School Report

Well, parents evening last night and what a surprise daughter is ahead of where she should be in English was not surprised by that to be honest, what was a surprise was how far she has come in her maths. When we moved her to this school in April last year her maths where that of a year 2 pupil (i.e. 6-7 year old), her old school and yes I'm going to name and shame St Albans, only did maths twice a week and when I found out she spent most of her time cutting up old magazines and sticking pictures down, I was fuming, luckily she tried to improve her maths with my help and we got her moving but for all my efforts they were undermined by the school. I showed daughter my traditional way of doing maths which actually she understood better than the 'modern' methods, but when she went to school to use them the teacher humiliated in front of classmates by saying 'we dont do it that way its stupid' 

So after 'explaining' to her teacher that she understood that way better and she was actually improving using it, I set about getting her into a school closer to home. Luckily we have a brilliant school on our doorstep Markeaton Primary and it has an excellent reputation, so in April last year she moved schools, now remembering where she was at in her maths by July she was up to year 4 maths (she was year 5) and now in feb she is at the correct level for her age. So through good teaching and her own efforts she has dragged her self up 4 levels in less than a year and now actually enjoys maths. 

I'm glad to say also that her move to secondary school which happens in Sept she will be going to a school (fingers crossed) that places maths/science/English at the heart of their teaching and that to me is good. She cant wait to start there I think the fact it has a swimming pool is clouding her judgement slightly but its good she is excited in going there. 

As for her old school I was told by a parent that when the children go up to secondary school nearly all the pupils from her old school have to go into special classes to bring them up to the standard they are at some its for a couple of weeks others are for a few months. It went from being one of the best primary schools in Derby to being in bottom 3rd in space of 3 years. However her new school is in top 3 yet again and only just failed to make top 250 in UK. 

So a happy dad here