What do school reports tell you?

Mine were always full of "could try harder"and were fairly disparaging..

Our first job at the beginning of each new term was to write the wretched thing up into a big book. I suppose it kept a note of my blossoming handwriting!!!!!!!!! Not to mention my attempts to correct mistakes invisibly. I don't think they had ever heard of positive encouragement at my grammar school.

I often wish they could have seen my future success without them .

Primary school - talks a lot, and still do.

I spent many years berating DS on his lack of effort at school and telling him about the glowing reports I had. Then I found some of my reports! They were practically identical to his with lots of "Could do better", "Needs to make more effort"

Jack must learn to inhibit his first response when playing = Jack must stop hitting classmates when he can't get his own way.

My school reports were generally favourable but said I must guard against flippancy. Pretty accurate, I'd say.

When I first started teaching in 1966, the children each had a report book, which carried on year after year, right through their school career. I was looking through one of these and, in one subject, I found the comment:"I was wrong." Nothing else! Puzzled, I looked back to the previous page and found the comment:" Couldn't be worse!"

My school report said "she would do very well if only she stopped talking long enough". Probably very true

I'm really interested in the comments about only positive remarks being made on school reports. I shall look forward to my DGS's report this year (Y3) with interest, since his teacher hasn't made one single positive remark about him so far this year, during 2 PT meetings (kept strictly to 10 mins despite the fact that he is in her bottom set in the class) and one SEN meeting. She didn't attend the 2nd SEN meeting but left a negative comment already written on the IEP.

I work with him twice a week after school, so I know he has made some progress, his reading has come on incredibly this year, and his mum and I welcome negative comments if they are constructive, but any requests from us for details about specific areas are brushed off.

His Y2 teacher was great, so is the SENCO, and last year I felt we were working together for his benefit, this year I just feel frustrated and so sad for him.

My son, who is a teacher, was telling me recently how long it takes him to write reports considering they can't say anything bad. He has to figure out how best to get around it without making anything up. So certainly, not all teachers use a report writer programme as mentioned.

I still have my school leaving report when I left the makeshift evacuee school at the age of 14 in 1944. There was a shortage of paper and I had to show this to any prospective employer that I went to work for.
There were no GCEs or anything else in my day. I will be 86 in May and have got through life quite well and had my books published.
I did not need to go to university to get through life.

or no speller it seems.. Musician not mucician!

I am no mucician and this was obvious from my school days:

MUSIC:
'Pen blows too hard down her recorder'

and the following year

'Pen must aim for a sweeter tone'

I did like seeing the DGC's Social Reports Craftycat but do not have little ones at school over here nor teachers in the family teaching this age group so cannot compare with the UK. You can imagine that my DGD's differed greatly from my DGS's . There were no subject marks or subject comments on these reports.

I felt it gave an insight on how they are learning to learn and think it would give parents an idea of what they needed to do. They did get them at a parents evening so could discuss with the teacher.

My wonderful DIL scans and sends me them so I can keep up with what is happening.

Primary school reports are very clear & very similar to Australian version above. There is then a section giving marks for each 'subject' & there is a large space for teacher's comments. They do stress the good points. Only had one report from 'big' school so far but it was very comprehensive & fair- I'm sure he COULD try harder!.
My father used to correct the spelling & grammar in my reports & send them back to the headmaster ( who also made bloomers!) This was a very good Grammar school in mid 60s. No comment was ever made to me but I bet they weren't very happy. I do see his point now- they were teaching ME so they should at least know the basics. My dad was a sweet, kind, even tempered man but he didn't like sloppiness..

The last decade of my state teaching career was one in which only positive comments were allowed on reports or tutor statements for university admissions. Even tearaways, the disruptive and bullies had to be praised. Completely useless for pupils and parents. Some of the statement banks were so generic and meaningless they might as well have said, 'sat in a room with others while some teaching was going on,' 'managed to breath in and out during the school day'.

