How do secondary school parents evenings work?

[PastelMonkey]

My dc is in year 7 and have their first parents evening soon. It runs for 3 hours and we've been asked to book to see the teachers. I'm a bit confused how it all works though.
Do I have to see every teacher? I know we probably do but how are they going to fit every parent in?
At your school do they hold the meetings in the classrooms or in the hall? I think if it's the classrooms it's going to be wasting a lot more time.
Does it usually take up the whole 3 hours?

I will contact the school to ask these questions but just wondered in the meantime what happens at other schools.

You pick the teachers you want to see.

Might be in the hall, might not. Have to fit them all in somewhere. Your DC attends as well.

Nothing else to add that that, so there's not anything else they'd be able to tell you.

I’m a secondary teacher. It depends for us:
if they’re online then happy days. Book your appointment, log on.

if it’s in person we’re all in classrooms (2 or 3 teachers per room) and you book time slots to see the teachers you want. It never runs to time!

you don’t have to see everyone, nor will teachers be able to see everyone (I teach 3 year 7 classes of 32 pupils in each. With the best will in the world I am not seeing all of them at parents evening).

Ours are done on teams now, we book slots to see the teachers we think important, eg maths, English science

Some schools round here do them entirely remotely, everyone gets 5 minutes and you automatically get cut off after every 5m appointment so can’t overrun.

Its a mad scramble to book appointments. I aim for the main subjects (maths, science, English, French, history and geography). In Yr 7 I only got maths, French, English and history as I logged in 15 minutes late! Ur8 I was more organised.

Then you have a 5minute slot. Teachers likely to run late, so you are legging it between appointments to find the next one is also running late. Its organised chaos.

As a parent you aren't there 3hrs unless your appointments are spread out.

Thanks everyone. It sounds as chaotic as I expected it to be!

How do you go about booking? Suggest whatever method they use, you get onto it asap as slots tend to go quickly and you can easily end up with great massive gaps between appointments.
Prioritise key subjects or ones where you def want to speak with the teacher for whatever reason. I have sometimes seen all teachers but not always.

At ours, if it’s not virtual (about half of them are - they alternate) the teachers are all sitting around at tiny organised desks in the hall, large drama room, and other bigger classrooms like a giant speed dating event. A bell goes off every five minutes to nudge people to get up and find their next date.

Is it an online booking system?

Go online as soon as it opens. I made the mistake at my first secondary parents eve and didn't book straight away and most of the teachers appointments were already full within a few hours.

Please don't contact school about things like this. They don't have time to reply individually to everyone, or even read the messages if everyone wrote in. There will be a procedure note sent out.

My strategy was:
. See core subjects and those DD particularly interested in (I never saw a music, art or PE teacher, but did see drama and food tech).
. Beforehand, ask DD is any issues in the class (eg behaviour, teach too fast, not stretched)
. Think any questions I might have (eg is lack of detail an issue, how can we help at home)
. maximum 3 points / questions per subject, sometimes just 'is everything going OK'
. some teachers have a prepared spiel e.g. what they have been doing. If what you want to ask is more important than their waffle, cut them short.
. stick to your 5 mins.

Just ahs DS's first one. We were limited to 8 appointments, so chose core subjects and ones he was particularly interested in (as he gets older will focus on those likely to pick for GCSE). I booked as soon as possible (with lots of swearing as the site kept crashing) so got what I wanted without too big gaps. Was limited to 5 minutes each, all in the hall and a bell rang at the end of each 5 minutes. Was done in about an hour.

There has been a mixture of online and in school parents evenings for DS16, and it was only the online ones where we could make appointments. The zoom connection automatically cut out at the end of the five minutes, and it was quite comical that both me and the teacher would speed up frantically in the last few seconds to cram it all in, kind of intense and stressful as well! The ones in school have been a three hour session where you go in the hall and queue up near a teacher, sit with them for unlimited time really, then move to another queue. We were at parents evening a few weeks ago and spent at least two hours there but only managed to see 7 out of the 11 teachers I would like to have seen. My advice would be just to embrace the chaos!

Ours are all done online much easier tbh don’t miss going into school really just had my 14 year olds parents night from comfort of my living room

We book back to back appointments with breaks (so typically 2 appointments and then a break). Book the teachers you most want to see first. See if your child knows if the teacher teaches other Year 7 classes (as they are likely to be booked up more quickly) and prioritise them if you want to see them.
I would not bother with subjects that your DC will drop as soon as possible, or ones on rotation where they've only had 2 lessons with the current teacher.

I would suggest not spending 3 hours as you will be exhausted. Just over an hour will be more than enough.

Physical appointments run only vaguely to time (so you can keep your eye open for an open slot that you can jump into). Online ones have the virtue of enforcing it.

