progress reports

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That's it ! I've had it ! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! ! got daughter's progress report today from her idiot,
chip-giving, no-good teacher.....absolutely not ONE positive comment on there ! I just fired off an email to the teacher & the principal stating that this was totally unacceptable, and that I can no longer wait for daughter's eval to be done~ i want a 504 plan NOW.
daughter knows her progress report came home today...what am i supposed to tell her ???that no matter how hard she tries, the teacher doesn't notice ? AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !

My son's teachers used apples instead of chips - might I suggest a some sort of not smiling face sticker on a note back to her - along with a definition of the word "progress". It seems like if she can not find one positive thing to say than she may be incapable of seeing her abilities.

I had problems with teachers when I was a kid. Some of 'em are just freakin' idiots. Your daughter needs to receive at home whatever she's not getting at school. I'd tell her that her teacher just isn't very smart or something less complimentary, but she's bound to repeat anything you say along those lines. Perhaps you should sit in her class and evaluate the teacher.

For what it's worth (it's a long time since my daughter was in grade school), I'd say the teacher has evaluated herself. If she was right and your daughter didn't make any progress, then she's a failure as a teacher. If she's wrong (as I assume she is) and your daughter did make progress (in spite of the teacher) but she doesn't see it, ditto.

In any case, from what you've said, it sounds like she's in the wrong profession.

Well most of the time I was in school, no matter how hard I tried nobody noticed. So after awhile of being ignored and being punished for defending myself against the unbridled cruelty of the other NT students, I said "Well do I need to fail to get help here? I'll fail, is that what it will take?" That got them to notice. I also told my parents that since SPED kept sending me the message that in order to get support you must be a faliure, that I would become one. That's when my dad became involved, because he didn't want me to ruin my chance at graduation. When it really was them who were ruining it.

I'm glad you're dealing with this now, I wouldn't be surprised if this happens again. For some reason, teachers feel it's perfectly acceptable to ignore the child who may have some troubles in mainstream, but otherwise work as hard as they can. Yet they'll give the grades, and the attention, to the brat, troublemaker, NT. You have to explain to your daughter, that the problem is not her, it's the teachers. That maybe no matter how hard she tries the teacher may not notice, but it's not worth becoming a trouble maker to get them to notice her either. Tell her to tell you if a teacher is ignoring her efforts, then you can tell the teacher that your daughter deserves better than to be told all her hard work and effort means nothing, compared to the pretty little NT who just has to giggle and toss around her blonde hair to get an A+ from teacher.

thanks for the replies....i've calmed down some....i am just so terribly frustrated at this teacher's incompetence. i mean, i send my emails from my work email address ( a well-known SPED school)...you'd think maybe she'd realize i know what i'm talking about. it's not like i'm one of those crazy parents who expects that their non-verbal, unresponsive kid will become a world-renowned fashion designer ( yes, we have a parent like this at our school)......i realize my daughter is having trouble. as a parent, i have always talked with my kids about the good & the bad remarks that they get on their progress reports...we talk about how great they're doing in some things, and what they think they can do to improve in other things~and again, i'm not expecting straight A students here...just kids who are trying to be the best they can be.
i can't even show my daughter her progress report. hopefully, i will receive a response from the principal today.i am so tired of this idiot teacher. maybe a classroom change is in order.

its so wrong that a teacher is not receptive to a child with special needs. I have been very lucky that every teacher has been top notch and understand his issues. last year the teacher gave me some attitude and I made sure that I let her know that we would not take the attitude. being that you have a child with special needs the teacher/school should be more receptive to your child who obvious has her own set of problems. with the IEP in place or not each child has a right to learn and not be cut down by some teacher who wants a robot in the class room..

just when i thought i'd calmed down....got an email reply from idiot teacher today telling me that she didn't write positive comments on anyones progress reports because, as she explained to her class, the only kids to get progress reports were those who need to improve......yeah.....and, she must've really explained this well to the class, because when daughter came home with the report she said: " mommy, did i do good?".............have now scheduled a meeting with idiot teacher, school social worker & principal. will be gathering all my copies of emails & daughter's paperwork......why does it all have to be such a fight ?

