After reading Seekers thread about schools misleading people, It's more of a what would you do but I wanted to ask this please

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

Ds is a very bright boy, he's ahead in maths/english/science by a couple of years or so. I moved him to the local state school last year for various reasons, mainly so he could make friends where we live. Things really didn't work out well for him (there's a thread or two somewhere on MN), he was bullied, work was far to easy so I pulled him out. When he left he was sent home with the 'work' he had done (all of three bits of paper and a painting) but for some reason they kept all of his maths and english. He was only there for a term and a half and really did learn nothing. They are having an Ofsted inspection some time this year and it concerns me that they have ds's work in the subjects he excelled in when he was elsewhere but not there. I suspect that they are using his work to show how 'good' the school is, ds has told me that they are using his work to show prospective parents evn though they know that he already knew all of this before he joined them. What do you all think??

[mummytime]

Schools do need to keep a range of work to be inspected by OFSTED. My children's work has often been kept a year or so after they have left a school. But after a year they should give it back to you, so I would make it clear to them you would like it when they have finished with it. IF you think they are going to try to pull the wool over OFSTED's eyes with it, I wouldn't worry.
If it is better than most children's at the school and OFSTED know you have withdrawn him (its on the records) then they will be suspicious (why was the one good child taken out of the school?). Actually OFSTED often don't look at all this past work that has to be kept to be audited.
However if you are worried then write to OFSTED yourself, they will keep your letter on file, as part of their evidence.

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

You've really helped. Thankyou.

[mrz]

I'm afraid one child's work no matter how good isn't going to make any impact on an OFSTED inspector and any parent who focuses on a single child's work is extremely foolish. Sorry I think your conspiracy theory is like most conspiracy theories ...

We had OFSTED last week and they wanted to look at what the children were doing while they were there not past work.

[Feenie]

Ofsted would scrutinise work partly to check it against teacher assessment procedures. Your ds wouldn't be on a classlist, or have a recent teacher assessment, so the school wouldn't want to use it.

[TheFallenMadonna]

I teach in secondary rather than primary, but we had no work scrutiny in our last inspection. As mrz said, they looked at progress made in each lesson.

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

Thankyou. I just can't understand why they kept them, he was sent home with the little bit of history/art but not with anything else. It seems really odd to me.

[mrz]

I would imagine the school has forwarded his "core" subject books and files to his present school along with any assessments and records.

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

No, they have not recieved anything at all from his old school, his class teacher told me a month or so after he started.

[mrz]

It's very unusual for the new school not to chase up such paperwork long before a month has passed.

[wastwinsetandpearls]

It is rather daft to think that a school could be saved from the pits of OFSTED failure by the work of one pupil who is not even any longer at the school.

We were recently inspected they checked the books of the pupils working in front of them.

[janeite]

I think you're being a bit OTT tbh, sorry. Schools may keep work (of whatever level) to use as exemplars for other pupils to see what a Level X piece of work looks like, or to use for moderation purposes. They certainly won't keep it to show an Ofsted inspector, who will only care about seeing the progress of the pupils in front of him/her in specific lessons.

[Hulababy]

Under the new OFSTED stuff then they won't have time to scutinise books. Most they;ll do is look at the work that is directly in front of the children at the time of observing.

[wastwinsetandpearls]

I think we were actually asked to hand over some exercise books to check our marking. I cannot remember though if they were classes they had inspected though. The inspectors would be able to tell by the dates if the work was from a previous year though.

[Feenie]

Our Ofsted team asked for every single Maths, Literacy and Science book in (for 220 children). I can only imagine it's because they wanted to dictate the sample they looked at - they seem to have commented on lots to do with work scrutiny in the report (which was very good).

[wastwinsetandpearls]

Gosh are you a national challenge school?

[Feenie]

No!

[mrz]

They certainly scrutinised our books last week. The children had to work on paper for the day the books were with the inspectors and this was scrutinised too (I assume to compare with books).

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

I see, thankyou. I just can't understand why they kept this and not the few sheets of science/history he did. They wouldn't achieve anything by keeping hold of them.

[wastwinsetandpearls]

I think it is right Feenie to be honest. When I have my marking checked as part of my performance management I just point to the cupboard and say take your pick. I know other colleagues cherry pick books to hand over.

Good teachers have nothing to hide so we should be happy for all of our books to be handed over for marking. My marking at the moment is a little behind because my workload is immense in other areas. I would not want to hide this either as inspectors management need to realise there is only so much one person can do.

I understand that it is not really possible but I would be happy for OFSTED to turn up unnanounced ( that is spelt wrong but I am shattered sorry) so they see us as we really are.

Maybe when we were inspected they did similar things in maths english science.

[Feenie]

Yes, I had no arguments about it, and neither did any of our staff.

But as happy as I am to be observed by anybody, any time, I think 2 days notice for Ofsted is as close to unannounced as my stress levels can realistically handle!

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

Ds is an exceptionally bright boy, his english work is very descriptive and articulate, the maths he's doing now is year 9 so three years ahead. It bothers me that they have kept them, he didn't learn this there. Ds has told me that they were kept to the school could show them to prospective parents, he must have got this from somethere. I do know they are being inspected some time this year.

[IngridFletcher]

I think they are extracting his DNA from it to make a clone of him to present to OFSTED.

[BelleDeChocolateFluffyBunny]

Well, god help them as they will have to answer his endless questions!

[wastwinsetandpearls]

But if they just turned up it would be done and dusted rather than spending two days worrying about it. I am sure at first we would all be paranoid that OFSTED were going to walk through the door at any moment we would calm down and work as usual. Some of us though would quite rightly up our standards just in case.

[Feenie]

I guess. I hated the old regime of several weeks notice - perfect for worrying and working oneself into a state!