Ours are AWFUL. Half the parents don't bother to book slots, but just muscle in when they see an empty slot. So everything overruns. We were there 3.5 hours last year. I nearly lost my mind with hunger.

Same as Teen who has sage advice as usual. Booked core subjects first as they go quick and only classes Ds would take beyond year 8, so never saw a drama teacher or music as that wasn't his thing.

We were mainly looking for where he fell in the cohort for year 7 and 8. In person parents' evening was great as each teacher had a matrix table listing each child in the class and their academic level which Dh was fantastic at reading upside down online we just asked outright where they fell, near to top, middle or bottom. Also anything they should be doing differently for success?

5 minutes doesn't seem like a lot for online but it is plenty for some subjects for your child. Example of one for us; your child is amazing and does everything I ask, contributes to class, submits high level homework I wish more students were like him. Any questions? Errr no.

In person were in the assembly hall and dining halls, maps on doors so you could locate the teacher.

Yes as others have said - log on the minute booking opens, focus on core subjects first then others in order of child's interest/priority.

DS2's school do online appointments now which is SO much better than than when DS1 was at secondary school and everything overran. With the online appointments you literally get cut off after 5 minutes so no-one can talk too much or muscle in!

Whether in person or online, though, I always feel that it's a bit like speed dating it's basically a case of "Hello! Well, they're great at X, need to focus on Y, could do with a bit more confidence when dealing with Z but otherwise all good, yes thank you, that's great, take care, bye!"

I think it is expected that if there are major concerns about a child in a particular subject that a separate meeting between parents and teacher should be arranged. Parent consultations really are just a whistle-stop update.

Badly.

They run badly usually.

In person is more chaotic than online but both are tricky.

Suggest making a hit list of subjects/teachers you want to see and prioritising those.

Like speed dating! It helps if you know where staff will be so you allow time to get from one room to another if needs be but avoid ling gaps. They might be in a hall but probably specialists in labs etc.

We were mainly looking for where he fell in the cohort for year 7 and 8. In person parents' evening was great as each teacher had a matrix table listing each child in the class and their academic level which Dh was fantastic at reading upside down online we just asked outright where they fell, near to top, middle or bottom. Also anything they should be doing differently for success?

This awful in so many ways I don't know where to start. It doesn't matter where your DC sits in their cohort as you have no idea whether the cohort is particularly low or high achieving. The teacher shouldn't have results on display for other children that your DH can read (and your DH should have the courtesy not to read). The only point I agree with (and that is always worth asking) is asking what your child can to do improve.

Yep, complete chaos. The booking slots aren't really adhered to by either teachers nor parents. It's just a guide really to limit the number of appointments for teachers (i.e. you can only book say 24 slots (2 hours and 5 minute slots) so each teacher has a maximum of seeing 24 parents). For us, it was partly in the school hall and then several classrooms in adjoining corridors (upstairs and downstairs), so it was always a fiasco. When one runs late you end up missing your "official" slot for the next, so you have a choice of waiting and being late for all others, or missing them out, getting back on track, and going back to the one you've missed at the end. Some teachers didn't accept bookings at all and it was just a "see how long the queue is" type of thing - they were the ones who had 2 (or 3) class groups in the same year so there'd never be enough slots to see 3 lots of parents. In the first year, you try to keep to timings and get incredibly stressed rushing between floors etc., but then for later years you realise it's a lot more casual and you end up ignoring the slots and just wandering around joining the queues that look the shortest and concentrating on the teachers you really want to see.

I saw the teachers where there appeared to be something to discuss. Much as it would have been lovely to be told my kids were fab and doing well, I didn't really need to take the teachers of those subjects time up doing that.

At college, following good reports, I asked them if the kids if they wanted me to attend as I thought at that point they really should be owning their lives! I would have gone if the reports showed issues tho.

We've only ever had online parent's evenings, but advice is probably the same:

Book as soon as the slots are released - if you leave it till next day you will be stuffed.

For online, back to back is fine, but leave a gap every 3 or 4 subjects or it feels a bit overwhelming.

Have a clear idea on what you need to know for each subject beforehand as 5 mins goes very fast. We always get sent the school report the week before parents' evening so that helps identify where the problems will be.

I prioritised core subjects and likely options in Y7/Y8. Now in Y10 I see all of them except PE.

If there are problems in a particular subject and you run out of time, arrange with the teacher for a follow up call or email.

Yes this. Absolute chaos and so much time wasted.

post covid we moved to school cloud and had video call appointments. Sure you got some parents who have absolutely no concept of professional behaviour, running their video calls from the supermarket carpark or a small garden party, or from bed, dressed in pjs, but even face-to-face we had some parents smoking joints on the yard.

Ive no idea what good reason schools have returned to face-to-face after finding a better way. Absolute madness.