If progress reports were only supposed to be negative then I think that is something the school would send a note home to the parents about. However - it seems like they are really trying to make kids unconfident about their skills regardless of whether they have special needs or not. One person was mentioning that their NT child was an avid reader before they started school and they were surprised when at the first conference the teacher was all about trying to make them think their daughter was just average and had no special abilities. What teacher of little kids would want to say that or think that a child has no talents. (They eventually figured out that the reading material for the kids was really bad and so their daughter because frustrated and uninterested from being forced to listen to these weird stories.)

And I don't think it is "crazy" for a parent to think their kid is going to be a fashion designer or painter or whatever regardless of how "low functioning" they may appear.

ok I just do not understand what is good out of singling out kids who did bad.. when are freaking teachers going to learn that belittling children at any grade is WRONG.. is this teacher from the OLD school and not willing to change? I know many teachers who are like this. its just wrong to bash these kids.. I had a comment last year because some of the comments that they teacher wrote on my sons test were very negative. I was not happy with the negative comments that were coming home so I explained to her nicely is that my son responds better to people who have positive things to say about him rather than dwell on the negative. i wonder if the school knows the policy of only giving reports to children who do poorly?? if they agree with this practice. my sister in law is a teacher and she tells of some pretty harsh kids but she says that she has learned no matter how bad the child is she gives him positive rather than drag him down with negative attitude. i think it gets the teachers rocks off to belittle children who have special needs. i have also told my school/teacher to NOT repsond to my son on what other kids in the class are at the level she thinks they should be, every child learns different.. i think its HIGH time to have a meeting with the school district and demand a IEP for your daughter. diagnosis or not you have a right to have her evaled and classified.. so she gets the help that she needs!

progress: (noun) Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French progrés, from Latin progressus advance, from progredi to go forth, from pro- forward + gradi to go...2 : a forward or onward movement (as to an objective or to a goal)

-- source: http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/progress

There might be another reason why this teacher isn't teaching 4th grade anymore -- she's a bad teacher.

Good luck, I hope the others will help instruct this teacher, but somehow, I doubt it. She may just be untrainable.

I forwarded her idiotic email to the principal yesterday, and he actually called the house today & left a message for me to call back ~ i think it's actually his home phone #. I called & left a message that i'll be home all evening, & that he should call me back. haven't heard from him yet.
i've created a positive student profile for my daughter , printed out all the emails, & put samples of daughters school work in her binder.

as far as the reference to low-functioning students, please don't take it wrong....i believe that many individuals can do more than they are given credit for. i believe that seemingly unresponsive individuals are receiving more messages than anyone would ever believe....i think, however, that is unrealistic to assume that your child will be able to draw fashion designs if they put everything in their mouth, & have very limited control of their arms or legs.

ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...it's terribly frustrating when people don't understand what you're trying to say....i'm just letting it go, because i don't seem to be making my point very well.

here's the latest....talked to principal, and he was quite concerned about my daughter not wanting to go to school anymore. i told him about the difference in daughter's affect on days that she "holds it together all day" & days that she doesnt~ it was like a light bulb went off for principal & he said~ she's feeling too much pressure in the classroom, & at our meeting next week we'll discuss ways that we can address that. we talked about the idiotic progress report & i told him that i philosophically disagree with such nonsense...he didn't have much to say about that. i asked him: " if daughter really understood that she was getting a progress report because she "had areas she needed to improve on", how come when she gave it to me did she ask: mommy did i do good?"~ he didn't have much to say about that either. principal asked if he could talk to school social worker about being able to take daughter out of class on a daily basis so she could have some time to "de-stress"....i agreed that this would be fine.
principal let me know that idiot teacher hasn't finished filling out paperwork yet, either....we're now going into our 11th week of waiting for results. dr called yesterday as well to try to let school know that he can't finish the report until the paperwork is in.....supposedly, i'll have results by the end of next week.
am scheduled to meet with idiot teacher, principal, & social worker late next week to set up daughter's 504 plan~ at least she'll be getting some help while we're waiting for the dx & for the school system to dispute it ( the system usually does....)

Good luck - sounds like the principal may have a clue. That will help a lot.