I are both graduates, I'm 2/3 of the way through a Masters. I know how to read. But it sometimes seems as if the way schools are asked to present information to parents is as difficult to interpret as possible. Recent S6 daughter's report with "target grades" for the Highers and Advanced Highers she is doing - Highers are graded A, B, C, D etc. But her working grades are 3 or 4, and her target grades are 2. You have to read through the accompanying bumf to find out that actually, there are bands with in the A and the B grades and that's what the schools are working on, although in most cases it matters not one jot to students or parents whether their B is a high B or a low B. It's a B.

It's just all so much more complicated than it needs to be. Parents who are not up to speed with all the bands and levels, or those who have English as a second language, must be totally bamboozled.

I think in secondary school reports are increasingly for the pupils, not for the parents. Kids recognise the grades and levels, and comments have to be so specific regarding academic improvement that most parents won't necessarily understand them.

I've just had ds's first S1 target report and all it has is bronze, silver or gold next to each subject area. He has a mix of gold, couple of silver and 1 bronze (English). This tells me nothing, except perhaps asking him to work harder in English class?

I left school 16yrs ago and have a masters degree and I don't get it. We don't have parents evening until June, so I just have to guess he's doing okay?

I've just had ds's first S1 target report and all it has is bronze, silver or gold next to each subject area. He has a mix of gold, couple of silver and 1 bronze (English). This tells me nothing, except perhaps asking him to work harder in English class?

I left school 16yrs ago and have a masters degree and I don't get it. We don't have parents evening until June, so I just have to guess he's doing okay?

Our school does bronze silver gold for attitude and attainment. But you could be level 3 gold in one subject and level 4 bronze in another and the level 4 bronze is higher. They really should explain it properly.

I’m a secondary school teacher. Lots of this is govt mandated, and very wordy.
We can not write that a pupil has achieved a certain level until every single outcome is achieved. But your child is probably already working within the next level. They also don’t have to achieved all of level 4 to sit N5. Lots of pupils will not see achieved level 4 on a tracking and monitoring report, but will sit N5s.

The progress level is just if they’re on track, or ahead. It sounds as though your child is doing exactly what they need to be doing- hence the level 2.