Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for the responses. It sounds like, for whatever reason, this is an anomaly-- which is great, in some ways, because it means it will likely be better in the future!

The link that someone else shared about assessments said that parents should receive a parent report that explains what assessment scores mean- that's the kind of thing that I would love, but didn't get (and the link doesn't work on the website to the sample letter).

I've reached out to our teacher via email a couple times (but literally just a couple), and she has not responded to my emails. Once she answered my question in the weekly letter to all parents, which kind of felt passive aggressive. We had a fall conference, but not with the current teacher.

Was there a mid-year teacher change? That might explain why you're not getting as much feedback. It takes time for a new teacher to get to know all of the kids so she can provide meaningful feedback to parents.

A teacher change mid-year can be hard. I actually think you're getting great contact, OP. An email once a week sounds on par with my experiences and I would be happy with that. I think it is odd that you're inferring passive aggression when the teacher DID respond to your query, just through a group message rather than one-on-one. Please don't set yourself up to be THAT parent. It doesn't help your kid at all. If you have concerns about your child's inability to thrive, then you need to make an appointment with the teacher. I would certainly do that before going to a principal. You need to do your job as a parent first imo and I say this as a fellow parent. It seems like you're waiting for the teacher to do all these things but you haven't done your part yet.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For equity reasons, a copy of the beginning of the year assessments should have come home in a folder. I received copies for both my kids.

Kindergarten report cards are coming up soon and that should give you a better idea how things are going. They should be doing assessments for report cards this month. In older grades you do get more regular report cards--kindergarten is an anomaly.

What? For the purpose of equity, assessment results should have been sent home in a folder?

OP, not sure what you are expecting from the teacher. A weekly communication is far more than we ever got from our schools at any level. You are getting regular communication. Beginning of year assessments are reviewed (or typically should be) with parents at the fall parent-teacher conferences. If there's an issue, the teacher SHOULD contact you; but if you have questions or concerns, you are ALWAYS able to contact the teacher via email to ask or arrange a phone call or meeting. If you get a teacher who is unresponsive, you should contact the principal.

Your privilege is shining through. You seriously don’t understand the benefit of sending home paper correspondence?

Kindergarten assessments weren't complete by the fall patent teacher conference. They're on a different timeline.

I understand that APS asks schools to send hope paper versions of the BOY assessments for those parents who may not be able to or know how to access ParentVue. I'm not even sure it's the teachers who do this--it may be school admin, but we've always gotten a paper copy.

That can (and probably should) be changed.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For equity reasons, a copy of the beginning of the year assessments should have come home in a folder. I received copies for both my kids.

Kindergarten report cards are coming up soon and that should give you a better idea how things are going. They should be doing assessments for report cards this month. In older grades you do get more regular report cards--kindergarten is an anomaly.

What? For the purpose of equity, assessment results should have been sent home in a folder?

OP, not sure what you are expecting from the teacher. A weekly communication is far more than we ever got from our schools at any level. You are getting regular communication. Beginning of year assessments are reviewed (or typically should be) with parents at the fall parent-teacher conferences. If there's an issue, the teacher SHOULD contact you; but if you have questions or concerns, you are ALWAYS able to contact the teacher via email to ask or arrange a phone call or meeting. If you get a teacher who is unresponsive, you should contact the principal.

Your privilege is shining through. You seriously don’t understand the benefit of sending home paper correspondence?

Actually, I prefer paper correspondence. But I don't think that is a matter of equity. It's not like information is intentionally being withheld from certain students and their parents and provided to others. Many a paper sent home via the student has never made it to the parent. And it's a waste of resources to mail that type of information out to every family.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For equity reasons, a copy of the beginning of the year assessments should have come home in a folder. I received copies for both my kids.

Kindergarten report cards are coming up soon and that should give you a better idea how things are going. They should be doing assessments for report cards this month. In older grades you do get more regular report cards--kindergarten is an anomaly.

What? For the purpose of equity, assessment results should have been sent home in a folder?

OP, not sure what you are expecting from the teacher. A weekly communication is far more than we ever got from our schools at any level. You are getting regular communication. Beginning of year assessments are reviewed (or typically should be) with parents at the fall parent-teacher conferences. If there's an issue, the teacher SHOULD contact you; but if you have questions or concerns, you are ALWAYS able to contact the teacher via email to ask or arrange a phone call or meeting. If you get a teacher who is unresponsive, you should contact the principal.

Your privilege is shining through. You seriously don’t understand the benefit of sending home paper correspondence?

Kindergarten assessments weren't complete by the fall patent teacher conference. They're on a different timeline.

I understand that APS asks schools to send hope paper versions of the BOY assessments for those parents who may not be able to or know how to access ParentVue. I'm not even sure it's the teachers who do this--it may be school admin, but we've always gotten a paper copy.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For equity reasons, a copy of the beginning of the year assessments should have come home in a folder. I received copies for both my kids.

Kindergarten report cards are coming up soon and that should give you a better idea how things are going. They should be doing assessments for report cards this month. In older grades you do get more regular report cards--kindergarten is an anomaly.

What? For the purpose of equity, assessment results should have been sent home in a folder?

OP, not sure what you are expecting from the teacher. A weekly communication is far more than we ever got from our schools at any level. You are getting regular communication. Beginning of year assessments are reviewed (or typically should be) with parents at the fall parent-teacher conferences. If there's an issue, the teacher SHOULD contact you; but if you have questions or concerns, you are ALWAYS able to contact the teacher via email to ask or arrange a phone call or meeting. If you get a teacher who is unresponsive, you should contact the principal.

Your privilege is shining through. You seriously don’t understand the benefit of sending home paper correspondence?