If the parents really wanted to know the truth you could tell them on parents' evening but, even then, some parents being so used to nothing but praise would take exception to useful pointers for improvement. If parents started to take professional advice personally and became abusive, I'd switch to bland-speak sharpish.

I noticed a strange contrast in the parents at the prep schools my own children attended. Those parents often only wanted to hear negative comments and 'how little Johnny could improve.' Teachers who didn't shoot from the hip were considered 'soft'.

Grandson gets very informative reports from school with details of how he does in each subject and information about the ones he is best at and those less good

I know there are many possibly apocryphal school reports, but my all time favourite was for a boy from his Geography teacher
"He does well to find his way home"

After over 25 years of writing reports and checking those of others, I deprecated the move to computer generated sentence banks as the start of a slippery slope. Far too many school reports of this type combine being too long with being quite meaningless at the same time.

One of my reports said A must learn to control her exuberance in the cookery class!!!

I wonder if they have the same reports in our Primary schools as my GCs have in Australia

They are ticked for rarely, sometimes, usually, or constantly and they are listed

WORK HABITS
Listens and follows instructions
Takes pride in work
Strives to improve
Completes task within set time
Contributes effectively in a group
Works independently when necessary
Works without disturbing others
Able to concentrate on a task
Seeks assistance when needed
Shows initiative
Punctuality to school routines
Attendance

SOCIAL SKILLS
Respects and follows class rules
Observes playground rules
Respects others and their property
Interacts positively with peers
Is well mannered
Responds positively to correction
Shares happily
Is responsible for belongings

They also get "medals" at the end of the year. My DGD got the "Academic Excellence" (I think that was what it was called) for her year and they have academic reports.

My school reports always said 'friendly, chatty, more than capable of any work set, but invariably puts in the minimum amount of effort required to satisfy the teacher's curiosity'. Not much has changed there then, I can do more or less anything that I set my mind to, but more often than not, CBA!

Our daughter was very upset with her son's school report, it was totally negative in all subjects, yet she knows he has some good points. Her job gives her access to some senior education advisor (not in her son.s school area). She arranged a chat with one of these advisors, the advisor was appealed by the negativity, that it was of no help to the child whatsoever, no suggestions of a positive nature. Also, DD is concerned about his hand writing and spelling, again the advisor was appalled by the constrained nature of the teaching, teaching what suited the school, not the child.
When her son writes on paper he is reticent, when he uses a white board he is far keener. The advisor explained that some children are afraid to make a mistake, the white board allows him to erase his mistakes and put them right.
Daughter feels better about her son's progress now, but not sure how to deal with the school.

To really understand a school report you need to see the reports for the rest of the class. I used to teach Home Economics and comments varied from 'can prepare a simple dish with help' to 'can follow a recipe and work independently to produce a quality dish'.
All my reports up to the age of 16 said I was quiet and well behaved. My think I forged them.

Reports tell you little you don't already know about your child in terms of education unless it's test marks. Everything must be couched in positive terms, so 'Social skills are improving' = has stopped intimidating other children. 'Is participating' . . . = has stopped disrupting lessons. ' Is beginning to make progress' . . . = has found things difficult so far but is making every effort ( positive) or has finally stopped messing about (negative) A polite friendly child - works well = exactly what it says; well done, you have brought up a lovely child.
We aren't allowed report writers but there are only so many ways to say the same thing on foundation subjects so it's Important to have a female and male version to cut and paste from.

My report from school said "sets a low standard and consistently fails to achieve it" and my army one said "looks smart in denims and works well under supervision " not really but close

I had Angela is excellent in English .History, and Art, but needs to concentrate more in Math,, yup, still do,, haha Math was ok, until it came to Algebra and Equations,, and Geography, was "We could put Angela in the middle of anywhere, with a Map, and Compass and she would get us home", "BUT (and it was a BIG BUT" she has no idea where places are,," eg The capital of oooh lets say,,, Bulgaria ? does it have one or is it one?