YR7 Report - Am I right to Feel Disappointed & Should I Query This With School ??

[RockinHippy]

DD has been very ill & only made it into school for a few days since early in the year. Up until recently, even though I asked from day one, there was nothing offered in the way of work for her, just reassurance that she is doing so well that there was no need to worry, she will soon catch up. DD is very ill/in a lot of pain, so does struggle to do any work, so this was a bit of a relief for a stressy, perfectionist DD & we are just relieved the school don't pressure us at what is already a very difficult time.

She has managed to keep up a bit with some homework grid stuff & has more recently had some work from school, which she's been doing subject by subject as she was getting very anxious & struggled more if she tries to flit between subjects. The illness is affecting ability to think straight & she's very hard on herself over this, so it's been a real a balancing act.

Just received her school report, which for most subjects is good/excellent & about 1/3 "insufficient data"

I'm not understanding how some subject teachers can mark her & others not.

One of the unmarked "insufficient data" subjects gives her a z grade, which I know DD will take literally & freak at, as this is a subject that she has some major confidence issues with (thanks to some odd belittling teaching methods & a personality clash in yr6) I spoke with one of this subjects teachers quite recently & they had nothing but praise for DD & her ability in the subject, so I'm very puzzled. Other subject teachers have managed a mark with less to go on.

Also I'm not understanding the "attitude to learning" Mark - notes with the report explain that kids with 1.8 or higher do better in their GCSEs & that it's taken as an average of the marks of individual teachers/subjects

DD falls below 1.8, but with good & excellent attitude to learning comments all the way through, bar of course the "insufficient data" subjects - does this look like an average that includes these subjects in the figure, therefore lowering her potential score?

I have a very ill & emotional DD on my hands & despite there being some subjects with lovely complimentary remarks & scores, DD being DD will only see the missing ones, plus she's going to feel very disappointed where there's no score when she has tried hard to work recently in that subject. So I can't show her this report, which considering we are trying very hard to help DD still feel connected to the school, is disappointing to say the least :(

AIBU to not understand this & want to query why it seems some teachers have made an effort to score her & others not ??? & has this affected her "attitude to learning score"

Or am I completely misunderstanding how the system works

I'm sorry you are going through this. It must be tough.

It sounds like a relatively automated report which can't cope with your daughter's unique situation. In your position, I would avoid showing it to her and get straight on the phone to the school to arrange an appointment with her Form Tutor/Head of Year or whoever is appropriate, so that you can have a proper discussion. Really, what you need is some specific comments from subject teachers that you can share with your daughter and reassure her about keeping in contact with school. But assuming you are in England, there's not much time to turn it around.

Or hide it and make sure you have a meeting early next term to have a similar conversation and agree how the school will provide your daughter with feedback appropriate to her situation.

It's not remotely on the same scale, but we had a similar format of report last term, which marked DD down for only "sometimes" handing in homework. She was outraged because they'd only had one piece of homework in that subject and she had done it on time. But "computer said no".

Hiya

I PM'ed you a few times last summer over the appeal situation. My dd goes to the same school as yours.

I suspect the ATL is based on all subjects, irrespective of circumstances. I would have thought that given your daughter's unique situation they could have worked something out though.

Teachers also tick the wrong boxes sometimes - my older DC got an non-excellent/good grade in a previous report and the teacher acknowledged it was wrong, but the report was never changed or reissued, the teacher just said 'yes, it was a mistake'.

I suppose they don't always consider the impact any perceived negative comments/marks can make on sensitive children, but given your daughter's circumstances I would definitely go in, and ask if they could put together a report for her that better reflects how she has done this year.

They may not be able to change the report the have issued, but they could get something together in the last few days of term next week and get it sent out to you. Maybe in a different more personalised format, but something that will act as a positive for your daughter who must be having a tough time. This is an occasion where one size does not fit all.

How is your DD's form tutor? If they aren't great, go straight to the person whose name was on the emailed copy of the report. She is quite old school, but I hope would take this seriously. Best of luck.

