school report

[lisa35]

J got another exclusion Monday, but had good two days, we ve had copy of report school sent to LEA-its impresive, raelly good, but god its hard to see it all in black and white- the stuff about "phyical violence, verbal etc

Made us realise just how difficult his behaviuor is for others, yet we just have to manage xxx

 

J told me tonight at one time he had thought about suicide, it seemed like an off the cuff comment, but how bad must our kids feel to be even saying stuf like that x

Jost wait for decision now, meetings next thurs, dont really see how thye can refuse, he currently has 8 hours 1 to 1 in classroom support, 2 hrs 1 to 1 in Games, 20 mins daily 1 to 1 in a morning and access to senco room

Just wondered whats max they may offer, we really want 1 to 1 every leson! and his sats from year 7 at primary were

English-5c,Maths 4b, Science 5c

They are now 4a for all, how damaging is all this on my somnns education! It says" no measurable progress-assessments commensurate with KS2 sats results

How depressing

Lisa

[David Matthew Baker]

Secondary Schools I've worked in often complain about the KS2 sats results. A lot of primary schools teach to the questions (as there is a very limited range of possible one) hence when they come to secondary the performance of the students is often a long way below what they achieved in their KS2 sats. In particular I've heard this from the science departments. It makes it even harder that a lot of science is now (which I personally think is better) heading towards knowing how to take results and then been able to analyse any set of data. It means it is harder to know exactly what will be asked but gives a more realistic result as to how the student peforms in science. I think other subjects also find that cramming for the KS2 SATs does mean that they have to play catch up as soon as they start to try and get the student to the level they are supposedly at. (Heard this from a couple of heads of department and one time a science advisor for the LEA was also present and agreed it was an issue in that particular case. Not sure if it is a wide spread issue but it wouldn't overly suprise me. It's one reason I'm not sure how useful SATs are. Secondary's are also guilty of teaching towards the tests where possible too so it's not just the primaries. I think tests in general too often just check a students recall ability rather than understanding. Where they do check understanding it is often just of the English language because everything is worded in such a complicated manor.)

 

Hopefully with additional support (that is well targeted) you will see a measured improvement in your sons performance. I wish him the best of luck. I assume (as you mention a SENCo) that he is in mainstream, I think it is a pity that the government doesn't better fund support staff in mainstream as there are many students who could benefit from greater access to staff assistance. It's only when you've worked for a while in (admittedly a very well staffed) special needs school that you realise how much difference having quick access to help for some more able students who still have difficulties that they need assistance with can make. I have to say I'm really proud of the students I'm presently working with. Just got back their physics results (for a mock) today and two are on very high Cs and the other is on a high D (and quickly spotted a number of silly mistakes he made when I flicked through the paper with him). A couple of them (yes I only have 3 students at the moment) can present quite challenging behaviour (physical and verbal) at times. The trick seems to be helping them to find stratergies to control their behaviour. Unfortunatally bribary seems to have been most effective after a recent run of problems. One set by the student himself (as he wants me to do something for him) and the other set by the teacher.

 

Another comment I'll quickly make (again from a work perspective as I don't have children of my own) is that a lot of the students (the school I'm working at is specifically for ASD) seem to have wildly fluctuate in how bareable they find school. I've never had a student talk about suicide but I've had them talk of running away from school, looking forward to they can quit, etc... whilst on other occasions I've been told how much they enjoy it. I know in one of the cases that I'm thinking about a lot of it come down to the fact that the student in question is quite vunerable to bullying. Hence if it's been a bad day he can get quite low and it can take a lot of work to try and cheer him up to a point where you can get him engaged in anything. Hopefully if the school know that he has been getting depressed enough to talk about suicide they watch out for signs of him getting depressed and take active moves to combat it.

 

Once again I hope you manage to get things sorted out soon for your son. It always sadens me to hear of students struggling in a school and it often makes me think what more could we do to help them. One thing that always makes a lot of difference though is a strong working relationship between the staff at the school and the parents. All the best, David.