Dear Parents,
By the end of the day on Friday, 27th January 2023, you should receive your child/children’s reports through ManageBac.
We sometimes forget, as teachers and as parents, how stressful this can be for students. Your children want nothing more than to make you proud (even if they sometimes hide this desire very well!). But if we want them to have strong intrinsic motivation, they need to want to improve their learning for themselves – not for you or for their teachers.
This is why I am writing with a plea to avoid judgemental comments when discussing their reports such as: “This is a terrible result!” or “See, I told you you needed to work harder, but you’ve been lazy.” They need to feel that this report card is about their learning, not about their relationship with you.
We all feel strong emotions when reading children’s report cards and I hope that I am not overstepping the boundary by suggesting that we avoid making statements about our children’s performance and consider using the following questions:
- What are you happiest about in terms of what you have learned or how you progressed during the first semester?
- What would you like to improve?
- How do you think you can do this? (Try to get them to be as specific as possible)
- Is there anything, as a parent, that I can do to support these good intentions?
Thank you for your precious collaboration.
Regards,
Conan de Wilde