I don't know anything of the history, so am only commenting on your OP, but if she's missed virtually two terms out of three, then I'm more surprised that it isn't marked as 'insufficient data' for all subjects.
Clearly there is more going on here than report grades, so I'd just file it away and not show her - if she asks, just say they weren't able to write on as she's not been there for them to assess he over the Spring and Summer Terms.
Some subjects might not have even seen her at all - it's fairly common in secondary schools for subjects to be 'blocked' into 4 blocks over the year so the teachers taking the 'blocks' in the Spring and Summer Terms won't have had any work from her I presume?

I think I would focus more on getting support for whatever it is that is making her unwell / keeping her off, and worry about grades and reports once she is actually attending school.

Have you contacted the council about your daughter? It sounds as if she would have been entitled to home tuition. You might like to find out about it for next year if it's still necessary. Don't let them fob you off with 5 hours a week, she should be entitled to around 15 hours if she can cope with it.

If she's been off for most of the year she should be marked with insufficient data for ALL subjects!

I always refuse to give report information for students who are absent long term or are removed from class long term for other reasons - I'd be making it up.

Some schools insist some info is provided and some teachers think they are doing you a favor if they just make up some nice comments.

Get intouch with your local hospital tutoring service she should be getting the education she can cope with - not just getting odd pieces of work home.

Yes, do contact the school. You are perfectly reasonable in doing so. I wish your daughter a full and speedy recovery.

Thank you all for your replies :)

Apologies for not replying sooner, it's a bit hectic here to say the least as DDs illness & injury nicely coincided with us having building work done, so it's been another kind of hell managing both & Im too worn out to string a coherent sentence together a lot of the time plus I managed to blow some of out electrics with a steamer used for wallpaper stripping & had no wifi until it dried out

I will try & answer some of your points/questions, but excuse me not replying individually, I'm too brain dead right now to hold names for long enough to reply, but will do my best

Thank you to those of you giving info on home tutoring - she hasn't had any yet, just a little homework, but it is now in the pipeline thanks to her CAHMS mentor, who has been a help, but upto 5 hours was mentioned, so it's good to know that they can up that to 15 if/when she can cope.

She has been in too much pain to cope with schooling, barely sleeps, plus she is on strong pain medication & she can't think straight as a result & this is making school work hellish for us both, she gets very upset that she can't manage things as easily as she usually can & just won't cut herself any slack at all, & being the closest to her, I of course get it in the neck with upset & hysterics, which makes my helping her focus very, very tough on us both as she usually ends up throwing herself around & making her injury worse :(

That said some of her teachers have been great, others not so much so & when she does have a clear moment & gets into doing work, I see her light up & we have her back again:) but the general feeling has been to let her get better & catch up later, which as things are, I wouldn't mind so much - but she is a very anxious perfectionist & panics about losing her places in the higher sets, so it's a lot easier said than done

I've not exactly been too impressed with her form teacher, though have found out recently she actually had 2 & the other has been fantastic at replying & sorting things out

I did end up contacting the school, her 2nd form teacher was a big help & yes the ATL score was inaccurate as it's an average.

I did try not to show DD her report, but unfortunately her friends were discussing getting them online & she kept asking for it, which I kind of expected from her as she prides herself on doing well & she also wanted to know she wouldn't be moving down any sets, which she worries a lot about as she thinks the lower sets are noisier & she suffers with SPD - which is crazy in current circumstances, but unfortunately what I expect from DD, hence why I was asking, preparing myself for what I knew was coming.

Ironically she was easily pacified over the subject she lacks confidence in, as she hasn't done much work at all in it at home. She freaked when she hit a topic she hadn't covered yet & got herself into such a state we had to leave it, this made it easy for me to get her to understand they had nothing to mark her on, so to lighten up & deal with it when she's better

She did freak out over another topic I hadn't preempted, because her grade hadn't gone up she had put a lot of effort into a written piece for assessment, even working on it in the middle of the night when she couldn't sleep & because of her effort & treble checking herself, she thought she had done well, but the timing of the report had me thinking it couldn't possibly be included, but she was still so upset about it - thankfully that teacher has been fantastic, & I can see why he was a favourite of hers.

