A primary school teacher, conducting parent-teacher meetings in the first grade, is faced with the problem of how to answer parents’ questions about the progress of their children. We offer a solution.
When you work as a teacher in the first grade, you don’t give marks to children. It is impossible – the child’s psyche is injured. And the kids come to school mentally ready for marks
Throughout the year, children rejoice at stickers, plus signs, teachers’ comments in notebooks: “well done”, “nice work”, “super” and meticulously count the number of stars, bunnies, cars – a whole accounting department! They color the teacher’s comments with colored pencils, add hearts, flowers. And everyone is happy.
But there is a downside to this beautiful medal. Parents are not always able to objectively assess the progress of their children. Just think, a sticker. There is no usual mark! “No marks – no problem,” some parents think. “So our son is doing well!” “There are no marks, what if everything is bad with our daughter?!” – others are worried.
The problem is aggravated by the fact that it is difficult for parents to determine from children’s exercise books whether the child is doing everything.
The lack of a reference mark makes it difficult for mutual understanding between parents and teacher. Teachers have to provide information on a child’s progress in a more familiar form – during parent meetings, they report on the progress of children using special tables.
How to create grading tables and how to work with them
A teacher collects information about the successes and failures of each child on a daily basis. By the parent meeting, all the data should be entered into the corresponding cells of the tables. This can be done once at the end of the school year. You can do it twice: in December and in April-May, then parents see the dynamics of academic performance.
Information that parents get from the tables
- what the child achieved in the learning process;
- what marks correspond to achievements;
- what is the overall level of performance in the class and what position in the overall “rating” the child occupies.
Parents receive objective data and do not remain in illusions, interpreting “bunnies” and “stars” in notebooks in their own way.
For the meeting, a teacher can make two types of tables – summary for the class and individual for each child. Parents receive a table with data on the progress of only their child.
Summary tables are posted on the board or displayed in presentation format. A teacher should give all explanations according to general tables. A well-prepared and thoughtful comment eliminates unnecessary questions and shortens the meeting time.
No surnames!
The names of the children are encrypted in the summary table. Instead, the letters of the alphabet. In this case, the order of surnames and letters is violated. That is, Werner’s student can be designated by the letter “F” and stand in the middle of the list. The letter that denotes the last name is indicated in the individual table that parents receive at the beginning of the meeting.
All this conspiracy is needed to keep calm in the ranks of moms and dads. So that no one starts to wonder where is the bad student Evans on the list, where is the excellent student Brown, where is the hooligan Smith, where are the children of the members of the parent committee, etc.
Colors in the table
The color of the cell corresponds approximately to the mark and shows the level of knowledge and skills. You can use 4 colors:
- Yellow – High level
- Green – Elevated level
- Blue – Average level (risk group)
- Red – Low level (critical)
Orange may be added to yellow as an indication of a very high level. It can also be just “+”. The number of tables, the number of sections and columns, their content are selected by the teacher.