Disengaged Y8s and 9s

[MayasJamas]

I’m a high school English teacher. End of year data drops are looming later this term, and looking at some of my students in Y8 and Y9. they just haven’t made progress. For some there’s a clear reason (severe needs, attendance etc). For a few, it’s purely because they are lazy and disengaged from lessons and homework. They don’t do enough work to develop the skills they need for the subject, or for me to assess any meaningful progress. This has been communicated to parents in reports, at parents evenings, and in some cases phone calls home. I’ve used rewards, incentives and sanctions in line with school policies. Yet I know I’ll be questioned on why they haven’t made progress. Looking back at their work since Y7, I think previous teachers have overstated their progress in previous drops, probably in order to avoid this sort of grilling.

Not sure of the point of this post really, just musing on what can actually be done about engaging kids in this age group who just aren’t interested. Is there any point? They usually buck their ideas up once the reality of GCSEs sinks in. But it just depresses me that they’d rather literally do nothing than engage with learning. Would welcome any thoughts!

Speak to your HoD and ask for some standardisation of assessments including legacy assessments. That way you can establish whether previous assessments have indeed been inflated or are accurate.

As a HoD (though not English but another core subject) I would say there needs to be some standardisation of assessments to avoid grade inflation.
Speak to your HoD and ask for this to happen for any upcoming or recent assessments.

Is it possible to see their work/assessment from previous years?

Gather evidence of everything you have done to try to move things for when you are asked about their progress.

@PumpkinPie2016 Yes - they do all their assessed pieces in a separate exercise book, which they keep from Y7 right through to Y11 (hard working students will fill several of these obviously). So I can easily look back and see previous years’ assessments, and honestly I’m 🤔 at the levels previous teachers have graded them at. Standardisation is definitely needed.