I asked if it was possible to have a couple of lines of feedback on this written work & he wrote a very long email explaining that it wasn't included in her report mark, but gave it a very high grade, so she was over the moon & this & the rest of what he wrote, plus form teacher explaining the ATL inaccuracy has meant she finally calmed down - phew!!!

She's now found something else to panic about instead !!!

We don't know yet when she will be back at school, there no wheelchair access yet, plus her sensory processing & dizziness etc are far worse because she's inactive & not sleeping well. We've been badly let down by our local kids hospital, even our GP agrees, so many things have gone wrong there, starting off with her being sent away with minor sprain advice & my having to argue with the head doctor to get any follow up at all & follow ups seem to have misdiagnosed & not taken her medical condition into account when assessing her - I swear at least 3 of the ones we've seen had no clue what it was at all, DH was really angry at the implications that she's an only child, so we were mollycoddling her & she was milking it - she is in reality very tough & fiercely independent

She does now have an appointment next week to see a recommended specialist at another health authority, so we will have a better idea after that, but it could well mean she needs surgery & with recovery & rehab, that could mean a few months more yet :( - though we are keeping our fingers crossed for a miracle of course

Hi Toasty :) yes I do remember you :) - our luck hasn't changed this year - fingers crossed it improves as its getting silly now think they will be carting me off if there's much more !

Glad you're a bit clearer. Just wanted to flag from a teaching point of view... you mentioned that some of the recent work there was no report comment for which surprises you. I've written reports in the past which took 4/5 weeks to be issued to parents - depending on what else is going on in school there can be a huge gap between class teachers writing comments to actual distribution.

Thanks busjs79 I did wonder if that might be the case as it did seem odd that this teacher had so much to say, but then nothing written - though that said, I didn't really expect anything at all, given the circumstance, but DD did & I'm very grateful that they did manage something for her, as now we've got passed the initial dramatics, it's helped her feel more connected to the school, which was lacking a bit at times.

Now she's just panicking about not knowing what form she will be in for year 8 - I've no idea if they keep the same form teachers or get new ones, I probably should have asked, but realistically I just can't see how a doctor can accurately diagnose & turn this around in what will be under 5 weeks, so it just didn't seem relevant yet

I'm more concerned about how to make her feel she's not completely missing out on school holidays & finding stuff she can do & still enjoy in a wheelchair, whilst not forcing her into groups of other kids her age or large crowds as she just can't cope :(

You're welcome RockinHippy - sorry I can't really offer advice for anything else. It sounds like a miserable situation, all I can do is offer my best wishes

Hi Rockin

I'm glad you've had some positive responses from the school. It is hard to get individualised attention when the school is so big, but once prompted, they do tend to come through.

Re form groups - they will be staying the same (in that I've not heard that there are any changes). It is likely that your DD's tutor and co-tutor will also remain the same for the whole time your dd is at school - unless staff leave, they keep the same class Yr7-11. Good if you have good tutors, not so with a few rogue ones!

In terms of sets, the kids did a maths test in early June, which was used to decide sets for next term, although there is termly fluidity with maths sets. Fast-track French classes have also been decided. For english, science and humanities, they tend to put them in two streams (high and middle), and mixed sets within those streams (or at least this is what they used to do). I've not heard anything about that this year, and my dd hasn't mentioned anything either, so maybe we will be told about this once they return to school in Sept.

Does your DD remember her SLG log in? - it might help her feel connected (if she is still struggling next year) to log in every day so she picks up the news as it happens, and has an idea about homework etc?

It does sound like she would benefit from a tutor though - she must have missed quite a bit of school, which must be both worrying and frustrating for her, especially if she has high standards.

Lastly, does your DD have a Statement/EHCP and do you have any contact with Amaze in Brighton - it sounds like you might benefit from a chat with them?

Hope things turn round for you and DD soon.

It sounds as though schoolwork it is causing your DD a lot of stress.This will only be delaying her recovery.i WOULD PUT A BAN ON ALL SCHOOLWORK until she is better.