FCPS (ES) report cards

[Anonymous]

It annoys me that teachers have to waste so much time producing these useless things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Elementary reports cards are useless. If your child is having trouble academically or socially, you'll find out long before the report card comes home.

Especially in primary grades. When I taught first, I hated doing them. I kept asking my principal if I could just write every parent a letter. No luck.

They take forever (or what seems like forever) to complete.

I don't understand why they take so long to complete. There are four numbers to choose from and a set of pre-printed comments to choose from. How much easier can it be to fill them out? 1. Needs intervention. 2. Needs improvement. 3 doing well. 4. Doing very well. You can't tell whether your kids should get a 1-4 on a report card for a task?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Elementary reports cards are useless. If your child is having trouble academically or socially, you'll find out long before the report card comes home.

Especially in primary grades. When I taught first, I hated doing them. I kept asking my principal if I could just write every parent a letter. No luck.

They take forever (or what seems like forever) to complete.

I don't understand why they take so long to complete. There are four numbers to choose from and a set of pre-printed comments to choose from. How much easier can it be to fill them out? 1. Needs intervention. 2. Needs improvement. 3 doing well. 4. Doing very well. You can't tell whether your kids should get a 1-4 on a report card for a task?

Agree with above especially since they're so meaningless anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Elementary reports cards are useless. If your child is having trouble academically or socially, you'll find out long before the report card comes home.

Especially in primary grades. When I taught first, I hated doing them. I kept asking my principal if I could just write every parent a letter. No luck.

They take forever (or what seems like forever) to complete.

I don't understand why they take so long to complete. There are four numbers to choose from and a set of pre-printed comments to choose from. How much easier can it be to fill them out? 1. Needs intervention. 2. Needs improvement. 3 doing well. 4. Doing very well. You can't tell whether your kids should get a 1-4 on a report card for a task?

I did some quick math for my elementary classes.

Life, Work, Citizenship:
12 grades x 30 students= 360

Language Arts:
9 grades x 30= 270 (class one)
9 grades x 26= 234 ( class two)

History/SS
5 grades x 30= 150
5 grades x 26= 130

That's a total of 1,144 grades per quarter and each one has its own little drop down menu. You can push down some of the grades, but that's only helpful if everyone gets NA or NT. That doesn't count searching for comments.

The last quarter, double that number to 2,288 (quarter and final marks).

I don't think it's a quick process, especially if you are looking at notes and grades when completing the PR. I'd be interested in hearing what other teachers think.

[Anonymous]

Takes me forever to do. And I hate the canned comments. Would much rather write a narrative.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Takes me forever to do. And I hate the canned comments. Would much rather write a narrative.

I asked my DW and she estimates it probably takes her around 5 hours or so to complete.

[Anonymous]

Specialist at an ES with 550 students. I have to enter 2,200 grades every quarter. 4,400 grades 4th quarter. It's a pain and they are meaningless. Then I have to deal with emails explaining why Larlo didn't receive a 4 in everything.

[Anonymous]

My issue is with the comment section ? Are they restricted from writing more ? Like others said there is no information there , growing up in a different country our report cards had good information on conduct and areas of concern . I find here lots of adjectives that don't really say much

[Anonymous]

Is there anyway parents can know which standards align with the "standards" written on the report card? I saw online that they chose a select few per grade level to highlight, but what about the rest??
I am also confused because my Kindergartner got a 3 for reads with accuracy and fluency. The standards say they need to recognize letters and letter sounds, read some common sight words etc. My child reads at an end of first grade reading level but got a 3 on this part. Does the 3 mean he isn't reading at his level with accuracy and fluency or he doesn't meet the Kindergarten standard of consistently recognizing letters and sounds (which just doesn't seem right given his reading level).

I'm just wondering if the whole report card is based just upon my child's current level (which could be higher or lower than the grade standard) or the standards for the grade level as listed on the web site... Or does this vary by teacher.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My issue is with the comment section ? Are they restricted from writing more ? Like others said there is no information there , growing up in a different country our report cards had good information on conduct and areas of concern . I find here lots of adjectives that don't really say much

We can only choose from a bank of comments. We cannot write our own. I often can't find a comment that says what I want to put down on the PR.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is there anyway parents can know which standards align with the "standards" written on the report card? I saw online that they chose a select few per grade level to highlight, but what about the rest??
I am also confused because my Kindergartner got a 3 for reads with accuracy and fluency. The standards say they need to recognize letters and letter sounds, read some common sight words etc. My child reads at an end of first grade reading level but got a 3 on this part. Does the 3 mean he isn't reading at his level with accuracy and fluency or he doesn't meet the Kindergarten standard of consistently recognizing letters and sounds (which just doesn't seem right given his reading level).

I'm just wondering if the whole report card is based just upon my child's current level (which could be higher or lower than the grade standard) or the standards for the grade level as listed on the web site... Or does this vary by teacher.

All of the standards are on the PR, but there are benchmarks and indicators that fall under those standards. The teacher may be assessing specific benchmarks or indicators under each standard. Could that be what you mean?

[Anonymous]

Can his mean a teacher just picks 4 for all the individual categories to avoid talking to Larlo's parents as to why it is 3?.

While I appreciate the pain teachers have to go through, I just hate this evaluation system where there in no room for the proper, correct feedback.

My kid is all 4s but the teacher does not say anything about the kids growth areas. I have a feeling she just gives 4s to avoid dealing with parents

[Anonymous]

All of the standards are on the PR, but there are benchmarks and indicators that fall under those standards. The teacher may be assessing specific benchmarks or indicators under each standard. Could that be what you mean?

Yes- thank you for making sense of what I am trying to say! I am wondering if there is a resource where parents can see which specific benchmarks/indicators fall under each standard for that particular grade. I'm just generally confused about it because we will see the same standards from K-6, so that renders the standards almost meaningless to me unless I know which benchmarks/indicators are being looked at for my child's grade level.

[Anonymous]

I think sometimes they get a 3 so they can show they were taught something and get a 4 next quarter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

All of the standards are on the PR, but there are benchmarks and indicators that fall under those standards. The teacher may be assessing specific benchmarks or indicators under each standard. Could that be what you mean?

Yes- thank you for making sense of what I am trying to say! I am wondering if there is a resource where parents can see which specific benchmarks/indicators fall under each standard for that particular grade. I'm just generally confused about it because we will see the same standards from K-6, so that renders the standards almost meaningless to me unless I know which benchmarks/indicators are being looked at for my child's grade level.

I try to put that information on the grading rubrics I send home.

When we switched to the standards based report I don't think teachers had much training on how to assess. Each year my admin asks what we would like in terms of professional development. Each year I suggest training on standards based reporting, but it never happens. I don't think all teachers know how to use our grading system. It's not consistent.