Anonymous wrote:Is this your oldest child? The transition to kindergarten can be kind of jarring because parents are accustomed to knowing everything that's going on with their kids day-to-day from being inside a daycare/preschool and having more contact from teachers (since that's the standard for preschools, and the ratios are lower so teachers have more time to follow up on each child individually), and then kindergarten becomes something of a black box where parents don't get the same flow of information they're used to. I would definitely reach out about specific problems (and would follow up with the administration if you're not getting responses), but it's not clear from what you've shared what you are looking for that you're not getting and whether those expectations are reasonable.

This is so true.

Anonymous wrote:For equity reasons, a copy of the beginning of the year assessments should have come home in a folder. I received copies for both my kids.

Kindergarten report cards are coming up soon and that should give you a better idea how things are going. They should be doing assessments for report cards this month. In older grades you do get more regular report cards--kindergarten is an anomaly.

What? For the purpose of equity, assessment results should have been sent home in a folder?

OP, not sure what you are expecting from the teacher. A weekly communication is far more than we ever got from our schools at any level. You are getting regular communication. Beginning of year assessments are reviewed (or typically should be) with parents at the fall parent-teacher conferences. If there's an issue, the teacher SHOULD contact you; but if you have questions or concerns, you are ALWAYS able to contact the teacher via email to ask or arrange a phone call or meeting. If you get a teacher who is unresponsive, you should contact the principal.

So we definitely had a non-communicative K teacher and experience that sounds along the lines of what you have. End of day, no matter what school (private or public, big or little, city or suburbs) your child is at, some teachers are really great at comms and some aren't. And that goes across all areas of teaching. Some teachers just knock everything out of the park and some make you think about that guy in the office across from your's who naps with his chair turned around from the door and an excel spreadsheet open, because he thinks no one notices. As a parent, if you have a concern about your child, raise it to the teacher, ask to speak to them, and if they cannot do that (and hey maybe they can't, this year has sucked), then you talk to the principal. There's nothing wrong with going to the principal, as long as you sincerely need more than a weekly all class update and have concerns about your kid.

Also, and this varies, but generally, email can be hard for teachers and admins. Unlike an office job where you're in front of the computer most of the day, they are not. So sometimes you have to use the phone or meet with them. It can feel super weird -- who wants to go to the principals office -- but it can be more efficient for everyone.

For the assessments, are you seeing the same issues at home? Is your kids interested in learning to read? Are they counting random numbers of things in your house? Are they able to have play dates without constant conflict or discomfort? The things you see and know as a mom, are they really in the assessments or not. If there is an issue you know is there, say something. Elevate it if it's not addressed. Advocate. But be honest, is it an issue of the child being average, of not having been presented with the material before, something like that, or is it that you sincerely think there's an issue.

Finally, part of raising these darned kids is letting them go. Having had a behavior issue kid, God love them, if there's a real issue, you in your heart and mind know about it already and need to address it with the school. If you really know your kid is falling behind, say something. But if it's just that you know she had her feelings hurt about share time one day or he got 12 sites words, not 15, do some thinking on if that's something you let go or not.

Good luck on all of this. Kindergarten is especially hard this year and you and your child will make it through.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for the responses. It sounds like, for whatever reason, this is an anomaly-- which is great, in some ways, because it means it will likely be better in the future!

The link that someone else shared about assessments said that parents should receive a parent report that explains what assessment scores mean- that's the kind of thing that I would love, but didn't get (and the link doesn't work on the website to the sample letter).

I've reached out to our teacher via email a couple times (but literally just a couple), and she has not responded to my emails. Once she answered my question in the weekly letter to all parents, which kind of felt passive aggressive. We had a fall conference, but not with the current teacher.

If she’s not responding to your emails, that’s weird.

I would say something to your assistant principal.

Yea, I agree. Escalate this to the assistant principal, alienate the teacher for sure, and start off the elementary school experience on an aggressively wrong foot. Great suggestion!

Is this your oldest child? The transition to kindergarten can be kind of jarring because parents are accustomed to knowing everything that's going on with their kids day-to-day from being inside a daycare/preschool and having more contact from teachers (since that's the standard for preschools, and the ratios are lower so teachers have more time to follow up on each child individually), and then kindergarten becomes something of a black box where parents don't get the same flow of information they're used to. I would definitely reach out about specific problems (and would follow up with the administration if you're not getting responses), but it's not clear from what you've shared what you are looking for that you're not getting and whether those expectations are reasonable.

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for the responses. It sounds like, for whatever reason, this is an anomaly-- which is great, in some ways, because it means it will likely be better in the future!

The link that someone else shared about assessments said that parents should receive a parent report that explains what assessment scores mean- that's the kind of thing that I would love, but didn't get (and the link doesn't work on the website to the sample letter).

I've reached out to our teacher via email a couple times (but literally just a couple), and she has not responded to my emails. Once she answered my question in the weekly letter to all parents, which kind of felt passive aggressive. We had a fall conference, but not with the current teacher.

Was there a mid-year teacher change? That might explain why you're not getting as much feedback. It takes time for a new teacher to get to know all of the kids so she can provide meaningful feedback to parents.

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for the responses. It sounds like, for whatever reason, this is an anomaly-- which is great, in some ways, because it means it will likely be better in the future!

The link that someone else shared about assessments said that parents should receive a parent report that explains what assessment scores mean- that's the kind of thing that I would love, but didn't get (and the link doesn't work on the website to the sample letter).

I've reached out to our teacher via email a couple times (but literally just a couple), and she has not responded to my emails. Once she answered my question in the weekly letter to all parents, which kind of felt passive aggressive. We had a fall conference, but not with the current teacher.

If she’s not responding to your emails, that’s weird.

I would say something to your assistant principal.